Stopping the next war
Commenting on Seymour Hersh’s New Yorker article about Bush administration plans to get the US into a war with Iran, Eliot Gelwan wonders what we can do beyond blog:
Throughout my life, I have been much more of an activist (literal meaning: “one who is active”, right?) than during the mounting outrages of the Bush years, despite my growing conviction this administration’s insanity presents the greatest threat to life as we know it that I have seen in my lifetime. Somehow I justified my complacency by saying that my weblogging activities are a sufficiently potent form of activism, spreading the word (yeah, right to my all of 300 or so daily visitors??). But none of the righteous weblogging indignation of a community of writers far more articulate and passionate than I am stopped the tragic debacle of the destruction of Iraq. Part of the problem is how inured we have become to the outrages of the Bush era as they have accumulated unceasingly. But the outrages to which we are ramping up now are transcendent, and now is the time for far more. What can you, we, do to make sure the administration does not pursue this mad course of action?
Like Eliot, I’m not as active as I used to be. Age? Health? Burnout? Tactical and strategic confusion? Competing political, family, job priorities? All of it, no doubt, and more.
This is important — not my own intermittent inertia in itself, but the fact that it is so widely shared. Our hesitancy helps sustain the status quo of power and privilege. But it’s not clear what would make enough of us do more, or what the result would be if we did, and without some hint at what might happen, it’s hard to get us out to do …. what? More massive marches against war, or for impeachment? Civil disobedience? Some media-friendly symbolic campaign? Blocking military bases? Another Michael Moore movie? Moving to Teheran to become human shields? Are we trying to prevent this next war by returning a Democrat to the White House so that he or she can run the next war after that, or do we aim to end the military-industrial complex regardless of who runs it, and how will we do that, exactly? Does preventing the war require a single-issue movement or is time to recognize, again, that we need something more comprehensive?
The proliferation of goals and options makes it hard to figure out what to focus on. For many years I’ve told myself that maybe it doesn’t matter all that much which track I take. Organizing meetings, writing for a blog or the alternative press, melding academic concerns about law and justice with political theory and struggle, attending occasional rallies or forums that others have organized — since it all makes some sense, it no longer seems to matter exactly what I choose, or even which issue I emphasize. I do what I can, at the moment. So I end up scattered, much less productive than local activists I see everywhere. Meanwhile, the multitude of conflicting analyses and goals leaves what used to be called, somewhat hopefully, The Movement scattered and splintered as well.
Eliot and I both live in Brookline, Massachusetts, where the local Peaceworks group has spent years leafleting, picketing, organizing. In liberal Brookline, Peaceworks has many sympathizers. Town Meeting will probably vote next month to support impeaching George Bush. Would Brookline be more opposed to the war if I had continued going to meetings after the first year or so? If so, would the town’s anti-war fervor be even higher, and if it was, would it make a difference? I don’t think so, but of course I can’t know for sure. I do think I’d feel better about my efforts if I had more of them to point at.
There is, of course, a large literature on tactics, running meetings, educating the public, preventing burnout, and much more. It is all useful. It doesn’t feel like it’s enough right now.
I share Eliot’s sense that the time has come for far more. Eliot, what say we have coffee and figure out what to do next?
May 24th, 2007 at 2:59 pm
I just stumbled on your blog while doing some random googling. Anyway, I share your sentiment. The heart that beats in my chest desires radical action to support radical change, yet there are forces to overcome, so not so easy. Namely my family, my commitment to them to support them and put food on their table and to be around to raise my children and love my spouse. I can’t do that if I am in jail, or dead for that matter. Is it possible that the window of oppurtunity has passed for those like us?