ASC Reps participate in the Interfaith Network
Karanveer Singh at the Drone Warfare Conference, Princeton, NJ
ASC Reps participate in the Interfaith Network on Drone Warfare (INDW) Training Conference held in Princeton, NJ
American Sikh Council (ASC) representatives Karanveer Singh, Satnam Singh, and Kavneet Singh attended a major conference held on the moral dilemma of Drone warfare. This particular conference was a national training conference to equip people of faith interested in organizing on this issue within the faith community on ways to advocate and educate faith communities and the public against drone warfare.
This important event was held at Princeton Theological Seminary – Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey from September 27 -29, 2019 and cosponsored by the Coalition for Peace Action (Princeton)
This occasion was attended by 80 faith leaders, community activists, academics and others from 24 states, interested in working towards limiting and stopping the usage of drones by our nation. The conference included representatives from the Sikh, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist and several denominations of Christianity.
The focus of the discussion and training entailed how to engage with legislators and fine tuning the skills of communication by activists, such as writing Op-Ed pieces, etc.
Some of the presenters included:
- Sarah Holewinski – Security Fellow at the Open Society Foundations
- Maryann Cusimano Love – Professor the American Catholic University, Washington, DC
- Virginia Farris – Foreign Policy Advisor for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
- Nathan Hosler - Director, Office of Peacebuilding and Policy at Church of the Brethren
- Heather Brandon-Smith - Legislative Director for Militarism and Human Rights for FCNL
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Allegra Harpootlian - Senior Media Associate in the Peace and Security Collaborative
Karanveer Singh and Satnam Singh at the Drone Warfare Conference
Two films were shown; first a 30 min documentary, 'Moral and Safe? War, Peace, Drone Warfare and the Religious Community' in which S. Kavneet Singh of the American Sikh Council was featured expressing the Sikh perspective on the topic. The second movie was another 30 min documentary 'National Bird' about the effect of war on the Drone Operators and the serious fallout of PTSD.
More than 80 countries have lethal drone capabilities. Use of drones directly harms attempts to promote human rights and the rule of law by violating international human rights law. Terrorist groups, like ISIS, now use lethal drones regularly. Drones dehumanizes all those who are being targeted in any kind of conflict but also does not distinguish between the innocent civilians and those being targeted.
According to Department of Defense in 2017-2018 (2-year period) 121,000 people have been killed by US Drone strikes. It is impossible that all of them were terrorists and all happened to be Muslims!
These killer robots(drones) have removed the decision making and minimized the onus of responsibility thereby making it difficult to blame an authority precisely for the killings.
Susan Smith, Dr.Farrukh Hakeem, Sahar Alsahlani and Kavneet Singh
The Sikh perspective on war as a last resort when all else fails, was discussed and presented.
The Drone Warfare meetings are ongoing in an attempt to resolve the ethical dilemmas all Americans are faced with and especially people of faith(s).
Kavneet Singh moderated a panel discussion on Saturday September 28, 2019 and also led the prayer service at the closing of the conference on Sunday September 29, 2019.
This extremely productive conference not only energized the attendees but the networking helped activists from across the country to connect and hopefully collaborate in the near future to eventually ban drones.
Kavneet Singh speaking at the Drone Warfare Training Conference
This extremely productive conference not only energized the attendees but the networking helped activists from across the country to connect and hopefully collaborate in the near future to eventually ban drones.
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Ravinder Kaur with Sutinder Singh about to do a kirtan recital
ASC reps attend Interfaith meeting at Protestant Church of Medford Lakes, NJ
American Sikh Council (ASC) representative Ravinder Kaur, Kavneet Singh and Sutinder Singh participated in an interfaith service held at the Protestant Church of Medford Lakes in New Jersey on Sunday, September 22, 2019 from 7 - 9 pm in the evening.
This special program included representatives of the Sikh, Jewish, Muslim and Christian faith communities participating in what was called a ‘Evening of Music and Poetry’.
Sutinder Singh and Ravinder Kaur (back left) with the other attendees
Sutinder Singh gave a short overview of the Sikh faith before starting their part of the event. Ravinder Kaur sang two ‘s-abads’ beautifully on the harmonium accompanied with Sutinder Singh on the tabla.
