UPRISE Tour in Cleveland Along with Amy Goodman : Cleveland IMC (((i)))

From Oct. 13-15th, the Counter Recruitment UPRISE tour cruised through Cleveland, giving us their all for three days: workshops, music, testimonies, friendship, knowledge.... Right now, the tour consists of Tom, an activist from Cleveland; Kate, a college campus counter recruitment activist from Santa Cruz; Ryan, a radical folk singer, educator, activist, and organizer; and Tariq, who served in the Air Force for four years, during which time he came politicized. They have been joined on and off by a couple of Iraq Veterans Against the War. The purpose of their tour is to bring attention to the problem of militarization in the world, the lies the military tells people to get them to join, the harmful practices the military uses both on its soldiers and on its "enemies", the role of war in the quest for economic globalization, and to try and strengthen local counter recruitment activities.

On Friday, they held a series of workshops on the West side of town with a music punkrock show finishing off the night. On Saturday, they held an all day event of workshops on direct action, globalization and war, the military industrial complex, and more at John Carrol University. In the evening, Amy Goodman, the host of Democracy Now, a grassroots, independent Media Daily News Show broadcasting out of New York City was the featured speaker.

The event was well attended by activists in the community and other folks who appreciate getting the news straight, as it is. Before she spoke, a couple of Iraqi Veterans against the war spoke about their experiences in the military and fighting in Iraq. Toby, who was in the military for two years shared how the military dehumanizes the Iraqi people so that soldiers will carry out their orders with a certain level of detachment which is necessary for emotional survival. He felt like he was a toy in the governments game, and that they used him, abused him, and forsook him. Charlie, the other Iraqi Vet spoke about his distaste for the "support the troops" stickers, how when people tell them they are proud of him, he cringes on the inside because he is not proud of what he did while he was in Iraq. He is also outraged at the governments inability to take care of its veterans with VA hospitals closing all over the place and 1/4 of the homeless population is Veterans.

Then it was Amy's turn. She's on an 80 city tour to strengthen Independent media all over the country stating that media should cover those in power, not cover for those in power and that it doesn't serve a democratic society to have media be a part of the state. I got an interview with Amy after the show--she was very tired so she gave me three minutes which turned out to be all we needed. Click on the audio link to hear the interview.

On Sunday, UPRISE held a movie showing hosted by C-Space with a special guest from Akron who gave a workshop about Globalization and the Iraq war. After the movie was an open mic with a number of different people singing radical folk songs. The star of the show was hands down our IMC correspondent Scout, who performed her own spoken word poem about the lack of women in the scene.
While they were here, the UPRISE collective strengthened the activist communitiy, educated people by bringing to light the ugly face of the military, exposed the truth that its not honorable to join the military and be on the side of one of the worst oppressive, terrorist nations on the earth right now: the United States. If you are out there and you think you have to join the military because you have no other choice, REFUSE! Don't believe the lies this country tells you.

For more information, check out their website at http://www.uprisetour.org

Cleveland Indy Media Center