Protest

Yesterday I got off of work very early. Usually “early” for me is like 6:00 or 7:00, but yesterday I was done at 4:00. That meant I had an extra two or three hours to sit around the house being bored and I discovered something rather strange. Every day when I’m working I tend to, towards the end of the day, be like, “I can’t wait until today is over, I just wanna go home.” But then I get home and I’m like, “Ok, I’m bored. This is lame.”

Those two statements pretty much sum up my “life.” I am either working, or I’m bored somewhere.

So today is Saturday and even though I was up kinda late last night (even though I fell asleep at the keyboard for like 20 minutes), I woke up this morning at 5:30. Now it’s 6:20 and I’m bored out of my mind.

I can’t really even think of anything to write. Well maybe that’s wrong, I can think of things to write, but I’ll just have to sort of change the direction that my diary has been going. I’ve said about all that I can think of about God and life and stuff like that, because those are recurring topics of thought and pondering for me.

It was a week ago today that people all over the world held “anti-war protests” all over the world. Here in the US, people estimate that between 2 million to 4 million people participated in the various protests around the country (which may seem like a lot of people, but it’s not even 1% of the national population).

Now these people who were protesting the war tried to make it come across like they were marching for “peace,” but I have reasons to think they had ulterior motives.

In all the pictures I saw taken during the protests, the vast majority of the signs that people were waving around didn’t have messages about preserving peace, instead they had messages slamming Bush and the current administration. From the news clips I saw on TV, the clever little chants they made up didn’t have as much to do with protesting war and promoting Bush, but they had more to do with protesting the president.

Then yesterday on the radio I heard a group of people commenting on the protests last week. These people are in fact the only people in the country who I think are actually qualified to say anything about whether people should be protesting or promoting a war with Iraq.

These people were Iraqi immigrants.

Who better to know the conditions of the land that they left? Who better to have constraint when threatened to have a foreign military in their homeland in which they still have friends and family?

They interviewed about ten people. Do you think any of them were at any of the anti-war protests? No. In fact I haven’t seen anything from ANY of the protests to show that even a single Iraqi showed up to any of the protests here in the states (I think that having an Iraqi at a protest against going to war with Iraq would probably be a bit like having a trophy. If an Iraqi DID show up I think it would probably get some publicity).

None of the people that were interviewed thought that having the US remove Saddam is a bad idea. Yes, the did have concerns about civilian casualties and for friends and family still over there. But they talked about how we have smart bombs and precision weapons to minimalize those types of losses. Isn’t it funny how those who came here from Iraq have more faith in the ability of our military than those all-American protesters?

In fact, at the dentist last Wednesday I was ready either Time or Newsweek and they had an article about how real estate markets in Iraq are booming. People are buying and building houses and businesses like mad. I don’t think that would be happening if the Iraqis were worried about us carpet bombing them. Again, they have more confidence in our military’s abilities than many people over here.

On the radio they also talked about how there are very few people in Iraq who don’t know a friend or family member who was either abducted, tortured, or killed by members of Saddam’s regime.

At the end they let a 27 year old Iraqi woman have the mic and she said something that I don’t remember word-for-word, so I’ll have to paraphrase. In he broken, but still fairly understandable English she said, “To those of you who want to protest war and want peace, where were you when Saddam was waging war against his own people? Where were you when Saddam was fighting Iran? Why have you been silent so long and just now want to come and protest war when our people can finally be rid of this man who has oppressed us for so long?”

Perhaps there is a handful of people amidst the protesters who are actually against the war itself and not just against our president and his administration. Of those, I wonder how many are REALLY against war itself. I mean, are they against any and all forms of war for any reason? Or are they just against the thought of having the threat of loosing American lives in a war that they don’t think directly affects them?

For those who are just unwilling to risk American lives in a conflict that they don’t think affects them, I wonder if their position would change if THEY were the ones stuck over there. I wonder if they would be so willing to protest when it would mean their liberation.

Anyhow, there’s a bit of a change from the usual things for me. Unfortunately I don’t have such noble reasons for supporting a war with Iraq. If the Iraqis are in a country with an oppressive and abusive leader and we liberate them, fine. I really don’t care what happens over their in their country any more than I care about what happens to all the people I share the highway with during rush hour. But I trust that the President and his people know more than I do, and have more concern for the safety of the people in the country than I do, and that if he is convinced that Iraq poses a threat to US and our allies then that’s good enough for me.

“Come one and all and see the broken man, talking to himself

He sits and waits for something better, he’ll never find it here

The people touch his hair and pinch his cheek; he can’t even feel it

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There it goes again, he’s listening to someone

He hears the bitter laughter

And all he wants to know is…

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Why…..does any of it matter? (I can’t take it any more)

You’ve gotta try……the inhale that makes the exhale so much better”

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Stone Sour