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peace activists
To Defeat Trump's Fascism, We Must Confront Militarism
While most Americans instinctively understand the threat U.S. militarism poses to democracy, the times call for more explicit links between militarism and rising fascism and a blueprint for reversing this threat.
Jun 12, 2025
President Trump’s deployment of 4,000 National Guard troops and 700 Marines to Los Angeles to quash peaceful demonstrations against brutal ICE raids is a wake up call. Now is the time to push back against this administration’s use of military violence against its own citizens to consolidate authoritarian power. As Trump threatens to arrest California Governor Newsom and unleash “troops everywhere,” the people of this country must reject militarization as a tool of authoritarianism and stand firm to defend and expand democracy.
As tanks and troops descend upon Los Angeles to silence dissent, on Saturday, they will roll through Washington in a display of power, revealing the undercurrents of an administration that wields militarization not for defense, but for domination.
On his 79th birthday, President Trump will finally get his “big, beautiful” military parade, brandishing unrivaled U.S. military might on the streets of the nation’s capital. Marking the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army, the $45 million parade will feature nearly 7,000 soldiers marching down Constitution Avenue, flanked by hundreds of B-17 bombers, Strykers and Apache helicopters. Washington will look like Nazi Germany, and unless we tackle militarism in our fight to defend democracy, we, too, may soon live under authoritarian rule.
As longtime peace activists, we have opposed U.S. wars against Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, and raised the alarm over militarized U.S. foreign policies like war drills against China and North Korea which provoke a dangerous counter-reaction and fuels an arms race that could trigger nuclear war.
The Trump administration isn't trimming fat from the federal budget, they're cutting the heart out of communities to further enrich billionaires, war profiteers, and techno-fascists.
Deluged daily with domestic crises, it is challenging to draw attention to the dangers of U.S. militarism, especially when most view it as a problem “over there.”
But now we are in an era where masked ICE agents are raiding schools, workplaces, churches and homes, tearing apart families by abducting and deporting legal residents and rounding up students for protesting U.S. support of Israel’s genocide of Palestinians.
The U.S. public can no longer afford to ignore the lethal consequences of militarism on our democracy at a time when our Commander-in-Chief has pardoned January 6th vigilantes, defied the Constitution and judicial rulings, threatened to invoke the 1807 Insurrection Act, and has already deployed the National Guard and active-duty Marines in an attempt to quash dissent at home.
While most Americans instinctively understand the threat U.S. militarism poses to democracy, the times call for more explicit links between militarism and rising fascism and a blueprint for reversing this threat.
Contrary to Trump’s campaign promises to end U.S. involvement in Ukraine and Gaza, he is calling for an unprecedented $1.1 trillion Pentagon budget for more war and militarism, including modernizing nuclear weapons, further entrenching the U.S.’ permanent war footing across the Pacific and Asia in preparation for war with China, and massively increasing policing, detention and deportation.
In 2026 alone, Trump and Republicans want to spend an additional $43.8 billion on mass detentions and deportations, funding more ICE raids like those in LA. This militarized budget accounts for 75 percent of the entire discretionary budget, which explains why on top of massive tax cuts for billionaires, there is no money for social programs and federal agencies that actually help our communities feel safe – clean air and water, healthcare, child nutrition, education, and housing assistance.
U.S. taxpayers are told this historic increase in more militarism is a “generational investment” in defending our country, or that it’s to honor the sacrifices of U.S. service women and men.
But the truth is that half of the Pentagon budget goes to defense contractors that sell weapons of mass destruction to authoritarian states and human rights abusers, like Saudi Arabia and Israel. Instead of financing Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza with $17.9 billion in 2024, U.S. taxpayer dollars could have provided more than one million U.S. veterans with VA healthcare.
Our taxpayer dollars also enrich tech billionaires like Elon Musk, whose $277 million dollar donation to Trump’s campaign landed him a $5.2 billion dollar Pentagon deal in April, and a free pass to wage an administrative coup. Billions of our taxpayer dollars also go to venture capitalist Peter Thiel, co-founder of Paypal and Palantir, which Bloomberg describes as an “intelligence platform designed for the global War on Terror [that] was weaponized against ordinary Americans at home.” Thiel, who doesn’t “believe that freedom and democracy are compatible,” just received another contract to carry out ICE deportations, and is, along with Musk, Meta’s Zuckerberg and other techno-fascists, seeking to build a dystopian future of unregulated “network states” and surveil us all.
