Students For A Peaceful Response, an anti-war activist group, staged a walk out yesterday at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
The event protested Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF), the U.S. military action against Taliban and terrorist controlled areas of Afghanistan.
After an opening moment of silence, SPR member Chris Thomas welcomed the small group of students who gathered in front of the Student Union at 9:15 a.m.
“We encourage you to read up,” Thomas said, gesturing toward several tables set up to the side of the podium. “We can’t build a movement against war unless you know what it is you are mobilizing against.”
There was no set agenda for the gathering, and participants were encouraged to come forward and speak out against OEF.
“I see politicians saying ‘I speak with one voice.’ We’re showing by showing up today we’re proving that wrong,” Randy Choiniere, a graduate Labor Studies student said. “See through the dogma, see through the rhetoric, see through the hypocrisy. George W. Bush does not speak for me.”
Graduate students from the Labor Relations Center cheered Choiniere on, then talked quietly amongst themselves.
“I’m against the war. I think that the ideal would be world court. They [terrorists] should be extradited,” said one graduate student, who only wished to be called Robert. “Afghanistan wouldn’t turn the terrorists over to the United States. I think there would be more justification [for air strikes] if they refused to extradite.”
Corrado, another graduate student, believes that the United States is at least partially responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks.
“We have to accept some responsibility; we can’t go around terrorizing other countries without expecting it here,” Corrado said. “It [the war] ignores the underlying principle for the cause of terrorist attacks on our soil – U.S. foreign policy.”
Joe, a Labor Center graduate student, was against OEF because he thought it wasn’t well defined enough.
“A lot of us are concerned about an ambiguous and undefined war. There are some defined objectives but a lot of undefined,” Joe said. “Bin Laden and the terrorists should be dead or in jail right now, but they are monsters that U.S. foreign policy has created.
“There are no easy answers.”
As the morning went one, the crowd gained some numbers, but attendance overall remained sparse, numbering roughly 50.
Around 10 a.m., two students with American flags and patriotic signs stood several yards away from the podium.
Chris Carlozzi, a junior political science student, said that he was there to show that UMass students were “rational.”
“We’re here because the United States has taken a strong initiative against terrorism,” Carlozzi said. “If these people are here to oppose that, we’re going to show them that there are people with rational minds.”
Sophomore political science and philosophy major Kiera Manikoff agreed.
“We are here to show support for our country; unity for both the administration and our country,” Manikoff said. “It dismays me that everywhere around the country people are supportive and then you come to UMass and you see this. It’s anti-American.”
SPR members continued to speak at the podium, while others made signs and still others bobbed for apples.
“That’s bob,” Thomas said. “Not bomb.”
Roughly a third of the small crowd gathered around Carlozzi and Manikoff, and began debating a wide range of social issues.
Towards 11 a.m., as hundreds of people streamed past the Student Union and the protest, Thomas retook the podium and urged SPR supporters to return to their classes.
“Go back,” Thomas said. “Tell them what’s happening, and bring them back here with you.”
Olaf Aprons, who lingered near the back of the rally clutching a small American flag, surveyed the crowd.
“Like half my class walked out,” Aprons said, adding that he didn’t see them at the rally. “They probably went home.”
