[Peace-discuss] [Peace] Why I won’t be marching in the July 4th parade

Mon Jul 3 00:11:13 UTC 2017

I hope to be in Canada. Will be finding out what returning thru a border is like for a white, cis, older couple. Just got to see the Rivera murals in the Detroit Institute of Art for the first time. So taking time off to re-charge. There was a protest in downtown Detroit Sunday July 2. We honked and waved to show support going by. We did not know about it ahead of time and it was mostly over by 330. Anne Bjornson Parkinson
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------ Original message------From: Karen Aram via Peace-discussDate: Sun, Jul 2, 2017 5:46 PMTo: David Johnson;Cc: peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net;Subject:Re: [Peace-discuss] [Peace] Why I won’t be marching in the July 4th parade

 I’m willing to talk, but even those who claim to be anti-capitalist can’t be bothered to join our AWARE anti-war movement, we’re the only group in town without a political agenda, other than stopping war and funding programs to eleviate poverty. 

On Jul 2, 2017, at 14:39, David Johnson <davidjohnson1451 at comcast.net> wrote:

Maybe we should begin plans for 2018, with a coalition of anti-war / anti-capitalist people from many of C-U’s organizations.

David J.

From: Karen Aram [mailto:karenaram at hotmail.com] 

Sent: Sunday, July 02, 2017 4:10 PM

To: David Johnson

Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] [Peace] Why I won’t be marching in the July 4th parade

Stuart will be marching with the Immigration Forum, he said they are protesting against the USG. 

I have nothing creative to offer, but you might check with David Green, he has our signs and he might be going. There really isn’t anyone else to make much of a contingent. 

On Jul 2, 2017, at 13:59, David Johnson <davidjohnson1451 at comcast.net> wrote:

I understand Karen and Carl, but it is a shame, considering the past years AWARE presence in the parade and it’s creative and powerful anti-war ; float / procession
 / theme.

Out of sight, out of mind !

David J.

From: Peace-discuss
 [mailto:peace-discuss-bounces at lists.chambana.net] On Behalf Of Karen
 Aram via Peace-discuss

Sent: Sunday, July 02, 2017 3:25 PM

To: C. G. Estabrook

Cc: peace at lists.chambana.net; Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net; prairiegreens at lists.chambana.net

Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] [Peace] Why I won’t be marching in the July 4th parade

 I
 won’t
 be going either, and its not just due to the heat, and my asthma There is little to celebrate with the continued injustice towards the working class, with the lack of healthcare, murder of people of color by our militarized police, continuing austerity and
 most of all the continuation of murders and destruction of millions around the globe, being perpetuated by the USG. We should be protesting, and some of us did yesterday.

On Jul 2, 2017, at 12:34, C. G. Estabrook via Peace <peace at lists.chambana.net> wrote:

“Champaign County. Freedom Celebration, ‘Salute To Education,’ includes a morning Youth Race and a 5K Race/walk, a parade at 11:05 a.m. begins near First and Florida, continues East on Florida to Lincoln Avenue then proceeds North on Lincoln Avenue to California.
 Evening entertainment at 7 p.m., corner of Kirby Avenue and First Street. Fireworks at 9:15 p.m., lunched [sic] from UI parking lot E14, west of State Farm Center.” [C-U News-Gazette]

======================================

AWARE has in years past been a notable presence in the July 4th parade in Champaign-Urbana. Talented AWAREists have presented anti-war floats and displays, often mocking the official patriotic themes of the event. (One AWARE entry under a ‘war heroes’ theme
 featured huge photos of courageous war resisters.)

But I’ve been convinced by Doug, long-time friend of AWARE, that any participation in the celebration of the shockingly misnamed “war of independence” lends support to the heavily mythologized tradition of America’s ‘good wars.’

None of them was good, including the ‘war against fascism,’ used by US propaganda to justify imperialist war from 1945 to the present day.

The poets often get there first: see Philip K. Dick’s “The Man in the High Castle” (1962) - a literary meditation, as in a distorting mirror, of how war can be used to justify further war. More directly, in “Human Smoke: The Beginnings of World War II, the
 End of Civilization” (2008), Nicholson Baker provides the history of the coming of WWII: Americans born since then have been systematically deprived of an historically accurate account - and not innocently, but to support Americas' subsequent wars.

We miseducated Americans have allowed US presidents to kill between 20 and 30 million people since 1945, for the profits of the US 1%.

In a lecture more than 40 years ago, just as the repressive policies of neoliberalism began to be adopted by all subsequent administrations (criticizing it made Trump president), the late Howard Zinn exposed the Fourth of July mythology. See the appended article,
 “Rethinking the Fourth of July,” with references to the important observations of historians Ray Raphael and Gerald Horne.

I don’t now see how I can oppose the propaganda of the Fourth of July celebrations and still participate, even in a critical way. I’ll stay home and watch the Red Sox play.  --CGE

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-bigelow/rethinking-the-fourth-of-july_b_5552378.html

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