Through the Eyes of Garry Davis: The World is My Country with Arthur Kanegis

Macro N Cheese

On Macro N Cheese, we often focus on economics - how society organizes real resources, and human life in general. We always seek ways to get our message out, to capture people’s imagination and motivate them. This week Steve talks to the director/producer of The World is My Country, a documentary about Garry Davis, who inspired and motivated millions of people as founder of the World Government of World Citizens.

Garry Davis was a song and dance man on his way to becoming a success in show business until the US entered World War II and he was drafted. He served as a fighter pilot, dropping bombs on Hitler’s armament facilities with enthusiasm. When he was ordered to bomb a city of civilians, the realization hit:

"Oh, my God. Why am I killing people in their homes and schools and factories for no other reason than they're on the wrong side of an invisible line? I look from my airplane. I can't see this line. It's imaginary. There's an imaginary line. I'm killing people for being on the wrong side of an imaginary line."

Davis created a Universal Declaration of Human Rights and set up the World Service Authority to issue world passports, world IDs, and world birth certificates. More than four million of these documents have been issued and over the years they've helped numerous stateless refugees escape from terrible situations.

As Arthur recounts Garry’s story, sometimes it’s hard to separate his own beliefs from Garry’s. No matter. Truths are truths. Nowadays any war - even a small, tactical war - means ecocide.

And now we have just a semblance of democracy. But it's not a real democracy. It's not what anybody wants. All the things that are happening in the world, nobody wants. Nobody wants us to be heading toward nuclear war. Nobody wants climate disaster. Nobody wants rising waters, floods, storms, tornadoes. Those are ecocide. Those are crimes, folks. This isn't happening because of some accident of nature or something.

Garry found it ridiculous that our political system is stuck within the electoral tools and traditions of the past - before telephones, computers, internet - when the way to run a government was to send representatives by horse and buggy to represent the citizenry. Now we can all be in a room, virtually, via synergistic Zoom meetings, and could be more directly involved and represented. It was part of Garry’s design for a “People Powered Planet.”

Arthur Kanegis is President of Future WAVE, Inc., a nonprofit organization dedicated to shifting our culture of violence to a culture of peace. He is the Director/Producer of "The World Is My Country" and has written and produced numerous other works. Arthur has also been a radio host, journalist and visionary writer -- on a lifelong mission to use the power of film to help inspire the world toward a peaceful and positive future.

Check out his work at theworldismycountry.com