The ONLY Ad Campaign Worth Following, All Year Round

Yeah, I know. 

A lot of people don’t like her. They don’t like her art or her music. They think it’s self-indulgent. As if that mattered.

They think, “She broke up the Beatles”. As if that mattered.

They don’t like the way she has managed her husband’s estate and legacy. As if that mattered.

They think she’s old or passé or quaint or irrelevant. As if any of that mattered.

But unlike nearly everyone in their generation of celebrities, she and her husband devoted their very considerable public presence and name recognition to single-mindedly promoting a message about making the world better now. Not tomorrow. Now.

I have no doubt that lots and lots of others, in that generation and after, have given tons of money to worthy causes. I’m sure of it. But John and Yoko made their celebrity itself synonymous with the message: Stop war. Give peace a chance.

They made that their legacy, and we should honor that by getting behind it. Today and every day.

You don’t have to like the Beatles. You don’t have to like John Lennon or his music. Or Yoko. You don't have to be Liberal or Conservative or White or Black or Brown or an Atheist or a Buddhist...You don’t even have to like music.

You only have to care. It's simple!

War Is Over (if you want it) is about your mind. Change your mind and you change your world. Change your world, and you help me change mine. Together, we start changing this whole mess into a garden. But it doesn’t work if you don’t participate.

I don’t know how you will choose peace over war. I can’t tell you how to change your mind.

Maybe you’ll tell yourself, first thing tomorrow morning and every morning after that: I want all violence to stop today!

Maybe you'll run away from violence wherever you see it. Tune it out, or, if you think you have nowhere to run...run anyway!

Maybe you’ll put a sign on the dashboard of your car, so that you’ll see it every time you get in: War is over, if you want it!

Maybe you’ll put the message on your bathroom mirror, so that you’ll see it every time you shave or brush your teeth or comb your hair or put on your makeup.

Maybe you’ll stop a moment and talk to someone you don’t know. Someone you think you don’t or won’t like. Someone you are afraid of. A homeless person. A migrant worker who just picked the strawberries you will eat tomorrow. A teenager running away from herself. The cashier at the local gas station. A Republican. A Democrat. An Independent. Someone who doesn’t vote at all. And you won’t talk about politics or religion or any of that crap.

Maybe you’ll just slow down for a moment, turn off the screen and tune into the sky or a tree or a bird or a raindrop or the moon.

When we alienate from our moments, we become afraid and alienate from ourselves. When we alienate from ourselves, we become afraid and alienate from each other. When we alienate from each other, we become afraid and alienate from the world we live in.

We really really do have nothing to fear but fear itself, as FDR so beautifully put it.

And that is how the violence begins. And by “violence” I also mean “neglect”. Neglect is just as violent as punching someone in the mouth. Only you’re punching them where it hurts a lot more: you are punching them in the life. You are punching them in the food they won’t eat today. You punch them in the house that the authorities just bulldozed because it was "inconvenient". You’re punching them in the childhood or old age or infirmity that you allow to be starved or poisoned or blown up or ruined. 

The war is in you. The environment is in you. The sky is in you. Your mind is in you. Your heart is in you. Only you can change these things.

It’s all the same ugliness, the same alienation, the same fear. It's all of a piece, and not of a peace.

But in the end, you must — YOU MUST — do everything you can to resist and release the mentality that causes war, because it’s the same mentality that is killing our environment!

If we do not…well, the planet will continue just fine without us for another 2 or 3 billion years. Plenty of time for another sentient species to evolve to replace us. 

So thank you, Yoko, for your dedication to the only message worth spreading!





Picture credits:
http://imaginepeace.com/warisover/
https://www.elsewhere.co.nz/othervoicesotherrooms/7118/guest-writer-madeline-bocaro-sees-yoko-ono-go-jazz-in-new-york-city/
https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/yoko-ono-given-song-writing-10629307