Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio. Hey
Speaker 1: brain Stuff, Loring bog obam here. If you have a
Speaker 1: can of spray paint and a giant rock face to
Speaker 1: paint on, and you need to tell a group of
Speaker 1: people half a mile away that you come in peace,
Speaker 1: how would you get the message across? You could paint
Speaker 1: in all of branch or a origami crane of white
Speaker 1: poppy or fingers making a V sign, But there's an
Speaker 1: easier way draw circle bisect it with a vertical line
Speaker 1: and two lines pointing down at a forty five degree
Speaker 1: angle from that line, like two drooping arms, and Wala
Speaker 1: message delivered. The peace sign is one of the most
Speaker 1: recognized symbols in the modern world, and it's relatively short history.
Speaker 1: It's become ubiquitous. It's on pajamas, jewelry, frisbees, in the
Speaker 1: floor mats of cars. But it has also been used
Speaker 1: as an emblem of a variety of uniquely twentieth century
Speaker 1: cultural and political movements, from the hippies to women's rights,
Speaker 1: to environmental protection to the end of South africa kind apartheid.
Speaker 1: But it was created for a very specific movement, nuclear disarmament.
Speaker 1: The peace symbol We Know and Love Today was created
Speaker 1: by Gerald Holtum, a British artist and activist who was
Speaker 1: a conscientious objector during World War Two. During the late
Speaker 1: nineteen fifties, some people in England were concerned about what
Speaker 1: they called the Big Bomb, the weapon that had seen
Speaker 1: dropped on two Japanese cities during World War Two, effectively
Speaker 1: ending the war but killing hundreds of thousands of civilians
Speaker 1: in the process. But by night three countries, the United States,
Speaker 1: the Soviet Union and England had begun to stockpile nuclear weapons.
Speaker 1: The Direct Action Committee Against Nuclear War, a group of
Speaker 1: pacifists and let's face it, people who were concerned about
Speaker 1: a future in which one nation state could destroy another
Speaker 1: by dropping a handful of bombs, organized a march from
Speaker 1: London to a facility where nuclear material was produced fifty
Speaker 1: two miles away that's about eighty three kilometers. Holton created
Speaker 1: a logo for the event, a circle circumscribing to characters
Speaker 1: from the flag semaphore alphabet, which is a type of
Speaker 1: optical telegraph that's been used since the nineteenth century. The
Speaker 1: two characters are n for nuclear, which has both flags
Speaker 1: at the signal ER's side at forty five degree angles
Speaker 1: and D for disarmament, which is a straight vertical line
Speaker 1: with both flags pointing straight up. Holtem's goal was for
Speaker 1: the symbol to be bold, simple, easily reproduced, and easily
Speaker 1: recognized even on the grainy black and white television sets
Speaker 1: of the day. And because he wanted his work to
Speaker 1: do whatever the nfties version of going viral was, he'd
Speaker 1: never copyrighted it and hoped it would take off. And
Speaker 1: boy did it ever. We spoke with Ken Calls, been
Speaker 1: author of Peace the Biography of a Symbol, which was
Speaker 1: published in two thousand eight on the fiftieth anniversary of
Speaker 1: the symbol. He explained that as the Vietnam War was
Speaker 1: beginning in the early nineteen sixties, the symbol was adopted
Speaker 1: as an anti war symbol, and because Holtem internationally made
Speaker 1: it free for anyone to use, it was passed out
Speaker 1: on buttons on college campuses throughout the war and adopted
Speaker 1: by the hippie movement as a symbol of nineteen sixties
Speaker 1: youth subculture. Colsben said the early anti war people were
Speaker 1: not hippies so much as pacifists. Worried about the growing
Speaker 1: fatalities in the Vietnam War, it morphed from a symbol
Speaker 1: that stood for nuclear disarmament to one that stood for peace.
Speaker 1: Gerald Holton died and, according to Colsben, who corresponded with
Speaker 1: him during the nineteen seventies, Holton asked that his tombstone
Speaker 1: depict the peace symbol he created, only with a twist.
Speaker 1: Colsben explained on his tombstone he wanted the symbol inverted.
Speaker 1: In other words, instead of drooping arms, he wanted the
Speaker 1: arms of his peace symbol to be pointed upward. In
Speaker 1: his mind, this symbolized the tree of life. In symbology,
Speaker 1: when a symbol points downward, that means someone has died,
Speaker 1: so I think later in life he realized he wanted
Speaker 1: it to point up like the tree of life where
Speaker 1: mankind lives. Unfortunately, Holton's revised peace symbol didn't make it
Speaker 1: onto his tombstone, but the first iteration of a work
Speaker 1: has certainly made an impression on the world. Of course,
Speaker 1: symbols are slippery. There have been plenty of emblems for
Speaker 1: one idea or system of thought that have had their
Speaker 1: meaning hijacked and changed by a political faction. For instance,
Speaker 1: the swastika is an ancient symbol that's been used in
Speaker 1: many parts of the world, from Scandinavia to India to
Speaker 1: the America's and the meaning is pretty wholesome and virtually
Speaker 1: all cases, with the one very notable exception. In various traditions,
Speaker 1: it was a symbol for divinity, good fortune, the sun,
Speaker 1: well being. In rebirth. To the Buddhists, the swastika symbolized
Speaker 1: the footprints of the Buddha. Of course, in the twenties
Speaker 1: and thirties it was adopted by Nazi Germany as its
Speaker 1: national symbol. As a result, when you see the swastica
Speaker 1: these days, it brings up very different feelings than it
Speaker 1: did for the thousands of years of human history that
Speaker 1: came before it. Calls been said, the p symbol stands
Speaker 1: for the rights of many groups of people. It's a
Speaker 1: remarkable symbol. We always have to stay alert to political
Speaker 1: factions picking up the symbol and changing the meaning. That
Speaker 1: would be very unfortunate. M Today's episode was written by
Speaker 1: Jesselin Shield and produced by Tyler Clang. Brain Stuff is
Speaker 1: a production of I Heeart Radio's How Stuff Works. For
Speaker 1: more in this and lots of other powerful topics is
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