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[FWIW, this is an extended comment I made to Selise in my last diary.]
Selise, why am I the only person in America wearing a black arm band?
A woman, an acquaintance, yesterday asked me if I had a death in my family. I said the arm band was for my country. I put it on back in mid-May for the illegal torture travesty, vowing as soon as the Obama administration cleaned up that travesty I would take it off.
I told her I also keep it on now for the travesties of the wars. So many deaths of Americans and Middle Eastern peoples for power and money. Not for helping humanity.
I told her I am also now wearing it for the 45,000 premature American deaths each year for lack of health care.
I wish I could say I was verbally assertive with the woman who asked, like the black arm band itself, but instead I was apologizing for being an "eccentric". Since mid-May only three people have ever asked about the arm band. She caught me off guard.
What a goofy middle-aged woman I was running around with a black arm band for the state of her country. That’s how I sadly saw myself reflected in her eyes. She looked dismayed, not unkind, but definitely not getting it, not comfortable with "it" or me at that moment, despite her nods of acknowledgment the country was screwed up as I began spewing the insane situations of our country. So many fresh and not so fresh hells. Or maybe she was backing away because she just wanted me to shut up about it all.
As I turned away I suddenly thought, "There is nothing psychologically wrong with me!" Unless it is that the black arm band isn’t personally dramatic enough considering the horrifying trouble this country and its people are in.
Power is in the hands of the betraying leadership and also the apathetic sheeple, who I guess have their bottom line: "As long as I personally am not dying this week in Iraq or Afghanistan or Fort Hood, or from lack of health care — or anyone in my near and dear, or maybe that makes me sad, but not enough to do anything about it — I will plod on as the country gets economically raped by Dems and Repubs in the same Greed-is-Good and we-are-not-regulated millionaire’s-billionaire’s club (soon to be a trillionaire’s) and patriotic young Americans and innocent Middle Easterners abroad who are trying to sustain their lives will gratuitously die. Well, not gratuitous deaths at all for the sociopathic profiteers and egotistical power mongers.
BTW, lots of millionaire-plus clubbers in our Congress right now. They are taking good care of their clubmates and themselves, not us, their CINOs, "constituents in name only".
Stocks are going up for health care companies already because the reform the Congress is arranging for us will screw the American people even more and help the big fat cats in the corporations get fatter. Much fatter. Someone on a tv trailer for a Bill Moyers’ show explains, "The class war is over. We lost!"
Congress and Obama will have their supposed "victory" of passing something they call health care reform.
Obama is deciding what percentage of young men and women will be used as cannon fodder in Afghanistan soon, many of them already played Russian roulette, or had the US play it, with their lives, on earlier deployments. The game goes on. And if it is only 30,000 not the 40,000 McChrystal asked for, will we take comfort in that "increment" and act like Obama is being heroically assertive and maybe deserves a second peace prize?
One mother is having to have her child put in foster care by the government because she has a crisis in finding a caretaker while she is serving her country. God help her and the child, no extension on her deployment! A leadership without pity for ANYONE who is not in the power and money elite loop.
So Veteran’s Day was last week. And Congress and the Prez will commit people’s lives to go die in other countries in the name of democracy. Have always done that. Will set it up that citizens of other countries will die.
And Congress and the Prez will let citizens struggle and die, too. Poverty is a sad thing, but, gee, they can only do so much. (BTW, the top 3 banks will give out $30 billion in bonuses for the holidays this year). Congress and the Prez will let people die for lack of health care. Congress and the Prez are on the friggin’ "TAKE."
And would they — Congress and the Prez — sacrifice their actual lives for their country? Do it a few times in their lives, even? Having survived the horrors go back into that hell again? The hell of war is a hell that keeps on giving, if you make it out of there alive the first time.
Would they sacrifice their jobs, risk them by taking an unpopular morally and politically risky stand, if it would save 45,000 American lives a year? No, because they have shown that. Selise, I would. If I knew 45,000 Americans were dying this year and I could stop it. My vote at a job might tank my job but still help to save all those lives this year and in future years? I would and I bet you and a lot of Americans would.
