When will we EVER learn?!?!
i know, i know...i asked that just a couple days ago, but it is something i have been pondering almost constantly this week. for those of you who don't know, that line is the refrain of a song which was (i believe) written during the vietnam war, called Where Have All The Flowers Gone?.
last weekend at the jim page concert (see my post titled "today was a very good day"), he spoke before one of his songs about something he called "Vietnam Fever". he was referring to the masses, the THOUSANDS of people who flooded the streets and the nation's capital to protest the war. where are those people now? i mean, sure there are protests, demonstrators, marches, but not to the same degree. and where are the young people?? we see veterans protesting and engaging in the events of the election year, but honestly most people my age i know are passively waiting for election day so they can either vote for kerry b/c bush is a bastard, or for bush b/c he is prolife. so, HELLO!? young people! what the hell is our problem?! we have opinions; why aren't we doing anything about them?
do YOU oppose the US occupation of iraq? have you done anything about it?
do you oppose the national guard being shipped overseas? have you done anything about it?
talk helps, but mostly talk is cheap. discussing these issues amongst ourselves has not and will not get much done. we must back up our beliefs with actions. we have no actual power over our country's foreign policy, but WE HAVE POWER TO INFLUENCE THOSE WHO DO!!! now, you might say that they are trying to end the war and would if they could, therefore saying "END THE WAR" is not helpful. but you know what? even if we sit at home and figure out a plan to get out of iraq, this is not an essay contest. we cannot devise a plan and submit it to them. the government might be frustrating, but THEY are still the ones with the means and the power. they just need initiative. they need to be daily reminded that the majority of the people that they "represent" is not supporting them this time. so, SPEAK UP!!!
my mind has been full of these thoughts all week. i trim rose bushes and wonder where all the activists have gone. i am not angry but i am indignant, and i am desparately in need of a constructive means by which to change the times.
and then. i opened the paper during break and saw a picture of a very elderly man holding a sign on a street corner. i assumed he was homeless. but as i read the article i learned that he is a 98-year-old man who has been sitting in front of an abortion clinic EVERY DAY for over 20 years holding a protest sign. every day, folks. for 20+ years! he is NINETY-EIGHT. damn.
do you oppose abortion? have you done anything about it?
some of my friends prayed in front of an abortion clinic once a week for several years. then they stopped. they stopped because IT CLOSED DOWN!!! we can make a difference. we can stand up to things we don't support, and we CAN change them.
i did some research online last night. a man at work (actually, it was the aforementioned "water treatment dude") said something about being shot by the national guard during a protest. i asked my friends about it, but no one knew what he was talking about. i talked to my aunt and also found some sites on google with info. on may 4th, 1970, four college students were shot and killed. nine more were injured. by the national guard. while protesting the vietnam war. the very forces that are supposed to protect us from invasion instead killed some of us for protesting our invasion of others. of course i want to know why. but what i really want to know is: WHY DON'T PEOPLE MY AGE KNOW ABOUT THIS? we had an exchange student from china years ago. she knew nothing about the tienamin square massacre. we were shocked and disgusted by her government or whoever kept this information from public knowledge. now i feel the same way, however. whose idea was it to not tell me about the kent state massacre?? but i am going to tell everyone i know. we cannot be blind to the actions of authority. power is a dangerous weapon and the second that we, the people, are lulled to sleep by a false contentment WILL be the same instant that our rights will be swept away...swiped from us. forever.
i read a statement by a man, a professor now, whose students asked him what he was doing during the vietnam war. luckily he was able to respond that he had been actively protesting and also wrote a book about it. how will we answer the similar question, "what were you doing during the war on iraq?"...by saying, "well, gee, i voted."? is that sufficient?
we are americans. are we still proud of that fact? i'm not. i am relieved that we still have the right to peacably assemble. but our rights, if not used, will disappear.
do you support our government? what are you doing about it?
posted by clara @ 11:00
3 comments
3 Comments:
Dear Clara, You've asked a very tough question. The era of the Vietnam war was a horrible time and ruined the lives of many people. And yes that song was written during the war as a protest song. Like I said in answer to your other questions, I know all the words. One line is "Where have all the young men gone, gone to soldiers everyone". Soldiers died, the young people at Kent State died, many young people protested on the streets, some protested in a quieter fashion by writing letters. Some of us, myself included, wore POW bracelets, with the name of a POW inscribed on them. I had friends who were drafted, some who enlisted, some who ran to Canada and several who died. Two of my friends came home strung out on heroin and eventually died. Most of the men and women who came home from Vietnam were scarred, if not physically, at least mentally. One of the things that caused the mental damage were the protests. Many of the soldiers felt like they had done something wrong, when in fact they were doing what was asked of them. The protesters could have just protested the war, but they took it a step further and cursed and spit on soldiers when they returned home. The "Sit Ins" to protest the war eventually turned into "Love Ins" and with that came drugs and the freedom to do with your body whatever you pleased. And some people destroyed themselves and others. Woodstock happened, communes were built, sex was rampant and abortion became an issue. The protests continued but they became less and less about the war and more about an individual's freedom to do whatever they wanted, regardless of the consequences to themselves and society.
