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Each and every day I receive more and more e-mails
asking for my signature on a petition, or asking
for a donation for a campaign or to air a new commercial,
or asking for funding on an important and urgent
issue. And the requests are urgent – there
are important issues being debated, issues that
will impact not only life in this country and the
world today but for years and decades to come. With
each request I end up feeling more and more overwhelmed
– how much money can I give or even afford
to give? I can sign each petition and send it to
all my friends as well, but would it really make
a difference, will any one listen, will anything
change?
Over the past few years I have signed many of these
petitions – against the war in Iraq, against
funding for that war, against legislation curtailing
civil and political rights, against drilling in
the Arctic. I have given money to presidential candidates,
candidates for the US Senate and House of Representatives,
for campaigns to inform and alert the American people
that our country is taking the wrong course. I have
gone on marches as well. Marches where there have
been thousands and thousands of people. For all
that effort the petitions seemed to fail, the candidates
have all but lost, and the marches and the campaigns
seem to make no difference. Where does that leave
me, leave us? Doing nothing is never an option,
but voting, signing petitions and sending money
(or even going to marches) do not seem to be enough
either.
I remember thinking about this more than twenty
years ago - debating with myself and with others,
about what we should be doing, could be doing. As
a student activist, I remember how we would put
down those people who “just” voted and
gave money. Though we judged others harshly, we
seemed to be even harsher with ourselves. Long conversations
about how active we all should be, that to be truly
involved, truly committed, how far should we be
willing to go? Was it enough to go on marches, to
organize and inform others? Or was it essential
to put your body on the line, to commit civil disobedience
and run the risk of being arrested and going to
jail? If I was committed to the causes I believed,
should there be any limit to how far I should be
willing to go?
This brings me back to a conversation I had with
a good friend of mine, who being over ten years
older than me, had been actively involved in the
movements of the 1960s. He had been involved in
the anti-war movement from its inception, had been
in the protests at the Democratic Convention in
Chicago in 1968, and continued to march in the protests
we were organizing in the late 1970s against nuclear
power, a continued build up of nuclear weapons,
and reinstituting registration for a military draft.
I had come to the decision that to show my dedication
I had to prove it by engaging in civil disobedience
and getting arrested. Even though I was deathly
afraid of being arrested and potentially going to
jail, nothing else would be enough.
When I shared my decision with my activist friend,
he stopped for a moment and asked me whether I was
doing this because this was the action I wanted
to take or if I was trying to prove something to
myself or to others. He went on to say that if being
a committed activist meant that you had to be arrested,
then I was insinuating that he wasn’t committed.
Though he had been active for more than a decade,
he had never been arrested and was not looking to
be. That if it came to that so be it, but it wasn’t
a matter of having it be something you were compelled
to do. The level of commitment, if it was to make
a difference, had to be something that one could
do and sustain. The struggle for social justice
was a long and arduous one, and to keep it up day
after day after day, we each had to judge what we
were capable of giving and to give to the fullest
extent that we could.
It has been twenty-five years since we had that
conversation. My friend is still active, doing what
he can in his community on both the local and national
level. I’m reading my e-mails, signing petitions,
sending money when I can, passing information to
friends, teaching yoga and writing articles like
this one that I hope will inspire people to think
and challenge the ways they approach and react to
the world. But for me it’s not enough. There
has got to be something more that I can do, perhaps
get involved with a local left-wing political party,
start something up with some like minded friends,
I’m not sure exactly what yet. What I do know
is that for each of us it will be something different,
a different level of commitment, and that commitment
could, will change, depending on how we grow and
change and how the challenges we face develop and
change as well. We need to be aware of our limitations,
while always being open to our capabilities. That
doesn’t always come easy – it demands
that we are always exploring who we are, what we’ve
done and what we believe we can do.
In my own explorations I have been amazed by the
ways I’ve changed and surprised by the things
that have stayed constant, and by the ways in which
the changes and the constants interact and influence
each other. One of those constants is the certainty
in the belief that we must always stay involved,
and never give up hope. The struggles can be long
and hard. There will be successes and failures.
There are ways to get through, though, by trying
to stay balanced and unattached whether we win or
lose. To seek out the support and inspiration from
like minded people. To keep on walking, thinking,
talking and dreaming.
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