2004 Peace Essay Contest Awards Reception

ACLU, others fight the Patriot Act

Excerpted from the American Civil Liberties Union

More than two years have passed since the USA PATRIOT Act was signed into law. Considered in its totality, this legislation represents a perverse inversion of the principle on which America's justice system is based: innocent until proven guilty.

Legislation to repeal sections of the PATRIOT Act that authorize "sneak and peek" searches and allow the FBI to access secretly all private records of any American is awaiting action from the House of Representatives. In the Senate, a bipartisan bill was introduced late last year to protect First Amendment activities by restoring a sensible definition of "domestic terrorism" by providing greater judicial oversight of federal investigations involving highly private and sensitive data.

We are also encouraged by two recent federal court decisions: one rejecting the White House's assertion that the President can unilaterally detain American citizens as "enemy combatants," and another ruling that the non-citizen enemy combatants held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, are entitled to habeas corpus reviews to determine the propriety of their detention. Both of these decisions affirm the basic American commitment to checks and balances on Executive Branch power.

The ACLU believes that most Americans think that it is a mistake to give unchecked surveillance, investigative and detention powers to any government official elected or appointed, current or future. We are determined to turn that belief into effective grassroots action, an irresistible force for liberty that will overcome not just one ill-conceived law, but all threats to freedom.

Dr. Cornel West pulls no punches around legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr.

By TINA ARNOPOLE DRISKILL

“How to make the world safe for the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr.?” is the fundamental question Dr. Cornel West, Professor of Religion at Princeton University, addressed at Modesto’s 10th Annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Commemoration.

Dr. West pointed to the combined need for “Socratic questioning” and the “prophetic witness of love and compassion,” praising Dr. King for bringing together “the legacy of Socrates and the legacy of Jerusalem.”

Our European founding fathers had “positive and virtuous democratic sensibilities,” said Dr. West, “even in other people’s lands that ordinary people’s voices ought to be lifted such that they could shape their destiny.” (As an aside, he quipped they may not have had women, black, or brown folk in mind.)

Socrates, quoted Dr. West, charged that the unexamined life is not worth living. Martin Luther King added that the examined life is painful. ” Dr. West stated there is "too much sleep walkin' goin' on," that "the unexamined life is not a life for the human being.

Martin Luther King didn’t like poor people comfortable with their lot, says Dr. West. He wanted them maladjusted to injustice, cruelty, bigotry, cowardice.”  According to Dr. West, King asked that people "live intensely, learning how to die to learn how to live.

“The rest of the world is looking at us as the last best hope on earth,” asserted Dr. West, while we have “a Disney World sensibility preoccupied with fun, fun, fun, and live under the threat of social death.”

“The Union [won] the Civil War,” Dr West pointed out, but “white supremacy [won] the peace.” Although for 12 years beginning in the 1870’s there were more black senators than today, he said, the curtailing of civil rights acts of 1866-67 brought on a new form of terrorism — subjugation — and meant civic death with the loss of rights and status in the public sphere.

Soon Irish workers and British Lords were brought together under the concept of white men, Dr. West said. “They had to be taught they were white, that to become an American is to know who the niggers are.”

In the legacy of MLK Dr. West suggested, “If the nation has the blues, ask the blues people, those who have had to deal with terrorism for 150 years on the inside what it’s like, what they have learned from it.

“After 9-11 all Americans feel unsafe, unprotected, subject to random violence and hate,” said West. “Before 9-11 to be a nigger in America meant to be subject to random violence and hate. The whole nation’s been niggerized!”

Dr. West, quoting Louis Farrakhan, said, “White supremacy must die for America to really live, then added, “The real truth is male supremacy, homophobia, class arrogance, prejudice and discrimination” are all ongoing and must end.

“Democracies can’t survive without exercise,” Dr. West warned. People have to be “willing to ask questions and cut radically against the grain.” We have to “muster the courage to think for ourselves” and resist allowing the media to tell us what to think.

