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TechnoratiVets for Peace Booted from National Memorial Day Parade
There is one group of veterans that isn't allowed to march in the national memorial parade in Washington on Monday.
That's the Veterans for Peace, Delwin Anderson Memorial chapter, based in D.C. It's named after a World War II vet who fought in Italy and then worked for the VA for many years designing programs for injured veterans.
The group had applied to join the National Memorial Day parade.
And initially, anyway, it was accepted.
But then, late last month, the group was told that it didn't meet the criteria to participate.
The American Veterans Center, which runs the parade, told them "we cannot have elements in the parade that have any type of political message or wish to promote a point of view."
But other groups, like the American Legion, will be participating in the parade.
Its creed is to defend "God and country" and to "foster and perpetuate a 100 percent Americanism."
And check out the list of major sponsors for the parade. They include: Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, the nation of Kuwait, the U.S. Army, and even the NRA.
"We're striving to keep political statements out of the parade," says Jordan Cross, communications director of the American Veterans Center. "Last year, we had two groups who supported the war, and we turned them down."
Cross says that when the American Veterans Center looked more closely at the Vets for Peace application and "saw what they were requesting, to carry a coffin in the parade, and all that jazz," it decided not to let them participate.
Michael Marceau, a wounded Vietnam vet, serves as vice president of the D.C. Vets for Peace group. "We're puzzled," he said, adding that he felt "very disrespected."
Caroline Anderson, the widow of Delwin Anderson, was supposed to ride in the parade in a convertible. Bashful, she doesn't want to talk about herself or on behalf of the Vets for Peace chapter. But she is not happy about the expulsion. "It's a great disappointment," she says, "to feel that other veterans would not allow them to be with them and march, just because they're for peace."
Matthew Rothschild is the editor of The Progressive magazine.
© 2008 The Progressive
34 Comments so far
Show AllYour article is appreciated, Matt, for where else would most readers find this information.
But we Veterans For Peace put ourselves in an improbable situation by intending to be for peace and at the same time be an organization that honors veterans who fought wars.
What is needed is an organization totally dedicated to representing strictly the victims of war, those that were killed or maimed. Of course it would be very telling if this pro-victims of war were to be led, or at least participated in, by veterans who had since seen the light and were ashamed of having fought and brought death and destruction.
It is a contradiction in terms to praise one's past 'service' in war and be against everyone's future participation in fighting - most unequivocally, fighting in and occupying someone else's country.
Having 'fought' is indeed a euphemism for having 'killed' in the parlance of a true pacifist.
Until the Veterans of Peace and anti war are more numerous that the Veterans For War (that is what they should call themselves), wars will continue.
Jay Janson, 100% with the victims and not with the veterans per se.
I don't think this is a sad commentary at all.
In this malignant, perhaps terminal phase of the Amerikan Empire, citizens don't have the luxury of turning off their brains in favor of experiencing culturally correct and approved emotions in accordance with stultifying, euphemistic tradition.
War grows tragedies more numerous than the poppies in Flanders Fields, and there are not enough tears to water them sufficiently, or wash away the misspent blood that germinated the seeds of bitter and senseless loss.
All the more reason to consider on days of remembrance the monstrous fraud and evil that is the reason for the season.
This is all a very sad commentary. This is Memorial Day folks.....not a day for political drama or political theater but a national holiday in honor of all our fallen veterans.
Please don't think I'm a war monger. I was a CO in the Vietman War era, participated in the first draft protest in West Virginia, etc.
However I have the greatest respect possible for the men and women who fought in our country's wars (whatever war) and this is their day.
Metallica, "Disposable Heroes"
Soldier boy, made of clay
Now and empty shell
21, only son
But he served us well
Bred to kill, not to care
Do just as we say
Finished here, greetings Death
He's your's to take away
the number of troops staying alive for very long after they get home from Iraq is dropping. I guess Bush doesn't want another agent orange scandal from the DU cases. Or have them start to talk of the war crimes they were ordered to be a part of. So don't worry peace and America don't belong in the same sentance.
First get adjunctive relief from a sympathizing lawyer. and then demand equal rights , if that doesn't work, then have the vets in your group do a set in at the beginning of the march, of course locate vet groups with sensitivities to what you are trying to do so they can support you. One group would be Viet Nam Vets Against the war and There are a new groups of Iraq servicemen and woman organized to deal with similar issues.
