Monday, January 17, 2005

On MLK Day, conscientious objectors have history on their side

Posted by Mickey Z on 01/17 at 07:28 AM
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  1. Thanks, Mickey Z.  If you have questions about Progressive Blogger Union, please e-mail me

    Posted by deb from Seattle  on  01/17  at  10:53 AM

  2. Great post. I’m reading through Zinn’s book right now. Kinda puts everything in a nearly hopeless perspective when you realize how long the whole sham has been going on.

    Happy MLK day everyone.

    Just an aside note the “reaching out to homeless veterans” image needs to be put on a white background or have it’s gif transparency removed. It’s nearly illegible.

    Sorry couldn’t resist… ;)

    Posted by Luna_C from The Great White North, what's a Calif boy doing he  on  01/17  at  11:38 AM

  3. How does one remove gif transparency?

    Posted by Mickey Z. from   on  01/17  at  11:58 AM

  4. You could send me the original image and I can tweak it for you if you like. I don’t know what platform you’re using or what applications you use for images. Otherwise, I could probably walk you through the steps.

    Posted by Harry from   on  01/17  at  12:19 PM

  5. I found one on the web. It wasn’t high quality to begin with, I’m afraid.

    Posted by Harry from   on  01/17  at  12:36 PM

  6. Thanks for your help, Harry...but I work with a standard blog template. Almost mistake-proof. I have no idea about the software used, etc. Nancy from Press Action is my web hero and swoops in to save the day if I screw up. For now, I’ll just find another image for this post.

    Posted by Mickey Z. from   on  01/17  at  12:41 PM

  7. Oops, Sorry for leaving you hanging like that. I had to leave to commute into work and just saw your posts. Looks like Harry helped you out already. Good job! smile

    In the future if you ever need any 2d work or 3D work done for your site or anything. Feel free to drop me a line and I’ll hook you up no problem.

    I’ll send you a link to my portfolio if your interested. 

    Peace and Love

    Posted by Luna_C from A rain soaked location in Vancouver.  on  01/17  at  01:55 PM

  8. Thanks...all the support is appreciated. Plus, it pushed me to find a better image for this post.

    Posted by Mickey Z. from   on  01/17  at  02:03 PM

  9. Shays’s Rebellion, like the Whiskey Rebellion that followed, is proof that ideals seldom survive the transition to power.  And MZ, I think you want “hanged” as the past tense of “to hang” unless you’re calling the dead guys either Xmas stockings or well-endowed.  I’m fighting a rear-guard action against Norma Loquendi here, but I won’t give this one up as easily as I did the one on “whom.”

    Posted by Richard from The great Red State of Texas  on  01/17  at  02:43 PM

  10. I’m not hung up about this...change is made but I can’t hang out right now.

    Posted by Mickey Z. from   on  01/17  at  04:14 PM

  11. Oh ha ha.  Good double shot!

    Posted by Richard from The great Red State of Texas  on  01/17  at  05:20 PM

  12. Great choice of quotes:

    “When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplet of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.”

    Whew!

    That says it all...and then some.

    On this day in 2005 we are up to our necks.

    The triumvirate of “isms” is gorging itself on all life-on-earth and the planet itself.

    Virtually nothing is left un-ravaged, untouched, un-owned, unoccupied, or uncivilized.

    If any of you have seen “The Corporation” (http://www.thecorporation.com) there is a segment in which one of the major-league capitalists lays out his plan to privatize every inch of public space on this blue-and-green marble. It was a very telling and moving moment. But that’s not when I choked-up...no that happened during the abused-and-tortured animals-for-food-and-products segment.

    Anything for a buck after all.

    Back to Z’s Rebellion:

    Yes, I too would support a modern day Shay’s Rebellion comprised of War Resisters, Conscientious Objectors...and a slew of others as well.

    Mickey Z’s dream and the weight of this day remind me of words I’ve heard spoken by Ward Churchill (Pacifism as Pathology) during a discussion between George Lakey and Ward Churchill on the so-called polarity between Non-Violence and Violence (http://tinyurl.com/4v9ef):

    [26:40 Mark]
    “How many of you out there support the EZLN...the Zapatistas? In principle...I don’t mean bein’ in the jungle carrin’ a rifle alright, obviously you’re here, not there. But in principle. [hands are raised] How many of you do not? Nobody not? There’s one that doesn’t, OK. To the extent that the preponderance of hands that went out [sic] were affirmative then I can say...that you support armed struggle...everywhere but here.”