At a time when most Americans want an end to war, Trump is using our tax dollars to celebrate militarism as a cornerstone of consolidating authoritarian power...
The Trump administration isn't trimming fat from the federal budget, they're cutting the heart out of communities to further enrich billionaires, war profiteers, and techno-fascists. In the report Trading Life for Death, the National Priorities Project and Public Citizen found that militarized spending increases in the reconciliation proposals total $163 billion for FY 2026. That's more than enough to fund Medicaid for the 13.7 million people at risk of losing health care, and the 11 million people at risk of losing food stamps.
As Trump uses the parade as a spectacle to exalt his unchecked power, people around the country will join over 1,800 organized protests under the banners of “No Kings Day” and “Kick Out the Clowns.” This day of action offers an opportunity to shine a light on the threat of a highly militarized society to our democracy, from the bloated Pentagon budget that leaches funding from investments that make us secure, to state capture by techno-fascists on our taxpayer dime. We need to do the hard work to redefine our paradigm of national security. The Feminist Peace Playbook: A Guide for Transforming U.S. Foreign Policy provides one such guide for moving our country from one defined by war and violence to one built on care, compassion and cooperation.
Let’s heed the prescient words of President Eisenhower, a five-star general who led the Allied Forces in WWII to defeat fascism, when he warned Americans to “guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence… by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists, and will persist."
At a time when most Americans want an end to war, Trump is using our tax dollars to celebrate militarism as a cornerstone of consolidating authoritarian power at home.
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Overlooking the Elephants in the Room
Jun 10, 2008
West Michigan became the scene of an imported brand of Middle Eastern conflict over politics and religion recently when Nonie Darwish, a member of the nonpartisan Young America's Foundation (YAF) speakers bureau, presented her view of the world at a lecture organized by the College Republicans in my town.
The YAF speakers bureau includes such colorful personalities as Patrick Buchanan, Newt Gingrich, Ann Coulter, David Horowitz, Michelle Malkin, Rick Santorum, John Ashcroft, Ward Connerly and Ted Nugent.
After September 11, Darwish, 59, an Egyptian-born author, activist and translator, decided to speak out against her own Islamic culture because she felt it perpetuated hate against the Jews in the Middle East.
"I learned that hate, vengeance and retaliation are important values to protect Islam and Arab honor," said Darwish, recalling her education as a young girl. "Self-criticism or questioning Arab teachings and leadership was forbidden and could only bring shame, dishonor and violence open those who dared try. Peace was never an option and never mentioned as a virtue."
In her speech, Darwish also railed against Arabs and radical Islam for causing Israeli-Palestinian tensions and pointed to verses in the Quran that invite Muslim violence against non-Muslims.
Darwish came to the United States 15 years ago. She is the daughter of Lt. Col. Mustafa Hafaz, an assassinated Egyptian guerrilla leader of the fedyadeen, a terrorist group that regularly raided Israel.
In addition to the 30 students who attended the lecture, Darwish drew another 15 - 20 peace activists from the local community who were there to protest her message. At first they were silent but as Darwish continued her 45-minute diatribe, they reacted to her with audible snickers and gasps of disgust.
The Q&A was even more surreal. Darwish ignored the students who were seated in the front half of the assembly room and instead turned her attention to the protesters in the back. She first called on two Pakistani Muslim men who argued with her over the details of Muslim life and religion. Then she called on two peace activists.
The students in the room remained largely silent and puzzled by what was transpiring before their eyes until Darwish finally called on one student who asked something on the order of Rodney King's plea: "Can't we all just get along?"
The organizers of the event were noticeably flummoxed by the response of the audience and struggled to know what to do. However, they had admirably adopted a free speech platform and maintained it, especially when two unarmed security guards suddenly appeared to calm down a couple of vociferous peace activists who came very short of being thrown out.
After her speech, a small crowd surrounded Darwish to ask more questions, point more fingers and poke more holes in her arguments. The guards, at the prompting of the student organizers, eventually escorted Darwish out.
The evening's program had become one filled with fiery affect lacking in intellectual content and ending up quite a distance away from the intended forum for "enlightened thinking" the organizers attempted to provide.
An English major might characterize the scene as a post-modern drama complete with many obscure levels of context, irony, paradox and identity politics.
