On Friday, February 14, I spoke with Ben Waxman, a senior at Philadelphia's Springfield Township High School, one of over 150 schools planning for a national student strike on March 5. "A lot of the kids in my school enlist in the military to get money for college. They come up to me and say, 'Ben, I don't want to get shipped to Iraq.' They want to stop this war." Waxman explained that "It's mostly some teachers and administrators that are against us. They say, 'Saddam Hussein is Hitler.' And, 'You don't know what you're talking about.'"

The response in Congress to the American people's skepticism about invasion bears much in common with the paternalism of those high school authorities. "There is no debate, no discussion, no attempt to lay out for the nation the pros and cons of this particular war... This chamber is hauntingly silent," said Robert Byrd (D-WV) in a recent speech before the Senate. It appears that little will stop President Bush from having his invasion.

It is in these times when protest seems the most futile that it is perhaps the most important. An Associated Press story released Saturday reads, "Rattled by an outpouring of anti-war sentiment, the United States and Britain began reworking a draft resolution... Diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the final product may be a softer text that does not explicitly call for war."

A "softer text" was not the demand of the individuals who demonstrated this weekend, nor is it enough to stop a war. Yet such a document provides an unusually sudden acknowledgement of the ability of protest to influence those in power. And it carries a reminder of a vital tradition in democratic political life: When the official avenues of discussion have been closed, democracy demands dissent.

back | next