Protesting the SOA, or Getting What's Coming To You
A Wesley alumnus sent a message to the alumni listserv this evening, announcing that he would be entering federal prison for 6 months “for peaceful protest of one of the United States’ largest terrorist training camps,” referring to the result of actions he took in the course of a protest at the site of the former School of the Americas at Fort Benning, GA.
Part of me would have liked to respond directly on-list, but there really wouldn’t have been much point to that. That list isn’t a place for a political flame war, and one way or another it would degenerate into such. I didn’t feel like introducing myself to the Wesley alumni list that way. Instead, I just wrote up a quick response to his (very limited) description of what he believed was being inflicted on him unfairly, and posted it as my AIM away message. The text follows.
Every time you hear someone talk about being sent to federal prison for 6 months “for peaceful protest of one of the United States’ largest terrorist training camps,” read that as “for trespassing on a United States Army base.” Then the facts become clearer.
Protest all you want, and you’re certainly free to hold your own opinions about U.S. policy during the 1970s and 1980s, but when you cross that line at Fort Benning, you’ve violated federal law, and you need to accept the consequences, not whine and try to muddle the issue.
5 September 2002 / 0 Comments / Tags: politics