September 15, 2001
The Left Unilaterally Disarms
by Rick Giombetti
What good is a Bill of Rights if individuals and organizations are
willing to throw it in the trash can in the face crisis and danger?
The AFL-CIO, International Rivers Network, Rainforest Action Network,
the Sierra Club, the Rukus Society and Friends of the Earth are among
the many liberal organizations that have announced that they are
canceling protests and even suspending entire campaigns because of
the September 11 terror attacks.
It's bad enough that the mass media is leading the drum beat for war
and the public towards a deadly embrace with fascism in the wake of
the tragic attacks. Now much of the left is engaging in what amounts
to unilateral disarmament at a time when the Bill of Rights needs as
many defenders as possible.
There is much justified fear about a suspension of constitutional
rights and marshal law. But what government needs to ban
demonstrations if there isn't anybody willing to hold them?
Perhaps the most disturbing example of this is an internal Sierra
Club memo circulated among the organization's leadership and staff
secured by the D.C. political newsletter Counter Punch. The memo
explains that "in response to the attacks on America we are shifting
our communications strategy for the immediate future. We have taken
all of our ads off the air; halted our phone banks; removed any
material from the web that people could perceive as anti-Bush, and we
are taking other steps to prevent the Sierra Club from being
perceived as controversial during the crisis. For now we are going to
stop aggressively pursuing our agenda and will cease bashing Bush."
Imagine if Martin Luther King had spouted similar tripe in his
"Beyond Vietnam" speech. In that great speech given a year-to-the-day
before he was assassinated on April 4, 1967, King denounced the U.S.
war against Vietnam and called the U.S. Government the greatest
purveyor of violence in the world. How forgetful that speech would
have been had King urged advocates for social justice to not say
anything "too controversial" about the Vietnam War and not to say
anything that could be perceived by people as being "anti-Johnson."
King's sentiments weren't popular among much of the general public
but he wouldn't be remembered as the great activist he was if he
didn't have the courage to express his convictions.
Among the groups canceling its participation in the upcoming
IMF/World Bank demonstrations is Friends of the Earth. FoE President
Brent Blackwelder wrote in a message to the organization's board and
membership that "it is also time for us to not lose heart, nor to set
aside our steadfast commitment to protecting the planet in every way
possible." He then justifies FoE's pullout from the IMF/World Bank
demonstration by stating that it is "out of respect for those who
lost their lives and out of concern for the safety of protesters, we
have chosen to demonstrate our commitment to peace and justice by not
demonstrating."
Now let me get this straight. According to FoE's reasoning, those
demonstrators who do show up in DC on September 29 will be engaging
in violence instead of expressing their own commitments to peace and
justice.
FoE's reasoning for pulling out of the IMF/World Bank demonstrations
is in harmony with the FBI's classification of Reclaim The Streets!
as a "terrorist" organization. RTS! is a movement that advocates
holding unpermitted block parties in urban areas. Yes, with an army
of DJ's armed with an arsenal of CD's and LP's, RTS! will be
terrorizing an urban area near you. WHAT ABSOLUTE NONSENSE! Is a
lobotomy a requirement for becoming a leader of a liberal
organization!? David Brower must be rolling over in his grave right
now!
A more honest, and reasonable, explanation for pulling out of the
IMF/World Bank demonstrations would be to explicitly state fear of
police violence. Blackwelder never once mentions this possibility in
his message, leaving the impression that it is protesters, not
police, who would be the cause of violence if they were to show up
and demonstrate. The only thing he needed to write was something like
"we're afraid the police are going to shoot demonstrators." That
would be a fair enough reason for not wanting to hold a protest.
Instead he wrote a confusing sentence that reads like it is comparing
holding a peaceful demonstration with blowing up a building. And I'm
really tired of hearing "we're canceling our demonstration out of
respect for those who lost their lives." Yeah, what a fine way to
honor the September 11 victims. Let's unilaterally give up our
constitutional rights and join the flag waivers at the Sierra Club in
helping the war makers usher in fascism.
The great environmental warrior David Brower would certainly not be
expressing the above mentioned nonsense and he most likely would be
endorsing the International Action Center's (IAC) call for an
anti-war rally at the White House on September 29 instead of the
planned anti-IMF/World Bank rally. Holding an anti-war rally on S29
would be a bold and potentially hazardous action. Such a
demonstration could be met with both police and counter-demonstrator
violence.
However, with Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell blaming the ACLU,
People for the American Way, gays, lesbians, atheists, pagans,
feminists and abortion doctors for the terror attacks and pogroms
against Arabs and/or Muslims underway, now is not the time to back
down from defending the Bill of Rights. There is no better time to
stand up for principles than when they are deeply unpopular. If
anti-Vietnam war protesters had postponed demonstrations until it was
convenient and safe to hold them, then that movement would have never
gotten off the ground. Also, and most importantly, by not pulling out
of a planned and already permitted demonstration, the IAC will force
the government to try to cancel it. This way an organization like the
ACLU can make an issue out of the demonstration being canceled in
court. This can't happen though if individuals or organizations are
insisting on not upholding their constitutional rights. Even if a
march doesn't happen, organizing for one right now is far better than
the unilateral disarmament the above mentioned liberal organizations
are engaging in.
Let's not let the September 11 terror attacks be remembered as an
American Reichstag Fire. Here in Seattle the Church Council of
Greater Seattle is organizing to protect mosques from violent
attacks. An attempted arson against a Seattle mosque has already been
reported. Meanwhile, Seattle peace activists are considering holding
demonstrations and teach-ins in as little as a week from now. They
should follow through on these plans. Staying at home and not
demonstrating isn't going to prevent fascism.
http://www.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=64091&group=webcast
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Macdonald Stainsby
Rad-Green List: Radical anti-capitalist environmental discussion.
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