[Peace-discuss] July 4 parade

Wed May 20 16:23:41 CDT 2009

Carl,

Yes that is part of our job; but I do not believe that educating is the most
significant part of our job.  But be that as it may, I doubt if one can
disabuse anyone of anything that they may strongly believe on the basis of a
slogan or two on a float that passes by within a few minutes during a parade
- especially when the  float and the message is in the minority and
overwhelmed by the floats and messages that promote the familiar and
accepted notions and beliefs.  

It may be best to either shock people with something so dramatic and
noticeable that it sticks in their memory for better or worse or present
them with some catchy slogan or vision that they and their children will
remember and associate with the group and what it represents in a positive
light. Lectures and education do not really cut it when it comes to
mobilizing people; education and lectures come after you have mobilized them
and now need to teach them so as to prepare them to justify future
participation and actions. Overcoming the learning curve takes work; and
most people do not get readily excited about having to engage in work unless
they are already committed to the cause.  It is not something that one does
on the basis of a float in a parade.

-----Original Message-----
From: C. G. Estabrook [mailto:galliher at illinois.edu] 
Sent: Wednesday, May 20, 2009 12:56 PM
To: LAURIE SOLOMON
Cc: peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] July 4 parade

Our job is to disabuse them of that notion.

LAURIE SOLOMON wrote:
> For sure; but some may not lend themselves to such editing without losing 
> their meaning and power.  Others might be able to stand on their own
without 
> any such editing.
> 
> However, I think, as has been pointed out by John W, many of the emotive
code
> words (such as "freedom," "justice," "liberty," etc.) are ambiguous with
> multiple meanings and/or significances and therefore open to
interpretation
> by the reader who given the audience for this parade may not be the
> interpretation that AWARE wants to send out.  For example,
> 
> <"Such will be a great lesson of peace: teaching men that what they cannot

> take by election, neither can they take it by war; teaching all the folly
of
>  being the beginners of a war.">
> 
> I would regretfully say that most of the hometown audience would agree and

> then go on to say that it was the perpetrators of 9/11 who really started
the
> war and we were merely defending ourselves.
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message----- From: C. G. Estabrook
> [mailto:galliher at illinois.edu] Sent: Wednesday, May 20, 2009 8:52 AM To:
> LAURIE SOLOMON Cc: 'Peace-discuss' Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] July 4
parade
> 
> 
> Judicious editing would be required.
> 
> 
> LAURIE SOLOMON wrote:
>> Obviously some of these are far too long for a slogan on a float that
> would
>> be of readable size and be able to be read in a very short time period
> while
>> the float passes by - let alone be short enough so that people can read 
>> several different quotes on the float.
>> 
>> -----Original Message----- From: peace-discuss-bounces at lists.chambana.net

>> [mailto:peace-discuss-bounces at lists.chambana.net] On Behalf Of C. G. 
>> Estabrook Sent: Tuesday, May 19, 2009 12:53 AM To: Peace-discuss Subject:

>> [Peace-discuss] July 4 parade
>> 
>> [At last Sunday's meeting we mentioned this year's "Champaign County
> Freedom
>> Celebration" <http://www.july4th.net/>.  AWARE has a tradition of
> excellent
>> entries in the July 4 parade -- none better than last year's splendid
> effort.
>> People in AWARE have worked hard over the years to combat the jingoistic 
>> assumptions of the parades' themes.  This year's theme is (predictably)
> "The
>> Lasting Legacy of Lincoln."  So I suggest we take the bull (and the 
>> alliteration) by the horns and produce something like last year's rolling

>> billboards. Here's a first draft; all the quotes are Lincoln's.  --CGE]
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> THE ANTI-WAR ANTI-RACISM EFFORT REMEMBERS LESSONS FROM LINCOLN ON WAR AND

>> WORK
>> 
>> ************************
>> 
>> * Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation whenever he shall
> deem
>> it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so whenever he
> may
>> choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose, and you allow him
> to
>> make war at pleasure. Study to see if you can fix any limit to his power
> in
>> this respect, after having given him so much as you propose.
>> 
>> * Such will be a great lesson of peace: teaching men that what they
cannot
> 
>> take by election, neither can they take it by war; teaching all the folly
> of
>> being the beginners of a war.
>> 
>> * Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and,
>> 
>> under a just God, can not long retain it.
>> 
>> * The severest justice may not always be the best policy.
>> 
>> * No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's
> consent.
>> * It was in the oath I took that I would, to the best of my ability, 
>> preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. I
> could
>> not take the office without taking the oath. Nor was it my view that I
> might
>> take an oath to get power, and break the oath in using the power.
>> 
>> * With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the
> right
>> as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we
> are
>> in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne
> the
>> battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and 
>> cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.
>> 
>> ************************
>> 
>> * These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert to fleece
> the
>> people, and now that they have got into a quarrel with themselves, we are

>> called upon to appropriate the people's money to settle the quarrel.
>> 
>> * Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit
> of
>> labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor
> is
>> the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.
> Capital
>> has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights.
> Nor
>> is it
>> 
>> denied that there is, and probably always will be, a relation between
> labor
>> and capital producing mutual benefits.
>> 
>> * The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the 
>> American people, just now, are much in want of one. We all declare for 
>> liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing.
> With
>> some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with
> himself,
>> and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word many mean
> for
>> some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other
> men's
>> labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called
> by
>> the same name - liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by
the 
>> respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names -
> liberty
>> and tyranny.
>> 
>> * We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best, hope of earth.
>> 
>> * We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have

>> been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown
> in
>> numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have

>> forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in 
>> peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have
vainly
> 
>> imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings
> were
>> produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with 
>> unbroken success, we
>> 
>> have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and 
>> preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!
>> 
>> * This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit
> it.
>> Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing Government, they can
> exercise
>> their constitutional right of amending it or their revolutionary right to
> 
>> dismember or overthrow it.
>> 
>> * Why should there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice of
> the
>> people? Is there any better or equal hope in the world?
>> 
>> ###
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________ Peace-discuss mailing list

> Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net 
> http://lists.chambana.net/cgi-bin/listinfo/peace-discuss