Code Pink May Be Spreading Its Colors Too Thin
Stuart Nachbar
October 27, 2008
Early in ´09, Defending College Heights, my second novel, will be out and America will still be at war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Originally, I thought the Bush Administration might come up with an "October surprise," but that seems unlikely as we approach Election Day.
Defending College Heights is a story that is partly about army recruiting. Like my first novel, The Sex Ed Chronicles, it is a "what if" story, in this case I ask: what might be the outcomes in a college community if a military recruiter were ever killed. During the protests of the Sixties and Seventies, recruiters from Dow Chemical were blocked from speaking to students on campus and ROTC buildings were destroyed. The major casualties of campus protest—those who actually died—were college students, and not necessarily students who confronted the military or skipped class to join into an anti-war message.
I have the novel in final edits as I read that Code Pink, a nationally publicized anti-war organization had given up on one of its´ goals: to close the U.S. Marine recruiting station in downtown Berkeley, California. They are closing their nearby office and everything, including tschotkes (they used the Yiddish!) and memorabilia is for sale. I don´t remember a Sixties or Seventies activist group raising money through memorabilia sales; protest was less business-like back then.
Code Pink has a far more ambitious agenda than the closing of a single military recruiting station; they are a national organization protesting the federal bank bailout, Secretary Paulson´s leadership of the Treasury department, and a $615 defense appropriations bill that was passed as the bailout legislation was under discussion. Local chapters have helped women from being evicted from their homes. A small group of their members even tried to handcuff Karl Rove while he was in San Francisco! This is an organization that started with an agenda that was primarily opposition to the war in Iraq. Today, I wonder if they might be spreading themselves too thin, or if they´re trying to match a message to the largest possible television audience.
But military recruiting practices have not changed much since the passage of No Child Left Behind seven years ago. While a policy of "absolutely no military recruiting" in high schools and colleges is unlikely to pass Congress, no matter who is president, there are policy changes that are realistic requests for organizations such as Code Pink. I have already discussed a "do not call" policy: no calls to male students without high school diplomas as an alternative to "opt-out," as well as repeal of "don´t ask, don´t tell" on this blog, to give two examples of new ideas. But my first impression is of Code Pink is that they do not want to carry water, in the form of new policy ideas, to Washington. It is not grassroots and it is not theatre. However, good policy changes "the system" more than protest.
I believe in an individual´s, and an organization´s, freedom to protest, and when possible their opportunity to right perceived injustices. However, the most effective protestors are single-issue constituent groups, not organizations spread in multiple directions to attack every presidential decision they don´t like. That´s what political parties are for.
Contact Stuart Nachbar at http://www.EducatedQuest.com, a blog on education politics, policy and technology or read about his first book, The Sex Ed Chronicles, a novel on education and politics in 1980 New Jersey, at http://www.SexEdChronicles.com.
Defending College Heights is a story that is partly about army recruiting. Like my first novel, The Sex Ed Chronicles, it is a "what if" story, in this case I ask: what might be the outcomes in a college community if a military recruiter were ever killed. During the protests of the Sixties and Seventies, recruiters from Dow Chemical were blocked from speaking to students on campus and ROTC buildings were destroyed. The major casualties of campus protest—those who actually died—were college students, and not necessarily students who confronted the military or skipped class to join into an anti-war message.
I have the novel in final edits as I read that Code Pink, a nationally publicized anti-war organization had given up on one of its´ goals: to close the U.S. Marine recruiting station in downtown Berkeley, California. They are closing their nearby office and everything, including tschotkes (they used the Yiddish!) and memorabilia is for sale. I don´t remember a Sixties or Seventies activist group raising money through memorabilia sales; protest was less business-like back then.
Code Pink has a far more ambitious agenda than the closing of a single military recruiting station; they are a national organization protesting the federal bank bailout, Secretary Paulson´s leadership of the Treasury department, and a $615 defense appropriations bill that was passed as the bailout legislation was under discussion. Local chapters have helped women from being evicted from their homes. A small group of their members even tried to handcuff Karl Rove while he was in San Francisco! This is an organization that started with an agenda that was primarily opposition to the war in Iraq. Today, I wonder if they might be spreading themselves too thin, or if they´re trying to match a message to the largest possible television audience.
But military recruiting practices have not changed much since the passage of No Child Left Behind seven years ago. While a policy of "absolutely no military recruiting" in high schools and colleges is unlikely to pass Congress, no matter who is president, there are policy changes that are realistic requests for organizations such as Code Pink. I have already discussed a "do not call" policy: no calls to male students without high school diplomas as an alternative to "opt-out," as well as repeal of "don´t ask, don´t tell" on this blog, to give two examples of new ideas. But my first impression is of Code Pink is that they do not want to carry water, in the form of new policy ideas, to Washington. It is not grassroots and it is not theatre. However, good policy changes "the system" more than protest.
I believe in an individual´s, and an organization´s, freedom to protest, and when possible their opportunity to right perceived injustices. However, the most effective protestors are single-issue constituent groups, not organizations spread in multiple directions to attack every presidential decision they don´t like. That´s what political parties are for.
Contact Stuart Nachbar at http://www.EducatedQuest.com, a blog on education politics, policy and technology or read about his first book, The Sex Ed Chronicles, a novel on education and politics in 1980 New Jersey, at http://www.SexEdChronicles.com.
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