    [28:54 Mark]
    “...the idea of a principled non-violence is an absurdity in a construction of violence. One in a position of relative disempowerment concedes nothing to power, forecloses no options, keeps options open, scrambles for every advantage that can be obtained, either tactically in a physical sense, or psychologically, particularly the latter. And in foreclosing as a matter of principle a certain privilege is revealed. Those who would not under any circumstances, or at least profess that position, resort to physical force occupy a position of presumed privilege where they will never have to confront direct peril.”

    And apropos of today, on the subject of Martin Luther King’s “non-violent” Civil Rights Movement:

    [31:55 Mark]
    “There were [sic] never a moment when it did not resort to armed force. By way of informing the F.B.I., for example, of its schedule of activities to try to coerce the F.B.I. by exposure…into doing its job. And the last time I looked the F.B.I, the local police, the county police, the other agencies that were supposed to provide protection to the marchers were in fact armed and this was known that they were armed and there was a recourse [sic] to the armed force of the state to provide protection to people pursuing their rights. And you may think that’s an extreme case, but that’s an acknowledgement of the absence of purity in the paradigm even of the most avowedly non-violent of all movements. And that’s not even taking into consideration the fact that there was active collaboration going on with the Deacons of [sic] Defense and Justice throughout the south on every single march that was organized by the S.C.L.C. [Southern Christian Leadership Conference] and that was an armed formation. It wasn’t publicized to a considerable extent but it was certainly understood that they would be there and were in fact solicited to be there by Martin Luther King and the other organizers of the marches at Selma and so forth.”

    And if I may be so bold as to sort of wrap all three of those quotes up in a not-so-neat package:

    [38:33 Mark]
    “Gandhi posited a principle which seems to have been forgotten in the discourse of non-violence in the United States and has been for a very long time and that is in order to be effective, non-violent Revolutionists must have already demonstrated the capacity to strike. And by that he meant in the most physical possible terms.”

    Food for thought as we contemplate the future of the Left...or what’s left of the Left.

    I leave you with dessert and coffee:

    http://www.kiddofspeed.com/
    ("Ukraine’s Orange Revolution")

    and

    http://resist.ca/story/2004/12/23/72242/667
    (I like the Delegitimate-Disobey-Disrupt approach...but are the numbers there...)

    I’m as chicken-s^*t and non-violent as they come...but as M.L.K. said:

    “I submit to you that if a man hasn’t discovered something he will die for, he isn’t fit to live”.

    And the after-dinner-candy must be Richard’s bittersweet observation:

    “...ideals seldom survive the transition to power”

    In solidarity and complicity,

    David Emanuel

    Posted by David Emanuel from Yonkers, NY  on  01/17  at  09:39 PM

  13. On the subject of “Supporting the Troops”:

    I’ve struggled with my feelings about the soldiers.

    I cannot call them “our soldiers”.

    They are not our soldiers.

    They are the System’s soldiers.

    They are our brothers, sisters, mothers and fathers...but not our soldiers.

    I know full well they are not fighting for me and in some very real sense it can be said they are fighting against me.

    I recently came across words which forced me to begin to think differently.

    The words posit the theory that in an exploitative system—such as the American System—everybody is exploited, top to bottom, side to side.

    With regard to Operation-Occupation-and-Obliteration in Iraq and Afghanistan, I find it difficult to say the victimization is equal in measure. But I realize that may not be the point. When all is said and done...you have life of all kinds on both sides of the conflict being destroyed, irreparably damaged, permanently maimed, or snuffed out for no good reason at all.

    The State and the System use up their soldiers much the same way one uses up a tube of toothpaste or a box of cereal.

    They are kept around and cared for as long as they yield service to the consumer.

    Once the product is no longer serviceable it goes in the trash with the rest of the garbage.

    I cannot support the soldiers of a merciless killing-and-torturing machine.

    But I can have empathy, sympathy, compassion, and understanding for the empty shells it spits out.

    Peace,

    David Emanuel

    Posted by David Emanuel from Yonkers, NY  on  01/17  at  10:26 PM

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