new direction for anti-war movement

We need to be leading the vanguard of reformist lapdog youth, liberal white kids, progressive radical rich, anti-authoritarian collectives and true democratic youth of privilege, persons of color, collective women, members of the rich queer white priviledged class, gender, anti-imperialist, anti-racist, anti-capitalist bosses, liberal, anti-communist, pro-capitalist anti-war movement (i.e., an anti-war movement which is under their control; by the way, this kind of movement fits into the general liberal peace/pacifist movement so forces like Quakers, etc. push to stifle political discussion about the capitalist roots spreading marxist thinking to masses of workers and students, pseudo-revolutionary elitist, dominating anti-imperialist, anti-racist, anti-capitalist, pro-communist war and oil and imperialism and capitalism, be bold, When we lead class struggle on the campus, fake revolutionaries like they will only be further exposed. They will play into our hands, victory is near commrades, we will lead the class struggle ha ha yes hmmm...

Now that I got your attention.... Actually I don't really give a fuck about the ISO either way. I have nothing against the organization, nor am I a supporter of it, but as one of the organizers for the conference, I feel the need to dismiss this whole nonsense about CSAW being an ISO "plot" or what not. For starters, the Berkeley Stop the War coalition elected 13 representatives to a coordinating committee. As a Chicana, we made damn well sure to have some sort of representation within the coalition. I must admit, I hate working in coalitions, and no offense, but I particularly hate working in coalitions where white males make up an overwhelming majority, yet I believe it is my responsibility to represent my people, our struggle, and our perspective among the white masses. It is up to me, and no one else, to speak and represent. Out of the 13 coordinators, 3 of the elected were from the Raza community. As for ISO, 2 members were elected, but ISO is not the only organization that they belonged to. I, myself belong to various organizations from the Raza community as well as other organizations outside of my community [not ISO] :) . So that accounts for 5 of us and as for the rest of the folks, we have all kinds of different folks (at this point I feel it ridiculous to continue with an ethnic/ racial/political/gender/sexual/religious breakdown of the representation of our coalition). My point is that ISO did not "high-jacked" this conference, nor was it the "main" organizer. Yes, the moderator we elected was from ISO, and looking back, damn did we fuck up by doing so :) but I say this only because of all the nonsense that arose from it and not because I regret backing up the moderator that we chose. All of the criticism that arose from the procedural way the moderator ran the meeting was wrongly misdirected as an accusation on the ISO, when in reality the moderator was trying to figure out how the fuck to run an efficient and representative meeting with a shit load of people. The funny part about this whole "fiasco" is that while people are accusing the moderator of favoritism on the selection of delegate speakers, it was not the moderator who was doing the choosing. If people who were at the meeting recall, there was a woman next to the moderator (non ISO member) who was actually in charge of the speaker's list and the moderator was targeted because he was the one who was calling out the names of the people that the woman had chosen. But putting this entire ISO bullshit aside, I guess I don't get why people are so caught up in that. I though what mattered was the fact that all of us are against the war, against racist scapegoating, and for the defense of civil liberties. I was very saddened that people feel that we cannot work out our differences. I am by no means stating that our conference was anywhere near perfect, fuck, I was surprised we were able to pull in as many people as we did, but this was the first time (for alot of us) to try and host something of the sort. I also hope that those who believed that the conference was an ISO plot/conference/scam/takeover could help organize another conference rather than breaking off and doing their own thing. Amongst Chicana/o organizers we have a saying, "La Union Hace La Fuerza" which means that there is strength in unity. I know alot of mistakes were made, but one of the greatest virtues of progressive folks (which I assume are among those who visit this web site!) is that we are not only critical, but open-minded and flexible enough to understand that shit happens but the struggle continues...

I just want to say thank you to everyone who has worked to organize - it takes tremendous courage and will (and maybe some important genes in this society!) to get up there and try to bring people together against the will of president select and government select.

All of you - ISO and everyone else - are to be congratulated for what you are doing, on your own time, for the good of everyone. Just remember that. Many of us don't organize, just participate, and we need your mature strength right now.

I don't know any ISO but I'm guessing they don't really mean any harm, and maybe - by now - have probably realized that people are really angry at them. Maybe its time to start again, given that probable realization, and try to refocus on peace.

Everyone makes mistakes, let's give all of us a break and move on.