SHARE YOUR CITY'S PEACE RALLY HERE.

Thanks for this, tresspassers will:





Thank you, Tartarin, again ...



And thanks, wolf, for that information. Good to see that more is planned.

85.000 to phone in their opinions today.

http://moveon.org/

I was happy to see TW finally began to see a little light in the arguments of others. As for him keeping his location a mystery, that is very wise, especially if he calls me a bedwetter a second time.

Joe

I never chanted, raised my voice, confronted anyone or was disrespectful to those around me. I simply held my sign and stood my ground. The abuse came first from a small group of homemakers standing near me, their small children dressed in red, white and blue.

"Go home! You don't belong here," they said.

All around me folks began to speak up, and it wasn't long before a large group of people crossed the street with banners and flags and began aggressively yelling "Go USA!" Bob, a young man with a ball cap and a sign reading "Drop Bush, Not Bombs" came and stood with me for support.

The really frightening stuff began when a television cameraman stopped and asked me why I was there. As soon as the crowd saw the camera pointed at me, they went wild. I was trying to express myself and they screamed at me and over my voice. A man stood behind me making obscene gestures as I spoke.

The reporter tried three times, unsuccessfully, to get a picture without obscenity. One woman spat in my hair. The journalist gave up and moved on. The mob did not. Men and women violently screamed in my face and Bob's.

It stopped just long enough for the president's motorcade to pass by and then erupted again. We were told to " Get the f--- out of the country," had obscene gestures pushed in our faces. An elderly man told me to "Go to hell!"

Disagree at your own risk

If not war then what?

In recent weeks, it has become the hawks' favourite riposte to mounting anti-war sentiment. But should critics of military action have to answer it? And, if so, can they offer any real alternative? We asked 48 high-profile opponents of the war to tackle the question.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/page/0,12438,903942,00.html

Sorry Nimh,

Looks like the same old same old. Not a practical option to getting on with what must be done in the lot that I could see.

the idea of "coercive containment" works for me

nice turn of a pharse dyslexia, you are a master -

Well, yes, linking the stories didnt necessarily mean endorsing them. I had posted the link because I thought the peace rallyers here would enjoy / appreciate the stories there.

I was kind of dissapointed by many of them myself. I do think that - for all the validity of their many reasons to be against the war, or this war - the question what then they propose to do about Iraq is the weak point of the peace movement (however variegated it is).

I find a surprising number of answers on that question are in fact versions of avoiding it, even if on the basis of legitimate enough arguments. You know, as in: what to do about hussein as a human rights violator/ dictator? "Well, as if that's what the US are interested in! They've never given a damn, they didnt intervene when he gassed the Kurds, were funding and arming him still at the time! And now you see, too, that they bring up the humanitarian argument for attacking Iraq at such a late time as to have no credibility for any sincere concern. And it's not as if the war won't lead to ethnic strife, or for example to Turkish troops taking the occassion to stifle the Kurds - and you know what the Turks, unhampered by any US pressure, do to their own Kurds" ... et cetera. Well, yeh, I always think in such a discussion, that may all be true, but still: what do you propose to do about hussein as a human rights violator/dictator?

Some of those interviewed in the link above do propose various alternatives, though they have the one problem in that the alternative to war usually proposed by peace activists - imposing sanctions - has already been tried here, and protested against by their very peers. Some of the commenters in the linked stories however explicitly say: it is not up to us to come up with alternatives; it's up to the government to make the case for war, and it's doing a bad job at it. And though I would agree with the latter, I find the former, as an answer, just ... not just. I don't think you can get away with that answer if there are Iraqi exiles and Kurdish dissidents saying, we're not interested in what the US's motivations are, we want them to start their war cause it's the only way for us to ever become free.

Sorry, I guess I'm straying off-topic again.

Nimh

Your point on alternatives is well considered. Of course, on the other side of the coin, we can make the very real error of assuming war is a terminal solution, a 'that'll fix everything' finality. In the case of Iraq, it might fix getting Sadaam out, and that is clearly the objective of this administration, but further than that is tough to predict with much certainty. And, in truth, the US in the last half century, has not had a great record for sticking around after regime changes.

But of course, there are alternatives. How many billions has the US already spent simply in bribes to Guinea and Turkey etc? You'd think that with all the consultants like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz chasing ambulances around Washington, some small portion of those billions could produce a few good ideas. Sure, Boeing would be really pissed, war being quite ideal as an income generation mechanism, but there must be one or two 'consultants' not attached to the arms machine. Maybe.

I have to admit that was something that helped drive me away from Abuzz: the assumption that if you posted a link -- "for your interest" -- you endorsed the opinion in the piece you linked to. Could we try not to do that here? The implication is that we shouldn't be reading or sharing anything that opposes our views!

I agree, Tartarin.

Meanwhile, FYI:

https://www.moveon.org/localads/?zip=55345

PDiddie, scary.

They turned the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras in Sydney last night into a peace demonstration of sorts. 250 000 people there.

TOKYO - Over 6,000 Japanese formed the human letters "No War" in a park in western Japan Sunday in a rally against a possible U.S.-led attack on Iraq

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030302/ap_wo_en_ge/as_gen_japan_anti_war_protest_1

Thousands hold 'million man march' in Pakistani port city against war on Iraq
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030302/ap_wo_en_ge/as_gen_pakistan_million_man_march_7


200,000 Yemenis protest war in Iraq

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030301/ap_wo_en_po/me_gen_mideast_anti_war_protests_1

Sozobe -- I guess we're all MoveOn members here! I did indeed contribute and noticed when I went back in this morning they're wildly oversubscribed. I tellya... the antiwar movement is getting stronger by the minute. There was a pro-war rally in Houston yesterday (see today's H Chronicle) with Tom DeLay and other lovely people of that ilk speaking. Not, uh, all that well attended. I think the chickenhawks were pretty embarrassed by a previous rally in San Antonio which totally bombed. Link to this is over on UN US Iraq if you need it.

I heard on war radio this morning (think it was Beck) that the chickenhawks would be mighty happy to have 5,000 marchers in San Antonio. I guess they figure if they have 1 for every 50 then it is equal. Typical Extreme Right Wing math!

Peace T-shirt leads to man's arrest

ALBANY, N.Y., March 4 - A Selkirk man says he was arrested Monday for expressing his objection to possible war with Iraq at Crossgates Mall. He says all he did was wear a T-shirt bearing a message of peace, which he actually purchased in the mall.

http://www.msnbc.com/local/WNYT/M276307.asp?0cv=NB10

Students protesting in the centre of Sydney yesterday. The same in Melbourne & Adelaide, too.
Heard a brief report of similar activities in London on the news.

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/03/05/1046826443811.html

~

Of course the front page of the Sydney newspaper carried a large photograph of a student being arrested. There were 3 arrests.

wilso

I was so PROUD of all the young people at the rallies on the 14th & 15th of February. So serious & committed.
And now I'm impressed they're organising their own rallies. The future can't be ALL bad, can it?