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August 24, 2005
The Political is Personal
When Cindy Sheehan returned from her ailing mother's side back to Crawford, unbeknownst to her, the protesters had erected a "large banner depicting her son's face."
You can see the depth of her heartbreak in the following picture, snapped as she cried upon seeing her child's face, all of a sudden, right in front of her.
Much has been written about how she is using her personal tragedy for political ends. Of course she is, and what is more honorable than that -- instead of withdrawing from the world into her personal pain, she is trying to find a way to prevent further wrongs and further surrow. In the end though, however political her actions are, they are also deeply personal. How could it be any other way? And it is not just that the personal is political, as the feminist insight goes, but political is personal, always, at some level. Sooner or later, as the so-called political starts descending down from the abstract --from the decisions, budgets, slogans-- into individual lives, the values embedded in that which is called "political" start to have real impacts on real human beings, as individuals, families and communities.
I can't help thinking, though, if Casey Sheehan had lived, would he have taken a life that would leave an Iraqi mother as heartbroken as his own mother is? Will his legacy be the power his mother has displayed as she refuses to budge from her drive to stop other people's children from killing or being killed?
This is up to us, of course, as it was beautifully put in Archibald MacLeish's poem (which I recently came across in the Vietnam War documentary "Regret to Inform.")
They say: We have given our lives but until it is finishedno one can know what our lives gave.
They say: Our deaths are not ours: they are yours,
they will mean what you make them.
They say: Whether our lives and our deaths were for
peace and a new hope or for nothing we cannot say,
it is you who must say this.
We leave you our deaths. Give them their meaning.
We were young, they say. We have died; remember us.
Posted by zeynep at August 24, 2005 11:18 PM
Comments
Ok am I the ONLY ONE who has noticed that Sheehan is the only member of Casey's family who is stalking the President and making an even BIGGER horses patoot of herself than she already is (the woman looks like she was hit with a Mack Truck)? Her husband has divorced her, and her family deserted her since she's went loony. Her son signed up for service in our military. Surely she isn't so stupid as to not KNOW THERE WAS A RISK TO HIS LIFE??? GET OVER IT AND MOVE ON WOMAN! If not in war, he could've just as easily been killed in training exercises or peace-time service. The time to complain about it would've been before he put his John Hancock on the contract! The Loony left is eating her up. Gosh it wasn't so long ago that Commies (er Democrats) and Republicans alike were hand in hand singing on the steps of the Capitol, and even screaming "kick some hiney" in unison!
I'm sick of everyone blaming our federal government for every little thing. It's not Bush's fault that help isn't getting to Hurricane Victims. There's a reason for the various departments of our government...power is DELEGATED!!!! Blame the local level if anything. These people were living in a salad bowl on the edge of the ocean for crying out loud they should've been better prepared for this. All the federal gov't does is fund the local *EMA's.
I wake up every day and thank God above that there wasn't a D@#@ Democrat in office on 9/11. If Gore'd won in 2000, we'd STILL be sitting around the campfire singing Cumbaya and smoking a joint, discussing how we obviously did something to deserve the attacks and how we can financially atone for it. GEEEEZ!
Posted by: Proud American at September 11, 2005 11:13 PM
your comment vaguley includes something that might be concidered intelligent. yes she is the only one in the family to do this. but in my eyes that makes her even more sincere in her message. I dont agree with everything she says, and yes she can be extreem at times. but why discredit her? in our society we are so quick to discredit people who dont have acedemic degrees. such as we give Ann Coulter a voice on TV and in books and [people mildly tolerate her because of her degrees. Also, you have no diea what a democratic persident would have done on 9/11. It is also completely irrelevant to Cindy Sheehan because she is protesting the Iraqi war, which Iraq has no clear links to 9/11 although our president always seems to bring that up to further tug on the heart strings of Americans to try to keep them from disagreeing with him.
Posted by: at January 18, 2006 09:32 AM