Uppity Wisconsin
Making Wisconsin Progressive Again
Summerfest and the Army: One more time
Fri, 07/04/2008 - 10:26am | xoff
One more time on Summerfest and the Army.
Having now visited the Army exhibit at Summerfest, rather than relying on newspaper accounts, I am ready to say that Peace Action-Wisconsin, Veterans for Peace and others made some real gains.
As Julie Enslow of Peace Action said:
This is a victory. We asked for the Virtual Army Experience to be removed and it was... They removed the Humvee and the huge screen with the virtual ride through the streets of a middle eastern town with people appearing on the streets to shoot at. After a temporary shut down of the tent to remove the virtual experience game, it was reopened with two rifle practice targets.One target was a typical circular target and the other, according to a TV reporter on the scene, were black silhouettes of the upper body and heads of people such as are used in police target practice, and I guess some arcade games. I cringe at the thought of the black silhouettes but it is a heck of a lot better than the virtual experience exhibit. Its not often you can take on the Army and win.
I had reacted more negatively based on Summerfest's statement on the issue, devoted in large part to licking the Army's boots and kissing its rear end. But actions speak louder than words, and Summerfest did the right thing.
Peace Action reports that, "There are still heavy recruitment tactics going on, including asking young people to sign up with their personal information which allows you to get a DVD game of the Virtual Army Experience to take home and allows you entrance into the tent to the target practice where you can choose between a rifle or a lazer pistol."
But it's certainly progress.
Summerfest and Peace Action have received lots of irate, vile telephone calls from right-wingers, hopped up from listening to talk radio.
If you have not yet called Summerfest to thank them for removing the Virtual Army Experience Exhibit, please do so. They need to hear some friendly calls from us. 414-273-2690.
And if you'd like to thank Peace Action, the number is 414-964-5158.
Our state senator thought the publicity from Peace Action brought a gift to the Army. I responded with a note to him and to the neighbors in Bay View Matters:
Senator Jeff [Plale]
I would like to comment on your point of publicity and give some background. Precisely about Peace Action's involvement, I believe I can offer something here.
For years peace activists have complained about the recruiting tactics of our military - inappropriate gathering of private information from schools, recruiting booths that misrepresent, - well, a laundry list of things we could honestly debate. But in the minds of many citizens military recruitment of our children should not be done without the explicit cooperation of parents. And that principle of parental control is continually violated. Continually.
However, when the young enter their 20s they begin to form their consciences about the use of violence in self defense. Earlier than that, the young people appear more attractive recruitment candidates because they can be formed to the rules of war, even rules that violate their own personal religion. Chilling, indeed, is the instruction to Army leaders how to resolve conflicts with their religious values.
To quote the Army Manual: "Your personal values may and probably do extend beyond the Army values, to include such things as political, cultural, or religious beliefs. However, if you’re to be an Army leader and a person of integrity, these values must reinforce, not contradict, Army values.” (Army Field Manual, [FM 22100, Chapter 232].[thanks to Bob Graf for this quote]
And this week we get yet one more example of how the Army does its recruiting - an offensive shoot-at-human-figures "game" (with a little story tag to justify killing as "rescue").
So am I whacked out to say: the killing exhibit and the Army's own leadership training manual, go hand in hand? Get the young to play soldier and you get a youth who will give up even their religious trainings?
Peace Action's intervention was no surprise to me because I know PA has been involved in this for 30 years. What is a surprise is that the press finally decided to open the discussion to a wider audience.
Bill Sell
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"Let us put our minds together, and see what life we will make for our children."
---Tatanka-Iyotanka (Sitting Bull) --- Hunkpapa Lakota chief