“Goodbye America…you are not the country that I love and I finally realized no matter how much I sacrifice, I can't make you be that country unless you want it.”
And so were the parting words of Ms. Cindy Sheehan, notorious activist who became the “face” of America's struggling antiwar movement in 2005 following the death of her son Casey, a U.S. Army specialist killed in Iraq.
Sheehan started a grass-roots peace movement with her highly publicized, month-long war protest outside President' Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas. Nearly two years after garnering national attention and leading several war protests around the world, Sheehan says she's done being the country's poster child for peace, citing several reasons including the effort took a toll on her financially and physically, strained relationships with family and ultimately ended her 29-year marriage.
In her “farewell address” published on the progressive blog, Daily Kos, Congress' decision to continue financing the war without a timetable for troop withdrawal also prompted her decision to step down from her activism. All her efforts these two years to promote peace and put an end to the war, according to her blog, were “in vain,” and that her son “did indeed die for nothing.”
Sheehan drew as much criticism as she did praise for her actions, as she's demonstrated through her outspoken persistence. It's undeniable this woman was dealt the worst blow imaginable as the parent of a deceased soldier. For that, I sympathize with her.
What I'm not keen on is reasons cited in her statements for leaving; they hardly serve as justification to abandon a mission she seemed so determined to uphold until the president provided her with some answers as to why her son had to die.
I agree with Sheehan that our country's in a bleak state. Divided sentiments over the war have turned friends against friends. Bush and his boys have created a cesspool of international hostility—a mess we younger generations will probably spend the rest of our lives cleaning up.
But portraying Casey (and basically every soldier overseas) as a sacrificial lamb to “the empire of the good old U.S. of A.,” and its parties that “play politics with human lives,” is taking a defeatist attitude that even a left-winger like myself won't lower myself to.
Iraq is the same old story of young people marching off to fight on the frontlines while politicians work their end of the deal from home, mostly. Pro-war pushers declare dying in the line of duty comes with the job (well, duh) and people who either can't or won't accept this reality are—in a nutshell—unpatriotic and don't deserve to live in this country and enjoy its freedoms.
But I digress.
I admire the fact people have begun questioning the immoralities of the Iraq war and our country's role in it. Emotion is a powerful motivator and serves as a catalyst for people to act out their oppositions by staging protests, speaking out, or changing their lives in ways that reflect their opposition.
Sheehan did. In doing so, she put a face on the average American's wartime sacrifices that didn't exist before. Early American antiwar movements had many faces, but for Iraq, Sheehan was pretty much it.
I suppose I overestimated her investiture in this cause, because I thought if someone could have represented the antiwar movement in the face of adversity, it would have been her. But she's thrown in the towel, despite all the vigor and tenacity she had going for her two years ago.
Yes, America may be a nation that pays more attention to its “American Idol” than the daily number of fatalities in Iraq.
Still, at the day's end you should have faith in something: a dream, a person, hobby—whatever. I dislike clashing with people over something as idiotic as politics as much as the next person.
I still, however, believe America is capable of ending its war, and that an outcome of peace isn't completely lost (yeah, I said PEACE). But a worse offense would be resigning myself to thinking it's all a lost cause.
Sorry Cindy, there's too much in life that already falls into that category.
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