STATEMENT BY SÉAMAS CAIN ...
TO BE READ OUT TO SUPPORTERS OF
THE RAYTHEON NINE ON
TUESDAY, MAY 27TH, 2008
OUTSIDE THE LAGANSIDE COURTHOUSE
IN BELFAST, NORTHERN IRELAND
http://www.raytheon9.org/
I want to add my voice to the voices of a number of other people in support of the Raytheon Nine. Do not let the Raytheon Nine stand alone! The Raytheon Nine have shown us how to think and speak and act for ourselves! Yes, stand with them now for your honour, and stand with them for the honour of your children!
In 1965, I participated in Dr. Martin Luther King's Selma Freedom March. I was not intimidated then by red-neck Sheriffs, attack dogs, and water-cannons ... and I see no reason why I should be intimidated by the Raytheon War Corporation now! In 1965, I thought I had been caught up in a huge spectacle and struggle of truly Biblical proportions; indeed it marked me for all the years of my life. At the time, there were those people who said it was an “End to History”; however, it was not the end of history ... the struggle for justice and freedom in the U.S. continues unabated to this day.
In 1967, I participated in “The March on the Pentagon” to oppose that other never-ending war, the war in Vietnam. Such mass-actions, nonviolent and deliberative, were an indication that ordinary people in large numbers could indeed challenge the mindless and deluded policies of government leaders. At the time, Abbie Hoffman told the mass-media that we would levitate the entire Pentagon thirty feet off the ground. Sadly, then and ever since, the only levitations we could witness were in the insatiable careerist schemes of the military officers. At the time, Jerry Rubin told the mass-media that we would encircle the Pentagon entirely and conduct “a hippie exorcism” of the evil. But clearly the exorcism failed, and the struggle for meaningful peace and justice continues unabated to this day.
In 1968, I was one of the protesters in Chicago against the Democrat Convention. Our insistence that the war must be stopped, and our unrelenting commitment to direct action, effectively brought to an end the political careers of President Johnson and Hubert Humphrey. Thus we revealed that even ordinary people could mark history itself, and challenge the High and Mighty.
In 1972, I participated in the Newry civil rights march in Northern Ireland. At the time, there were people who said that the Civil Rights Movement in Northern Ireland was a mere imitation of the Civil Rights Movement in the U.S. But such people were crudely and prissily ignorant of the connections, specific and concrete, between the Antislavery and Abolitionist movement in the U.S. and freedom movements in Ireland, north and south.
Sadly, all kinds of people, even people in contending factions, turned away and allowed themselves and the entire landscape of Ireland and Northern Ireland to be frozen over into ice, yes the political ice of the Eighteenth Century, and contending clichés from the political ice of the Eighteenth Century! (Structural and political notions from the Eighteenth Century have been singularly unsuccessful in resolving any of the conflicts and strife of the last one-hundred years, and in more than one part of the world!)
In 1981, I took part in protests against the circumstances surrounding the death of Bobby Sands. Indeed, I was totally overwhelmed by my experiences at that time. I could not understand the failure of so many people ( ... people in England and Ireland and the U.S.) to understand the implications of a fundamental disrespect of what is human! Nevertheless, the struggle for respect, simple respect, continues unabated to this day.
The Raytheon War Corporation lied to its own workers. The Raytheon Corporation lied to the citizens of Derry. The Raytheon Corporation lied repeatedly to government officials in Northern Ireland. And the Raytheon Nine spoke truth to power! (Do not let them stand alone!) It is horrible to think that human beings should pay with imprisonment or worse for the exercise of that most human right which, no matter what party or faction we belong to, we must all value and defend.
We live in a time when tyrants and militarists, throughout the world, have become ever more crass and venal. Indeed, they have become nothing but laughable and empty caricatures of themselves ... as they fashion unrelentingly a new dark age of brutality and want! And the Raytheon Corporation, flippant and shallow, is the perfect example of the type, as they have designed the way for the commodification and the merchandising of war itself.
Is it not time that we all work together for a peaceful and just society? Is it not time that we all push through to find a way to make new, truly human relations? I suggest that the movement for a just and peaceful society must itself be creative or it will not be at all!
The Raytheon Nine spoke truth to power! Do not let them stand alone!