It was sad to see the peace activists forget their mission of nonviolence and react rudely to Darwish. They could have been more effective by simply maintaining a silent demonstration in protest to her message.
Equally troubling is the College Republicans' reliance on the YAF, which purports to furnish the aspiring conservatives with political savvy and organizational strategy. What it seems to do instead is to divide the world up into liberals and conservatives and to foment antagonism against liberals.
For example, according to the YAF website, the "nonpartisan" group provides conferences, internships and resources to promote the conservative agenda on college campuses and strategies for countering "leftist tactics against your speaker."
The YAF suggests ways students may "maximize funding from the university and private supporters" who would presumably be against them and their politics. It also has a program that teaches students how to fight "anti-military bias and misinformation" by leftists who "continue to belittle our armed forces and to prevent as many students as possible from participating in the Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) and from speaking with military recruiters."
The YAF sponsors the "9/11: Never Forget Project," which it began in 2003 after it discovered that "most college campuses were either completely ignoring the anniversary of the terrorist attacks or scheduling a politically-correct activity instead."
Ronald Reagan is the group's standard bearer and his creed is "the centerpiece of the student programs." The YAF proudly touts its role in the preservation of the president's Western White House, Rancho del Cielo, as a "living monument to Reagan's lasting accomplishments."
Actually, what the student audience's nonplussed reaction to the event perhaps makes clear as we ramble along in this first decade of the twenty-first century is that arguing about religion and politics has become pointless, especially when we refuse to deal with the "elephants in the room" like $4 per gallon oil, two wars we won't end and can't win, global warming, food shortages and price hikes, unprecedented species extinction, sub-prime mortgage failures, crumbling infrastructure, violent weather patterns and destructive earthquakes.
It's time for all Americans to turn the page on the old politics and to start working on the new challenges we face in our world.
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Moving From the Margins to the Mainstream
Jun 02, 2008
Movements for change begin mysteriously at the margins but if they take hold, they can have a big impact on society.
"Things happen. You have to count on it," said Tom Hayden at a recent lecture sponsored by the Southwest Branch of the ACLU of Michigan.
The veteran activist first witnessed the process of social change while a student at the University of Michigan in 1960. As editor of the Michigan Daily he was covering John F. Kennedy's visit to campus and discovered that a small group of students got to the presidential candidate about 11 p.m. and handed him a plan for an international peace program.
That group included local activist David MacLeod, who Hayden recognized at the lecture.
At the time Kennedy didn't know fully what he was signing on to and his advisers were stunned by his spontaneous policymaking. The program turned out to be the Peace Corps.
"It was unexplainable how David got the [plan] into JFK's hands," said Hayden who pointed out that "chaotic processes" often accompany movements for change.
A year later Hayden would co-found the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), which promoted the 18-year-old right to vote. This idea had first surfaced during World War II but it was the Vietnam War that brought home the point that the nation that felt its young were responsible enough to fight a war should be responsible enough to vote.
"We were relatively marginal but that didn't matter because we found a cause," said Hayden. "It was driven into me at the time that all things are possible."
Although the idea for the Peace Corps literally happened overnight, change usually takes at least a decade, said Hayden, and not all movements achieve their goals. Women's suffrage took 100 years; ending slavery took 500 years.
The Electoral College seems to be an obvious issue for change, especially since the 2000 election when Al Gore won the popular vote and George W. Bush won the electoral vote. However, there seems to be no political will to eliminate it.
"The Electoral College was one of the dynamic compromises of the Constitution," said Hayden, adding that the "imperfect document" also follows the movement for change model.
Prior to the Revolution of 1776 the Continental Congress grappled with whether or not to declare its independence from England, a prospect too radical for most colonists. However, taxation without representation eventually tipped a majority of the public toward separation.
In 1787 the framers of the U.S. Constitution incorporated independence as a key theme for the new republic but they could not end slavery or extend suffrage beyond white, male property owners. Such radical ideas would have split the movement for nationhood.
"Each generation claims the promise, ideals and aspirations of the founders and they become a movement," said Hayden. "This is how social change works and it's an important concept for professors to discuss and teach."
Hayden wasn't sure what America's next great social movement would be but he predicted that it will come out of the "Obama generation."
Obama came from the margins, too, Hayden noted. No one saw him coming anymore than they did Kennedy. And like Kennedy, Obama may end up articulating a new vision for the country based on the next generation's desire for change.
