The War On Dissent Gets Creepy

[No Exit]

The War on Dissent Gets Creepy
by Mike Ferner

On New Year's Day, I decided to start 2006 out with a public protest against the war. Little did I know how public it would become.
My younger brother and I (he was only the wheelman, led astray) tagged three highway overpasses near Toledo with "TROOPS OUT NOW!" (see photo, below). Suburban cops with too much time on their hands and citizens with cell phones being what they were, we were soon pulled over by five (no kidding) patrol cars and arrested on no fewer than five felonies each. For those of you who haven't been paying attention to how state legislatures protect us from crime, in the late 90's in Ohio it became a felony to spraypaint a public building (called "getting tough on gangs") AND a felony to possess a can of spraypaint in the commission of that crime ("possession of criminal tools" says the Ohio Revised Code). We spent that night in jail and the next day appeared, shackled together, before a judge who set bond at (this is all for real, pals) $3,000 each, no 10% business.

(snip)

(Because the author of this article had previously been a city councilman, The Toledo Blade wrote about his spraypainting, commenting negatively on it.)

The Blade was gracious enough to list me in the company of some civilly disobedient heroes, indicating my behavior fell woefully short of those honorable standards. Spray paint wasn’t invented in Gandhi’s day, but might he at some point have scrawled "Brits Out Now" with whitewash and a brush? One might think so. "But why break the law," people ask? "What about this war troubles you enough to break the law?"

In one word: images.
Images that never leave me.

Images of young soldiers and marines lying in row upon row of hospital beds. Images of picking shrapnel out of Mike Ramsack’s backside…dressing Bob Butikofer’s wounds every day and trying not to make him scream…changing colostomy bags on guys hoping they won’t defecate out the hole in their guts caused by a gunshot wound to the abdomen…trying to give a brain scan to a young soldier missing his entire left temporal lobe…Images of eating in the chow hall as dozens of patients in wheelchairs, on crutches, missing arms and legs and eyes line up for dinner…Images of a young man sitting silent and broken in a corner of the psych ward. And there are other, more recent images from my trips to Iraq that I cannot forget. Images of the kids I met on the streets of Baghdad, and the ones in Abu Siffa who shared their chicken and rice dinner with an American journalist two days after a cruise missile blew their orange grove to bits. Images of Fatima in the Sa’adoon St. copy shop who told me how beautiful she thought her country was and how she hoped there would be no war. Images of the young U.S. Army sergeant from West Virginia I accompanied on patrol one night near Balad, who answered my question, "why are you in Iraq?" with a tired shrug saying, "I really don’t know." And his partner from North Dakota, just as bone-tired, who answered simply, "oil."

(snip)

"Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of the leaders of their government and have gone to war, and millions have been killed because of this obedience...Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves, and all the while the grand thieves are running the country. That's our problem." (Attributed to Historian Howard Zinn.)

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig6/ferner5.html

[HysteryDiagnosis]

1. It's simply the war on truth, some people don't want to be set

free.... pity.

[No Exit]

3. They would rather go on being slaves, and possibly dying for NOTHING,

than admit they were WRONG.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

6. When man lashes out aggressively, he will usually find out that

his actions were a mistake... anger and aggression are nothing more than fear turned inside out. Shrubco has turned the responsibility of protecting the U.S. into an evil twisted profitable adventure. We could not have been led down a more wrong path by these morans in D.C.

[No Exit]

16. I agree with you, and all I have left to say is, when, oh when,

will it END???

[HysteryDiagnosis]

17. I'm not a big fan of the bible.... but it is written somewhere in there

that the armies of the earth will go to war with the armies of heaven... what that means I don't know but the outcome will be that we won't be exporting war no more... of that I am sure.

[No Exit]

19. Well, I don't believe in hell, but I frequently wish I did.

For obvious reasons--because I fervently wish * and Cheney could burn for all eternity in hell.

[Berry Cool]

8. I know I'll be disagreed with on this, but here goes anyway.

Why spray paint? Why not something that won't have to be cleaned away by anyone later?

It's possible to make a big protest noise in ways that don't involve defacing things.

And spare me the lecture about how defacing things is but a small matter compared to an illegal war. I believe in the "broken windows" theory of society, which is that if you don't care about something as small as defaced things, you eventually won't care about something as big as an illegal war either.

In one place where I went to school, there was a huge wall that everyone understood was reserved solely for graffiti. If people wanted to get a message out about anything--from a party to a political viewpoint--they could put it on the wall. It was all very civilized. People allowed old messages to stay untouched for a certain period of time before painting over them. It was ever-changing and visually interesting, as well as a measure of what kind of political sentiments were in the air at the time.

OK, I admit. I have never bought the concept of graffiti as "art." I don't understand the graffiti culture and never will. But that's just me. Anyway, I don't think this is about graffiti culture. This is about a guy who decided to express his political opinion by spraypainting it, and ended up treated like a criminal as a result, rather than an exerciser of his First Amendment rights. Surprise? I think not.

My feeling is, if you want to protest, write letters, hold public demonstrations, come up with many creative ways to get your message across. Don't spraypaint stuff. If you spraypaint stuff, that just gives 'em an excuse to arrest you for defacing something. And guess who'll probably be doing the cleanup job: you.

