Bismarck Peace Conference

A Lighter Shade of Red:
North Dakotans Take a Stand for Peace

It’s seven a.m. and the sun is rising. It’s an ordinary sunrise for this part of the country: a giant glowing orb appears on a perfectly flat horizon and proceeds to lift itself into the heavens, slowly and magnificently casting rays of crimson, peach, and pale yellow throughout a massive sky. Bits of light fall on the lapping shores of small lakes, cling to the tops of thin branches of denuded fall trees, and bounce on the highway divider markers. The light removes a purple cloak from fields that stretch on and on without a mountain in sight, occasionally interrupted by a few kriss-cross blocks and low buildings demarking a city. For a moment, a pink hue floats just above the earth, and gives the impression that peace is everywhere.

This is North Dakota, a state with little over 650,000 inhabitants, allotting it only one Congressional representative, less than a handful of colleges, few multi-story buildings, but no shortage of wheat fields. Towns preserve an America that is fading in the west: mom and pop shops, wide avenues, 50s-era architecture, and not a Starbucks in sight. One would think that this sparsely populated state would be as staunchly conservative as can be; after all, this is “red country,” there are two large air force bases, and the state’s next door neighbor is South Dakota, where women’s reproductive rights are threatened with extinction. One might expect to find dubious stares or outright insults if caught with an anti-war bumper sticker or tshirt.

It is also a state with a budding peace movement. On a speaking tour visit to North Dakota this past month, I discovered another side of the story. I experienced a state rich with Americans using common sense to deduce that something is wrong with the current US foreign policy.

Amidst the blank stares and vague yawns, I found students eager to talk about how to create world peace, how to be advocate for social justice, and what to do to bring our troops (namely, their friends) home from Iraq. During one presentation, when I timidly mentioned the Department of Defense statistic of how many of our soldiers have been killed in Iraq, two teachers interrupted and preempted what I was about to say by asserting that 2751 was a low calculation, and that we had to look at the number of wounded soldiers, and also the death count of Iraqis, recently released to be over 650,000.

And when, in one class, I was able to bring up the live website, www.nationalpriorities.org, and show the students how much of North Dakotan’s tax dollars are going towards the war—$402,000,000 and growing—there was a collective gasp, and one student said, “that could have gone towards more scholarships for our education.” This student approached me after class and told me about how she had to work double shifts at the local Walmart to make ends meet.

In two classes I passed out pink post it notes at the start of class and asked the students to write down one wish or hope they have for a change they want to see in the world. Almost every sticky note returned with the words “world peace” or “bring our troops out of Iraq”. Taking these little pink slips as evidence that students were willing to take action, I urged them to vote and to fire those elected leaders that were not working towards peace through democratic process this November. I also highlighted the Books not Bombs campaign, which encourages students to walk out of school on November 7th. Even the most outspoken anti-war professors got a little uneasy around that idea!

Sure there were kids with stories about friends who fought in Iraq and want to go back, and one young man even walked out when I said the word Iraq at the start of a class (I later found out he had just enlisted only days earlier), but I was surprised to see the majority so deeply in favor of an end to the war.

Over the weekend I spoke at the statewide annual peace conference at Devil’s Lake State College, which drew a crowd of about 65 people from small towns and cities scattered throughout the state, including businessmen and women, a youth dance troupe, a carload of Canadian environmental activists from Winnipeg, two foreign exchange students from Norway and the Sudan, a humble 81 year old World War II conscientious objector, a government employed soil scientist, and the president of the college. When I talked about

After a brief presentation at a Sunday church service, the first question from the congregation came from a sixteen-year-old young woman who asked, “How can I join CODEPINK?” People were inspired to hear that women around the country are standing up for peace with creative demonstrations and courageous actions. That’s the phenomenal thing about the CODEPINK women’s movement: it doesn’t cling to the coastlines, but rather drifts through the Midwest and the south, with strong established local groups in St. Louis, Missouri, Tallahassee, Florida, and Dallas, Texas, and now an interested group of young (and young at heart) women in North Dakota.

The receptivity of North Dakotans to ideas of peace and an end to the occupation of Iraq are not so surprising when we look at the reality of that state. North Dakota has born the brunt of this war, as second in terms of the loss of soldiers in Iraq per capita. Over 350 North Dakota National Guardsmen and women are currently stationed in Iraq. Both senators and the representative are Democrats. And, nationally, over 67% of Americans are now in favor of a troop withdrawal from Iraq. The peace movement may not be omnipresent in North Dakota, but people have common sense and can see the toll this war is taking on their communities.

On Monday, local peace activists gathered at a busy city intersection in Bismarck during “rush hour” and held a peace vigil with drums and hot pink signs reading “Vote for Peace” and “Honk for Peace.” To my surprise, the honking almost drowned out the drums! We handed out Give Peace a Vote pledge cards, inviting people to take a pledge for peace campaign info, and we sang, “All we are saying, is give peace a vote!”

Four people draped a pink banner reading “Give Peace a Vote!” over the ledge of the fourth floor of a nearby parking garage, and, ultimately, were not arrested. Our demonstration included a group of high school aged women, and several kids.

The police responded to a call from the parking lot owner asking that the activists be arrested for trespassing with kindness and patience. When one man started jumping up and down, red in the face with anger, and said to the officer, “Can’t you see that they’re trespassing?” the officer replied, “Well, then, I guess so am I!” We were peacefully escorted out of the building with no charges, and for the record, were never given a warning to desist from our action while in process of displaying the banner.

I left my CODEPINK banner with the group as I waved goodbye and departed for the airport… and I’d like to think that I left a little residual pink all around the state.

I prefer the red and orange sanguine shades of sunrise to color coded terror alerts any day, and traveling to North Dakota was a powerful reminder that I’m not alone in the conviction that we must revere life, that real family values are about nurturing, not bombing, families.

Visit the North Dakota Peace Coalition at: http://www.ndpeace.org/
The North Dakota Peace Coalition tables at farmer’s markets and community events, distributes “protect our troops, bring them home” info pamphlets and yellow magnets, and organizes art and music peace performances. They plan to have a holiday campaign to promote peace toys and troops home for the holidays.