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About The North Coast times-eagle. (Wheeler, Oregon) 1971-2007 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 1, 2000)
PAGE 3 NORTH COAST TIMES E A G L E, WINTER 2000 BILL LOGAN hat, broadcast two hours of radio every morning from the church basement. As the tear-gassed protesters arrived during the afternoon, we congregated there and formed many alliances We realized even more how all our issues meshed, and felt our solidarity. The steelworkers have formed an alliance with the tree sitters in northern California, and they invited everyone to a free party at the church. David Brower, president of the Steelworkers, and David Foster of Earth Island Institute spoke of their alliance and their hope of bringing union members and environmentalists together in a massive movement.There was a wonderful alliance of foods — everything from turkey, baked potatoes and hearty soup for the steelworkers to hummus, tabouli, veggies, fruit and chips for the vegetarians Everyone feasted, picked up literature, shared stories from the streets. Charlie King, Jim Page, Sweet Honey in the Rock, and African drumming entertained us. The sanctuary was rocking! By the time Ruth and I left, the curfew was on, many streets barricaded, and the buses not running. 'The Raging Grannies' tore up sheets to make armbands for us to show we were peaceful protesters. Fortunately, we were able to sneak out of the church, circumvent the barricades, and walk up over First Hill to where we were staying with encountering tear-gas. Ruth is a member of the Women's International League for Peace & Freedom (WILPF), and they were one of the NGOs (non-govemment non-profit organizations) who had been invited to attend the WTO meetings. We went to debriefings every evening to learn what was going on. These powerful, informed women, one from the U.S. and one from Canada, had attended other international meetings where they also met in women's caucuses to decide strategy, and lobbied their own country's delegates. But at this WTO they felt completely marginalized, more like window dressing than players. They were given abbre viated packets that did not even include agendas or locations of meetings. They were served elaborate lunches and given a box of chocolates, but had no access to delegates. They reported that the delegates of the smaller nations felt equally marginal ized and powerless. The Golden Rule of the WTO seems to be "The ones with the gold make the rules." Thursday's session at the church was on Food & Agri culture, again with powerful speakers from around the globe, including India, Bangladesh, France, Uruguay, Korea and China. They told us how the WTO requirement for exports is pushing hundreds of thousands of small farmers off the land and into cities, and of problems wth genetically engineered crops. At noon we marched down to the Pike Street Market for a rally in support of family farmers. As we were returning to the church, we ran across the protest at the jail demanding the release of the 'Seattle 400'. The DAN was so disciplined! One guy juggled, another hula-hooped. The crowd chanting but calm. Some of the chants were call and response. I was across the street and couldn't understand the words, but it sounded like a church service. The police surround ed the block but did not interfere. One man threw a bottle. Other protesters immediately picked up the broken glass. A man behind me yelled, "Agent Povocateur! Will somebody please escort that gentleman away?" He split. The DAN protesters had had too much nonviolence training to be incited into mob action. That evening after our debriefing with WILPF we walked up Capitol Hill to the Community College, where a video of police violence was scheduled. However, the college was closed because during the previous evening students had been tear- gassed as they left their classes The students and neighbors were irate and were forming an impromptu march, as much to protest the police action as the WTO We marched with them for awhile, then turned off to go home to bed Bikes & Beyond 1335MARINE DR. ASTORIA, OREGON 5O5-325-A21O lucybookiPpicifier com Friday's session was at the Lutheran Church and was on corporate accountability. We broke up a little early to join a march from the Labor Temple sponsored by Seattle's labor, environmental, religious, civic, community and student groups This was a huge march, larger than anyone expected and was joined by many Seattleites protesting the police actions. "This is what democracy looks like! " and "Free the Seattle 400! " we chanted.One man had a large sign stating the First Amendment. Another said "My taxes paid for your tear-gas." Again, people were talking and networking all along the route.Two underground newspapers with news of the WTO protests not found in the local mainstream media were distributed The ACLU passed out fliers asking for reports of police misconduct. The 'Wobblies' (Industrial Workers of the World) called for a general strike Everyone was talking about 'where do we go from here'? How can we expand these alliances and how can the movement grow? How can we spread the word about this powerful event in the face of the mainstream media's obsession with the violence? I wish I could have attended the Friday session on Fish eries, Aquaculture & the WTO, where family fishers from around the world discussed the impact of globalization and corporate consolidation on their lives, environment and community, but Ruth and I left on the 5:00 train after six very powerful and energizing days THE LONG ROAD BY ARTHUR MORGAN For perhaps the next half century or more the burden of our attention and of our loyalties, and the full drive of our aspirations, should be given to bringing