[Zodiak]

18. And this guy learned something else

He learned that his treatment is exactly what a young man would get for tagging anything else on a highway....five felonies. In his attempt to reveal an unjustice, he discovered another one...one that landed right on his face like a ton of bricks.

Still, I feel sorry for him. His heart was in the right place, but not his mind.

[yellowdogmi]

20. I agree with you that defacing

things is not an acceptable solution. I think that there are other ways to effectively spread the same message. such as

http://www.freewayblogger.com/

[tabasco]

22. I agree. I don't believe in vandalism.

Vandalism is just another form of destruction.

There are better ways such as banners to communicate the message.

I don't believe in the harsh treatment for these folks. An appropriate punishment would be community service of cleaning all the things they spray-painted and a small fine ($1000 or less).

[Child_Of_Isis]

2. citizens with cell phones

And there you have it. Big brother doesn't have to watch you.

[No Exit]

5. Anyone who backs this fraudulent war is too stupid to be

allowed to drive a car!

Ohio needs to make another law about THAT.

[ermoore]

4. Come on . . .

Look, you vandalised public property. Why are you so outraged that you got arrested? You're a little short of civil disobedience here.

[No Exit]

9. Oh, looky.

Looky, everyone! Here we have one of the people who is willingly letting himself/herself be led to hell by "too much obedience" (to quote Mr. Zinn.)

That's my opinion, and if you don't like it, I'll spraypaint it on the side of your house. (Just kidding.)

Are you in favor of this fraudulent Iraq war, and if not, what do you do to show your disapproval of it?

[Berry Cool]

13. I don't know who you're addressing, but I can tell you,

I express my opinions every chance I get, and without spray paint.

[No Exit]

15. I don't use spray paint, either. I was addressing everyone; in

particular, I was addressing poster "ermoore".

I talk to people about why I disapprove of this fraudulent war. I also write to people about why I disapprove of this fraudulent war. I have even written to freepers about it--not a pleasant task.

But I don't do enough.

This man (in the article) decided to do something much bolder than what I do. I wouldn't dream of finding fault with him.

I think what this man (in the article) needs is some BANNERS.

[Berry Cool]

12. Yeah. I mean, I could take a crap in the middle of the downtown square

and say "I am taking this crap in protest of the war." And guess what's going to happen? I'm going to get arrested for public exposure and, uh, littering or something. LOL.

I am all in favor of protest. Protest, protest, protest! Just don't give them an easy way to accuse you of being a criminal and put the handcuffs on you.

Call me crazy, but I don't remember Martin Luther King Jr. ever spraypainting anything. When HE got thrown in jail for civil disobedience, it was for protesting peacefully. Made it a whole lot harder to paint him a lawless criminal and dismiss him out of hand.

[zann725]

7. Thank you for the post, and quote: "Our problem IS civil obedience."

Powerful piece.

[No Exit]

10. You're welcome, and yes, I think you've gotten the point.

That quote jumped out at me, too.

[Zodiak]

11. So someone narced on him

Wow...now I know nothing at all about who called the cops, but my devious little DU mind cannot help to wonder if it wasn't a Bush supporter (or a war supporter).

Civil obedience is a big problem, I agree. However, one must know that if they engage in civil disobeience, today's judicial climate WILL throw the books at you. Dissent is not appreciated. This poor guy now has to live with felonies on his record for what would normally be a misdemeanor crime. I wish that he had read up on what he was about to do before he did it. Well-planned civil disobedience would keep the man's record a little cleaner.

Still, I cannot fault him for his emotion or his drive for justice in this war (if not justice in his local area).

Be smart...make SURE that what you do in civil disobedience is not a felony (and have a lawyer at the ready). There are lots of creative ways that civil disobedience can be used without ending up in jail forever (a free man is free to do it again...a felony menas you blow you wad all at once). Spray-painting public utilities is apparently not one of them.

ON EDIT: I don't think this guy is outraged he got arrested. I think he is outraged that he was charged with five felonies. That does seem a bit excessive for spraying a tag.

[Berry Cool]

14. Thank you, Zodiac.

I think protesters make themselves more powerful if they don't do something that makes it *easier* for the general public to dismiss them, to write them off as hooligans. If they do, that just makes the link easier in their minds: War protester = hooligan, lawbreaker.

However, if they see someone treated like a criminal for NOTHING other than expressing an opinion, that creates some cognitive dissonance where there might not have been any before in the minds of some people. "Wait...all this guy did was say he was against the war, and they ARRESTED him? Isn't this a free country? I mean, I may not agree with him, but isn't he free to say what he wants?"

Then the wheels start turning. People start realizing that the real reason some people get arrested is not so much because they broke the law as because they said something unpopular. And then, hopefully, they get mad.

Martin Luther King was no dummy. He knew how easy it was for whites, especially in the South, to dismiss out of hand any group of blacks raising a ruckus over anything (and dismissal was the KINDEST treatment they'd get). So, he raised a ruckus without trying to damage anything. When he got tossed in the pokey anyway, it opened some minds to what was going on. That he wasn't being jailed because he broke the law...no, that was beside the point.

And that made all the difference.

[f-bush]

21. The Facist state loves to use

minor crimes like these to turn them against people and ruin their lives for speaking out against the states' oppression and evils.