Adding another dimension, Dr. West stated, “Socrates... never cried. Anyone who never cried, never really loved. If you never loved, you never lived. You can’t live in your brain, in analysis. Self mastery and self control have an appropriate place, but there are moments in which you have to cry.”

“Socrates argued, Jesus wept,” Dr. West differentiated. In the legacy of Martin King individuals “need to courage to care, to love enough, to be compassionate enough, empathetic enough to conceive of what it’s like to be in the shoes of other people.

“Where are the non-market values of Socratic questioning and the prophetic witness of love, compassion and justice?” asked Dr. West. Both are waning, especially for the younger generation, 100% of our future, who are being told the highest form of life is the orgiastic.”

Quoting an 11th commandment which says, “Thou shalt not get caught,.” He went on to question a culture in which 76% of high school students say they cheat regularly on exams. “What kind of culture can survive with that level of ‘gangsta’ mentality?”

He joined MLK and John F. Kennedy in the belief that “it is difficult to sustain a democracy over space and time,” and was critical of a culture in which it has become “fashionable to be indifferent to the suffering of other people.”

When “narcissism, hedonism, individualism, and careerism are so pervasive that we think the only thing we have to do is cultivate our own little privatistic gardens and allow the public square to be shot through with desert-like weeds, then you lose your democracy,” he warned.

He echoed the belief of many that “we are hemorrhaging from the top,” displaying “obscene levels of wealth and inequality. One percent 48% of the net financial wealth, then say we don’t have enough money to provide for health care, education, child care...Where’s all the money?”

We are the “wealthiest nation in the world, while 20% of children are living in poverty and 43 million have no health care insurance,” he decried. “That’s a disgrace!”

The global impact of this worldwide, according to Dr. West, is in a world of 6 billion people, one billion human beings live on $1 a day, 2 billion live on $2 a day and the 3 richest people in the world have more money than 47% of all humanity.

“In the name of truncated notions of success,” so many people “think of material prosperity and personal security,” said Dr. West. “Martin Luther King meant dignity, self respect, self regard,” explained Dr. West, “things that can’t be measured in terms of numbers.”

He cited the spirit of a Mrs. Till, whose 14 year -old son was murdered in 1955. The child’s body was put on display and Mrs. Till was asked, “What do you tell the world?”

Her reply, “I have not a minute to hate. I want to pursue justice for the rest of my life.”

“Where did that level of spiritual maturity, moral development come from? “ asked Dr. West. There was “no talk of hunting down, no revenge, no axis of evil, demons, a right side, a pure side.” There is just a refusal “to fight gangster activity with counter activity, to use the ammunition of love and justice.”

Dr. West punctuated that concept by saying “we don’t recognize how subversive love and justice really are. Are you really on top [when your] spirit is empty and full of existential malnutrition. You may have a lot of material toys, but you’re over there in the suburbs feelin’ like you have less to offer on a human level than the folks who refuse to hate, when they’re being hated. That’s the tradition that’s waning these days.”

He named the “shortsighted leadership of some who think you can shape the world in your own image, that you can dominate or control history,” a self deception.

“What an illusion!” he exclaimed. “Every empire at its worst tried to do that and they all met their end, often not by attacks from the outside solely, but by suicide on the inside by losing [their] energy to protect [their] condition for democratic practices, [their] rights, [their] liberties, [their] willingness to speak and question.”

Martin King would recognize the hope of the people of the blue sensibility, said Dr. West, the hope that allows the people to “wrestle with darkness, despair and death and keep on anyhow, to endure by means of a deep commitment to compassion and justice, even if it means you have the chance of a snowball in hell. You do it because it’s right, just, moral, and that’s the kind of human being you wanna be in the world.”

“That what brother Martin’s about.”

Peace activist sentenced to prison

Kathy Kelly has spoken several times in Modesto about her work in Iraq with Voices in the Wilderness.