Would Congress or the Prez, say, give up wearing their favorite pair of Gucci loafers for a week if it would help someone?
I’d say they are not ready to sacrifice to that degree. Yeah, I am bitter. But I bet I am right, even on that.
Why am I the only person wearing a black arm band in America?
53 Comments
Most people could give a shit less about their Country they are so wrapped up it themselves.
I don’t wear a blackarmband but I also don’t stand and ‘pledge allegiance’ to a flag that doesn’t represent ‘liberty and justice for all’. And I fly the flag upside down.
I love it when people ask me why.
ah. libby. if only we could find a way for your “eccentricity” to spread, maybe like h1n1 except instead of causing disease it would wake up the conscience and spark the empathy of every person affected. i like to imagine that.
when i went for nonviolence training in bethlehem i remember at some point after bob, one of the instructors, told a particularly harrowing story someone asked him where he found the courage to stand in front of guns being aimed at kids. bob said it wasn’t courage, it was a kind of rage. later when i reflected on the training and my own small experiences i realized it wasn’t the kind of rage i was used to experiencing and observing — the kind that is all about ego defense. it was a rage against injustice — about wanting to protect the young man with a gun from becoming a murderer almost as much as wanting to protect the children from being hurt. i don’t think that kind of rage can exist without empathy. in fact, sometimes i think it’s the result of empathy.
anyway, when i read your essays i’m reminded of bob and his rage against injustice. and maybe, in some way i don’t quite understand, your “eccentricity” does spread with your words. at least i think it might be so libby because now i’m wearing my black arm band too.
You’re not eccentric. And you’re not goofy
Thanks Libby
Thanks you, libby. It’s a remarkable diary. Keep spreading the passion.
Recommended. Thanks, Libby. Maybe because you’re a real journalist, like this one who writes about the difference. Scroll down to “Journalism as a Weapon of War”.
Ray McGovern’s latest video on torture. Hear his story of what Isaiah didn’t wear…and what he said. And what Emerson said to Thoreau the jailbird; and what Thoreau answered…
Some of the best parts are in the Q&A period after the main talk; just wait and it will come on automatically.
Dang it! when I edited all the paragraphing was lost and I can’t correct it. Sorry folks.
Thanks for fixing the paragraphs, Mods!! That you, greghus hon?
as William Blake wrote, roughly:
few have the courage to gaze through, and take what they learn into their own being, much less back out into everyday society, as you do.
but, as selise notes, courage is contagious.
iremember, when we spend time with the well-informed choir at FDL and then, well, bump into smart, intelligent, and even liberal-minded people IRL (let alone the not so liberal minded) who kind of shut down after Obama got elected. Like they had done their yearly bit for democracy and didn’t want to be inconvenienced by worry. After all, he is not Bush! It stuns and frustrates.
good for you, ubetcha. I think exhibiting one’s principles in a concrete way is so powerful. It is walking the walk … after talking the talk.
sometimes when I am on jury duty, we all do that shallow chatting but we are not allowed to talk about the case. And sometimes when we finally have to hammer out the verdict and can talk about it I am stunned by some of my fellow chatters who can be so different in terms of moral values and priorities from me and I assumed they would think x just from their appearance and way of being and they are thinking y. And we were so shallowly chummy. Serious and wrong assumptions.
One day at work I started talking about single payer health care very heatedly, and assumed people had a remote idea what I was talking about. They did not and I realized I had to get more realistic. But also, it does take courage to assert one’s values and knowledge. I wasn’t sorry. But I felt like I was assuming way too much.
And you know what they say about messengers. But we need to talk to each other for the sake of information and morale but also talk to the non-choir, too.
Amazing how strong group-think and cronyism is. And how the media really does give people sound bites to make sweeping judgments from.
:) Wow, the back of my throat got tight and I teared as I read this.
And on my Galbraith diary Mason put an arm band on, too. Wow.
