STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK
She called President Bill Clinton “a weenie” for failing to overrule his military leaders and endorse a ban on the use and production of landmines.
And, she says, she hated accepting the Nobel Peace Prize for something that involved the efforts of people around the world.
“It was all of us—we, we we,” said Jody Williams, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for her five-year campaign to ban landmines.
Williams, who joined the ranks of Martin Luther King Jr., the Dalai Lama and Mother Teresa in that moment, spoke Thursday and Friday at the Alturas Institute’s third annual Conference of Exceptional Women held at Ketchum’s Community Library.
The audience of 165 chuckled and applauded as the outspoken women bounced around, tapped her foot in indignation and refused to mince words on any number of subjects.
Williams was launched into the world of advocacy when she stood up for her older brother, who had been born deaf. Her target: the blond, blue-eyed “stud of the fourth grade” who repeatedly bullied her brother because he didn’t talk like others.
“I told him, ‘The only reason you’re mean to my brother is because you can be,’ ” recounted Williams, who is a couple weeks shy of her 58th birthday. From then on, anytime something happened where I could have raised my voice and didn’t, I felt muted. When I see something I believe is wrong, unjust, I can’t not do something.”
Her first protest--against the Vietnam War while a University of Vermont student--forever changed the way she viewed U.S. policy.
“I realized that every country creates a mythology about itself, picking facts that make it look magnificent and leaving out the ones that don’t,” she said. “There have only been a handful of years this country has not been involved in subverting another country.”
Armed with a bachelor degree and Master degrees in international relations, Williams spent 11 years working for human rights in El Salvador and Nicaragua.
She organized the International Campaign to Ban Landmines in November 1991 at the invitation of Bobby Muller, head of the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation.
“When a war ends, weapons go home with soldiers. But land mines stay in the ground and can literally kill or maim your grandchildren,” she said.
Williams learned the laws of war, visited with representatives of countries that manufactured or had land mines and built a network of supporters around the globe to win passage of a 162-nation treaty prohibiting the use and production of the explosives.
She was just the third American woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize and only the 10th women overall in its 102-year history.
She was recognized twice as a Woman of the Year by “Glamour” magazine, along with such other women as then-Sen. Hillary Clinton, Katie Couric and Barbara Walters
And she told the story in the books “After the Guns Fall Silent: the Enduring Legacy of Landmines,” and her memoir: “My Name is Jody Williams: A Vermont Girl’s Winding Path to the Nobel Peace Prize.”
Afterwards, she helped found and chair a Nobel Women’s Initiative to use the prestige of the Nobel Peace Prize to amplify the efforts of women around the world working for peace with justice and equality.
But in no way is she ready to rest on her laurels.
Williams noted that more than half of the United States’ budget goes to the military, with this country spending more than China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, France and Britain combined. That doesn’t include $15 billion for nuclear weapons that is hidden in the Department of Energy’s budget, she added.
She still hasn’t gotten over the fact that the United States increased its military spending to extend its dominance, rather than scaling back when Russia collapsed.
“Before 9-11 we were the most militarized country on earth, but that didn’t stop three planes from flying into buildings,” she said. “Think of how much more stable the world would be if we spent that money on public education and health care and making sure workers have meaningful work.”
Today Williams is donating her time to ban killer robots—artificial intelligence-driven combat machines that Williams said makes drones look like Model Ts when it comes to weaponry.
It’s a nerve wracking deal for a woman who grew up practicing hiding under a school desk in the belief that that would spare her when a nuclear bomb hit.
Not only is she worried about America’s enemies hacking the robots but she worries about the morals of the people who program them.
“There should always be a human making decisions because humans have the capacity for compassion and empathy,” she said.
Thankfully, she said, those who develop artificial intelligence are not all on board. Three thousand developers said they would not participate in Google’s plans to provide AI for the Pentagon. And many artificial intelligence scientists have said they do not want to be targeted like nuclear physicists were.
“But we need citizenry to stand up and back them,” she added.
Williams lamented that civics courses have been cut back to make room for technology and science courses.
“We no longer talk about our responsibility as citizens,” she said. “People are afraid of the word ‘activism,’ but the central part of that word is ‘act.’ All you have to do is act. If you just sit around with buddies at a wine bar and whine about the problems in the world, shut up.
“Just think what the world would be like if everybody volunteered even an hour a month,” she added. “You do not have to do everything--I pick little things that matter to me. Pick the little things that matter to you, and we can change the world.”