The three-time Nobel Peace Prize nominee was sentenced to three months in federal prison for bearing witness against US military violence by crossing onto the property of Ft. Benning military base in November, 2003, to protest against the School of the Americas/Western Hemisphere Institute for Security

Kathy Kelly’s statement before Judge G. Mallon Faircloth

I'm fortunate to have been influenced by the life and witness of some extraordinary individuals, many of whom have appeared before you in court, several of whom are now co-defendants.

Their witness in this court has been valuable, constituting a rich and sad drama.

It's important to continue bringing before this court testimony from or about those who can't appear, people whom we've met when visiting places directly affected by US expenditures on military training and military solutions. Quite often these solutions are based on threat and force, rather than considerations of mercy and compassion.

A report in the London Observer yesterday quotes US Armed forces medical personnel warning that 20 percent of the veterans returning from Iraq will suffer post traumatic stress disorders -already 22 soldiers have committed suicide.

Families of these soldiers, whose arms will ache emptily for loved ones that will never return, can, I believe, find understanding in the families of others far away from the US who similarly feel bereaved.

In 1985, very aware of Joe Mulligan's and Bernie Survil's work, I traveled to San Juan de Limay, in the north of Nicaragua. Children there were radiant and friendly, many of them too young to understand that during the previous week US funded contras had kidnapped and murdered 25 people in their village. Later that summer, I fasted with Nicaraguan's Foreign Minister, himself a Maryknoll priest, and listened to stories pour forth as many hundreds of Nicaraguan peasant pilgrims vigiled and fasted in the Monsenor Lezcano church to show solidarity with the priest-minister's desire to nonviolently resist contra terrorism. Rev. Miguel D'Escoto urged us to find nonviolent actions commensurate to the crimes being committed. This experience gave me reason to believe that the US could have used negotiation and diplomacy to resolve disputes with Nicaragua.

The Christian Peacemaker Teams maintained a steady presence in Jeremie, in the southern finger of Haiti, throughout the time when the US had determined it was too dangerous for US soldiers to be there. In 1995, I was there for the three months just before the US troops returned. Throughout this stretch of history, the US spent more money on troop movements, equipping troops, training troops, than it spent on meeting human needs. The Commandant of the region, Colonel Rigobert Jean, commented publicly that he was "ashamed and embarrassed that it was left to the 'blans' (Creole for foreigners) on the hill to preserve peace and security in the region." He was referring to our five person team. Again, I had reason to believe that unarmed peacemakers could be relied on to create greater security in areas of conflict.

Indelibly marked in my memory from that summer are the Creole words that children could no longer suppress as evenings drew to a close and they longed for adequate meals. "M'gen grangou," I'm hungry.

More recently, in Iraq, during the US bombing in March and April of 2003, I saw how children suffer when nations decide to put their resources into weapons and warfare rather than meeting human needs. All of us learned to adopt a poker face, hoping not to frighten the children, whenever there were ear-splitting blasts and gut wrenching thuds. During every day and night of the bombing, I would hold little Miladhah and Zainab in my arms. That's how I learned of their fear: they were grinding their teeth, morning, noon and night. But they were far more fortunate than the children who were survivors of direct hits, children whose brothers and sisters and parents were maimed and killed.

Judge Faircloth, we have experienced and seen the deadly effect of US military policy on mothers and children, on families. We have held the children and tried to comfort them under bombs.

It is because of these experiences that we feel so strongly. And this is why I'm willing to go into the US prison system and experience again, as we have before, the suffering of all of these women who are being separated from their families in the American prisons. It's important to hear the voices of women trying to comfort their own children over the telephone, children they won't see be able to hug and cuddle, I remember my friend Gloria, in the prison telephone room: "Momma's gonna tickle your feets, oh baby, momma's gonna tickle your feet, you momma's baby." Gloria and many thousands of other mothers locked up in a world of imprisoned beauty would never tickle their baby's feet, because they'd been sentenced to mandatory five year minimums.

Sometimes I think we face a wilderness of compassion in this country. But when I think of the many voices that have tried, in this court, to clamor for the works of mercy rather than the works of war, I feel at home, I feel grateful, and I feel a deep urge to be silent and listen to the cries of those most afflicted, -their cries are often hard to hear-but when we hear them, we're called, all of us, to be like voices in the wilderness, raising their laments and finding ourselves motivated to build a better world.