Thanks, Selise. Thanks for being such a good sport. I began to comment to you on the other diary and was thinking of the remarks by you and lets and Mason and iremember and TCU, et al. and then all of a sudden the above diary/comment just came pouring out. I mean it came out in about 10 or 15 minutes tops. Vomiting out. Connecting all my angry and moral dots. So I appreciated you as my listener and am glad you are cool with me plunging you at the beginning of my diary title! Thank you. It was presumptuous I know. I trusted your capacity for empathy! :)
selise, you are such a role model and a support for me on this campus and I thank you.
I appreciate what you are saying re the Bob story. How fascinating. Yes, that spirit that cries out for justice is so valuable and important and enlivening! I want to sustain it more. And also the capacity to see both sides, and how radicalization happens and the desensitization. The arm band came out for me hearing the horrors and the scope of the torture program and then with my horror of the lack of horror of so many fellow citizens and those within the administration.
And I realize how talking the talk is empowering, but with this experience IRL with this woman and the armband, it was a walking the walk challenge … very clumsy I confess. I saw how I am not socially integrated with my intellectual and verbal blogging courage — that more placating social persona of mine, with which I was raised not to “inconvenience” others in their denial and interfere with their comfort zone, to especially be a “good girl”. Generosity and loyalty more valued than honesty. But getting older and hearing about “tough love” .. I see honesty is a generosity. And loyalty is dangerous when it is cronyism, group think, etc.
So I was clumsy asserting my beliefs and not that forceful compared to my writing bravado but next time I will be stronger. And there was the arm band. Clearly a symbol I have been dedicated to. And the arm band has become a part of my daily ritual. I put it on in the morning and take a deep breath and say a prayer that the growing “vigilance” of more and more of us will make a difference.
I don’t know why so few people remark on the arm band. My close friends know why I wear it since I told them. People who are acquaintances probably assume it is for someone who passed on and don’t want to trigger any emotionalism with me, maybe. I also wear dark colors a lot, so maybe it is not even noticed that much. Just part of my odd fashion sense if they do? Or maybe there is a buzz about it, but I am not included in it, because I am the creator of it. Sigh. So be it.
I remember during the first Iraq War I had an old peace sign necklace at the bottom of my jewelry box I resurrected and I tied a little yellow ribbon to it and wore that. No one ever commented on that, but I am sure that was noticed more than my arm band then. The focus on the troops was such a big deal then, remember that excited jingoism then, and all the exciting weaponry CNN reporters were lusting about, and no one on the tv news was tallying up the collateral damage of Iraqis killed, it was so noticeable in its absence, or what was really happening. And the arc of that war went fast. But back then I assumed more people I was acquainted with would be automatically anti-war as social liberals but they weren’t. They seemed to be ex-DFHs but were so pro the first Iraq War. Looking back I realize maybe it had something to do for some of them maybe with being Jewish, and the Middle East locale as opposed to Viet Nam’s made them more protective of Israel and thus more hawkish and pro-US involvement over there. I’m speculating.
Anyway, my friend, thanks for the validation. We join forces to promote EMPATHY! :) A humanist paradigm shift from the patriarchal power and control mode to the humanist cooperation and partnership one — promoted by truth to power.
They say mental health is dedication to reality at all costs (probably that was scott Peck), and I want to stay committed to that and not let the “insanely unjust situations” become normalized and acceptable and part of a “learned helplessness” indoctrination on my spirit.
john, so glad to have you show up and say that! thanks. so nice to have kindred spirits as a base camp in this truth to power business! :)
thanks, lets, for your inspiration. when i start flagging, always gratified to see you posting and offering your common sense, great intelligence and strength!
I forgot to mention BB’s link which got me so riled up in the first place about the Congress being up to their arm pits in the corporate profit making troughs in the Middle East and deserves a more careful read! But it was enraging!
acquarius, boy, the voices of Pilger and Fisk among others are true courage and wisdom and call outs for justice! There is so much to wade through and listen for but we need to seek out the truth and perspective from those brave messengers.
