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Frieda Gardner, W A M M
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STOP THE NEXT WAR NOW: Effective Responses to Violence and Terrorism, Edited by Medea Benjamin and Jodie Evans, Inner Ocean Publishing Inc., 2005, $14.95.
“STOP THE NEXT WAR NOW,” printed in big yellow letters on the front of a bright pink T-shirt worn by a woman, is a grand title for a book. It is a command, a provocation, an invitation to thought and action. It's pessimistic, assuming another war is on our horizon, and optimistic, assuming we will do something to prevent it.
The subtitle, “Effective Responses to Violence and Terrorism,” combines wild hope and realism, because the world right now overbrims with murderous conflict, but also right now, even in America, the empire which seeds violence all over the globe, there is a growing resistance to the war we're in, and to the idea that war will free us from fear of terrorism. The book's editors, Medea Benjamin and Jodie Evans, helped cofound the national women's peace and justice organization Code Pink in 2003, as the Iraq War was being cooked up. Starting from Washington, D.C., and urging women everywhere to join in, Code Pink vigiled, organized rallies and sit-ins at Congress, distributed huge pink buttons of protest, hung pink slips aimed at the war's planners, sent a delegation to Iraq, and joined the millions who marched in protest worldwide in February of 2003.
Many in WAMM, standing on the Marshall Avenue Bridge each Wednesday afternoon or driving around town distributing hundreds of SAY NO TO WAR IN IRAQ yard signs or answering the huge volume of calls asking, “Where's the next demonstration?” recognized with relief and appreciation this new national voice, adding fresh militancy, humor, and inventiveness to the peace and justice movement. Alice Walker, writing the foreword, was not planning to get arrested on International Women's Day of 2003, but the sea of pink, the noisy, irreverent chants, the puppets and music and seriousness reminded her of other times she'd been arrested, so she also crossed the line to protest the deaths that were to be in Iraq, and the vast waste of resources which could be used “to build hospitals, housing and schools” both here and in Iraq.
Though some of the contributors to Stop the Next War Now (SNWN) belong to Code Pink, the book contains essays from a broad range of activist women - young, old, and middle-aged, of various colors, backgrounds, and nations, some lawmakers, some law-breakers, diplomats, writers, dancers, mothers, teachers, muralists, trade unionists, NGO workers, people in the military. It begins with a chapter on the single “voice.” We hear from Camilo Mejia, bravely choosing conscientious objection, and Cindy Sheehan, standing up to the president in behalf of her dead soldier son. The early chapters recommend attention to our very right to dissent, and also urge examination of our relationship to the actual warriors in our “culture of violence” as well as to our dreams and enactments of peace.
Very soon, the editors move to bread-and-butter organizational issues: how to make the peace movement stronger and wiser, how to make women's insights more prominent, how to broaden and deepen our coalitions. The second half of SNWN attacks the some of war's toughest roots: corporate media, entrenched mainstream political parties, the military-industrial complex, and our oil-based economy. Lest we feel the war-world too heavy on our shoulders, the last chapter celebrates “joyful revolution” in nine different ways.
Given its range and depth, I imagine three main uses for SNWN. First, if the names, events and ideas seem familiar to you because you're an engaged peace and justice veteran, you can give it to someone less experienced. Second, if in your political work you need some inspiration or sense of solidarity, try out Eisha Mason's list of all we accomplished in not stopping the Iraq War (stimulating public debate, making our movement more international, relating national to local organizations, etc.). Or find out how Diane Wilson, Texas shrimper and troublemaker, learned how to relate environmental degradation to our need to control world oil markets. Finally, use it as a resource. There are quotations, peace prayers from every major religion, letters, and true life stories. And, of course, websites galore, for protesting vets, families of soldiers, civil libertarians, old- and new- fashioned peace groups, media activists and many others.
Every reader will have a complaint about SNWN. I think there should have been more about the capitalism underlying everything discussed. Aside from Arundhati Roy's introduction, some acknowledgments of American empire and corporate culture, and a chapter on “oil addiction”, our media, legislatures, and military-industrial complex are left unrelated to profit structures. Also, there's a lot of print about holding our elected officials accountable, but little talk of alternatives to two-party system. Still, three of our bravest and most articulate legislators-Cynthia McKinney, Lynn Woolsey and Barbara Lee know how to relate our prisons and poverty to our military budgets. And in the end, for every voice I missed, I heard a new one–Wangari Maathai relating peace and the planting of trees in Kenya, or the young Adrienne Maree Brown, juggling voter registration and radical analysis in Brooklyn. |
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W A M M Action
Code Pink and other groups are sponsoring a huge worldwide petition to be delivered to Congress in time for International Women's Day, Mar. 8th. Sign the petition online.
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© 2006 Women Against Military Madness. All rights reserved.
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Complete February 2006 Index - click here
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