Peaceful regards,
Séamas Cain
http://alazanto.org/seamascain
http://seamascain.writernetwork.com
http://www.mnartists.org/Seamas_Cain
323 Fourth Street,
Cloquet, Minnesota,
U.S.A.,
55720 – 2051
Phone: 218.879.8628
TO BE READ OUT TO SUPPORTERS OF
THE RAYTHEON NINE ON
TUESDAY, MAY 27TH, 2008
OUTSIDE THE LAGANSIDE COURTHOUSE
IN BELFAST, NORTHERN IRELAND
http://www.raytheon9.org/
I want to add my voice to the voices of a number of other people in support of the Raytheon Nine. Do not let the Raytheon Nine stand alone! The Raytheon Nine have shown us how to think and speak and act for ourselves! Yes, stand with them now for your honour, and stand with them for the honour of your children!
In 1965, I participated in Dr. Martin Luther King's Selma Freedom March. I was not intimidated then by red-neck Sheriffs, attack dogs, and water-cannons ... and I see no reason why I should be intimidated by the Raytheon War Corporation now! In 1965, I thought I had been caught up in a huge spectacle and struggle of truly Biblical proportions; indeed it marked me for all the years of my life. At the time, there were those people who said it was an “End to History”; however, it was not the end of history ... the struggle for justice and freedom in the U.S. continues unabated to this day.
In 1967, I participated in “The March on the Pentagon” to oppose that other never-ending war, the war in Vietnam. Such mass-actions, nonviolent and deliberative, were an indication that ordinary people in large numbers could indeed challenge the mindless and deluded policies of government leaders. At the time, Abbie Hoffman told the mass-media that we would levitate the entire Pentagon thirty feet off the ground. Sadly, then and ever since, the only levitations we could witness were in the insatiable careerist schemes of the military officers. At the time, Jerry Rubin told the mass-media that we would encircle the Pentagon entirely and conduct “a hippie exorcism” of the evil. But clearly the exorcism failed, and the struggle for meaningful peace and justice continues unabated to this day.
In 1968, I was one of the protesters in Chicago against the Democrat Convention. Our insistence that the war must be stopped, and our unrelenting commitment to direct action, effectively brought to an end the political careers of President Johnson and Hubert Humphrey. Thus we revealed that even ordinary people could mark history itself, and challenge the High and Mighty.
In 1972, I participated in the Newry civil rights march in Northern Ireland. At the time, there were people who said that the Civil Rights Movement in Northern Ireland was a mere imitation of the Civil Rights Movement in the U.S. But such people were crudely and prissily ignorant of the connections, specific and concrete, between the Antislavery and Abolitionist movement in the U.S. and freedom movements in Ireland, north and south.
Sadly, all kinds of people, even people in contending factions, turned away and allowed themselves and the entire landscape of Ireland and Northern Ireland to be frozen over into ice, yes the political ice of the Eighteenth Century, and contending clichés from the political ice of the Eighteenth Century! (Structural and political notions from the Eighteenth Century have been singularly unsuccessful in resolving any of the conflicts and strife of the last one-hundred years, and in more than one part of the world!)
In 1981, I took part in protests against the circumstances surrounding the death of Bobby Sands. Indeed, I was totally overwhelmed by my experiences at that time. I could not understand the failure of so many people ( ... people in England and Ireland and the U.S.) to understand the implications of a fundamental disrespect of what is human! Nevertheless, the struggle for respect, simple respect, continues unabated to this day.
The Raytheon War Corporation lied to its own workers. The Raytheon Corporation lied to the citizens of Derry. The Raytheon Corporation lied repeatedly to government officials in Northern Ireland. And the Raytheon Nine spoke truth to power! (Do not let them stand alone!) It is horrible to think that human beings should pay with imprisonment or worse for the exercise of that most human right which, no matter what party or faction we belong to, we must all value and defend.
We live in a time when tyrants and militarists, throughout the world, have become ever more crass and venal. Indeed, they have become nothing but laughable and empty caricatures of themselves ... as they fashion unrelentingly a new dark age of brutality and want! And the Raytheon Corporation, flippant and shallow, is the perfect example of the type, as they have designed the way for the commodification and the merchandising of war itself.
Is it not time that we all work together for a peaceful and just society? Is it not time that we all push through to find a way to make new, truly human relations? I suggest that the movement for a just and peaceful society must itself be creative or it will not be at all!
The Raytheon Nine spoke truth to power! Do not let them stand alone!
Peaceful regards,
Séamas Cain
http://alazanto.org/seamascain
http://seamascain.writernetwork.com
http://www.mnartists.org/Seamas_Cain
323 Fourth Street,
Cloquet, Minnesota,
U.S.A.,
55720 – 2051
Phone: 218.879.8628
posted by G.d'A-L. or HARL or Ori Sapel at 9:44 PM
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