I thought that the issues raised by this march had been rather
thoroughly debated on line but since the leaders of Peace Pledge raise
them once again, let me repeat what I think is the fundamental one, and
which the organizers of the march, including Peace Pledge, never address.
The key organizing task for peace activists who organize in the south
side of Chicago, is reach out to and activate the wide spread opposition
to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan which exists within our African
American, and Latino neighbors. We have tried for years to reach out to
community leaders of color on the south side with limited success for
reasons which we understand- mainly that they see the peace movement as
a white movement which is in practice indifferent to their other serious
concerns.
This is what framed my reaction to this demonstration. Would 100,
overwhelmingly white north side leftists, marching
on Obama's house
further our outreach? I didn't think so.
Of course Peace Pledge and the other organizers of this demo have a
different agenda. They wanted to show their opposition to the war in
Afghanistan and thought targeting Obama's house would get them press.
They have no knowledge or serious concern about the community they are
marching through. To them it is similar, as Andy Thayer one of the
leading organizers of the march insisted, to Cindy Sheehan's trek
through Texas to Bush's ranch.
These are just two rather different views of what it takes to organize
an effective anti-war movement. Unless someone has a real suggestion on
how to bridge this gap, we should agree to disagree and move on.
Mel Rothenberg
melinda power wrote:
> We would like to respond to the myriad emails sent out about the demonstration we helped organize to oppose the 8th anniversary of the U.S. invasion
of Afghanistan.
>
> The Peace Pledge, alarmed at the possibility of an escalation of the war in Afghanistan, concerned about the ongoing US invasion of Afghanistan with its inevitable destruction of lives, and troubled by the lack of an active anti-war movement in Chicago, called for a coalition to plan a demonstration for the 8th anniversary of the invasion.
>
> The Peace Pledge attempted to get the word out to as many groups and individuals as possible about the meetings, since our goal was to be as inclusive as possible. We also hoped other groups and individuals would spread the word to let people know about the plan for the demonstration.
>
> In the coalition, we had discussions about:
> 1. What were our goals? We concluded we wanted to show our opposition to the war in Afghanistan (and, of course, Iraq) and we wanted to help to remobilize the rather dormant anti-war movement and to attract media
attention.
> 2. We discussed where to have the demonstration. The two main sites were downtown or a march to the Obama residence (or as close as we could get). Many, though not all of us, thought a Saturday demonstration downtown was something that we had experienced too often and thought we should try something new. After some discussion and disagreement, we opted for the march to the Obama residence for a variety of reasons. In general, some of us in the coalition prefer marches through communities since they enable us to reach a different audience than we reach with a downtown march. Also, we felt (wrongly as it turned out) that a march in Obama’s community would attract media attention.
> 3. We had a series of discussions about the politics of the demonstration. The biggest issue was the politics regarding the presidency of Obama. There were some who wanted to focus on Obama as responsible for the ongoing war in Afghanistan (which,
indeed, he has not only continued but escalated). However, after debate, the viewpoint that prevailed was that it is not a question of an individual, but of a system that is responsible for the war and that is what we need to focus on. Therefore, it would be a mistake to target an individual and to hold one person responsible for the war, since an entire “military-industrial complex” is at issue. We further realized that although we had divergent views on Obama, many people in Chicago felt favorably towards him and we did not think it wise to have the issue be Obama when our real issue is ending the war in Afghanistan (and Iraq). Therefore, we decided that we would hold the march in Hyde Park since we do feel that it is the right and responsibility of all of us living in this country to let the public, officials, including Obama, and whoever else may be paying attention, that we in Chicago oppose the war. We saw ourselves as both protesting the war
and delivering a message of opposition.
>
>
> Those who say the march was an anti-Obama demonstration are not accurate. We don’t understand how it can be viewed as inappropriate to march to Obama’s residence to, as we said, “send a message to the President” that we don’t support the war. After all, the president has on numerous occasions encouraged supporters to push him. We hope, just as those who awarded him the Nobel Peace Prize must hope, that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq will end and that he will help to end them.
>
> There were also comments made about the fact that this was a demonstration composed mainly of white people from the north side. The racial composition was predominantly white. We are not sure of the geographical residence of the participants in the demonstration, nor of the relevance of that.
>
> We respect the right of self-determination of communities of color. However, we do
not feel that Hyde Park can correctly be defined solely as a Black community. We believe it is a more racially mixed community.
>
> We appreciate healthy political debate regarding these issues, but we think the healthiest, most beneficial contribution we all can make to end the war in Afghanistan and Iraq is to organize public opposition to these unjust wars. We need to work together based on what we agree on, not what we disagree on.
>
> John Bartlett
> Margaret Power
> Melinda Power
>
>
>
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