Berkeley Students Demonstrate Against War

Today, on the UC Berkeley Campus, four effigies were hung from Sather Gate to raise awareness of the consequences of war with Iraq. The dummies had signs identifying them as 'accountability,' 'civil liberties,' 'Iraqi children,' and 'our sons and brothers.' Students also scrawled anti war messages in chalk around sproul plaza, the birthplace of the free speech movement. Remarkably, these actions constituted civil disobedience under current student code, resulting in at least one citation.

One protester said, "People need to wake up. Mainstream media glosses over the reality of the pain and suffering that is caused by war, and the injustices of detainments and deportations under current US policy. People don't realize that they can be held in solitary confinement, without charges, indefinitely - with no ability to contact their families or lawyers."

Protesters said that their main goal was to incite action - the US is going to attack Iraq, and something must be done. Students distributed flyers advertising for actagainstwar.org and gave advice on how to organize effectively. One student said, "People are going to need to work together to shut the city down and show this country once and for all that the people are not going to just stand idlely by as this country strips away their rights." The demonstration was organized by several local student affinity groups.