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Juneau joins the call for peace
By Sean Smith and Vita Wilson
Whalesong Staff
Concerned
Juneau citizens have been organizing various peace-promoting events
in the past few weeks, as U.S. military activity in Iraq becomes
more of a possibility. On Saturday, Oct. 18, UAS Global Connections
and Amnesty International clubs, and a local “Seeking Peace
with Iraq” group sponsored a community dialogue and concert
for peace at the Student Activities Center. This past Saturday,
Oct. 26, around 350 people met at St. Paul’s Catholic Church
and marched to Fred Meyer and back, an effort that coincided with
marches in several major U.S. cities on the same day.
UAS Spanish professor Rick Bellagh and former UAS student
government president Tia Anderson helped organize the events. With
about 50 people in attendance at the concert, musical performers
from around Juneau came to peacefully protest the potential war
with Iraq. Around 80 people total attended the dialogue. The event
was free to all who wished to come, but few students seemed interested.
The crowd, of mostly non-UAS students and some faculty,
wore buttons sold at the door for a dollar donation. The buttons
had messages to U.S. government leaders, with phrases such as “Stop
Bush,” “No First Strike,” and “No War on Iraq.”
The acts filed one by one to the stage decorated with a tree cutting
with fall colors, and the wall directly behind the stage was decorated
with a sheath with the word “peace” written in many different
languages. The message throughout the night was to get involved.
Since most of those at the concert were not going to be able to
attend the national peace marches on Oct. 26, Bellagh helped plan
a local march on Egan Drive. Throughout the night supporters were
making signs for the march with cardboard and finger-paint. The
slogan for these national marches is “Not in my name,”
a phrase heard throughout the night.
“We are trying to make people not afraid to speak out,”
said Rick Bellagh, who was also the host of the concert. “Letting
people know that this is not the time to be passive” was a
message all of the people involved tried to convey.
On the same day of the Juneau peace march a national
march protesting the war on Iraq took place in Washington, D.C.,
as well as marches in San Francisco, Seattle, and several other
major U.S. cities. The march in D.C. drew 10,000 people and the
smaller marches expected a few thousand apiece. Juneau march organizers,
who expected between 100 and 300 people, were very pleased to see
about 350 marchers, 1 percent of the city’s population, marching
on Saturday.
“The biggest purpose of marching is to get out
and show other people in town that war is a bad idea,” said
Bellagh. “That’s the only way we can get the stranglehold
on the public opinion broken.”
Though Bellagh and Anderson were the point people for
both Saturdays’ events, Bellagh says, “It couldn’t
happen without a core group of 35 who regularly attend the “Seeking
Peace with Iraq” meetings.”
Anderson said that 50 people have been gathering for
the past several weeks. At the second meeting they decided to place
an ad featuring signatures of people who do not support U.S. military
activity in Iraq, in the Juneau Empire for three days. The actual
1100 signatures were delivered twice to the Federal Building joint
office of Sen. Frank Murkowski and Sen.Ted Stevens and Rep. Dan
Young, requesting a teleconference response to the signatures. The
request for a direct response was denied due to the senators’
and representative’s busy schedules.
Bellagh is hoping for more students and community members
to get involved. For those who are interested in participating,
Bellagh is always willing to talk. You can give him a call at 465-6432
or attend the Tuesday night “Seeking Peace with Iraq”
meetings from 5:15-6:15 p.m. at the Northern Light United Church
downtown.
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