Talking peace without knowing war

Early last week I was walking outside the William Pitt Union with a few friends after a… Early last week I was walking outside the William Pitt Union with a few friends after a scene rehearsal for my directing class. I don’t remember the exact topic of conversation, but I know we were fairly loud and quite animated as we made our way through the crowd.

“Can you talk to me for a minute?” asked a voice to my left. I shrugged as my companions disappeared into the throng of milling college students. I was a little annoyed that our conversation had been interrupted and I wanted to catch up to them.

I turned to see a small woman and a large video camera.

“Have you been watching much of the coverage of the war?” she asked.

“No,” I mumbled, suddenly embarrassed.

I’d been avoiding the war coverage. Every time a special report or the evening news came on television, I turned it off. Or to the WB, which, mercifully, seemed to be as aware of the war situation as I was. I haven’t bought a newspaper in months and whenever my well-meaning mother asks, “So, what do you think about this war?” during our daily phone calls, I steer the conversation to something else.

It’s not that I have nothing to say about the war. It’s that I don’t want to say it. I have several core beliefs about war in general, but when it comes to this war, I don’t have enough information to make a judgment without sounding stupid. I’ve always hated protesters who can’t speak coherently about what they’re against and I was determined to stay out of the ring.

But this I can say coherently: I’m ultimately a pacifist. You can tell me it’s not logical, you can tell me it’s a fantasy, but I will not accept a world where violence of any kind is the answer.

Perhaps it’s a simplistic view, but I believe in a United States where 50 cents of every dollar I pay in taxes does not go to wars, past, present and future. I believe in a world where when we tell our children that violence is wrong, we won’t be undermining that message by bombing children in another country.

Of course, when that reporter looked at me expectantly, I could say none of this. All I could stutter out was that I didn’t know anything. I searched the crowd for my friends, desperate to get away from my own ignorance.

What did this woman want me to say? Why, when the sidewalk outside the Union was flooded with students, did she single me out?

Why not one of my companions?

Later on, I would laugh that she took one look at the three of us and decided I’d be an easy mark. Eddie is tall and scruffy, with hair that often falls in his eyes, radiating peacenik for all to see. Darlene is a tiny girl with short hair, on that day clad like a postmodern hippy in sandals and an Ani DiFranco T-shirt. And there I was, neither a hippy nor a peacenik, camera ready with my perfect eye makeup and vacant smile.

“Do you think there’s too much coverage of the war?”

I nodded, gathering my thoughts, wishing it were Eddie or Darlene on the spot. Surely they would know what to say.

“There’s so much of it, it’s impossible to make a conscious decision to avoid it,” I said. “It’s on every channel. Of course, I guess then you just … I don’t know … turn the TV off.”

Of course, it was that stunningly brilliant sound bite that they showed on the 6 o’clock news. My roommate greeted me at the door with, “Well, you didn’t sound like a complete idiot.”

Gee, thanks. I sure felt like one. Perhaps the moral of this story is to know your enemy.

Had I known more about the war situation, I could have spoken clearly and compellingly about why I’m against this show of might. Instead, I blushed at my own lack of knowledge and dashed off as soon as the interviewer finished.

Perhaps to speak up for peace, we must know about war.

Beth Hommel welcomes intellectual discourse on this issue, but asks that you clearly label hate mail so it can be deleted. Rational, grammatically correct responses can be sent to bhommel@pittnews.com.