Peace & Justice
Mark your calendar for Peace Camp: June 24-26. For 21 years the Modesto Peace/Life Center has hosted a weekend in the High Sierra for people of all ages with good fellowship, lively discussions, the best camp food imaginable. Relaxing, refreshing, even invigorating.
Click here for full info and flyer
ACTION: To help plan, phone Ken Schroeder at 526-2303.
By
PHOEBE TYSON
The
author, a freshman at Waterford High School, wrote the following speech
What
would you do if you walked into a local park and saw combat boots laid in ranks;
one after the other, and you had no idea what was going on? Would you pass it
by? Or would you stop to see what it was all about, because you can see
California flags sticking out of over one hundred pairs of those boots?
On
Wednesday, March 30, 1,529 pairs of scruffy black combat boots were laid out in
perfect ranks on the meticulously manicured grounds of the Capital Park in
Sacramento. These boots memorialized those soldiers who have given their lives
in Iraq. Over one thousand pairs of civilian shoes were arranged into a
maze-like configuration called a labyrinth, where people slowly paced their way
to the center, deep in thought and prayer. This labyrinth symbolizes the one
hundred thousand plus civilians, both American and Iraqi, who have died in Iraq.
The
Eyes Wide Open Project is a memorial to all those who have died in Iraq. It is
an exhibit of boots and shoes which has been traveling through the United States
since January of 2004. It was started and is sponsored by the American Friends
Service Committee, a Quaker organization headquartered in Philadelphia. When it
started, there were only 504 pairs of boots, which then was the current death
toll for U.S. soldiers.
The
boots exhibit is run by volunteers; even the man who has been driving the truck
of boots for the last year is a volunteer. Some of the boots have been donated
by soldiers’ families, but most have been donated by army surplus stores.
Those shoes, symbolizing the civilians, have been donated by volunteers working
on the exhibit as it has traveled throughout the U.S.
Reactions
to the exhibit have been all across the board. I saw families cry over their
child’s boots, and leave pictures and flowers with the boots to be carried
along for the rest of the exhibit’s time. I heard one woman asking to have the
boots of a friend’s child removed, because they felt like their grief was
being put on display, or even ridiculed. People came to cry over the boots, or
wander slowly through them, even though they personally haven’t lost any one.
Some citizens have taken offense to the memorial, because they think it’s just
those hippies off on another peace protest. There were some veterans who came to
rant about how these men and women had died to save their country, and how the
losses were so much lower than previous wars in which the vets had served, while
other veterans came to help set up the exhibit and talk to visitors.
Some parents of dead soldiers have decided to talk to the public at the
site of the exhibit because they want people to understand that war is not all
glory and fame.
On
the 30th of March, I helped with the exhibit for nearly eight hours.
It took between three and four hours to get all those boots and shoes set in the
appropriate places. By that time, visitors were slowly wandering through the
exhibit, talking to the people in the information booths or attempting to
quarrel with the volunteers. When I looked at all those boots laid across the
bright green grass, and watched as the cold wind fluttered the tags attached to
them, I couldn’t help but think that this lush place was so different from
where those soldiers and civilians died. I had the eerie sense that if I looked
up at the wrong time, I would see those boots filled with transparent soldiers
in battered and bloody camo and the area of the shoes over run by wispy phantoms
full of bullet holes with blood on their hands.
The
GI Rights Hotline
(800)
394-9544 405
14th Street Suite 205 |
WHERE YOUR INCOME TAX MONEY REALLY GOES: War and Its Costs
Sonorans rally
against the war
By PAT CERVELLI
Despite the rain, 300 community members attended the March 19 peace march and rally in downtown Sonora’s Court House Park. This was the third annual peace event held by the Tuolumne County Citizens for Peace since the eve of the 2003 Iraq war. More than the usual number of passersby witnessed the march and rally since the huge “Home and Garden” show was held in town at the same time.
The keynote speakers were Lynn Mac Michael of “Voices in the Wilderness” who has visited the Middle East eight times in the past 15 years, and Vietnam veteran George Main, president of the Sacramento Veterans for Peace.
A 4-piece band and singer (Amy and Luke Rutten and Friends) entertained the marchers as they gathered. Other speakers included Ruth Morgan, a Stockton mother of two U.S. Marines who have recently served in Iraq, local playwright and poet Rick Foster who read his poem, “The Man Who Was Born in Iraq the Same Instant as I,” and a 20-year-old local rap artist, Tom McDonnell, who performed a rap about global issues from war to Bush to health care to Gaia.This Declaration, completed on April 2, 2005, was read in Riverside Church, New York, on April 4* by Kelley Ogden, of Houston, Texas, the final consensus leader of the Peace Not Poverty Write-In sponsored by The Beloved Community.