Terrorism and transformation: Reflections in the Pantheon

By MARCI LAUGHLIN

I attempt to distract myself from the daily battle for seats in the metro by peering at the newspaper in the hands of the Signora next to me. “Police take precautions for possible terror attacks in Rome,” reads the main headline. The young man to my right is reading a different newspaper with a similar headline: “Next bombing expected in Rome.” Glancing around, I notice that each of the 3 free dailies display headlines and articles warning of imminent terrorist attacks. Terrorism is on the minds of everyone, and many Romans talk of ways in which they can avoid the metro which many assume to be a plausible target if high casualties are the goal of the terrorists.

As I push my way out at the next stop, I feel the now familiar lump rise in my throat and the threat of tears that have been my near constant companions in the weeks since the bombings in Istanbul. I left Istanbul only a month before the terrorist attacks and watched the news with anguish as bodies were being dragged from ruins of buildings I used to pass every day on my way to work or to meet friends for a Turkish tea or coffee at our cafe. I know that my closest friends were unharmed, but I am uncertain of the fate of the couple hundred or more students I taught during my two years in Turkey.

The heaviness I feel reminds me of how I felt after September 11th. But I feel even closer to this tragedy, because it happened in my stomping ground, a city I love and thought would be my permanent home, until I became engaged to an Italian. I currently live in a small town outside Rome.

Attempting to shake the sadness, I make my way to the Pantheon, the ancient temple turned church; a site of worship since pre-Christian times when it was used by pagans to worship the sun. In Augustan times, it became a temple dedicated to the cult of all the Gods, hence its name.

As I enter the Pantheon with its 43.3 meter diameter cupola, I am awed. Its size, harmony, and antiquity never cease to amaze. I notice a monument and two guards stationed in remembrance of the Italian Carabinieri killed in Nasirya, Iraq in November, 2003; and a flow of tourists, mostly Italians, punctuated by many other nationalities; an international milieu.

Is it wise to frequent such high profile tourist spots? Surely terrorists could never attack a place such as this? Surely they have some respect for antiquity! I chide myself for my thoughts and for momentarily giving in to fear’s voice. It is the very same fear which, had it been indulged many years ago, might have drastically changed the course of my life.

As a Davis High School [Modesto] student in June of 1985, I was about to embark on my first mission; to Athens, Greece as an American Field Service (AFS) exchange student, until my parents announced they would not permit me to go because President Reagan had advised Americans against travel to Athens in the wake of a TWA hijacking. My parents were worried and I was devastated. I had aspired to be an AFS exchange student, to travel abroad for the first time, to be a goodwill ambassador. At age 16 I had already spent much time worrying about the fate of the world, the Cold War and possible nuclear holocaust. I wanted to learn more about foreign cultures so that I might contribute to greater cultural understanding and world peace.

Thanks to AFS staff support in New York and my Modesto AFS advisor, Nina Zagaris, my parents relented and let me go.

It is now December, 2003 and, through hindsight’s hazy filter, the world of 1985 appears so much safer. Although there was terrorism then, it was always in other peoples’ backyards. I recall my naive aspirations (world peace?) amid a world seeming to become more unstable, marked by less understanding and tolerance of other cultures. Then, I realize that my years abroad have given me much goodwill and greater understanding.

During my 2 years in Cairo and Turkey, I learned how to slow down and not always pursue being productive. The best way to do one’s Turkish or Arabic homework was in the company of friends while inhaling the sweet smoke of the apple tobacco of a water pipe, also known as nargile or sheisha.

When my sister visited me in Istanbul in 1998, she commented that I was much more generous than she remembered, that my friends must have rubbed off on me. Without realizing it, I had forgotten the American system of going Dutch, when tab calculating had resulted in shortages and ruined a good evening. Instead, I had learned to pay bills, unconcerned about who didn’t pay or whose tab was more, because inevitably, somebody else would offer next time, and more likely several would insist upon paying.