I haven't read a history book in quite a while so don't know if there is any thing in them about that era or if teachers skip over it. What I do know is this: the protesters of that era have grown up. We've had children and grandchildren. Most of the communes folded, and as adults we've realized that some of what we did caused innumerable problems for the generations of today. Children having children, drug abuse, Aids, abortion, etc.
The other thing I know is that it is your right and your duty to protest something you truly find offensive. Not to protest because everyone else is doing it, but because you believe in a cause. And a protest doesn't have to be a mass of out of control people screaming and yelling. There are many ways to protest and I think that's why you don't see what happened during the Vietnam war. No one has taken away the right of people to chain themselves to buildings or take over cities for days and days to protest something. But, I think many of us learned that one of the most effective ways to change something is to vote. Vote someone in or out, your choice. One of the reasons that people can now vote at 18 is a result of the Vietnam war. It seemed wrong to send boys to fight who couldn't even vote, so the laws were changed. Now it is our duty to exercise the right that was given to us to elect the person/s who will do what we think is right. Many people still protest on the streets, they carry signs and megaphones and talk to anyone that will listen. That's their right, no one will take it away. But I don't think you'll see the kind of protests from the Vietnam era ever again. Those protests were not just about the war, many of those protests were against everything our Country stood for and those protester have gone the way of the flowers.
I'm still proud to be an American, even if I'm not always happy with what we've done or are doing, but if I choose to protest today it will be in a more peaceable fashion. Peace, Kitty
Clara, first I am sad to hear that you are not proud to be an American. Pride does not have to be boastful arrogance, or blind narcissism. Pride in America can be the pride of supporting our Constitution and Bill of Rights, and defending those rights. I am curious as to what aspect of the war in Iraq you oppose. Is it the whole idea of war in general, or is there some aspect of this particular war that you disagree with? It seems to me that this war, while avoidable in the beginning, is in fact a Just War. I say this war was avoidable for the simple fact that we did not have to invade Iraq when we did. However, it was nearly unanimous by most all in this country, and many in the rest of the world that it was the right thing to do. We are fighting an enemy that hates not just our occupation of Iraq, but our way of life, our Constitution, our Bill of Rights, our Christian religion, in short, everything about us. For the third time in history, radical Islam has declared “Jihad” on the Christian West. This current war in Iraq is part of that war. We are fighting Jihadists in Iraq that are flocking there from all over the Middle East. This war, if not fought in Iraq or Afghanistan, would be fought elsewhere. We cannot run from this fight, this fight came to us on September 11th 2001. Those who say we are not fighting the same enemy are playing politics. Check out Bin Laden’s Fatwa or declaration of war, first published in Al Quds Al Arabi, a London-based newspaper, in August, 1996. The fatwa is entitled "Declaration of War against the Americans Occupying the Land of the Two Holy Places." This war has been coming for some time. I don’t mean to preach but our freedoms are something that I am PROUD of, and something I think we need to fight this war for. Ok, this is going to get much too long and should really be broken up into separate categories. I realize that the thrust of your post was to question peoples seeming lack of protest these days. I am not sure where the people are, quite possibly on-line blogging their frustration out to the web instead of being in peoples faces. While I support the right to protest I can not say that I support the views espoused by the protestors during Viet Nam, nor the protestors today against the war in Iraq. It is our duty, as Americans, to become informed of the facts to the best of our ability, decipher the rhetoric, and vote our conscious. Many of the protestors have only succeeded in the last duty, but fail to get facts and see through the rhetoric. Ok, sorry, this has gotten much too long. I occasionally have posted some on this topic, but plan for more along this thread. Sorting out what has happened in America in the last 50 years is something that interests me greatly. I’ll stop now. If you’d like check out my blog, I can’t promise much but I am seeking to understand. -dominumutvideam.blogspot.com- Good luck with the roses.
thanks a ton for your feedback! like i've said, i'm not super educated on these issues and it really helps me to hear new facts and opinions. i will try to post more about the war (what i say about it unfortunately is always just opinion) especially as i talk to europeans about it.
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