Protests
reminiscent of Vietnam
Peace activists are patriotic, not un-American
COMMENTARY
Jeff Brubaker
Everywhere you look, there are people disgusted with
the constant war rhetoric of the United States. In the
past weeks, hundreds of thousands of people have taken
to the streets to protest President Bush and his hawkish
plans for war with Iraq, but while such protests lead
others to question their patriotism, it in fact makes
them more American.
The current situation in many ways mirrors that of the
peace movement during the Vietnam War. While many would
say the peace movement of the 1960s and 1970s was nothing
more than a blip on the political radar screens, there
is a definitive resurgence of anti-war sentiment. Many
of our parents took part in the protests of those turbulent
years; are they less patriotic for having done so?
As much as more conformist groups would like to admit,
the framers of our country were protesters of their
government. They saw a system that was corrupt and malfunctioning
and sought to change it for the better. The 250 people
who were arrested in New York City Feb. 15 probably
see themselves in the same light. Would the commanding
faces of Mount Rushmore disapprove of such efforts?
I, for one, could not imagine a Benjamin Franklin or
a John Adams adhering to the rules of a government they
deemed unjust and immoral.
Americans are growing uneasy as world opinion seems
to be turning more and more against them. Britain, our
closest ally, even boasted over a million people in
Londons streets to protest what they see as U.S.
imperialism. Are they wrong? Websters Dictionary
defines imperialism as extending a nations authority
by acquisition of territory; is that not what the United
States is doing in Afghanistan, and what Bush plans
to do by occupying Iraq?
What might the great thinkers of history say about our
so-called patriotism? Voltaire said, It is lamentable,
that to be a good patriot one must become the enemy
of the rest of mankind.
George Bernard Shaw wrote: patriotism is your
conviction that this country is superior to all other
countries because you were born in it.
If patriotism carries with it such ethnocentric virtues,
I want no part of it.
None of this means that hippies are taking over; the
flower power train has not yet left the
station, but an ethical response is reacting to Bushs
warmongering. People are feeling compelled to voice
their opinion, to exercise their rights in an attempt
to prevent what they see has an unjust war.
It would be wrong to think protesters are in anyway
un-American because they are using their First Amendment
rights. We cannot take a fundamental liberty and turn
it against a citizen.
Jeff
Brubaker is a junior history major from Weslaco.
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