"They have a self-confidence that their moment has come," said Hayden of today's young. They don't want to settle for the way things are or for the way they were achieved in the 60s."
Hayden's own 34-year-old son has had to convince his father of this break from the past.
"You have to go to Obama's rallies to see this or you'll miss it, too," said Hayden. "There is an unexpected social movement that has not occurred since 1968."
Hayden's eight-year-old son, who is African-American, is also swept up in the "turbulence" of change. Interestingly, he isn't moved by race in this presidential election as much as he is by the environment. He aspires to be a marine biologist to do something about it.
The former state legislator and sociologist by profession illustrated that social change occurs once activists achieve 25 to 30 percent support from mainstream public opinion. When they reach 40 percent, the idea becomes a "norm." Politicians then pass a law to institute the change, although it is far more compromised from its radical origins.
Nevertheless, the existing order co-opts the movement for change, said Hayden, because grassroots activists usually disperse once they achieve their goal, much like the Iraq War peace movement has.
The existing order also seeks to erase the memory of the movement or to claim it as its own through commemorations on postage stamps or the naming of parks, buildings, boulevards and holidays.
"This was the same government that jailed radical reformers [like Martin Luther King, Jr.,]" said Hayden.
The activist, writer and politician is a leading voice for withdrawal from Iraq and last year published Ending the War in Iraq. He spoke about that prospect somberly.
"Ending the Vietnam War took 12 years of my life," said Hayden. "So far, the Iraq War has been going on for five years -- 15 if you count Gulf War I."
Hayden said that even with a Democratic win, the plan is to leave tens of thousands of troop advisers in Iraq. The Baker-Hamilton Study Group also advocated withdrawing all but 20,000 troops in order to stabilize the country.
"If we can't win with 150,000 troops, how can 30,000 finish the job?" he asked.
Hayden also pointed out that this war has been designed with the Vietnam War in mind. For example, there is no draft and the number of dead soldiers is minimal in comparison. There is also a great effort to subdue the protests, which accounts for the media's sketchy coverage of the peace movement.
"Fighting tolerant warmakers is harder than fighting those who beat you up," said Hayden, who was thrashed and jailed during the 60s protests. The Internet generates much more information to a broader audience but it creates much less face-to-face interaction and fervor.
Hayden urged peace activists to help end the war in Iraq with the following suggestions:
* Spend time with those who disagree with you and make alliances.
* Work with anti-war people in the armed forces and let them know their rights.
* Show up at community colleges and conduct debates on military recruitment.
* Consult https://www.nationalpriorities.org/costofwar_home to find out and report how the cost of war is diverting funds from your community.
* Make alliances with those hurt by war's budget (i.e., senior citizens, veterans who need medical care, educators).
Hayden also said that any movement for change can happen by focusing on one's own experience. Working for energy efficiency on college campuses is a good example of what students can do.
"Start with things that are achievable and reach out to the undecided population," he advised. "Look for friends on the faculty but focus on your student friends."
Because activism often competes with students' time for study and a job, Hayden recommended that students combine their activist interests with service learning opportunities, work-study projects and research papers.
Hayden's Web site provides information about his other causes, which include erasing sweatshops, saving the environment and reforming politics through greater citizen participation.
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August Alert
Aug 03, 2007
So, what's with August? Since George W. Bush became president, August has either been a month when terrible things happened or it has foreshadowed a precedent. Let's look at the evidence year by year:
2001
During the President Bush's month-long vacation at his Crawford ranch, then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice presented him with the memo "Bin Laden determined to attack inside the U.S." September 11 resulted.
2002
The rumblings of war began in earnest as Bush started talking about Saddam's threat to the United States. Troops and materiel began moving en masse toward the region. On March 19, 2003, war began.
2003
Americans were impatient that the war had not yet ended. And neither Saddam, the WMDs, or Osama bin Laden had been found. A July Gallup poll showed that 42 percent of the public thought the war was going badly, up 13 percent since May when Bush proclaimed that major hostilities in Iraq had ended. The United States was spending about a billion a week on the war and Bush lobbied Congress for an additional $87.3 billion, which he got in October.
This was the first of many installments he would request. So far, the war has cost $448.67 billion, according to www.nationalpriorities.org and some say it is expected to reach between $1-2 trillion before it's over.
