Bravo to Michelle Goldberg and her staggeringly insightful article on how last weekend's global antiwar rallies were, in fact, not sober round-table discussions on the various complicated alternatives to the impending and "unavoidable" war on Iraq. When I heard an antiwar rally would be coalescing in the parks and streets of Washington, D.C., my first thought was "Finally, I can gather with thousands and thousands of individuals to debate at length the many possible options to the 'problem' in Iraq, hopefully arriving at a plausible diplomatic solution, which we can thus present to the United Nations for subsequent implementation." Imagine my surprise when instead I found a teeming mass of people, representing all strata of American society, gathered in the nation's capital for one simple, and therefore impotent, reason -- to express that no matter what their political affiliation or station in life, they believed war in Iraq was not the solution.

For shame, people of America! It is not enough to simply protest what you believe to be a crude, destructive and violent response to the current situation in the Middle East. It is not enough to simply say that what is being done by the Bush administration conflicts with the values and beliefs of a substantial portion of the American population. No, it is your place to do what various world leaders have not -- provide a clear and concise solution. Merely saying the current solution may not be the best one is inadequate. Merely implying that there should be more discussion in the first place is inadequate. It is your responsibility to do what your jobs as teachers, computer programmers and graphic designers have prepared you to do -- fashion doctrine on complicated international policy.

To further her perceptive reporting on the protest's inability to solve the Iraqi difficulties, Goldberg also did an excellent job of simplifying her response by clinging to the relative minority of extreme fringe elements. Focusing on the level-headed businessmen, college professors, mothers and fathers who comprised the majority of the protesters would only complicate matters (yes, they were there, but they seemed to be there "as well"). Instead, she turned her critical eye on the obvious voice of reason --the smug man in the devil suit. In fact, according to Goldberg, it was his fault the entire rally wasn't effective in the first place. Because his far-left ranting, and the ranting of those like him, overshadowed the modest signage of the marching septuagenarian grandmothers, Goldberg acutely observed that the protest lost its "voice." Because the shirtless eco-punks, Harvard Square anarchists, subtle anti-Semites and unwashed neo-hippies marched alongside World War II veterans, teachers' associations and SUV-driving yuppies, each approaching the march with different ideologies but each arriving at a similar conclusion, the rally became muddied and confusing. That such seemingly polarized subcultures could reach a consensus on a single issue was obviously negated by the fact that they were, in fact, seemingly polarized subcultures.

Of course, Goldberg's piece wasn't completely error free, to which she alludes early in her article. Failing to follow the lead of almost every major media outlet in the nation, she made one very large mistake: She reported on the rally in the first place.

-- Abe Ogden

Goldberg is apparently having a difficult time taking the messages of over 100,000 individuals and assembling their messages into a neat United States foreign-policy package. Well, duh! With dozens of speakers and thousands of diverse participants ranging from Iraqi dissidents, raging grannies, extremist splinter groups, retired military generals, college students, et al., it is hardly appropriate to expect a message with a coherent blueprint for foreign policy.

I consider myself an activist and have organized and attended various demonstrations and events in Washington over the past few years. Dare I say that it was refreshing to see the simplicity of the message this time around, strewn across signs, T-shirts and banners: No War With Iraq. If the blanket message were any more defined, surely some groups and individuals would feel alienated, petty activist politics would set in, and average Americans would be presented with multiple alliances to choose from, thereby confounding and belittling the root message.

And while I agree that protesters should address the "moral nuances" of both camps, I would hardly characterize the participants of the protest as "callous" or "morally empty," as Goldberg does. As the author highlights, many of the attendees were first-time protesters. Hopefully, as some of these folks keep educate themselves, they will form sophisticated and intelligent opinions about Saddam's ultimate fate. I have my own opinions regarding the sanctions, the International Criminal Tribunal and Saddam's criminal past that probably do align with Mr. Leif's (the 18-year-old student mentioned in the article) and I have never been called "imperialist." See, at a protest, I am content marching alongside Zionists, Palestinians, anarchists, veterans and hippies, even if I do not agree with all of them. That's the beauty of coalition building.

I found that this demonstration ran in stark contrast to the IMF / World Bank / World Trade Organization rallies that, for example, actually do have clear recommendations for institutional and governmental change. But those policy recommendations, ranging from user fees on education to water privatization in developing countries to democratic transparency in the IMF, are often so complex and so, God forbid, intelligent they are lost by both the media and even some participants alike. This points to the confounding question that angers and puzzles activists across the board: Even when a movement does have specific demands and recommendations, the media and the status quo brazenly don't report them and apparently don't care.

It seems to me, Ms. Goldberg, that you are damned if you do, and damned if you don't.

-- Natalia A. Rudiak

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