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By H. PATRICIA HYNES

Whatever postures our country has projected to the world — shining city on a hill; leader of the free world; model of democracy; the indispensable nation; a rules-based order — all have crumbled like a house of cards. Our country’s failures, however,...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

On a blackboard in a 1930s log cabin at Jacob’s Pillow dance theater in the hills of western Massachusetts, I came upon an intriguing question written in chalk: When do you feel your true self? Visitors had left responses on the blackboard, some...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

In late 2020, a report titled “Saving Gaza Begins with its Water” stated: “The water crisis in Gaza is a problem of daunting proportions, with grave implications for the more than 2 million inhabitants of the Palestinian enclave ... The aquifer from...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

As I write, five of nine governments with arsenals of nuclear weapons — capable of destroying life on our planet many times over — are engaged in war: the United States (in multiple wars and stoking one with China), Israel, Russia, and NATO members...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

The war on women is everywhere: in the home, locally, nationally and globally. Take the recent report from NELCWIT here in Franklin County. In this past year they served 1,933 women survivors of mainly male sexual and physical violence.In 2018, the...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

They gather every Saturday morning on the Greenfield Common from 11 a.m. to noon, often staying later. Their signs and banners read:LET GAZA LIVEFREE PALESTINECEASEFIRE — NO ARM$ TO ISRAELNEVER AGAIN FOR ANYONEWhy?Johanna (Jo) Rosen stands on the...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

In June 2023, Amanda Jones, an African American who had recently given birth to her second daughter Miranda, died from pregnancy-related causes. Her state, Georgia, ranks among the least safe states in the country for women to give birth; and the vast...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

On March 8, 1908, female garment workers marched through New York City’s Lower East Side to protest child labor and sweatshop working conditions and to demand women’s suffrage. By 1910, March 8 became observed annually as International Women’s Day and...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

As I began this piece on trees in forests, woods and parks, a friend asked, why in February? Why didn’t I wait until the deciduous trees were a palette of new spring green crowning the stark brown trunks and branches of winter? The next day, Jan. 7,...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

Dear President Joe Biden: I would wish you a Happy New Year but it seems trite, given all the challenges and troubles you and our country face in 2024 — some inherited from previous administrations, others of your making.Americans are 10 times more...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

Civilization has been described as “the slow process of learning to be kind.” This past summer and early fall, while I stood with peace and justice companions on the Greenfield Common, I witnessed a pervasive culture of kindness.Karen Boyden, with the...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

For the second consecutive year, a peace and justice group in the West African country of Cameroon launched a creative program on non-violence in a high school on International Peace Day, Sept. 21, 2023. Their ambitious goal, which involves engaging...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

I am heartened each time I come across a study affirming that waging war is not an innate part of human nature, that we humans are just as likely to be peaceful as we are to be violent. To quote the revered anthropologist Margaret Mead, ”warfare is...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

“I go to school because I need to learn … I need to learn math and times tables and fractions. But if I don’t go to school, I won’t get a job to buy everything I need … I would not be able to know my ABCs. I would have to live on the street. I would...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

The 19th century origins of Mother’s Day differ vastly in spirit and purpose from celebrations of it in the 20th and 21st centuries. Mother’s Day was first inspired by two women with diverse but compatible social and political purposes. Prior to the...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

April, the month tax filings are due, prompts us to ponder what our income taxes pay for. Are they used to provide all citizens sufficient resources and public goods for human security and well-being — the core of our national security?How much of our...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

A month ago, I heard on the news that Boston public schools would be closed on Feb. 3 because of the severe Arctic cold and wind chill forecast for that day and the next. My first thought was: What if the students’ mothers are working single mothers,...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

Signs abound in Greenfield’s downtown shop windows, among them PEACE, ART NOT WAR, FOOD FOR ALL NOT WAR, SOLAR NOT WAR, MAKE TEA NOT WAR. Why have so many shop owners and institutions, including the Greenfield Library and Greenfield Community...

By H. PATRICIA HYNES

January 22 marks the second anniversary of the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, a global lifeboat supported by 70% of the world’s countries. Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Energy’s 2023 budget request for nuclear weapons’ upgrade is...