People over nations. People over profits. And the transnational corporations are a factor this generation and the next must reckon with and is so formidable and ruthless.
Could not access your Ray McGovern link but will try to search for it. He is another voice of great courage. Whenever I see something he’s written on ICH I race to it.
I was thinking with this Peter Galbraith story, it feels like a lot of things are swirling about in the back rooms right now. Curious to hear more from you and BB if you are onto this particular fresh hell.
Sometimes I marvel at things that are put out there and seem true and unchallenged but they do not seem to dent the consciousness of people and the slow-witted media for a long time. Sometimes the disclosures are factual. Sometimes they are stunning in their horridness. And when that is minimized and denied it is crazymaking.
There is the hidden truth. And then there is the truth that is not hidden but is rejected by the main stream for a long time. For politically cautious reasons, etc. Emotional and socially challenging reasons.
Sometimes the denial of the villagers can get really up close and personal when it is interfered with. More and more I keep thinking of McCarthyism and what a litmus test people were given for their commitment to uncompromising morality or compromise of values for pragmatic social and economic survival. I get stunned at how few there are in Congress it seems who have the courage to challenge the cronyism there. But then I realize that “when good people do nothing” line from Burke and how many have let horrors happen around them through the centuries. We all collude with social injustices to some extent. But to try to stay awake more and more is the challenge and the call.
I am really indulging myself in this diary and thread. Thanks for your patience and base camp support, my friend.
Thanks, spork. So true. What a great truth. I feel I am so fresh from the fog myself, I have that sophomoric impatience with others who are still there and yet I am in maybe a less foggy fog. Fighting for justice is a real life marathon. And being so low on the food chain, so to speak, speaking for myself, can be a detached, non-crony and good view, ironically.
Thank God for the net and this site and the voices of others. We each act as messengers in courage and pass the truth on to others. Those ripples do travel, out of our control. ya never know where it goes and who it will help or relieve or enlighten … or anger. But people need to have their truth acknowledged. The more it is denied by the majority the more important, vital, it is to hear from another witness who gets it.
selise, I was thinking of your experience and your Bob story and the idea about surrendering in an experiential more than logical/thinking oriented way and the wave of feeling is part of that conversion process to a spiriual alignment. And I thought, too, of “tank man” and what an incredible iconic image his standing in front of the tanks were, too. Just one human being saying, showing NO! And how dangerous that image was and “disappeared” from the China culture for the young generation. The fear of what spork says is the contagion of courage.
I was also thinking of that moment of Huck Finn where Twain has Huck defy all his indoctrination and declare he’ll go to hell to help Jim cuz he knows in his heart and gut he has to do that.
I was also thinking in those moments of moral epiphany, well someone once told me the short form of the serenity prayer is “f*ck it!” An exclamation of will in defiance of safety, a sacred surrender.
libbyliberal,
Thank you.
Righteous anger is truth, justice and peace all in one. Righteous anger is the best kind of anger.
Sounds like black arm bands might be a good movement for all of us.
And I do not think you are bitter. Someone who is bitter tends to be apathetic and would not take the time to write a piece like this or stop and explain the arm band. It sounds like you are disgusted beyond belief.
Righteous anger. It’s a good thing.
thanks Libby think I will try the black band. Maybe stand near a shopping center with a few signs and a black arm band. Just found one of my signs that I made on the spot in front of the MSNBC cameras during the Dem Convention in Denver last year “Bush and Cheney deserve fair trials”
That will work!
Many Americans are about to go into a shopping frenzy. Put their pedals to the metal burning fuel to buy plastic and silk shit from China. While close to a million are dead in Iraq, hundreds of thousands injured, millions of Iraqi’s dead. 4500 and counting American soldiers dead, 40,000 and counting injured. All of this based on a “pack of lies” And the warmongers continue to walk free
What a world what a world.
