Peter Boyle
I was watching the ABC TV news the other night and one of those gruesome reports of another day of war in Iraq flashed on the screen. My nine-year-old daughter said: "Why don't they stop this war? They are just killing more and more people."
My partner and I have never shielded our child from the news, ugly as it is. We think she copes well. As a four-year-old, she bravely rode thorough the experience of being carted off and detained along with the two of us and a score of other activists by Indonesian police for the "crime" of attending a conference on globalisation in Jakarta. She's knows a lot for someone her age.
But then came her next comment. "I know you are trying to stop the war, but it's not working is it?"
"Some things take time, darling", said my partner, flashing me a look. Our daughter had eloquently summed up the thoughts of so many in the anti-war movement today. Is all our campaigning worth anything? Can it work?
I made a mental note: We must make that visit to Vietnam we've talked about for too long. We'll walk the land that was once blighted by a seemingly never-ending war. We will move among the laughing Vietnamese children, who like us have the fortune not to have lived through war.
Then we will say to our daughter: "It does work."
In an earlier period of doubt in the anti-war movement, a forerunner of Green Left Weekly, Direct Action published a picture of Vietnamese freedom fighters and posed the question: What if they tired of marching?
Green Left Weekly keeps campaigning through the rises and falls in confidence in the movements for peace and justice. We are trying to raise $250,000 for our fighting fund over the course of this year. Last week we raised $1144, bringing the total we have raised so far this year to 31% of our whole year target. We need to catch up. Can you help?
If you can help with please send your donation to PO Box 515, Broadway 2007, phone it through on the toll-free line — 1800 634 206 (calls from within Australia only) — or donate online at: <http://www.greenleft.org.au/fogl.htm>.
From Green Left Weekly, June 14, 2006.
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