When is the line crossed? At what point does our relatively ineffective passive resistance to the torture regime, inspired by Bushist fascism, become collaboration because we refuse to take a more direct subversive stand?
I can think of any number of non-violent measures that would successfuly frustrate the feds, but most of these would likely come at great personal cost, including imprisonment or worse. I always indulged myself with the fantasy that I would not have sat idly by during the Holocaust, but having done little more than talk in the face of Bushist atrocities, I am no longer convinced of my own moral fortitude.
I want to take action. I want to start swinging back for all those who have suffered in my name as an American. I will not engage in violence, but there is a lot more I could be doing.
Across the country there have been protests, with plenty of signs and slogans and shouting and melodramatics. However little has changed. In fact, as you know, the Bushists are more firmly in control of the country than ever.
I think it's time to do more than march. But do enough of us, do I, have the courage to blockade government buildings and military bases? Do we dare drive a hundred boats fifty yards off the coast of Gitmo with banners and bullhorns demanding openness and justice? Are there any with enough guts to charge and occupy buildings used by this government to run their terror regime? Do we have the nerve to organize ourselves into cells of non-violent resistance, to start thinking and acting like a true party of opposition, working under a unified strategy and with a command structure to manage logistics, to determine targets for political action, to network regional and national events of civil disobedience?
At some point, should we fail to act against the criminal abuses of the federal government, we become complicit with it. At some point, it seems to me, we have to stop repeating the cliché, "we support our troops" (with an implied "right or wrong"), and start demanding that our "troops" take personal responsibility for their actions, whether under orders or not. That they act like Americans, God damn it, regardless they be at home or abroad. Beyond torture, our soldiers and paramilitary agents and private contractors (mercenaries) have recklessly brutalized and murdered civilians, sometimes with intent and sometimes inadvertently; they have destroyed the personal property of noncombatants; they have humiliated civilians; they have destroyed non-military targets; they have arrested persons without due process of law. I don't support that, and I don't support "our troops" when they do these things. Furthermore, I expect them to disobey orders of an immoral or illegal nature. But then again, how can I expect them to tell their superiors to pound sand and risk court marshal if I am not willing to take similar risks as a civilian?
So before action can be taken, I must stop being a hypocrite and discover my manhood and human soul. And to have any effect, thousands of us must do the same.
Mark Parker (mjgzmark)
Banning, CA
(The now infamous SusanG can vouch for me that I'm not a government plant trying to stir up trouble with which to frame the masses.)