Some folks will shop till they drop
Black Friday stampede
http://www.slashgear.com/wal-mart-employee-killed-in-black-friday-stampede-2824536/
Perhaps we can have the beginning of a movement here! Remember when people used to put those stupid “Baby On Board” stickers on their car? Well, I think we should put black “armbands” or ribbons (like the do for other causes) on our cars (and arms) now. Then next to the armband, we could choose from HUNDREDS of phrases that explain WHY we are mourning our country:
because of torture; scape goating these unconvicted prisoners in Guantanamo; ignoring the Geneva Convention for HUMANE treatment of prisoners; sending more troops to Afghanistan; the unending war in Iraq and saber rattling at Iran; Health Insurance/BIg Pharma Giveaway Spree called by the House: Healthcare Reform; Equating Money with Free $peech- corporate personhood; refusing medical marijuana but allowing price supports for tobacco; media consolidations……. All your own! I have to stop now – my blood pressure is going up!
Someone remarked about Jury Duty above- I was never chosen because I said I was a member of the ACLU!
Libby, here’s link to my new diary which has the link to Ray McGovern’s talk, and a music video that’s out of this world.
Go Libby! Isn’t it time for a giant protest march?
We all need to pack our bags.
“send these people back where they came from’
Best thing I have seen in a while
http://crooksandliars.com/david-neiwert/teabaggers-punkd-anti-racists-who-ge
Well, this post and these comments are frickin’ powerful! Wow. I almost missed it because I don’t always remember to check Seminal posts. And this is a seminal post by every definition.
Black armband. You are one gutsy American, ma’am. Sadly, I need to think (always dangerous) about whether I have the guts to follow in your footsteps on this.
I think I can, I think I can.
P.S. I would like to excerpt from and then link to this on my blog. Okay with you? Back later.
Thanks, klynn. Appreciate the wisdom and eloquence of your comment. Coming home from work last night I was thinking about the exchange with Selise about the anger and I thought, wow, I never used the word “righteous” in the thread and that is the word that describes it.
Fighting for the right and true! What made America once upon a time be labeled the “home of the brave”. Human rights has stopped being on the to do list of priorities of our leadership. The corporatized agenda is exclusive, amoral and irresponsible. I heard the word “responsibility” shifted around to “the ability to respond.” Our government has lost that for its citizenry. The top 1% it “responded” like crazy on behalf of re the bailout. And now with the insurance and pharma companies needs, it is hustling to respond to them.
Obama made a huge deal with Pharma, a backroom deal, so much for upfront transparency, that if they gave enough to make it look good he would help them out and they would put a big fat wad of money (I am so bad at retaining numbers, often I do retain them but I doubt myself because the amounts are so large.. what used to be shocking millions are now billions) … anyway, I can try to find again, maybe on pnhp website, but pharma promised to put its money into ads praising whatever friendly health care reform passes finally to convince the citizenry it is a wonderful plan for them.
The “appearances” are so important, the priority, or shining them up and branding them is simply standard-operating-procedure. Of course, poor Obama has the wingnuts irrationally coming out with bizarre and horrifying and dangerous allegations so one could see why he would want some industrial strength genius and heavy money for media seduction, but …. how dishonorable. The plight of people… and money .. all the money for campaigns and disinformation advertising going there… (not to mention for killing not enhancing lives).
Black armband? I have one of those from Veterans for Peace. Looks nice with a blue shirt, too.
Selise, your comments about rage are so right on.
Leen, wow, now there are four of us! How very cool, and that will empower me all the more wearing the band. I have a feeling I’ll be more dignified, keep it simple, but blunt when I explain myself more and more when asked about it.
I love that slogan about a fair trial for Bush and Cheney. I keep using the expression accountability coma to describe the Obama administration. Glenn Greenwald is a constitutional lawyer and he keeps his readers like me, very non-lawyers, posted on what would be appropriate. Having worked for obama at the end, I still have that flame of hope that he is reviewing the situation. That the other “sane” shoe will drop and that immoral matters will be taken care of.