When we returned to the United States, she pleaded with me to live in Turkey so she could have an excuse to visit frequently; because, as she so aptly observed, it was a place where acts of kindness are not random. They seem to be the rule, rather than the exception, and, contrary to popular opinion, ESPECIALLY if you are foreign.

Days after my recent arrival in Italy, I struck up a conversation with a doctor. When he heard I had come from Turkey, he grimaced and said it was a country he had no desire to visit. He said it seemed dirty, and, like so many others, he had seen the film Midnight Express, which gave him a bad impression. This old, sensational film continues to be the only information that some people have about Turkey. After seeing it, I was appalled by the grotesque depiction of Turks whose Turkish was worse than mine. I suggested to the doctor that most prison tales were not the best advertisement for a country and assured him that Turkey was indeed a country worth visiting.

He asked me why I had chosen to live in Turkey. The shortest answer: I fell in love with Istanbul, and I met some of the best friends I will ever have in my life. Perhaps the most important thing I learned from the Turkish culture is dost. In Turkish, dost connotes a deeper, more intensive friendship, a lifelong friend, a friendship without conditions or boundaries. A dost would be at your side at a moment’s notice, without any questions asked, or more likely, a dost would pre-empt your request and show up before you called. I have encountered many older Turks who had lived abroad for as many as 40 or 50 years, and then chose to return to Turkey, because they could not find the same companionship and quality of friendship they had known in Turkey.

My experiences in Turkey are such a stark contrast to the image of the barbaric Turks that so many Europeans and others still have today, which I first encountered on the bus trip to northern Greece with my AFS family in 1985. As we rolled into the small town of Xanthi, close to the Bulgarian border, my Greek sister warned me to stay on the bus rather than get out for the rest stop since the town, inhabited mostly by Turks, was dirty. In fact, my Greek mother reveled in telling me stories about the Terrible Turks. Later, feeling like a traitor, I waited 6 months before informing my Greek family of my residence in Turkey.

Sometimes the greatest lessons come in the most modest forms. On that same bus trip, my Greek sister bought a chocolate bar, and then immediately passed it to me and her friends nearby, undisturbed by the fact that only a tiny square remained for her. I flushed with shame as I realized I had speedily consumed my own bar of chocolate without thinking to offer her a piece. Only then did I understand her look of surprise the day before when I had gone to the market and bought an ice cream only for myself, not thinking to buy one for the other members of the family. Further observations confirmed that the sharing of chocolate, of food in general, was the norm rather than the exception. Now, years later, having lived in Mediterranean cultures with this same norm, I am surprised when my American and northern European classmates remark on my generosity as I pass around the homegrown grapes and mandarins that I have brought to share with the class. I had forgotten that this behavior was a gift learned from living in Middle Eastern and Mediterranean cultures.

I recall the words of a teacher in Cairo who distinguished between two types of knowledge, real knowledge, the type pursued by the Sufis (Islamic mystics) and other Christian mystics, which he considered transformative, and acquisitive knowledge, the type promoted by academia. According to him, it is the latter kind of knowledge which is valued today, which manifests in the publish or perish mentality, fostering the notion that the more you produce, the more you know, the more knowledge you have. But in the terms of the mystics, a knowledge that did not transform was not true knowledge. Knowledge was not about acquiring or having, but about becoming.

As I leave the Pantheon, I feel a rush of gratitude for the people and the places which have contributed to my becoming, and for my parents for overcoming their fear of terrorism and letting me embark on my journey.

Midway down the steps, I feel a tap on my shoulder. Startled, I turn to see a young woman who holds an umbrella and asks me if I have left it. To my surprise and delight, she is speaking Turkish. I thank her in Turkish, and it is her turn to be surprised. She asks me why I know Turkish and the usual questions ensue. We continue our conversation over coffee.

I’m smiling. The gray is gone. Yes, terrorism may be a reality, but so is connection, exchange, transformation, and the continuing journey.

The author graduated from Modesto’s Davis High School. and UC Davis in International Relations.