This is a review of some of the work I've been involved with during my life.
Category: Uncategorized
Refuse to normalize what is grotesque
The Economic Draft is the modern mechanism of conscription that weaponizes survival needs to force individuals into complicity with systems of extraction and violence. Individuals are "conscripted" not by law, but by manufactured scarcity—the threat of starvation, homelessness, and the loss of healthcare.
Tending The In-Between
Despite the trauma from the deployment of ICE agents to Minneapolis, the response of the people there, and supporters globally, has given us a template for effective, nonviolent systemic non-cooperation to state violence. Something that will likely be needed to withdraw our consent from further occasions of state violence, perhaps in our own communities.
Minneapolis Active Objection and Renewal
The powerful and peaceful witness shown by the people of Minneapolis is a template for other communities that will likely be confronted with similar tactics by ICE.
Signs and Witness 2
In Indianapolis, we had been working on defunding the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) for several months. On November 15, 2016, a crowd of about 200 of us alongside Native Americans in traditional dress marched through downtown Indianapolis with our signs about defunding the pipeline. We stopped in front of two of the banks involved with funding the pipeline, Chase and PNC Bank. The crowd stood in silence as people went in to close their accounts. That day the group withdrew $110,000 dollars.
A dozen Roses for Renee Good
In these tumultuous times, we should pay a great deal of attention to our Spiritual life. Now is the time to join with others outside our usual circles. We all need each other.
Signs and Witness
Another day a young Black man stopped, got out of his car, and walked up to us. I wasn’t sure how that was going to go. But he said, “a white man holding a Black Lives Matter sign”. I said, “yes, a white man holding a Black Lives Matter Sign”
Quakers Silent Witness for Peace
Quaker public witness has stood in opposition to cruel and authoritarian actions in our country before. It is time for us to show this love in action again. American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)
National Quaker Conference on the Draft 1968
As Friends we have for many years been granted privileged status within the draft system. This has often blinded us to the evil of the draft itself, and the treatment of those not so privileged. We are grateful for all those who by resolutely resisting the draft have quickened our conscience. We are called into the community of all who suffer for their refusal to perform unconscionable acts.
Actively Object, Don’t Resist
What a witness provides is testimony. This is true both in biblical teaching and in contemporary legal practice. People being trained as observers in relation to ICE gather the testimony, not just of their own eyes and ears, but of the videos they take on their cell phones. And the testimony must be unbiased. Marshall Massey