Bush's approval ratings had nose-dived to 50 percent as people began to feel that they had been duped into war. Nevertheless, the mainstream media were reluctant to dig out the truth on this matter. Meanwhile, Bush supporters defended him and called the peace activists traitors whose demonstrations were responsible for the deteriorating situation in Iraq.
There was so much discord in the country that people were lulled into denial, said New York Times columnist Paul Krugman. By September 11, people were apparently so weary of war that many skipped the second anniversary observances. World opinion of America was plummeting because of Bush's unilateral, preemptive invasion of Iraq. This action would come back to haunt the president in October when he failed to enlist the aid of our allies and the United Nations in Iraq.
2004
The presidential race between George W. Bush and John Kerry got dirty early when the Swift boat veterans, who allegedly served with Kerry in Vietnam, kicked off an advertising campaign against him. First, they accused him of having been unfit to lead them. Then they trashed him for criticizing U.S. policy in Vietnam before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 1971. Finally, they disputed Kerry's claim about being in Cambodia on a secret mission. Kerry delayed addressing these ads and his wait affected the election's outcome in November.
2005
Cindy Sheehan camped outside of the president's ranch requesting a meeting with him regarding the death of her son, Casey, who was killed in Iraq the previous year.
She drew worldwide media attention to the callousness of Bush who refused to meet the mother of a dead soldier. He also had not and still has not attended one funeral of a fallen Iraq War soldier or marine. Sheehan's standing up to Bush re-energized the peace movement. The movement's presence had been made invisible partly because it was largely ignored by the administration and the mainstream media and partly because peace activists were demoralized that they had not prevented the war from starting and can't get it to end.
On August 29, Hurricane Katrina blew away New Orleans and Americans discovered that the federal government was not only unprepared to deal with domestic emergencies, it was unwilling to help Americans, especially if they were poor. National Guard troops who would have been there to help with disaster relief were in Iraq. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) completely botched its rescue duty and Director Michael "Brownie" Brown, resigned his post in disgrace in September. He would be one of the first incompetent Bush appointees to go.
2006
Preparations stepped up for the November elections that would result in the Democrats winning both houses of Congress. The war in Iraq was the single issue that brought people out to vote against the president and Republican Party candidates.
War broke out between Israel and Lebanon. Amnesty International said Israel violated international law by deliberately destroying Lebanon's civilian infrastructure. The United Nations' humanitarian chief accused Israel of its "completely immoral" use of cluster bombs. Israeli reserve soldiers protested their country's provocation of the attacks and called for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's resignation as well as an investigation over the failures of the conflict. Meanwhile, Hezbollah captured and held two Israeli soldiers.
It was discovered that former U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage had originally revealed the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame to columnist Robert Novak in 2003. I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby (who was born in August), Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, would be indicted in March 2007 for his role in disclosing Plame's identity. Libby was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison and $250,000 but President Bush commuted his prison sentence because, he said, it was too severe. Such action coincided with a growing list of situations where Bush would claim "executive privilege" as a way of evading responsibility.
Virginia Tech closed its campus and canceled classes as police searched for a man suspected of murdering a hospital security guard and a police officer. Eight months later on April 16, Seung-Hui Cho, a senior majoring in English, killed 32 people before he took his own life.
2007
This year we started the month of August with the collapse of the Minneapolis I-35 bridge over the Mississippi River. Such a tragedy calls attention to the safety of America's nearly 600,000 bridges. The U.S. Department of Transportation reports that one-quarter of the nation's bridges, including the 40-year-old Minneapolis bridge, were considered "structurally deficient and functionally obsolete" in 2005.
Bridges are part of the nation's aging highway infrastructure that is in desperate need of repair with an estimated cost of $68 billion, according to NBC News. After all the tax cuts-both state and federal-and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, where is the money going to come from? Let's not forget that the Republicans gained control of government in 2004 by promoting tax cuts. It's chilling to think about what the Minneapolis bridge collapse might foreshadow.
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Peace Pilgrims
Jul 12, 2007
It was truly inspiring to hear that Ashley Casale, 19, and Michael Israel, 18, decided to walk 3,000 miles across the country for peace. They began their journey on May 21 in San Francisco and plan to end up in Washington, D.C. on September 11. Such a commitment to the cause of peace is unusual and admirable!