“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”
Thirty-eight years ago today, Dr. Martin Luther King reminded us of those moments in life where silence is betrayal. Our collective conscience tells us now is the time to speak. Today we walk in the footsteps of Dr. King, Mahatma Gandhi, Fred Korematsu, and countless others who have walked this road before. We follow their footsteps along a path of moral evolution so we may forever change the way we see ourselves and those with whom we share this earth.
War poisons the moral fiber of every individual and rips the intricate fabric of life. As a nation, our core values are peace and non-aggression towards other sovereign states. The war in Iraq, however, violates this principle of non-aggression for the Iraq war is a war of choice. We did not engage in diplomacy, but rather, bullying. Saddam Hussein did not possess weapons of mass destruction and Iraq did not invade or attack our country. It is painful to face this nation’s arrogant and brutish tactics but our conscience tells us that we must end this war.
The war in Iraq violates law and perverts our sense of justice. We can no longer be viewed as an impartial arbitrator of disputes, but as a biased proponent of our own self-interest. We have lost the moral high ground for condemning the aggression of others. Our compassion and care for our fellow man has been twisted and warped into intolerance, hatred, and bigotry. The war in Iraq was born from the curtailing of freedoms and liberties that our founding fathers, and those like Dr. King, worked so hard to secure. This war promotes fiscal insanity for us and future generations, and it narrows and degrades our soul. It is a cancer that, if left unchecked, will only spread. Our conscience tells us that now is the time for action, before the war destroys all that we hold dear. We must speak so that our families, our children, our loved ones, and our nation are not lost in a miasma of fear, anger, and retribution. We must end this war.
First, we must cease all combat operations. Troops should be withdrawn on an orderly timetable, with only a small portion remaining to assist in the rebuilding efforts. To the extent that troops are necessary to maintain order, peacekeeping activities should be turned over to the UN and the international community.
Second, we must dismantle our military bases, which only serve to remind the Iraqi people of our presence. We have done enough damage and must remove the vestiges of this transgression.
Third, we must use all unallocated monies to fund the rebuilding of Iraq’s roads, building, and infrastructure destroyed by this war, as this is our moral and legal obligation. Instead of US corporations and war profiteers, we must employ the Iraqi people, "the engineers, mechanics, farmers, and business leaders, including women" to rebuild their country as it is their vision and promise that we must aspire to.
Fourth, we must give international relief agencies full access to help the people of Iraq and alleviate their suffering. We must help heal the Iraqi people and reweave the fabric of their lives.
Next, we must accept the form of government freely chosen by the Iraqi people, without US influence. Our insistence upon a particular form of government only degrades the political process and democracy cannot be imposed upon others by the barrel of a gun.
Also, we must take steps at home to change the mindset of the American people. Through an environment of fear and images of mushroom clouds brought to us by our government at the hands of a permissive media, we were provided with a false sense of justification for our actions. We were wrong and we need to recognize that we were wrong. Americans must be reminded that truth, honesty, freedom, and liberty for all are our core values. The freedoms and liberties that have been taken from us through the labels of “traitor,” “un-American,” and “terrorist” must be restored. We must rise as a people to ensure that our freedom and liberties are not taken so easily from us again.
We must also address the root causes of this conflict, not only in our hearts but in our daily lives. We must wrestle with the biggest factor of our aggression and we must reduce our dependence on oil.
As a result of this war, countless lives have been lost and ruined, and our integrity among our global partners has been compromised. We must repair relations and strengthen the ties that bind us all by eliminating the permissiveness of greed and violence and holding those responsible for this war accountable. At the same time, we must also demonstrate the power of forgiveness. We must release those we have imprisoned, even those who may now wish us harm. The men, women, and children of Iraq should be free to begin rebuilding their lives, regardless of our suspicions. We must remove the log in our own eye before attempting to remove the splinter in another’s.
We must demonstrate our strength at home and abroad by apologizing to the Iraqi people, the UN, and to the world. By redressing the wrongs that we have inflicted, we demonstrate respect for freedom and democracy. By redressing the wrongs, we strengthen the bonds of humanity, we make peace possible, and we restore our soul.
In the name of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., let us lift our voices and rock the heavens for as our conscience tells us, now is the time to speak.
*Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., delivered his speech "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence!" on April 4, 1967 at the Riverside Church.
The Beloved Community promotes non-violence, social justice, fair and equal treatment under the law, care for the environment, and freedom. Visit www.peacenotpoverty.org/index.php
Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) calls for participants to join the 75-mile Migrant Trail Walk, through the Arizona desert from Sasabe, Mexico, to Tucson, Arizona, between May 30 and June 5.
The Walk is organized by a coalition of Arizona border groups participating in the No More Deaths movement, an effort to stop migrant deaths and highlight the inadequacies of current US immigration policy.
The Migrant Trail Walk highlights the experience of migrants as they make their way through harsh terrain. Over 230 migrants died last year. Cost is $350.
ACTION: For applications visit: www.cpt.org/delegations/delegations.php or email delegations@cpt.org or call Doug Pritchard, 416-423-5525.