After the tears settled, I realized that the truth of their struggle has been so disguised, distorted, and blocked; Memory distortion has even rewritten the personal history of some of the men and women who were in the war.
In order to continue to militarize the people, they must all be brainwashed about any type of revolutionary movement. Especially within the ranks. Especially when officers were being fragged by their own troops.
I realized something very different is happening today. Sure, we don't see the coffins. We don't hear Walter Cronkite telling us the (falsified) numbers of the killed. We don't have journalists documenting the atrocities with film. But we have a very strong tool that cannot be erased.
We have our blogs. We have our websites. We have our truths. We have our resisters. We have people like Gerry Condon and Carl Rising-Moore, and even Senator Kerry (who testified at the Winter Soldiers' Investigation about the atrocities) who are still working to keep our kids safe from the war machine.
We have brave soldiers. All are brave, some are able to show their courage to resist. has created an incredible site called COURAGE TO RESIST and is at the side of any soldier who talks out against the war. Currently Kyle Snyder, who could be arrested and imprisoned, is now traveling around the country to speak out against the atrocities and bring the truth about the genocide perpetrated against the Iraqi people.
The truth is very hard to speak. The truth was hard to speak during the Gulf War. I was in college during that time, and many of my friends were 'international students". I began to wear a black armband for each day of the war. (Hint, buy dark tights, cut in strips, and you have a yourself enough armbands to wear for about a month.) I remember talking to my friends from Iraq, who were booked on flights home. I will not forget the fear in the eyes of these kind, gentle souls who were going home to potential hell.
I tried to organize a protest at that college. I put "how to resist" leaflets out as well as placing conscientious objector information on the public bulletin board. The flyers were taken down each day or had obscenities written on it. I had many of them, so I kept putting them up. (Hint: wallpaper paste and a metal pole make a long long long lasting flyer. These days one might laminate it before pasting it up to any pole in the area.)
When I organized an antiwar demonstration during the "Gulf War", the only other people who stood with me were either professors or free-thinking young people. We had a mass demonstration. We were 14 people against millions of flag decals.
Today, we have much more to share and more to say; We have more ways to speak, write, and photograph the truth.
Do it. Just do it.
We will not be brainwashed into submission and our movement must be heard LOUDLY. Maybe Sean Penn speaks out that the first thing on activists' agenda should be impeachment. Sure. Later. Right now, people are being murdered. Stop the murders. Love the troops. Get them out NOW.
History will impeach the worst president since Nixon. Even if it doesn't happen in office, it will happen in the history books.
We have already been killing for more days and weeks than in WW2. We are coming close to another hundred troops killed this week. We cannot nor shall not allow this war to turn into the Viet Nam hell that is carried by so many of our "historians" today.
Get the real history. Support the truth tellers. Watch, rent, BUY the DVD. It's called SIR, NO SIR. And its worth millions of dollars. Buy one today at a clearly reduced price.
And then, reduce the price of our country's loss. TROOPS OUT NOW. END THE GENOCIDE. SUPPORT WAR RESISTERS. DON'T REGISTER FOR SELECTIVE SERVICE.
And find peace in your own knowledge that you are telling your own truths.
peace.
lisbeth
war resister, CO counselor
Storefront for the documentary is located at http://www.sirnosir.com/home_dvd_storefront.html
to arrange an activist screening http://www.sirnosir.com/home_dvd_screening.html
following this post: interview with the director
ZNet article about the film
--
When people no longer fear authority
a greater authority will appear
don't restrict where people dwell
don't repress how people live
if they aren't repressed
they won't protest
thus the sage knows herself
but doesn't reveal herself
she loves herself
but doesn't exalt herself
thus she picks this over that
Dao de Jing # 72
translated by Red Pine
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The best way to end the war is to support war resisters.
"War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector
enjoys the same reputation and prestige as the warrior does today."
- John Fitzgerald Kennedy
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