Having worked for Edwards I was excited by the specifics of his blueprint to go after the two Americas and integrate them into one fair one. Greenwald talks about two-tiered justice. Even now with Obama administration wanting to do military tribunals for the compromised cases, and turning over the sure thing cases to the regular court system. And Obama having been a constitutional lawyer, with such disrespect for the law as foundation in this country. And habaes corpus was around since the 17th century, recognized by the world as necessary. And I thought it was only Bushco and John Yoo and Gonzalez who found that and Geneva Convention rules as “quaint”. The afterglow Obama electioneers need to wake up that Obama is not re-instating this stuff. I keep waiting for it to happen.
I honestly thought I would take off the armband when Obama got his act together. And there are dribs and drabs of rhetoric that keeps one hoping and like the 9/11 trial being set up for NYC, I guess refreshes the hope as the right pops off irrationally. But there is no “righteousness” to return to the rule of law in our Congress, save for Kucinich or Feingold or a few, too few, others.
One man who was rendered and tortured it was soon discovered by Bushco top echelon, Rice and Tenet among others, that it was mistaken identity. He had a similar name of someone on the AQ list. They kept that man confined for months AFTER THE DISCOVERY HE WAS INNOCENT, kept him in the cage … he waged a hunger strike even, lost over 50 lbs., again caged and receiving presumably his daily torture routine, in those horrifying conditions. While the Bushcos met in their conference rooms as to how to cover their asses when his story was told. His wife thought he had left her, cuz it is all super secret and she and family mourned their situation and moved to another country even.
Finally they dropped this guy … oh darn … I am forgetting which country, in the dead of night in a remote area, and he was of course fearful and disoriented, I think I did a diary a while ago on this, anyway… he was sure he would die. He was picked up as a terrorist because of his appearance, raggedy and disheveled. This is the level of cowardism. Even if they believed their AQ hysteria about terrorists, a guy they knew absolutely wasn’t…. they didn’t release immediately, with apology and restitution.
And when other governments even now want justice done for those victimized by our terrorism witch hunts, the US government that has such military and used to have such money but still clout threatens and blackmails the other country into sacrificing justice.
That Walmart story sends chills. People have higher selves within and lower selves. A continuum. We’ve been talking about courage being contagious. But that shopping hysteria is the opposite. narcissism and desensitization on steroids contagion. Step over the body you just trampled and get that sale.
Well said, lefty. There are so many fronts, too. And we need to stick our heads up and collectively and efficiently fight together for justice.
I keep saying that public option and single payer separated the health care fighters in a way. Sympatico in essence … but it diluted the collective passion and energy and attention we could have had somehow.
And even with writing diaries. Want to push the justice for health care, but what about Afghanistan, but what about as you say ALL THAT IS GOING ON. That is why FDL is so remarkable. We are teachers and scouts and students for each other on this stuff. To stay awake and learn and get outraged and maybe those ripples, along with what you are saying, our concretely being visible out there, to the non-liberal bloggers, the non-choire, will re-awaken and reinvigorate at least the 80 million who decided there could be hope with Obama’s promise of change, especially among the youth who have such reasons to be cynical and distrustful.
And we need smart and passionate leadership as we get here at FDL, though we may disagree on some issues but it is a blessed free speech democracy here, too, which only helps strengthen it. Healthy communication and back and forth should be, as I have heard said, strong and flexible like tough leather, not like peanut brittle.
After putting on the black arm band over torture. I was thinking of a white arm band for health care. Promoting that. And what about the war? And then I reasoned that my arm would look like a barber pole there would be so many issues for outrage still.
I remember during Viet Nam protests the word “enough.” with a period after it started appearing, and all those peace signs on cars and jewelry and T-shirts, etc. And the bumper stickers. It did help raise consciousness. And this country is fighting corporate media all the more. The power of TV really insinuates itself into attitudes. It disinforms about or ignores what should be front and center for recovery of America’s soul.
acquarius don’t have access to hear at the moment, but so grateful you did this and looking forward to hearing him soon using your link. Have been curious about seeing him in person after reading him so long. Thanks. Good for you. I need to push to read more of these remarkable diaries. I am inconsistent and they have gold in them. Gold for spirit and mind!
