Antiwar Grannies arm themselves with toy soldiers
by Doug Grow
Star Tribune
Published February 25, 2006
Rejected by the Army, Grandmothers for Peace has opened up a new front in expressing opposition to the war in Iraq.
The Grandmothers, sometimes working in conjunction with Women Against Military Madness, are leaving toy plastic soldiers around the metro. Attached to each one is the message: "Please bring me home."
So far, they say, about 500 of the tiny troops have been placed in buses and coffee shops and on store shelves. The Minnesota chapter of Grandmothers for Peace International has no way of knowing who is finding the soldiers.
Erica Bouza, a serious pacifist who laughs easily, is the strategist behind this action. The spouse of former Minneapolis Police Chief Tony Bouza, she first gained attention locally in the 1980s when she'd be arrested protesting by the cops who worked for her husband.
Almost 75 years old, she's still protesting. But like many of her contemporaries, she understands that the classic protest of the 1960s -- people on a street corner waving signs and listening to predictable speeches -- no longer captures the imagination of many.
"It gets tedious to demonstrate," she said. "The only perk is that you're with your friends. I seldom go to the speeches anymore. And you [in the media] certainly don't go."
So Grandmothers for Peace put their heads together to try to come up with creative ways to get their message out.
In December, the Grandmothers marched into a recruiting office near the Minneapolis campus of the University of Minnesota seeking to enlist so their grandchildren would not have to become "cannon fodder" for the war in Iraq.
Bouza still laughs about the greeting they got from the recruiter.
Grandmothers: "We'd like to join the Army."
Recruiter: "You're too old."
Grandmothers: "How do you know?"
Recruiter: "Show me a driver's license. ... You were born in 1931!?"
Eventually, the recruiters decided the easiest way to deal with the Grandmothers was to let them fill out enlistment forms.
"Then," Bouza said, "the Army sent us notices: 'You're rejected. Too old.' "
Not able to enlist, the Grandmothers turned to the little green plastic soldiers a few months ago.
"It wasn't my idea," said Bouza, who won't divulge whose idea it was. "But I loved it."
She goes to stores where party products are sold to purchase the little plastic troops.
"They're used as party favors," she said. "They come in bags of 15 for $2. I pay cash so they can't track me down."
The most difficult part of the job, she said, is stapling the "bring-me-home" message to the soldiers. Once outfitted, the troops are distributed among the Grandmothers who make the final deployments.
"It's like the mark of Zorro," Bouza said. "They just suddenly appear. It's just a little thing. But maybe it will raise the consciousness of somebody who comes across them."
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