(support that 18-year-old vote--you're finally old enough to both kill Afghans and to elect the button-pushers)

So this is what happens when a generation obsessed with the '60s finally gets its own war:

It divides up into those who take the high school pep rally approach to patriotism--in all its redwhiteandblue fight-song-singing pomp--and those who spraypaint "fuck your bombs" on the public artwork at my school.

That's right, FUCK your bombs, Western Washington University.

I don't know that it even made the local news.

Their point isn't, however, to actually change anything. Obviously. Otherwise they'd have staged their "die-in" somewhere where they might be witnessed by, say, someone who has some sort of control over the US/UK genocide of Afghanis. Instead, they were perfectly happy to stage it Red Square, where students walking (running) to class could momentarily either:

a)feel like shit because they have no control over US foreign policy;
b)get pissed at the "unpatriotic" (note the quotes) behavior of those who think murder is bad; or
c)feel superior, because instead of making a fuss over an idealistic belief that seems to have no practical application to the situation, they're sitting back and not doing anything.

And me. I don't side with any of them, because an issue has finally been thrown at me for which I have none of the strong opinions I'm generally known for. I side with no one, because they're all wrong. But what else could I ask them to be when there is no answer that is right?

So I sit quietly when the flag-waving US pep squad reveals their blindness to the imperfections of our nation--and to the humanity of our enemies. So, too, do I sit quietly when my peers so excitedly protest their first issue that they can get more people to care about than Tibetan freedom.

I sit quietly, and I listen, and for once in my life I argue no point to no one.

And it tears me up.

~~~~~
fall '99

revolution.

they say fighting
      for peace
is like fucking
      for virginity--