Today we're visiting Sam and Nomfundo in Soweto. They're talking about conflicts in their lives.
Hey Sam, how’re you?
I haven’t seen you for ages.
I’ve been working as a waiter during the holidays to make moola for my studies.
Shu that’s great!
Can I ask you something?
I have been getting into a lot of fights lately;
with family and friends.
I don't know what to do.
That's weird!
I was chatting about fighting with my bro Geoff yesterday.
He asked me if there is a difference between conflict and violence. What do you think?
I think it’s the same thing…
conflict means fighting and violence means fighting.
Geoff says conflict doesn’t mean fighting!
It just means that two people have different opinions about something.
Say we both want to watch TV, but I want to watch the news and you would rather watch sport.
Mmmm…this could cause an argument….
unless we watch something we both enjoy
or one of us changes our minds.
Or we agree to watch at different times.
Exactly! If we do resolve it, it has been a conflict; but not fighting.
But if we don’t find a solution and we start shouting at each other or we end our friendship, then it is violence because we are hurting each other!
So conflict doesn’t always need to be bad!
Sho thing! If we find a way of talking about the conflict and reaching a solution that we both like, then it will probably make our relationship stronger.
So why is there so much violence in the world?
I suppose people don’t know how to resolve their conflicts peacefully.
But why don’t they?
I don’t know…
All I know is there aren't many people I could go to for advice on how to solve my conflicts in a good way.
Mmmm…me neither.
Most of my friends usually end up shouting or saying harmful things to each other.
And even adults do that a lot of the time.
Some adults even take it further and start using their fists with each other.
Or guns and knives. And look at what we see on TV!!
Lots of conflicts, most of them handled with violence.
Even in the newspapers we read about neighbours using witchcraft on one another.
And we read about rape and crime and countries fighting each other with bombs.
Which is probably why so many people deal with conflict in a violent way.
Geoff gave me some tips for avoiding violence, like waiting before reacting when someone makes you angry.
If you first take a deep breath and count to ten before reacting you are less likely to get into a fight.
...or if you're very angry, telling the person you're not going to talk about it now, but will come back later when you've cooled down.
Shu! that's a challenge but it would help if i could do it!
Yes…but if we don’t do something the world will just get more and more violent and dangerous….
And who knows, we might be contributing to this!
And I want my children to grow up in a peaceful world.
What I’m thinking is it would be good to find some people whom we’ve seen dealing with conflict in peaceful, constructive ways and learn from them.
That’s a good idea.
I’m going to carry on talking to Geoff…since he got me thinking about all of this in the first place.
And I’m going to talk to my grandmother – she’s a very wise and gentle old woman. I have never seen her raising her voice to anyone.
Maybe she can help me with the fights I have been having.
If you want to work on your conflict-resolving skills look at the pledge and the discuss activities in this lesson.
Good luck!
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