Group plays “spin the missile”

Thinking back to childhood, many people can recall playing the popular middle school party… Thinking back to childhood, many people can recall playing the popular middle school party game called spin the bottle. Everyone sits in a large circle and one person starts by spinning the bottle in the center of the group. He or she has to kiss whomever the bottle points toward.

Few have ever thought of using a firearm or missile instead of a bottle.

At Sunday’s anti-war rally, the Pink Bloc, a radical peer group for peace and justice, hosted a game of “Spin the Missile” where a 2 1/2-foot-long gray missile made of chicken wire and papier-mache was spun instead of a bottle.

A group of about 30 people from various cities in the tri-state area gathered around a blue tarp and took turns spinning the missile.

Everyone was brightly dressed in pink and many wore a pink triangle on their lapels. Each person in the circle had a neon pink sign taped to his or her coat representing an area of the world or a different type of person.

Signs reading “El Salvador,” “Bolivia,” “Single Mother,” “Dyke” and “Starving Child” signified the many walks of life affected by going to war.

The missile was used to emphasize the ridiculousness of the war on Iraq and the need for friendship, not war, said Marie Skoczylas, a RESYST organizer. RESYST is a radical queer project of the Thomas Merton Center.

“The term ‘queer’ stretches the limitations of the current gay liberation movement which has begun to strive for equality while increasing and perpetuating economic injustice,” Skoczylas said.

According to Skoczylas, the “Spin the Missile” game was a symbolic performance to illustrate the “controlling tendencies of the Bush administration and its seemingly indiscriminatory attacks to continue as the world’s dominate superpower.”

“We’re using the classical game of affection to blur gender lines and to show we need to put love in our lives and not hate,” Skoczylas said.

Attendees at the event were not just from the Pittsburgh area.

“It’s refreshing to see solidarity in the youth that are willing to stand up for a positive cause,” said Luke Nene, a student at the Cleveland Institute of Art.

Many people are not just outraged by the concept of war, but for the lack of reason behind it, Stephen Donahue, of Bloomfield, said.

“I think the ongoing war is a disgrace and I hope Pittsburgh can send a message to the administration that the people will not stand for this war,” Donahue said.