The two teenagers have been discouraged, however, by the negative reception they have received by some people and by the lack of participation by those who support the peace movement.
Actually, their reaction seems to be universal for peace activists across the country who put much time and energy into standing for peace only to be ignored by the media and dismissed by the now-miniscule number of Bush-supporters. What is even more baffling is that they are thanked and congratulated by the 70 percent of those who want the United States to end the war in Iraq-but who do nothing about it.
Perhaps we need to look at our peace activism in a different way.
On January 1, 1953, a 44-year-old woman began a journey that would amount to her walking 25,000 miles over the next 28 years of her life.
Her first walk began in Pasadena, California, at the head of the Rose Bowl Parade so that she would be seen. She then set out to deliver two petitions to President Eisenhower: one to end the Korean War and one to establish a Department of Peace. The third petition she delivered to the United Nations: a request to disarm the world and redirect the funds for arms to funds for human need. She went by the name of Peace Pilgrim.
Peace Pilgrim was distressed over the world at that time so she prayed and contemplated what she could do about it. The nuclear age had begun, the Korean War was on, and Senator Joe McCarthy was out hunting communists.
The five-foot-two woman wore a blue tunic, the color of peace, with white letters that read "Peace Pilgrim." She carried no money, made no plans, and sometimes slept in haystacks, drain pipes, or barns. Sometimes she didn't eat.
Peace Pilgrim didn't approach other people but instead waited until people approached her. They often invited her to their house. She would talk with them about her life story of transformation and commitment to peace. This would inevitably prompt questions for them such as:
* "Wouldn't it be better to uplift each other rather than destroy each other?
* How am I going to live a meaningful life?
* What choices have I made in my life already?
* What do I need to change in my life to make a difference?"
Peace Pilgrim was invited to give presentations in churches, schools and in homes; she spoke on radio and television. She corresponded with thousands of followers and answered every letter (through her sister in New Jersey) and published a newsletter, Peace Pilgrim's Progress.
In 1972 Peace Pilgrim came to Kalamazoo to speak at Western Michigan University. Amy Anderson attended the lecture as part of a philosophy class she was taking there.
"I was so inspired and overwhelmed by her," said Amy, "that I asked the woman next to me, my classmate, if we shouldn't invite Peace Pilgrim to lunch." She agreed and the three women met at the Anderson home for a lunch of scrambled eggs and green grapes. Throughout the afternoon they talked about Peace Pilgrim's adventures as a walker, how she got started walking and ways she spread peace from one person to another.
At the conclusion of their visit, Amy offered Peace Pilgrim a bunch of grapes to carry with her, but she refused saying that she didn't carry food with her. Amy then offered Peace Pilgrim a ride to her next location, about 40 minutes away, partially by freeway. Peace Pilgrim usually avoided walking on freeways so she accepted Amy's offer, but only as far as the exit.
"She got out of the car, thanked me and walked on her way. I never saw her again," said Amy with a sigh. "But Peace Pilgrim affected my life a great deal. She was a blessing to me. I thought that if she could affect others like she affected me, then her life was a blessing to the United States and the world."
Amy showed me her paperback book on Peace Pilgrim and handled it reverently. She pointed to the back cover that quoted Peace Pilgrim's mantra: "I shall remain a wanderer until mankind has learned the way of peace, walking until given shelter and fasting until given food."
"Actually, Peace Pilgrim's philosophy was rather simple," said Amy as she opened the book and read from the inside cover page: "This is the way of peace: overcome evil with good, and falsehood with truth, and hatred with love."
Amy closed the book, heaved a sigh and shut her eyes momentarily. "That's what affected my life: that woman and this statement. But I'm just an ordinary person who did what I could to make a difference."
Ordinary indeed. As a wife and mother in the 1950s and 60s Amy did all the usual things: school, PTA, church, hospital. She assisted the youth minister at her church for 11 years and recently helped set up the walk-in health clinic there. But Peace Pilgrim took Amy to a new level where she could be "more brave" and less afraid of what other people thought about her activism. "Peace Pilgrim put a little starch in my spine," said Amy.
Amy's foray into the peace movement began with the Nuclear Freeze movement of the 1980s. She served as secretary of the local group for nine years and collected documents on everything this group ever did. She inadvertently became the Kalamazoo peace movement's archivist. During the 1990s she worked the cameras for social justice programs at the local cable TV station. Today, at 77, Amy still attends peace activities and sometimes stands on the corner at the peace group's Sunday vigil.
