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Artists, Activists Join 'Not In Our Name' Protest
Hartford Courant, by FRANK RIZZO September 21, 2002
Suddenly, the clarion bell of dissent was ringing again.
Readers of The New York Times woke up Thursday morning to find a full-page ad featuring a virtual Who's Who of artists, activists and academics protesting post-9/11 policies of President Bush.
Under the headline: "Not in Our Name," more than 500 people put their own name forward to object to U.S. foreign and domestic policies "which pose grave dangers to the people of the world," and urged others to protest as well. "Let it not be said that the people of the United States did nothing when their government declared a war without limit and instituted stark new measures of repression."
More than 4,000 signed this declaration for independents. (The complete list is available on www.nion.us.) Since the ad - which cost $38,000 - appeared, more than 1,500 have signed on.
The list of names (some in boldface type, some not) is staggering. Many are familiar from past protests against the war in Vietnam and from previous civil, feminist and gay rights struggles: Jane Fonda, Ramsey Clark, Angela Davis, Noam Chomsky, Daniel Ellsberg, Edward Asner, Ossie Davis, Haskell Wexler, Susan Sarandon, Pete Seeger, Howard Zinn, Martin Luther King III, Edward Said, Rabbi Michael Lerner, and Gloria Steinem, among them.
A good number of names come from the theater community: Eve Ensler, John Guare, Tony Kushner, Kathleen Chalfant, Wallace Shawn, Andre Gregory, Richard Foreman, Kia Corthron, Mos Def, Marisa Tomei, Gore Vidal and Jeffrey Wright, among others.
Others include: Steve Earle, Terry Gilliam, Claes Oldenberg, Barbara Kingsolver, Bill T. Jones, Danny Glover, Robert Altman, Laurie Anderson, Casey Kasem, Oliver Stone, Russell Banks, Grace Paley, Adrienne Rich, Viggo Mortensen, Milton Glaser, Aaron McGruder, Ani Difranco, Brian Eno, Kurt Vonnegut, Alice Walker and Amy Ray of the Indigo Girls.
"People have been longing for this," says Clark Kissinger, a spokesman for the group that created the statement. "Everybody has been waiting for someone to stand up and say the emperor has no clothes, and that's what you have here. It's a statement that basically repudiates the whole direction of things. This is not about terrorism or protecting the American people. It's about American empire-building."
Kissinger, who was one of the organizers of the first anti-Vietnam war march on Washington in 1965, points out that the statement doesn't make any reference to any political activity "and that's what's enabled a lot of people to sign it. It's not sponsored by any organization. It's only a statement of its signers, and they signed it solely based on its content."
However, other groups, using the statement as a catalyst, are organizing a National Day of Resistance Oct. 6. In New York a rally will be held that day in Central Park from 1 to 5 p.m. (Information: www.notinourname.net.) Organizers in Connecticut are arranging bus transportation to the New York City event. Information: 800-770-9067 or 203-498-8185, or e-mail nionehwaven@aol.com or connecticutpeacecoalition@hotmail.com.
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