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This weekend I went to the anti-war march in D.C. To be honest, my housemates and I were drawn in by the prospect of seeing Cindy Sheehan, Jesse Jackson, and Joan Baez and were further encouraged by the promise of some good tunes. It also seemed like a good people watching opportunity. However, it soon became more than that for me. I'm not even sure that I can express it in words. I just felt like crying...both happy and sad tears, the whole day.
I'm usually shackled by my sense of science. I like to see all sides of the story and have the options weighed thoroughly before commiting to anything (even small things) so I was inspired by all the passionate people. So many came to stand up for what they believe in. The posters, costumes, chanting, singing, and drumming, were signs of their effort. And the crowd definitely wasn't one dimensional. There were young and old, families, church groups, lesbian moms, labor unions, university students, veterans, and of course, throwbacks to the hippie days of old. I ran into people I knew from college, and in a scary moment, a picture of my high school teacher who died in Iraq. I was even inches away from Cindy and Jesse.
I got angry at the people on both ends who represented their causes poorly. "You suck" as chanted by one pro-war demonstrator is hardly a valid argument.
I was very impressed with the police presence, the respect shown to them, and their respect for the protestors.
However, despite it all, my favorite chant was still, "What do we want? Ice cream! Butter pecan? Butter pecan! Sounds good? Yumyum! Rabblerabblerabblerabble." And my favorite sign was an anti-protest reading "Hippies smell. Go home hippies...and take a shower."
I feel that I didn't do any justice to my feelings here.
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