I agree completely LIB. I have been trying to tell people that keeping a democracy, country, and good Government takes more than voting once in awhile.
It also takes intelligence in the electorate.
What You say is true.
People just don’t know what’s good for themselves.
Look at th people still trying to defend the last Administration, while cutting down the new.
This doen’t make for a better country for them, us, and the future generations.
Loo Hoo!!! Yes. A passionate one.
I know Cindy Sheehan keeps remarking on where did everyone go post Bush. The wars are still around. But Obama’s entrance gave enough hope to lose the mmomentum of protest. And yet his presumed “potential” is an enemy to our unity for what is not right.
When I attended a rally in NYC in front of Aetna building for SP it was a real turning point. Walking the walk for single payer. Nervous about the militarized police and the rep in NYC after Repub. convention of unfair arrests — it gives you pause, and you know now the media will not give attention to a faction that is going against the “corporations” who feed the media.
But how wonderful and contagious the spirit is. I remember one chant was “AET-NA SUCKS” one group said, ‘SINGLE PAYER NOW” was the response. And the word “sucks” at first was not said very loudly. I mean, I don’t easily release such undainty language. I chose to be on the answering chant of “Single payer Now.” pretty soon, it made me laugh, the word SUCKS was said with such vehemence and lustiness… and loudly.. and I realized I was the only voice left crying out “Single Payer Now”. The word “sucks” was cathartic and empowering.
Yes protest groups embolden, and our citizenry needs emboldening. And look at the irrational wingnuts getting passionate and emboldened. We need to be rational people with passion, too.
I remember reading an editorial by a young man in American Prospect who was so disgusted with the Code Pink women and their protests. And I think he thought they should simply be blogging their protests. Calling it in, so to speak and it made me sad. When I hear of SP sitins where people are deliberately letting themselves get arrested for the cause. I am so impressed and grateful and guilty I am not paying more attention to their courage.
On RFK, Jr’s air america show he told a story about how when Thoreau was jailed and Emerson I think came to see him or help him, he called out “Henry, what are you doing in there?” And Thoreau called back, “Ralph, what are you doing OUT THERE?”
hey barbara. You make me smile. You know when I put the darn thing on it was to be for a short time. Awaiting word on the news of Obama flexing for justice. Someone on this site I think said, “Wow.. gonna wear that the rest of your life?” I gulped. Who knows.
I don’t know if the black arm band idea will capture the imagination of the majority, but I love the company, believe me, and it really is seminal as you say.
And as I said, since mid-May there seems a profound lack of curiosity even about my wearing it. The first week I thought I would be challenged and I was primed and ready. I was wearing a bright orange top when the woman asked me about it recently and I was so not used to having to defend it I stammered and forgot all my best lines from long ago May. :)
But, like in that Network movie, clearly we’re all madder than hell and we don’t want to take it any more. And the wingnuts are stealing the passionate thunder in this country. It deflects from the profound feedback the administration and Congress should be getting from us, the moral liberals, and this is part of the astroturfer team MO. Cover up the true populism, the grass roots with their fake populism. Crazymaking upside down indignation. helping the corporate rapists they are. Indentifying with the aggressors in this country.
would be an honor, barbara.
link us to you, too?
Very cool, SD. I may start wearing lighter colors so it gets seen better.
I use those black athletic head bands. Seems to work on upper arm, though some slide down.
well said, iremember! Yeah, we all have to sustain attention here. the country has a bad case of ADD, and also trying to function with the economic stress pulls people away from the fight and also there is a tipping point of demoralization, too, when you are fighting for your very survival. Don’t have the luxury of time and a survival-primal-worry-free mind.
there is a great, if not exactly cheerful essay on “Tank Man” at Lawyers, guns and Money. where they postulate that as important is “Tank Commander”, who refrained from running the guy over.
a partial quote, but the whole thing deserves a read:
how far the American security apparat is willing to go against U.S. citizens is a dreadful and dire question. The ubiquitous surveillance systems they are building do not bode well, nor does the use of mercenary contractors, who may be relied on to do things that standard police and military units would not do.
