No tears need to be shed for Greensboro

As a committed antiwar activist, I take serious issue with Matt Hill Comer's recent article "Tears for Greensboro: Have we lost the vision of nonviolent change?" Much of his article centers around an antiwar demonstration that took place on Jan. 11 in downtown Greensboro, in which nine people were arrested after occupying the intersection of Elm and Market streets and refusing to move.

I'd like to preface all of this by saying that I applaud Mr. Hill Comer's protest against the military's "Don't ask, don't tell" policy, which is a repressive policy that prevents people who are openly gay from joining the military. However, this is a large part of what makes Comer's article so confusing. The very strategy Comer stands for and has himself employed - that of nonviolent civil disobedience - is what he criticizes in the Jan. 11 protest! Not only does he equate simply occupying an intersection with outright violence, he actually goes so far as to side with the police against the demonstrators, saying that "The rally . . . was, without a doubt, an act that in its very nature provoked retaliation," and that it was "everything that a civil disobedience and nonviolent protest should not be." Besides the fact that occupying an intersection can't be in any way construed as violent, Mr. Comer has seemingly already forgotten his own actions at the military recruitment center which, of course, was "an act that in its very nature provoked retaliation" as well!

If, as Comer suggests, performing an action so simple as standing somewhere and refusing to be moved amounts to violent and therefore reprehensible action, then I wonder about his assessment of the heroic Sit-In movement, which actually won the desegregation of lunch counters through exactly this type of action. Perhaps he thinks they should have merely stood outside holding signs?

Furthermore, by declaring that nonviolence is "something that cannot be turned on or off like the pressing of an on and off switch of a television," Comer fails to realize an important point: that nonviolence is a tactic, not a long-term strategy, and that people who are met with violent oppression have the right to resist that oppression with self-defense by any means necessary. By imposing his own moral standards on the movement, Comer is making gravely erroneous implications. Would he suggest that people living in U.S.-occupied Iraq simply lay down their weapons and allow the U.S. to continue to wield its military might and its puppet government like a club to crush legitimate democracy in favor of oil revenues? Put another way, if another country invaded the U.S., wouldn't we have the right to armed self-defense of ourselves and our families?

Mr. Comer frames the question in the wrong way when he asks if we have lost the vision of nonviolent change. Rather, he should ask himself objectively how we can stop the war. I suggest he read about how the Vietnam war was ended - through a soldiers' revolt, a massive U.S. antiwar movement, and resistance from the Vietnamese people. He may find that his "tears for Greensboro" are needlessly shed.