Date: Fri, 14 Jun 2002 19:16:52 -0400
From: Anthony Ryan <tonybook at worldnet.att.net>
Subject:[antifadc] The Guardian 6/14/02 - Statement on the war on terror
To: Acie <aciebyrd at starpower.net>
We won't deny our consciences
Prominent Americans have issued this statement on the war on terror
Friday June 14, 2002
The Guardian
Let it not be said that people in the United States did nothing when their
government declared a war without limit and instituted stark new measures of
repression. The signers of this statement call on the people of the US to
resist the policies and overall political direction that have emerged since
September 11 and which pose grave dangers to the people of the world.
We believe that peoples and nations have the right to determine their own
destiny, free from military coercion by great powers. We believe that all
persons detained or prosecuted by the US government should have the same
rights of due process. We believe that questioning, criticism, and dissent
must be valued and protected. We understand that such rights and values are
always contested and must be fought for.
We believe that people of conscience must take responsibility for what their
own governments do - we must first of all oppose the injustice that is done
in our own name. Thus we call on all Americans to resist the war and
repression that has been loosed on the world by the Bush administration. It
is unjust, immoral and illegitimate. We choose to make common cause with the
people of the world.
We too watched with shock the horrific events of September 11. We too
mourned the thousands of innocent dead and shook our heads at the terrible
scenes of carnage - even as we recalled similar scenes in Baghdad, Panama
City and, a generation ago, Vietnam. We too joined the anguished questioning
of millions of Americans who asked why such a thing could happen.
But the mourning had barely begun, when the highest leaders of the land
unleashed a spirit of revenge. They put out a simplistic script of "good v
evil" that was taken up by a pliant and intimidated media. They told us that
asking why these terrible events had happened verged on treason. There was
to be no debate. There were by definition no valid political or moral
questions. The only possible answer was to be war abroad and repression at
home.
In our name, the Bush administration, with near unanimity from Congress, not
only attacked Afghanistan but arrogated to itself and its allies the right
to rain down military force anywhere and anytime. The brutal repercussions
have been felt from the Philippines to Palestine. The government now openly
prepares to wage all-out war on Iraq - a country which has no connection to
the horror of September 11. What kind of world will this become if the US
government has a blank cheque to drop commandos, assassins, and bombs
wherever it wants?
In our name the government has created two classes of people within the US:
those to whom the basic rights of the US legal system are at least promised,
and those who now seem to have no rights at all. The government rounded up
more than 1,000 immigrants and detained them in secret and indefinitely.
Hundreds have been deported and hundreds of others still languish today in
prison. For the first time in decades, immigration procedures single out
certain nationalities for unequal treatment.
In our name, the government has brought down a pall of repression over
society. The president's spokesperson warns people to "watch what they say".
Dissident artists, intellectuals, and professors find their views distorted,
attacked, and suppressed. The so-called Patriot Act - along with a host of
similar measures on the state level - gives police sweeping new powers of
search and seizure, supervised, if at all, by secret proceedings before
secret courts.
In our name, the executive has steadily usurped the roles and functions of
the other branches of government. Military tribunals with lax rules of
evidence and no right to appeal to the regular courts are put in place by
executive order. Groups are declared "terrorist" at the stroke of a
presidential pen.
We must take the highest officers of the land seriously when they talk of a
war that will last a generation and when they speak of a new domestic order.
We are confronting a new openly imperial policy towards the world and a
domestic policy that manufactures and manipulates fear to curtail rights.
There is a deadly trajectory to the events of the past months that must be
seen for what it is and resisted. Too many times in history people have
waited until it was too late to resist. President Bush has declared: "You're
either with us or against us." Here is our answer: We refuse to allow you to
speak for all the American people. We will not give up our right to
question. We will not hand over our consciences in return for a hollow
promise of safety. We say not in our name. We refuse to be party to these
wars and we repudiate any inference that they are being waged in our name or
for our welfare. We extend a hand to those around the world suffering from
these policies; we will show our solidarity in word and deed.
We who sign this statement call on all Americans to join together to rise to
this challenge. We applaud and support the questioning and protest now going
on, even as we recognise the need for much, much more to actually stop this
juggernaut. We draw inspiration from the Israeli reservists who, at great
personal risk, declare "there is a limit" and refuse to serve in the
occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.
We draw on the many examples of resistance and conscience from the past of
the US: from those who fought slavery with rebellions and the underground
railroad, to those who defied the Vietnam war by refusing orders, resisting
the draft, and standing in solidarity with resisters. Let us not allow the
watching world to despair of our silence and our failure to act. Instead,
let the world hear our pledge: we will resist the machinery of war and
repression and rally others to do everything possible to stop it.
From:
Michael Albert
Laurie Anderson
Edward Asner, actor
Russell Banks, writer
Rosalyn Baxandall, historian
Jessica Blank, actor/playwright
Medea Benjamin, Global Exchange
William Blum, author
Theresa Bonpane, executive director, Office of the Americas
Blase Bonpane, director, Office of the Americas
Fr Bob Bossie, SCJ
Leslie Cagan
Henry Chalfant,author/filmmaker
Bell Chevigny, writer
Paul Chevigny, professor of law, NYU
Noam Chomsky
Stephanie Coontz, historian, Evergreen State College
Kia Corthron, playwright
Kevin Danaher, Global Exchange
Ossie Davis
Mos Def
Carol Downer, board of directors, Chico (CA) Feminist Women's Health Centre
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, professor, California State University, Hayward
Eve Ensler
Leo Estrada, UCLA professor, Urban Planning
John Gillis, writer, professor of history, Rutgers
Jeremy Matthew Glick, editor of Another World Is Possible
Suheir Hammad, writer
David Harvey, distinguished professor of anthropology, CUNY Graduate Centre
Rakaa Iriscience, hip hop artist
Erik Jensen, actor/playwright
Casey Kasem
Robin DG Kelly
Martin Luther King III, president, Southern Christian Leadership Conference
Barbara Kingsolver
C Clark Kissinger, Refuse & Resist!
Jodie Kliman, psychologist
Yuri Kochiyama, activist
Annisette & Thomas Koppel, singers/composers
Tony Kushner
James Lafferty, executive director, National Lawyers Guild/LA
Ray Laforest, Haiti Support Network
Rabbi Michael Lerner, editor, Tikkun magazine
Barbara Lubin, Middle East Childrens Alliance
Staughton Lynd
Anuradha Mittal, co-director, Institute for Food and Development Policy/Food
First
Malaquias Montoya, visual artist
Robert Nichols, writer
Rev E Randall Osburn, executive vice president, Southern Christian
Leadership Conference
Grace Paley
Jeremy Pikser, screenwriter
Jerry Quickley, poet
Juan Gumez Quiones, historian, UCLA
Michael Ratner, president, Centre for Constitutional Rights
David Riker, filmmaker
Boots Riley, hip hop artist, The Coup
Edward Said
John J Simon, writer, editor
Starhawk
Michael Steven Smith, National Lawyers Guild/NY
Bob Stein, publisher
Gloria Steinem
Alice Walker
Naomi Wallace, playwright
Rev George Webber, president emeritus, NY Theological Seminary
Leonard Weinglass, attorney
John Edgar Wideman
Saul Williams, spoken word artist
Howard Zinn, historian
Contact the Not In Our Name statement
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002
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