Famous Reactions
What would your friends and loved ones say to you upon hearing the news that you are going to drop everything and go into a conflict zone to do peace work? Here are a few famous reactions …
This one from M:
"I should tell you about the letter I got from my sister before I went to Iraq last year, re: how I wasn't on the (and I'm not kidding you) 'saved list' of people in our family, and wasn't it time I got right with Jesus and .....blah blah fucking blah."
This from D:
"I told my 83 year old father over the phone last fall that I was going to Iraq in January. His immediate response was, 'The Hell you are!' There was a short, pregnant silence; historically he was an authoritarian figure, so I wasn't sure where this was going to go. Then he finished his statement with, 'Good for you!' He was and is profoundly disgusted with the dishonesty and brutality of the US invasion of Iraq and is proud his children have enough courage to stand up for human decency."
From my own experience my parents appear to be deeply cynical that my going would make any difference. I recall an email message from my Dad that went roughly, "The best you can hope for is to become completely unemployable in the U.S. and have to seek asylum in Canada." … to which I replied, "Well, at least I’ll have health care!"
By far the most sincere comes from my friend J who spent several months in Iraq both before and after the war:
"The best one I can think of, from personal experience, came from my 7-year-old. He said, 'Dad, I know you're going there to try to help the people, but I just don't want, while you're there helping them, for you to get killed.' Then he burst into tears."
What would your friends and loved ones say to you upon hearing the news that you are going to drop everything and go into a conflict zone to do peace work? Here are a few famous reactions …
This one from M:
"I should tell you about the letter I got from my sister before I went to Iraq last year, re: how I wasn't on the (and I'm not kidding you) 'saved list' of people in our family, and wasn't it time I got right with Jesus and .....blah blah fucking blah."
This from D:
"I told my 83 year old father over the phone last fall that I was going to Iraq in January. His immediate response was, 'The Hell you are!' There was a short, pregnant silence; historically he was an authoritarian figure, so I wasn't sure where this was going to go. Then he finished his statement with, 'Good for you!' He was and is profoundly disgusted with the dishonesty and brutality of the US invasion of Iraq and is proud his children have enough courage to stand up for human decency."
From my own experience my parents appear to be deeply cynical that my going would make any difference. I recall an email message from my Dad that went roughly, "The best you can hope for is to become completely unemployable in the U.S. and have to seek asylum in Canada." … to which I replied, "Well, at least I’ll have health care!"
By far the most sincere comes from my friend J who spent several months in Iraq both before and after the war:
"The best one I can think of, from personal experience, came from my 7-year-old. He said, 'Dad, I know you're going there to try to help the people, but I just don't want, while you're there helping them, for you to get killed.' Then he burst into tears."
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