Peace is not the American way. Just look at our history. Yes there is peace but who's peace? The winners so if that is the case there is peace in Iraq since it isn't attacking any other countries. Sick is all I can say. I will send you a postcard from my new country as I am out of America forever.
I am a member of VFP my chapter prez testified with Kerry in the first Winter Soldier that gave TRUTH about the My Lai Massacre. This is nothing new for VFP, we've been denied over and over at so called Veterans Parades.
Pro-Military vet groups call us Traitors, I would call us Patriots for wanting an end to this Illegal Occupation and bringing our troops home ALIVE and UNHARMED, as we say, "Peace IS Patriotic".
Dulce Et Decorum Est
"Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.
"GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
"In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
"If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie:
"Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori."
~ Wilfred Owen, who was killed in action on 4 November 1918, only one week before the end of WWI.
VFW=Very F*ckin Weird
Christopher John:
Your comment was righteous, and right on Bro'! Get some :)
"...You know, a coffin and all that jazz," the guy says---You know, your needlessly dead children, that sort of crap....Geez, what's next, thinking that foreigners' lives are as valuable as an American's?
In Minnesota, there are separate events for veterans and for Veterans for Peace. If there were only one, and all who attended the blended event -- including other veterans -- could see and hear what the VFP members have to say, no one in the crowd could or would praise war ever again. It is a heart-changing experience to learn of the psychic pain these brave men and women have endured, some, veterans of Vietnam and even Korea, for decades, and to meet the friends and family who have provided moral support all that time.
mom4peace,
thanks for the link
WATCH VETERANS FOR PEACE, IRAQ VETERANS AGAINST THE WAR, and MILITARY FAMILIES SPEAK OUT marching in the Martin Luther King Jr. Parade, Long Beach, CA.
You decide....Does the crowd find them offensive????
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiD_L0iaO4s
Love,
mom4peace
I look on the politicizing of Memorial Day with great sadness. You know, when I was a child, Memorial Day was often called Decoration Day, a day during which we honored those in the military who gave their lives for the good of the country by decorating their graves. But we also decorated the graves of our ancestors, often enough those who came from the "old country" to start new lives so that their children, and their children's children would prosper, me among them. After the morning parade of Boy Scouts and veterans in diverse uniform marching behind the high school band, I would walk with my father to Woodlawn Cemetery and there help him trim the boxwoods that graced my grandparents' grave, and the grave of an uncle who died long before I was born. Stores were closed on that day. It was a day of remembrance, not commerce. Years later, working in China, I went on an April holiday with a friend and his family to clean the grave of their ancestors. Standing on that quiet hillside, I understood our Memorial Day all the more.
I am a member of VFP and have seen the same disrespect here in Vermont. Let's face it. 'Peace' is NOT really very American. Our whole history is one of glorifying war. How often are there parades to honor conscientious objectors? How many monuments to peace are there around the country?
Where would the U$A economy be without war? As Gen. Smedley Butler said many years ago "War is a Racket". Death, destruction, and weaponry are the favorite exports of the US. We sell arms to both sides and then stir up conflict. And we wonder why they hate us....
Glory of War
by
Steve Osborn
What is this Glory of War?
The politicians loudly prate of destiny, of right,
Then return to their bunkers to hide themselves away
As the bands play and the soldiers march off in all their panoply.
People cheer them as they ride off to meet their fate.
Rockets fly and bombs fall, napalm smoke fills the air.
Gaunt young-old men with haunted eyes, shooting, shooting,
At others who look the same, but for the uniform., shooting back.
Cities fall, women run screaming, babies burn and starve,
Large eyes staring, uncomprehending.
Sad eyed children line the streets,
Picking over garbage and begging for food.
What of the young soldiers, on either side, who marched off to Glory?
Those charred, stinking, corpses littering the sand?
Uniforms burned off, they all look alike to the flies that lay their eggs.
Their dreams, their hopes, their loves, mean nothing anymore.
"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori,"
Wrote the Roman poet Horace in the time of Christ.
"It is sweet and honourable to die for one's country."
How much sweeter to live for it, and build a world of peace.
19 Feb 2003
@aliensoup: Thanks and apologies to the VFW for the wrong attribution. Very sloppy on my part.
May the wicked become good,
May the good obtain peace,
May the peaceful be freed from bonds,
May the free set others free.
- Prayer of a Boddhisatva
What better way to honor our veterans than to deny them the freedom of speech, as embodied in the First Amendment, the foundation underlying all other freedoms?
The concept of our veterans swearing an oath to defend the Constitution must also be, in the words of Alberto Gonzales, a "quaint" notion.
Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori is a line from the Roman lyrical poet Horace's Odes (iii 2.13). The line can be rendered in English as: "It is sweet and fitting to die for one's country." [Wikipedia]
________________________________________
I don't consider myself a Christian as such, but I appreciate that Christ gave it His best shot; still, two millenia later, most of manunkind retains allegiance to the Old Law, the Talon Law, which is the foundation of Horace's obsolescent observation.
As long as citizens and political rulers alike accept the necessity and righteousness of warfare, our rituals will extol the putative virtues of Sacrifice and Death in defense of one's country.
"Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!"
Sir Walter Scott's atavistic paean to nationalism was taught to me in parochial school, and the sentiment still flourishes in our backwards and unregenerate ruling class. It's another ponderous rock in the foundation of traditional patriotism, a component of the "Blut und Boden" values that underpin the righteous necessity of Defending Our Way of Life against perceived threat and oppression.
Alas! It is no surprise that benighted petty authorities still banish from public observances those who have paid their dues in military service, but no longer make obeisance to the God of War.
After all, principled anti-war representatives might spoil the tone, the mood of such ceremonies, in which patriotism is defined as a respect and appreciation not only for the sacrifices made by those who serve(d), but obliquely, for the institutions which made such sacrifice possible.
Personally, I believe that every Memorial Day parade and ceremony should be festooned with banners reading: "War! The Reason for the Season!"
They need to notify the ACLU. Their First Amendment rights have been trampled.
Just a comment to Arvy: The American Legion and The VFW (Veterans of Foreign Wars) are not the same organization and do no promote the same patriotic garbage.
The parade in Bremerton was an "Armed Forces Day Parade" which has been held for about 60 years now to glorify the military. They allowed the local VFP group to march in the parade last year, but decided this year that they were too political, religious etc to participate. Bremerton for those who've never heard of it is in existence only because of the US Navy. Back in the early 1900's the Bremer family gave the ground to the Navy to build a a shipyard and it's been 100% military ever since. The thought of Peace is pretty scary to a community which is built entirely on the military and its expansion. The brouhaha over Veterans for Peace actually brought out a larger number of people who support Peace than likely would have attended the parade if they had been quietly allowed to take part. It takes a lot of work to bring people around to seeing that Peace is not an easy goal, but we must keep trying day by day!
Well said, rjmart01. An excellent opener to this thread of comments.
Let's get this straight. Being pro-peace is inconsistent with what the VFW regards as "100 percent Americanism". I guess its a good thing that those who fought in "the war to end all wars" are no longer around to apply for a marching permit.
The same thing happened in my home town of Bremerton, WA. The people in charge of the Memorial Day Parade decided the a local veterans for peace group was inappropriate for the parade citing the same reason. It sounds like a repbulicanderthal conspiracy to me.
No, No, No, VFP was excluded for their own safety because of the lions. You see Mark Antony has this chariot that is pulled by two lions, and if VFP was in the parade the Masters were afraid the lions might get loose and eat them. Security is job #1.
Way to go Christopher and I hope you do come up with a few ideas and follow through with them as well. It is time some one took that first step toward fixing the problem. For change there has to be that first step by that one man.
The majority of Americans, that includes veterans, don't even realize that they have been living within a cult of militarism for at least the past sixty years. I am a proud member of VFP Rachel Corrie Chapter 109. Another local VFP chapter in Washington State was refuse entry in an Armed Forces Day parade in similar idiocy. Peace is not only patriotic it is the only hope that we have.
As a Vietnam Veteran who believes in peace, it does not surprise me that Veterans for Peace are not allowed in a war memorial parade; certainly cannot taint the current administration's "American" message. I'd like to be able to see the nation of Kuwait's float, or Lockheed Martin's drum & bugle corps; but I'll be boycotting D.C.'s proud American affair, and gathering with some buddies (many veterans) firing up the barbie, and seeing if we can figure out a way to get these idiots out of power!
Peace is Patriotic, & dissent the highest form of free speech.
Why so surprised? The USSR didn't allow peace minded veterans marching in their May parades. Why would the us of war allow a bunch of subversives to honor those who died for the rich?
Just so everybody's clear:
Glorifying peace is political.
Glorifying war is American.
Being a good American is not being political. If you're political, you're not a good American. This is shown by the fact that we always elect candidates who claim not to be politicians.
If you're really a good American, on the way home from the parade, you'll stop at the big box store and buy a lot of stuff you don't need, on credit.