Free Speech Coming under Fire

I recently wrote the article called Imagine ....I Can't. I placed it in my local coalition's discussion room to evoke some discussion about the issues of activists attempting to tone other activists down to present a better PR presentation, activists attempting to censor or script events in one way by discouraging some in their form of expression and activists attempting to tell marginalized people what and how they can express themselves.
The issue of lockstep thinking in the movement is as old as activism. It keeps reappearing. When I was in Crawford, Texas this summer a group of vets standing post down in what we called the ditch ran across an attempt to keep us quiet while Republican protestors across the street were yelling profanity and making accusations about our patriotism.
The veterans led by Dennis Kyne responded by skipping together as Dennis played his "skip" song. It broke the tension some of the younger vets were feeling ...and yes, some of the older also.
When Republicans chanted "USA " we joined them. When they sang patriotic songs we joined them. We were having fun and being loud. A group of handlers from Cindy Sheehan's tent further up the road from our ditch came down and tried to squelch our singing and responding to the Republicans.
Suddenly what was said to be a rally was turned into a vigil according to the handlers. We refused to go along. Our refusal brought down a woman who seemed to always be in charge ...I'm not sure who designated her to be leader but she definitely felt she was.
She broke out a megaphone and scolded the vet group for well over ten minutes as the Republicans listened in glee across the road. Only because a dear friend of the vets who had been Cindy's attorney asked us did we go along.
The woman in charge told the group she would hang around to make sure things were done as expected to add injury to insult.
I wrote about this incident to my local coalition and was accused of being a misogynist by a man who had close ties to Cindy....well she was to go on his radio show in rural Colorado. It seemed there could be no criticism of the whole Cindy phenomenon. Cindy later bailed on the visit after a church in a town close by decided they didn't want her appearance at their church.
In truth I loved what Cindy was about, I hated what some of her handlers and PR people did. Cindy remains a heroine in my eyes.
On another occasion a vet group marching in the September 24th DC rally told a woman I knew from Colorado to leave because she was a member of Code Pink. My friend had come to the vet group to see me because we'd not seen each other for some time. We hugged and were catching up with each other when a vet friend of mine told her she didn't belong with the vets.
Now that was misogynist!! Unfortunately, I was a coward and didn't speak up for Karen. She, however, was very cool and rejoined Code Pink after telling the vet she was just there to see me and catch up.
At a civil disobedience in front of a recruiting station a friend of mine was told to tone things down when she was loud with chanting and made some sarcastic remarks to police. The police actually joked with her while the activists attempted to shut her up. My friend is a person of color who has many family members living in Basra, Iraq.
One would think my friend might have some reason to vent her anger and feelings toward the military and police. "Not allowed", she was told.
These are some of the many attempts to modify or censor behavior and expression I've witnessed just recently.
Now after writing my article called Imagine...I Can't in which I try to have the reader imagine how it might feel to be an innocent civilian in a place like Iraq while under occupation or seige, I'm told I'm targeting certain members of the coalition who organized the rally for Bush's visit on November 29th.
I'm told this because I use the article to demonstrate why some might be angry and passionate enough to use profanity or flip the President off with the middle finger. After detailing the horrors we might experience as innocent civilians in Iraq, I then say I can't try to tell someone not to be outraged or not to express that outrage.
In a week since the rally I've been told I have a personal vendetta against one individual who took exception to my article and chose to use a public discussion room to belittle and criticize me personally rather than just make her opinion known.
When I addressed her objections she became further infuriated with me. There's since been several exchanges that seemed to get uglier and more personal.
One response I made had to do with this person asking me why I didn't focus on the glass half full idea of press coverage. In other words I needed to be positive about our rally getting a good turnout by the press corps.
I was provided a tape of CNN's coverage which focused on protestors flipping off the press buses and the President. The anchor woman and reporter showing the footage acted like the bird was a senseless murder. At one point the anchor said, " well that's enough of that ...."in a tone so serious it made many of us roll in laughter.
Again when I wrote a parody about the Tragedy in Denver, my protagonist accused me of being divisive and negative.
I responded with the following bit of writing.