Maybe, like Amy, we need to be more ordinary. Maybe like Peace Pilgrim, we need to be more confident in our vision. Maybe, like Ashley and Michael, we need to be more willing to do something for peace in public.
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Women in Black: Mourning for All Victims of War and Violence
Jun 27, 2007
It's a warm summer day at noon and I'm standing on a major highway in my town with five other women who are dressed in a black top, pants and veil, wearing sunglasses, and holding a sign that says: "Women in Black: Mourning all victims of war and violence." The wind blows such that my black veil comes undone and I have to flip the loose ends over my shoulder to secure it. Wearing a veil is strange for me, yet I proudly wear this one because I am wearing it as a call for peace.
Standing still in one place is hard work. Mostly, my arms get tired holding the 20x30-inch foam-board sign. So I shift its position: side to side, top and bottom, side and bottom, top and side. Wearing a solemn expression on my face is also difficult. It's not a natural public posture. So whenever someone honks a horn or waves approvingly at us our leader advises that we just nod in acknowledgement.
Sometimes my body feels antsy and I want to quit my place and leave. Then I think about our wounded and dying soldiers. I think about the Iraqis living in rubble without water or electricity and without safety from looters, insurgents, suicide bombers, or stray bullets-and getting killed or maimed. These thoughts help me overcome my own temporary discomfort and maintain my resolve to stay the entire hour for this week's demonstration-and to come back for next week's demonstration.
Spending an hour demonstrating on a street corner is a strange experience. After standing for about 20 minutes, I block out the swishing sound of cars moving across the pavement and then drift into a different zone, sometimes closing my eyes as if to keep the sights and sounds of the street out of mind. At this stage, standing with the Women in Black becomes a meditation. I don't hear angels or harps; instead I feel a deep solidarity with other women with me-as well as those all over the world who are against war and violence. It's not that taking a stand in the street stops the war. Rather, it's about being in a "zone" with other women where my "I" transforms to a "we" by demonstrating for the essential cause. This is a very powerful realization because just by "being there" we are among those calling for peace. If we were not there, how could others contemplate the cause of peace?
As we stand on the street corner we find that we do provoke a response from the drivers who pass us by in their cars. Many people honk their horns in approval. Some people just stare at us. Often the passengers mouth the words of our signs slowly, one word at a time. Children in the cars turn to their mothers asking who we are and what we're doing. A few people shake their heads at us or flip us their middle finger. One deeply upset semi-truck driver took both hands off the wheel and gave us an emphatic thumbs-down. Another man, dressed in a black business suit, stuck his tongue out at us as he passed. Then there are those who rev up their engines as they go by.
Women passers-by are a little different. One woman stopped to tell us that we were wasting our time protesting the war. "The real issue before us in the world today is to stop the killing through abortion. You should be standing in front of Planned Parenthood with me in protest," she said. Another woman tried to intimidate us by taking pictures of us as she wheeled her car around the corner. Still another shouted out her car window: "Why don't you go back to your own country." Apparently, she thought that we were Muslims because we wore black veils; she didn't notice that we were all Americans.
Standing with the Women in Black allows us to make a public statement that war and violence are simply no longer acceptable in our world where it's too easy to commit genocide with sophisticated and deadly weapons and where mostly civilians, not soldiers, are getting killed. However, until enough people believe this truth, the Women in Black will continue to mourn for war's victims. And mourning is a proper response because it forces the issue of war out into the open at a time when too many people don't want to think about war or its consequences of death, destruction, or the loss of billions of dollars that could be spent on programs at home and abroad that actually help people live better lives.
At various times in history, it is the women who mount a protest when they tire of an injustice. In 1848 American women held their first convention for suffrage and got organized. In 1917 Alice Paul stood at the White House gates demonstrating for suffrage and then endured jail and even abuse. In 1955 Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on the bus and helped to kick-start the Civil Rights Movement. In the 1980s Argentinean mothers and grandmothers took to the streets to demand that their government stop "disappearing" the men of their families. Today, among the peace activists in the world are the Women in Black, who began among Israelis and Palestinians demanding peace in the Middle East and spread among women in cities all over the world. They are among those calling for an end to war-all wars! Until that happens, the Women in Black will continue to mourn.
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