But courage, purity, and principle can get respect, even from folks ‘just following orders’.
amen!
libby, you give me waaaayyy too much credit. i think you must not know how much your diaries and all your writing inspires me. please don’t stop writing! and please give yourself some credit for stepping outside your comfort zone to talk to your acquaintance about what your armband means to you. it always takes courage (or maybe a little of bob’s rage *g*) to step outside our comfort zones. it’s not about where our zones of comfort are — it’s about taking that step beyond and that’s especially hard to do alone. there’s a reason people work in affinity groups when the going gets hard. if you have an active imagination (and i’m going to guess you do! *g*), if there is a next time, you might consider trying to see the conversation, not through the eyes of your acquaintance, but through our eyes — your friends here who would be cheering you on! you go libby!!!
i’ve got to step away from the computer for a bit… but i’ll be back later to read all the comments…
I posted a comment to your original post that I’m going to repeat in principle, if not word for word, since my comment got lost in the shuffle.
You inspired me and I’m now wearing a black armband, so now there are two of us.
Hopefully more by now.
Mason, see reply #12 above — I am about to revisit Galbraith diary, but please, I was so touched by your revelation to put on an arm band. God, did I not validate that back there??? So sorry.
Mason, you are second of our six (maybe five and a half, but even visualizing doing it is so profound) person movement if I am counting correctly. :) Believe it or not writing the diary was not primed by the goal to recruit, just to spotlight the somber and horrifying plight we are in. But what a secondary gain is this!!! And when I am approached again I will have the strength of five behind me as I speak and how grounding is that? A base camp for sure.
If you don’t stand tall, you”ll have some splainin to do. That buzzing sound you hear ain’t no wasp, unless you’re livin in the tropics or southern hemisphere. It’s a drone.
That would be a sick joke.
@40, selise, love your reminder to visualize situation from your and base camp’s eyes. will help shore up my higher self and ego strength for sure. :)
someone once said, “life begins at the end of your comfort zone.” I hear ya. And the idea that courage is not the absence of fear, it is moving forward in spite of it. I keep postponing taking strong stands til courage and comfortable strength comes to me. Life is too messy and spontaneous to wait up for my readiness… there is a moral urgency for sure.
hey mason. too true.
earlier today I was thinking about an old assertivenness book that says some people go after a mosquito (small annoying prob) with a sledge hammer. I think that has been the US military M.O. for decades.
spork, what a fascinating stretch of awareness you gift with. How true is that with the driver of the tank. It takes two to make a paradigm shift from patriarchal power and control to humanist partnership and cooperation.
One of my favorite movies of all time is The Lives of Others.
I was reading acquarius’ favorite today, Ray McGovern, who talks about how Amnesty International and the grassroots questioning of US administration’s propaganda against Islamists is doing more to help de-radicalize Islamist militants, from the prior’s respect for freedom of speech and honoring that right in all, humanitarian rights, not national exceptionalism and denial. To re-propagandize terrorism, to not end torture and rendition seriously not just in rhetoric … will cause further “reaction formation” in young Islamists to keep the radicalization momentum going. The Fort Hood tragedy can be manipulated by neocons. Instead of introverting about the crises in our military, project and blame out there out of collective national ego… and blame and put kerosene on the international fire.
mason @43 … back at Galbraith thread, I did make further comments to you. my computer is acting up right now so can’t give you the link. to be continued. later. lib
“I wear the black for the poor, the beaten down…”
@48, love Johnny Cash. Favorite of mine is Ring of Fire!
acquarius74, your comment reminds me of an article robert fisk wrote about amira hass and how she came to learn the importance of of not standing silently ‘looking from the side.’
http://www.commondreams.org/views01/0826-04.htm
i love that!
p.s. what klynn @19 said.
excellent.
excellent point. and sometimes true empathy can illicit empathy in return.