Remembering Dave Dellinger of the Chicago Eight and the First Inauguration of G.W. Bush to the Presidency of the United States
"We mourn the victims and express our solidarity with their wives, husbands, children, friends and relatives. We have to put this destructive terrorism into a real perspective, senseless as its horrors are. Killing innocent civilians in other countries would do no justice to those killed in this country, and will not bring them back to life. Launching a war that destabilizes regions or leads to a further escalation of violence would be a grave mistake with unforeseen consequences. It would not increase our safety and might increase the likelihood of more terrorist attacks. Instead we should strengthen the efforts to strengthen non-violence throughout the world." Dave Dellinger
David Dellinger passed away in 2004. Dave was the foremost, longest living and most consistent advocate of revolutionary nonviolence in the United States.
"I am an old man, " Dave, age 53, declared during the 1969 Chicago Conspiracy Trial.
Dave was accused by the prosecution of being the "principle architect" of the demonstrations at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, the scene of the notorious police riots. Yet his behavior was entirely nonviolent and was in fact consistent with peaceful demonstration and with the civil rights identified in the U.S. Constitution.
The events of those troubling yet liberating years and Dave's teachings thereafter are of course still relevant to today's continuing struggle for freedom, and should be carefully studied lest the lessons Dave passed on to us from his predecessors be lost along with our precious freedoms.
I had that historical context in mind when I wrote the following little article, Where Have All The Flowers Gone Again?, on the first inauguration of George W. Bush, Jr. to the presidency of the United States - the article was rejected by 47 publications of all political stripes.
Flowers come and go, some blooming longer than others. We can only hope that people stop to smell them, then take care to grow a few in their own gardens.
Where Have All the Flowers Gone Again?
A good song is well worth repeating time and time again. The Song of Love and Freedom has endured the centuries. However, if the proponents of hate and violence in our society have their way, that song shall eventually be muffled by riotous intercourse and the devastation of civilization itself.
Inauguration Day USA 2001 called for an augury or divination from the flight of birds or from the bowels of sacrificed animals. Therefore I was moved by the flight of song birds and by the examination of certain organs of the Establishment to ponder on what Inauguration Day USA 2001 spells for the world.
Some of our dissident youth have taken up good causes, yet I find the general approach of many of them, especially the rapidly growing number of self-styled "anarchists," disconcerting.
They speak of "solidarity" or unity in diversity, yet they have no cogent philosophy of the concrete universal. They have quite naturally imitated the unmitigated hypocrisy, prevarication and outright lying found at the highest levels of every social organization - the family, the church, the school, the company, the state, the military. They have been stupefied by multi-tasking, by mass production and consumption of trash, junk and garbage. They have been rendered incoherent by soundbites, newspeak, fast-paced, multi-screened multi-media. They are preoccupied with so-called "facts" or the particulars of consumption, much to the detriment of the universal, which they, as "independent" sceptics, believe can be dispensed with simply by attacking every other point of view. They might even ignore an argument in their favor because some point therein pushes one of their many panic buttons. Their weapon of choice is the personal insult, and political engagement consists in cowardly campaigns of personal destruction against anyone who is courageous enough to identify himself and speak against what is obviously an inharmonious, chaotic cacophony of random points of views. Their unity fosters hate over love. Their love is hate-others based group-love.
I experienced the Sixties in my youth. I recall that we had more solidarity in love than in hate. We struggled against the Man and his so-called "pigs" in Chicago and throughout the world, not to murder the authorities and their policemen, but to kill hate with love, our love symbolized by flowers and peaceful demonstrations; and we proceeded the best we could despite the fact of a violent element in our ranks, and despite the fact of being clubbed, tear-gassed, and thrown into paddy wagons, and even killed. We did not hide our identities behind phony masks. We were not ashamed to publicly state our opinions courageously.
Now, then, People Without Borders who joyfully experienced the Sixties sadly contemplate the new decade and century because they believe the Suidae family has inadvertently been given a renewed license to devour people in the Name of the Nation and the Invisible Hand.
Therefore I believe it is high time for People Without Borders to remember their roots with a renewed Declaration of War, not the war of impersonal rapine and murder against the powerless and poor practiced by the enemy, but a war of Love against the selfish grounds of hate, the domestic enemy within us all.
We must not stand passively by and suffer a new Reign of Greed. We must fight. Our victory depends on the active exercise of the power of Love. So how can the war against war and poverty be waged? Many are the ways of love to be found by each and every one of us. Some of us recall personally inserting flowers into the gun barrels of soldiers.
Where have all the flowers gone? Long time passing, it seems.
We heard 'Where Have All The Flowers Gone?' sung at the Great Chicago Conspiracy Trial. Dave Dellinger, at age 53 the old man of the Chicago Eight, said that the record of that trial would be a rallying point for a new generation who would not put up with tyranny, "will not put up with the facade of democracy without the reality." Dave is still very much alive. Many of us who were less than half his age at the time feel almost dead and gone now, especially those of us who "sold out" and "dropped in"; that is, into the private fascist organizations we despised.
Indeed, where have all the flowers gone? And how do we grow them again? I have looked over the transcript of the trial for clues. The following excerpt is just one of many that I found, but a precious one to contemplate:
KUNSTLER: Now, what did you do at that press conference?
COLLINS: Well, (sings), Where have all the flowers gone...
COURT: Just a minute, young lady.
COLLINS: --where have all the flowers gone?
COURT: We don't allow singing in the Court, young lady.
KUNSTLER: That is what she did at the press conference.
COURT: You asked her what she did and she proceeded to sing.
KUNSTLER: That's what she did, Your Honor.
COLLINS: That's what I do.
May the singing of that question be the oracle to which we should answer to the best of our abilities before it is too late.
-Peace-
"There is no doubt in my mind that nonviolence is currently incapable of resolving some of the problems that must be solved if the human race is to survive... Those who are convinced that nonviolence can be used in ALL conflict situations have a responsibility to devise concrete methods by which it can be made effective... Gandhi often made the point that it is better to resist injustice by violent methods than not to resist at all. He staked his own life on his theory that nonviolent resistance was the superior method, but he never counseled appeasement or passive nonresistance." - Dave Dellinger, 1965 'The Future of Nonviolence'
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Excellent article.