Panel discusses war objectors

U.S. military recruiters visit local high schools 10 times per year, but the Monroe County Community School Corporation has refused to allow counter viewpoints about the effects of military service on young people even once this past school year.\nNot content with presuming young Hoosiers will seek out opposing information on their own or with the help of their parents, IU graduate student Colin Schoder-Ehri hosted a Bloomington Friends Meeting about "Truth in Recruiting: People of Conscious and Morality of War" Monday at the Monroe County Library. The meeting was called to share with community members the theory behind conscientious objection and the steps necessary for young Americans and their families to pursue conscientious objector claims despite the lack of an imminent military draft. \n"Even if there was a war that had a good justification it would have to outweigh the cost of war, which includes for starters, what's called collateral damage, which is a general deciding how many innocent people can be killed to obtain a certain objective -- the killing of innocents," Schoder-Ehri said to a crowd of 50 Hoosiers. "Even if an attacking power has the highest morals, simply being in a region where you are the law by the force of your arms can lead to chaos, lead to atrocities on either side." \nSchoder-Ehri said he was contacted by a Bloomington North High School teacher and parent of a BNHS student about discussing conscientious objection as an alternative to military service, but his proposed discussion was diverted away from school grounds after lengthy discussions with the principal and the MCCSC school board. \nCommunity members from the IU student group Against the Occupation of Iraq, Green Dove Network, Spirit of St. Paul Catholic Center and the Bloomington Peace Action Coalition co-sponsored the event. Speakers included Rev. Bill Breedon, Brown County author Hank Swain and Bloomington poet and Reiki Master Patricia Coleman.\nA conscientious objector is a person who believes that it is wrong to kill another being in war, according to the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors. The military defines it as a "firm, fixed and sincere objection to war in any form or the bearing of arms" because of deeply held moral, ethical or religious beliefs.\nThe main questions leading the discussion included: One, are any wars good? Two, are you willing to be ordered to kill? And three, what happens when you decide to follow your conscience?\nCommunity member answers to question one included the necessity to prevent genocide and other humanitarian aims, trillion dollar business interests, romantic overtures and even global ignorance.\nPanelist answers to question one included the reality that war to stop genocide often results in increased genocide and further conflict, thus perpetuating the cycle of violence that allows death and destruction to flourish at the cost of human life, environment stewardship and future diplomacy based on peaceful negotiation instead of the bullets and bombs. \nSwain, who is also a Quaker elder, said the abbreviation of "C.O." is important to both the pacifist and the warrior because war is the "never-ending habit of humanity." \n"The soldier and the (conscientious objector) have more in common than you may think. Both of our decisions derive partly from fear -- fear of being ostracized and shunned from the society that nurtured you," Swain said. "The soldier is afraid of that shunning more than the chance he might be harmed or killed if he goes to war. The C.O. has the same fear, not of being rejected, because he already knows when he makes the decision that he is going to be rejected and shunned. His fear is, 'Will he be able to stand up against the shunning?'"\nOne community member lamented that the panel was speaking to the choir because the audience consisted of older Americans and not the younger people from local high schools the discussion organizers had hoped to address. Considering the crowd demographic, she asked the panelists how MCCSC teachers and other community members might introduce the topic of C.O. to their classrooms and neighbors.\nSchoder-Ehri said military recruiters used advertising language to entice young people to the prospect of military service like the buzz phrases "job training and skill" and "money for college," even though the training involves skills necessary to participate in the killing of human beings. He said the long-term damage to the environment, economy and humanity in war-torn countries is reason enough to offer alternative information to young Americans to counter the recruiting promises many soldiers find unfulfilled long after basic training is completed.\n"It's very hard to justify impoverishing a nation and destroying a land for 10 and 20 years. Perhaps it's true that a war could be good, perhaps it's true that a war could be fought in self-defense, but I don't believe that the United States is ever going to fight a war in self-defense," Schoder-Ehri said. "And for me that's reason enough to say that I will never participate in the U.S. Armed Forces because I don't believe that it will ever lead to something that is good"