Anti-Rally Wars

Flags, storks and brilliance

I needed a good spring break adventure this year.

Some of my more cynical friends and family members pointed out that people who are no longer in college do not get “spring break,” they get “another week of work.” I dismissed this argument, however, based on the reasoning that youth is simply a state of mind, promptly quit my job at Buffalo Wild Wings (motto: “Clean this Grease Filter and We’ll Give You Seven Bucks, You Interchangeable Corporate Cog”), and headed down south to Washington D.C. for a major rally to protest the war in Iraq.

Scheduled for several American cities including New York, Portland, and San Francisco (where the war protest clashed with pro-sodomy and pro-marijuana rallies, creating confusion and a great idea for a romantic comedy starring Susan Sarandon and Larry the Cable Guy), the protests were meant to mark the four-year anniversary of the beginning of this disastatastrophe.

I’ve always considered myself to have the essence of progressive political ideals, but then again, I am from small-town central Ohio, where occasionally people consider you despicably liberal if you’re against bestiality. Therefore, I’ll be the first to admit, I sometimes do not fit in so well with the far-left anti-war crowd, mostly because I still subscribe to such unpopular notions as “common sense” and refuse to participate in any type of performance art where I have to wear a Dick Cheney mask and lather my naked body in crude oil while getting spanked by a guy in a suit with the word “Corporation” written on his forehead (do not laugh; I’m sure somebody from Wellesley College has written this into a play).

Yet the American anti-war movement has grown from its tender youth back in 2003 to a full-fledged mainstream entity, and while standing huddled in the freezing wind between the Lincoln and Vietnam War memorials, I saw evidence of this: young people, students, the middle-aged, the elderly, war veterans—people of all different stripes who’ve finally had enough of a foreign policy seemingly run by a Magic 8 Ball.

This journalist must unfortunately report that the fundamental insanity that governs many people’s ideological leanings still reigns heavy and hard during these gatherings. Present at this rally were both the demonstrators and counter-demonstrators, which included such pro-war groups as Move America Forward and Gathering of Eagles. As it always seems with such occasions, both sides seemed bound by some type of pact to see who could dress more ridiculously. From the anti-war demonstrators I saw everything from the typical Goth/anarchist attire to several women carrying around an eight-foot stork puppet, which they would presumably control from within (your guess is as good as mine as to what political message that was intended for). From the counter-protestors, it looked as if Uncle Sam had vomited in a San Francisco leather store. Most of the people lining the sidewalk to heckle you on your way to the actual rally seemed to think that if they could simply cover their bodies and immediate surroundings with enough American flags, it might make the simplicity of their arguments true.

Sadly, despite encouraging sightings of concerned, civic-minded citizens, ideological gridlock still held sway over the proceedings. Anti-war protestors ran around with T-shirts and posters comparing George W. Bush to Adolf Hitler and handed out fliers claiming “9/11 was an inside job!” This inanity was matched only by counter-demonstrators brandishing equally idiotic posters with such nuggets of strategic wisdom as “Cowards Run,” “Freedom isn’t Free,” and “Jane Fonda is a Traitor Bitch.”

Here’s a quick axiom that you can live your life by as sure as the sun rises: If your deeply held political belief can fit into a simple slogan or sound bite, you are probably an idiot. Social, economic, and military issues have nuance that requires thought—not just repeating the simplistic five words gleaned from 24-hour cable news and your buddy’s T-shirt. Yet we live in a sound bite society, which is the reason we’re in this mess in the first place.

The real tragedy then is that reasonable, thinking people are squeezed out of the debate. There is little room at the table for rational minds that think this war was ill-conceived, ill-executed, and quickly turning into a situation that could fan the flames of anti-Americanism and Islamic radicalism rather than douse them. Similarly, it’s hard to squeeze a chair in if you’re a person who can admit that the pretenses for this war were false but ultimately fears the consequences of a withdrawal of American troops, not just for Iraq but the region.

No, instead you must either stand with the “Nazi war criminals” or the “faggot cowards” and God help you if you choose the wrong side.

After swallowing just about all I could from this depressing little tour through the current state of American political discourse, my friend and I took a walk over to the Lincoln Memorial to stand in the shadow of one of the few American presidents who actually deserves all the praise he gets (suck it, Clinton and Reagan). I thought of Abraham Lincoln’s ultimate achievement—the abolition of slavery—and how that movement began on the political fringes with things like the Underground Railroad and John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry. It occurred to me that sometimes you need the radicals to open the eyes of the tempered.

Yet I still have to believe in my naďve little heart that people are not sheep (no matter how often my high school friends insisted that about eight beers could change that). We are all thinking, sentient beings capable of discerning truth and forming our own independent opinions without the screeching cacophony of our parents, our pastors, or Fox News.

Then again, as I walked south along the Mall, I could not help but think that somewhere there is a U.S. soldier and an Iraqi who will both be the last people to give their lives for the miscalculations of their superiors—thinking, sentient beings, all of them.