NEWS
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History Shapes Views on Peace
By Roxanne Amico
BUFFALO, NY (2003-04-15)
Listening to Dan Lenard's Apr. 3rd commentary trivializing the meaning
of anti-war protests brought fond memories of high school, where some social
studies classes were elective, some required -- like world history and
my favorite, American Studies. I was lucky because my teachers saw my
restlessness as a desire to know more than what was in the curriculum.
They took me under wing and encouraged critical thinking.
I learned to think of history as pluralistic; was taught to think of
histor - IES, and ask, If history is made up of the stories we learn
about human experience, whose experience will we hear about? History
in what context? WHO writes history books and how is the history written?
My mind saw forests of histories. Reflecting on that exciting time,
I think of Helen Keller, ecstatic when shown words for water, tree,
face, -her own name - connecting her to the existence of others through
language. I was deeply moved thinking of history this way because while
learning about U.S. Immigration in school, at home I heard my father's stories
about his experience as an Italian Immigrant. I was able to connect
my life to the history of my country, because of my father's story.
My American Studies teacher handed me a book by New York Times correspondent
Hedrick Smith. At that time, over 20 years ago, the prevailing story
about the Soviet Union was that they were "the evil empire."
Smith's book helped me begin to see Russians as they see themselves.
I also learned the history of the colonies of England, and that during
the anti-colonial struggle in India, led by Mahatma Gandhi, the British
paid agents to turn that struggle violent, to try to stop it.
I studied the civil rights movement of the 50's and 60's in the U.S.
Deep South, learning that after lives of suffering, black people risked
assault from the Klan and the police for those victories; learning that
the U.S. government paid agents to incite violence to try to stop the civil
rights movement and the anti?Vietnam war movement.
I learned in the context of art history that Picasso painted Guernica
in 1937 to depict some 1,600 terrorized civilians massacred in a small
Basque village, after three hours of bombardment, during the Spanish
Civil War. In February, as Colin Powell prepared to deceive the world
about the need' to bomb more civilians, the UN reproduction of Guernica was
shrouded. I think history will find this shameful.
More recently, I heard Reverend Lucius Walker, an American Baptist Minister
who works with Mayans of Chiapas, Mexico, who are struggling for their
right to their own land. The tourism industry will not tell the story
of these people, so the Reverend tells the story for them, while inspiring
hundreds of others to aid them. This is history carved of active world citizenship.
A people's history will say what we insist when we take to the streets:
That most people protest war because personal AND world history taught
us that war kills civilians and that we will not tolerate that in our
names, not with our tax dollars, not on our watch; that we need not wait
for the ballot box to voice our non-cooperation.
Studying mass media analysis in high school was context for my skepticism
about histories as told in our current age of the mass media, where
politicians, generals and CEO's own and control most news we hear: Note
the 'embedded' reporting that is making a sanitized Hollywood production
of atrocious realities.
In high school I learned my passion for justice was loving, not hateful,
as Dan Lenard wrongly characterizes war protesters. H. L. Mencken said,
"Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence." I
imagined what life was like for millions of people in the world who cannot
sleep because of REAL poverty, disease, and criminal acts like this
current attack on Iraq's people and land.
Having no children, as a peace activist and artist, I think of my life
and my work as my creation: America is our child, what we imagine it
to be, and what we make it possible for it to become, with our eternal
vigilance. This is not naivete. It is wisdom evolved from the histories
of people throughout the world courageously asserting love of our lives, motivating
us to act in the present to step into a future of better lives for ALL.
Not apologizing for anger, nor mistaking it for hatred, from this love,
I will continue to act on behalf of others and myself to create a world
friendly to children and to dreams.
History is also told in music. American musical artist Laurie Anderson
says, paraphrasing Walter Benjamin, "History's an angel; a pile
of debris: the angel wants to go back to fix things...But there's a
storm blowing from Paradise -- blowing the angel backwards into the future...
this storm is called PROGRESS."
It is progress -- something to celebrate -- when millions of people
throughout the world protest the killing of those who cannot sleep in
peace. Others can watch it on TV -- or can join us.
- Roxanne R. Amico is a visual artist who stands with Women in Black.
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Last updated April 24, 2003