Committee Opposed to Militarism and the Draft (COMD)

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From Draft NOtices, January-March 2022

The Israeli “Refusers”

 — Paula Hoffman-Villanueva
 When Israeli children play with toy soldiers, it’s not just a game, a fantasy or an aspiration. It is a fact of life that they will serve in the military, usually right after high school. When children hear stories from family members about their time in the military, it is not just from a father or one aunt or cousin. Nearly all (male and female) adult family members have stories to tell about their time in the Israeli Defense Force (IDF). There are exemptions for Orthodox Jews, the mentally or physically unqualified, young mothers, Arab Israelis, and a few others, but it is rare for a citizen to be deemed a conscientious objector. To seek CO status in Israeli society is considered the ultimate betrayal and a process that will bring certain suffering to the individual.

 The IDF is commonly referred to as “The People’s Army.” It is required service, a rite of passage, one’s patriotic duty. For a young person to question this obligation is truly an act of courage, and with it comes the knowledge that s/he will be shunned by family, peers and society. The typical labels are used: coward, traitor, extremist, deviant, gibush (someone who doesn’t pull their weight). When a family member is an identified refuser or refusenik (savarim in Hebrew), the entire family suffers community scorn.

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From Draft NOtices, January-March 2022

 Ethnic Studies Take 2: The Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum

— Isidro Ortiz, PHD
The Covid-19 pandemic has exacted a heavy toll on education and posed many unprecedented challenges to educators at all levels. As reported by Emma Dorn and her colleagues in “COVID-19 and education: The lingering effects of unfinished learning,” during the 2020-21 academic year, “the impact of the pandemic on k-12 student learning was significant.” Moreover, “the pandemic widened preexisting opportunity and achievement gaps, hitting historically disadvantaged students hardest.” Students in high schools became more likely to drop out of school, and “high school seniors, especially those from lowincome families, are less likely to go on to post-secondary education.” At the same time, the Defense Department has announced a new STEM strategic plan that would further militarize the nation’s schools. The plan would focus on student populations regarded as “underserved and underrepresented in STEM,” including military children, racial minorities and female students.

While these developments do not bode well for anti-militarism struggles, all hope is not lost. They have been accompanied by the rise of a counterhegemonic movement that has catalyzed the development of a new curriculum, the Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum (LESMC), that has significant potential to develop two essentials for future action against militarism: critical agency and self-efficacy.

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From Draft NOtices, January-March 2022

Female Draft Registration Decision Delayed, for Now

— Rick Jahnkow
Language that would have expanded draft registration to include women was, fortunately, pulled from the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) before Congress approved the bill in December. Pres. Biden then signed the NDAA on December 27, 2021.

Previously, the House, Senate and Biden were expected to approve the NDAA with registration of women included, but when the NDAA appeared headed for a deadlock in the Senate, an agreement to remove the provision was negotiated in order to secure votes from anti-feminist Republican senators who opposed the drafting of women. As a result, the current system of only registering males will continue to be in effect.

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Ninth CIRCUIT COURT RULING: CONFRONTING MILITARISM BY USING EQUAL ACCESS TO HIGH SCHOOLS

When the military comes to your local high school, you have a legal right to give students an opposing view. This has been the position taken by federal district courts in Florida, Pennsylvania and Illinois and two federal appellate courts. The most broadly-worded decision came from a case that COMD took to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in the 1980s. Here is the background:

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