I've responded individually to C... about her questions on my video posting. I will say the comments were a parody because I found the entire CNN video hilarious. I've written much more of a parody on my blog that includes the video footage.
In the email sent to me by Kelly the comments I read from Mike seemed to indicate humor.
As I told C... in my email to her...I don't see the American press in any way half full...I see it as totally empty. The American press ,to me, are the propaganda stooges of a tyrant causing hundreds of thousands of deaths throughout the world.
If there were anything to laugh about; the American press would be the laughing stock of journalism. They are complicit in the current genocidal bombing and artillery attacks on "chosen" Iraqi cities much like attacks on Fallujah.
Entire cities are being cordoned off with no entry or exit while Americans bomb and shell to rid them of "insurgents". The insurgents continue to include innocent civilians, innocent kids unable to leave these chosen cities. It's the new Vietnamization of Iraq.
Additionally, the El Salvador option is being carried out by the American trained forces against the Sunni communities because Cheney and Rumsfeld have identified theSunni as the insurgency. Every war needs a demon to beat down. Seymour Hersh spoke to this El Salvador option back in January of this year.
For those unfamilar with Hersh, he is the reporter that exposed the My Lai massacre in Vietnam. But as a mainstream journalist, he fails to tell the complete storyof the Middle East. His cognitive dissonance seems to be Palestine.
As for Chief Whittman....the city of Denver ranks very high in cases of deadly force, police brutality and failure to discipline rogue cops. Hopefully he was out on Tuesday to assure there wouldn't be a repeat??
If you think I'm a cop-hater you'd be wrong. My father-in-law was a cop and I loved him dearly. He actually walked the beat in the community he lived in. He later became known as the most progressive warden in the Pennsylvania jail system. He struggled to get funds for inmate education and job programs. His recidivism rate was the lowest in the state.
I saw many former inmates come back years later to talk with him and thank him for the help provided.
I still keep in mind the police are a para-military organization,though. People carrying weapons are potentially dangerous to anybody around them. To me, young males with weapons are frightening as acculturated by this society. I can remember myself as one. I think the potential harm and danger of a police force carrying weapons is reason enough for CopWatch to be in existence. I'm grateful for all the CopWatch folks who work hard to prevent abuse of power.
Peace,Terry
Addendum: I want to remind folks anything I write is always my opinion. I always try to avoid individual attacks or insults.Invariably, some things any of us write or say can be interpeted or perceived negatively by an individual. If you feel offended by any remark I've made please feel free to contact me individually for clarification.
Peace,
Terry
Again and again I met anger and accusation of attacking individuals. A friend of mine then jumped into the argument. Larry is a younger black activist....well he's in his thirties but that's young to me. He has dreds and is quietly outspoken.
Here's an eloquent statement by Larry:
I'm wading in this as well. I was not there yesterday, because I was one of the unlucky ones who could not take off work, seeing as I languished for a long time as a service employee and a day-laborer for scant under the table wages. I'm sure people remember me covered in dry wall dust. Reprimanding people for expressing themselves, however they choose to do so, especially people on the front line, be they people of color, young people or people that have family having bombs dropped on them is sorry indeed. And if some people have sensitive ears, then oh well. I can't appease this weak liberal mentality that eschews harsh language and militant tactics. And, to tell people to organize their own rallies is very divisive. Especially when certain sectors of the peace movement constantly maginalize youth and people of color, opting to invite out the weakest elements of certain communities because they want a Black face, when these elements have never been on the front line of opposing the war anyway. I remember the call for the antiBush rally, and it said be loud and vent and let those bastards hear our righteous outrage, not be PG or G rated.
Larry later wrote an even more eloquent statement I want to give a separate posting to.
But here's what we've become, folks. A group of white middle class activists claiming to want diversity but blocking it by not wanting to upset the neo-conservatives or the mainstream press. We've become a group of press-pandering phonies sucking up to what Dhar Jamail calls the presstitutes called mainstream media.
We don't do things if it's not a good press day. We're coached by media experts on sound bites and cookie cutter responses to questions. Spontaneous outrage is out and toned down sound control is in. We've become them.