Jeffery Kearns introducing the panelists at event, September 26, 2019
ASC attends ‘Religions in the Workplace’ at Blue Cross Blue Shield, Philadelphia, PA September 26, 2019
American Sikh Council (ASC) representative Kavneet Singh attended panel discussion held as part of corporate education on ‘Religions in the Workplace’ at the Professional Development Institute at Independence University headquarters in Philadelphia, PA on Thursday September 26, 2019. The event was organized by the Interfaith Philadelphia (ICGP).
There were over 50 attendees who were engrossed in the very interesting discussion among the distinguished panelists.
All the four panelists were professionals from the Sikh, Jewish, Muslim and Catholic Faith traditions. The discussion was moderated by Jeffery Kearns a manager at the institution. The over 90 min event focused on an overview and a practitioner’s inside view of the different faith traditions and also the pro and cons of them practicing their faith vis a vis the corporate environment.
Attendees at the meeting
These types of panel settings covering the role of religions in the workplace are very important in order to have conversations while uniting management and other leaders on inclusion while creating true diversity through reasonable accommodation.
Kavneet Singh with Dr. Mirza, University of Notre Dame
ASC participates in the RNA Conference, Las Vegas, NV September 19 – 21, 2019
One of the ongoing panel discussions
The various sessions covered a range of topics from ‘Sexual misconduct in the Catholic Church’ to ‘Hindu Nationalism and its many violent outcomes’ and many other interesting and meaningful themes.
A panel discussion which included Simran Jeet Singh
ASC representative networked with many of the journalists present while some reached out later to cover various topics on the Sikhs from bullying, to our participation in the many wars defending America.
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The event started off with the Stillwater’s Gospel Band group consisting of vocalists Gene Clark, Jeff Frank, Mike Gerety, Sandy Grimes, Todd Johnson and John Myhre who sing gospel music in the bluegrass and country music genres.
Frahat Biviji representing the Muslim faith and very eloquently read out several short poems which touched the heart as they were imbued with true love of the Divine.
Ami Yares of the Jewish tradition, a passionate singer and guitarist sang about the longings of the heart in English and Hebrew.
The entire congregation of over 80 attendees very attentively listened to the various renditions. There were interesting conversations at the end of the event.
Sally from the congregation stated, “The words from the Sikh scripture Sri Guru Granth Sahib touched my heart. Of course, with this group you are ‘preaching to the choir’ but word gets around and hopefully we are widening horizons.”
There were many interesting questions posed by the audience and the panelists were able to clarify many misconceptions in the process!
The Interfaith of Philadelphia and Professional Development Institute at Independence University must be thanked for holding this much needed event for the second time this year, to bring community members together which continuously move the inclusiveness in corporate America forward steadily.
Every minority group regardless of their faith or denomination has and can be impacted negatively; therefore, it is important that everyone works towards the betterment of all, especially when the Sikh Faith stands for the ‘Welfare of Humanity’.
American Sikh Council (ASC) representative Kavneet Singh attended the Religious News Association (RNA) three-day national conference held at the Westgate Convention Center downtown Las Vegas, NV from September 19 – 21, 2019.
The conference was primarily attended by news reporters from most of the nation’s major news outlets, including some major TV stations, all covering religion and associated news. The attendees also included an array of professional academics to policy analysts working for various think tanks and non-profit orgs.
There were exhibitors from the ‘atheists’ to one of the nation’s largest think tanks, namely the, ‘Council on Foreign Relations’ and everything in-between.
There were 230 registered attendees and a dozen exhibitors. There was a steady stream of visitors and many of whom were news reporters from various new outlets across the nation who stopped by at the American Sikh Council exhibit and got turbans tied.
ASC continues to build relationships with the media since Sikhs in particular need all the assistance they can get, so that ignorance and misrepresentation is reduced through accurate and positive stories.
Many new brochures were added this time in order to add meaningful material to the Sikh heritage spectrum. The overwhelming majority of the journalists who visited the Sikh exhibit, appreciated the concise information for them to be able to use when they do cover the Sikhs on several issues.
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The American Sikh Council is the umbrella organization representative of Sikhs in the United States. It is an elected body of Sikh Gurdwaras and institutions. Currently 74 Gurdwaras and other Sikh institutions across the nation are members of ASC. The major governing purpose of the organization is to represent the collective view of Sikhs in the United States. ASC works to promote Sikh interests at the national and international level focusing on issues of advocacy, education, and well-being of humankind.