about a revolution in the personal character of the American people When I use the word "character" I have in mind three elements.First its purposefulness, or the pattern of desire — the vision of the life it would be well to lead, of the kind of world which so far as wisdom, judgment, and good will can determine it would be well to live in. Second, I include good wll and the skilled and disci plined drive of desire vtfiich presses toward the realization of aims and purposes. Great insight into what would constitute a good life for one's self and for society has value only as expressed in well-considered action, though under the term "action" I should include the disciplined and carefully expressed thinking of the student, and the work of the artist, as well as the more obvious activity of the laborer or the businessman. Great vigor of action by itself, however, may have no more social value than the capricious force of the tornado, unless it is directed by a vision of what is desirable... The third factor is ethical or moral quality, the habitual choice of means that are wholesome in their own effects. Even when the desired end is good and the disciplined energy great, it is important that the methods used shall be in themselves ethical or moral. My definition of ethical or moral action is as easy to state as it is difficult to apply That is an ethical act which is good when judged by its total consequences — which is good for the future as well as the present, for society as a whole as well as for ourselves.. There is scarcely any more effective means for bnnging about social change than the "apostolic succession" that results from inanimate association of persons of clear purpose and great commitment with small groups of young people We must begin far back, in the slow, thorough building of character which will be tried out in the realities of everyday living, and which by aspiration, disciplined by open-minded, critical inquiry, will mature a philosophy of life reasonably adequate to the present day. As that quality of character is matured, it will result in leadership that will apply itself to the issues of the time It will give concrete expression in everyday life to a new vision of the quality that life may have When that vision is clearly expressed and clearly defined the people will gradually receive it as their own. The long way round of build ing character, in the end will prove to have been the short way home to a good social order Arthur Morgan was once head of the Tennessee Valley Authority during the FDR administration, and was considered the USA's leading flood control engineer. Earlier, in 1921, he made Ohio’s ailing Antioch College one of the best undergraduate schools in the country. Later focusing his energies on the restoration of small community life, he organized in 1940 the foundation known as Community Service, Inc During that time he wrote "a rather wonderful little book," The Long Road, from vtfuch this excerpt has been repnnted from MANAS, a 'journal of independent inquiry', which unfortunately ceased publication in 1986 I have been thinking about that week ever since, and I do have some observations and questions to throwout: ~1. The protest I saw and experienced was nothing like what TV reported. Is this because TV news is increasingly controlled and censored by big corporations? What can we do about it? Could we broadcast the church sessions, the peaceful marches on TV or the Internet? ~2. I was overjoyed to observe the young people in this protest; in their numbers, their friendliness, their discipline, and their practice of nonviolence and use of consensus One young man asked me if this is what it was like in the '60s, or were we a lot more organized I had to laugh ~3. The police were protecting the WTO, not the citizens or businesses of Seattle Their orders were to maintain their perimeters, and they did nothing to stop the window breakers, even though they were right there. They were much less organ ized than the protesters. ~4 It was wonderful to share the protest with the unions, and the developing alliance between them, the environmentalists and the church is portentous. We all felt it. ~5 Unlike dunng the Vietnam War protests, there was little opposition to our views Many people were frustrated by the shut-down of the city and the tear-gas, but most thanked us for our work and said they agreed with us 100%. -6. What should we do about the rock throwers? Some of us thought we should control them ourselves, as they comple tely destroyed our message. Others said no, we are peaceful protesters, it's up to the police to control the violence. What did the mass, nonviolent movements of Gandhi and Martin Luther King do about rock-throwers. Does anybody know? All four of my children have told me they are proud I was protesting in Seattle, and my teenaged granddaughter asked me to take her with me if I ever went to another protest. It was difficult for her 5 year old sister, watching TV and knowing her grandma was there, to figure out who were the good guys and who were the bad guys. Their mother suggested that part of the fervor was millennium fever, and she's probably right, as the corporations have been overly-greedy for a long time. But I say, let's build on it! This week felt like the beginning of a new, mass international social movement, folks. I think a question in the future will be 'Were you in Seattle in 1999?" I am so happy that I was. Lois Morford has been called an "International Activist.” She lives in Astoria and has written many articles on human rights in Central America, where she has actively worked for those rights for many years. POLK RILEY'S PRINTING • ASTORIA 503 325 7775 1 800 732 7775 325-0379 http://www.paclflar.com/~wlllow
