Committee Opposed to Militarism and the Draft (COMD)

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From Draft NOtices, October-December 2006

 



—Martin Smith
    

I will never forget standing in formation after the end of our final “hump,” Marine-speak for a forced march, at the end of the Crucible in March, 1997. The Crucible is the final challenge during Marine Corps boot camp and is a two-and-a-half-day, physically exhausting exercise in which sleep deprivation, scarce food, and a series of obstacles test teamwork and toughness. The formidable nine-mile stretch ended with our ascent up the “Grim Reaper,” a small mountain in the hilly terrain of Camp Pendleton, California. As we stood at attention, the commanding officer made his way through our lines, inspecting his troops and giving each of us an eagle, globe and anchor pin, the mark of our final transition from recruit to Marine. But what I recall most was not the pain and exhaustion that filled every ounce of my trembling body, but the sounds that surrounded me as I stood at attention with eyes forward.

Mixed within the repetitive refrains of Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA,” belting from a massive sound system, were the soft and gentle sobs emanating from numerous newborn Marines. Their cries stood in stark contrast to the so-called “warrior spirit” we had earned and now came to epitomize. While some may claim that these unmanly responses resulted from a patriotic emotional fit or even out of a sense of pride in being called “Marine” for the very first time, I know that for many the moisture streaming down our cheeks represented something much more anguished and heartrending.

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From Draft NOtices, October-December 2006

 


—Rick Jahnkow
    

Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed Assembly Bill 1778, legislation that would have required California high schools to redesign their student emergency cards to help parents and students opt out when school lists are given to military recruiters (see the July-September Draft NOtices).

The reasons Schwarzenegger gave for not signing the bill were in a veto message to the legislature:

    State and federal law already require school districts to notify parents of the types of student information that they release to the public. The notice must include an explanation of a parent’s right to request that the information not be disclosed without prior written consent and the method and timeline for making such a request. Ultimately, I believe that schools should maintain the flexibility to develop their own procedures to ensure compliance with state and federal laws without the state dictating how procedures are implemented.

Schwarzenegger’s veto message suggests that he was misinformed about at least one aspect of the existing federal law on opt-out. Contrary to his assertion, the language of the existing law does not require schools to give a specific method or timeline for students and parents to exercise their right to opt out. The lack of such guidelines is one of the reasons why the bill was introduced by Assemblyperson Sally Lieber.

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From Draft NOtices, October-December 2006

Directed and produced by Patricia Foulkrod, distributed by Focus Features.


—Mernie Aste
    

I teach courses about multicultural education at a university in Southern California. My class prepares teachers to instruct children from a wide variety of backgrounds, including those whose parents are in the Marines and Navy, refugees from war-torn areas, privileged groups, and immigrants. Some of their parents are between military deployments; some are disabled or deceased as a result of war. (An estimated 1,600 U.S. children have lost a parent to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.) Some of the school-aged children themselves have memories of bombing, hacking, hiding, escaping, smuggling, and surviving. I do my best to prepare student teachers for the cultural variations and cognitive challenges that kindergarteners through twelfth-graders bring to Southern California classrooms.

Up to now my focus has been on ethnic and cultural realities, including class, disability, and LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, questioning). After screening the film “The Ground Truth,” I plan to add military culture and its impact on school-aged children and their families.

The film tracks the experiences of men and women who joined the military for a variety of reasons, including patriotism, tradition, to “be a man,” healthcare benefits, and/or lack of other employment or education opportunities. The film follows them through induction, basic training, deployment, injury, discharge and veteran status. The bait-and-switch tactics of military recruiters are emphasized. One individual in the film commented, “They don’t tell you the consequences,” citing the example of “seeing your friends killed.” While the recruiters emphasize the career opportunities of the military, one recruit says, “The purpose [of the training] is to kill. The purpose is to take life.” Another states that the military creates “a sustained state of mind to take a life when you are not enraged as a conditioned response.”

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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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