School of the Americas Protest

(November 2002)

I had barely lived in Asheville for a month when I signed up to go on a buss trip to the 2002 SOA protest. I barely knew these people, but they treated me like family.

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Group from Asheville.
A group shot of the people from Asheville, NC who drove on the same bus to protest.
Asheville teens.
Smaller group of fellow Ashevillians.
Yummy. Not!
We arrived the evening before the actual protest. The group had dinner at a local Chinese restaurant. Here we see Jackie obviously under-whelmed with to the choices.
Jim's beard.
I love Jim's beard.
After dinner we attended several seminars at the Bradley theater in Columbus, Ga. I'm sorry to say this is the only picture I have of it downtown Columbus.
SOA Poet.
Later that night, this girl read an awesome poem in from of the Bradley theater. (pictured above)
Protesters live in the lap of luxury on these overnight trips.
All young poets drink coffee.
Here's the poet, pictured two slides above, having breakfast & coffee the next morning. Last nights performance must have worn her out.
After breakfast we piled back onto the bus to drive to Ft. Benning. (That's where the SOA is located.) . Here is a pic of "Caterpillar" on the bus.
Priceless pic.
Godless SOA.

A small group of counter-protestors who support what the US government does at Ft. Benning put up this marques, above a billboard, which originally read "God Bless". Someone altered their sign overnight. LOL

I doubt the conservatives who put this up appreciated the irony that the billboard was advertising oil.
Security was overly tight. Can't let a bunch of pacifists get to close to a fort filled with trained military killers. The killers might get hurt!
This bag was left alone for 30 seconds before a bomb-sniffing dog was called in. The owner of the bag kept saying "That's my bag!" (Owner was not 5 feet from the officer.)
At SOA protests, different groups set up booths. This machine, representing corporate-greed, picks up dolls, representing children, then throws them in the garbage.
This guy was selling shirts like the one you see here. I photoshoped out the price. (Later that day I bought one of these shirts from him.)
Cool costume.
The parade to the SOA was incredible. Lots of colorful costumes and street-plays.
This puppet represents Imagination. You can't look at this pic and not feel warm & fuzzy inside.
Stilt-walker.
Here I am waving a yellow flag behind the huge sunshine puppet. One person waving a yellow flag looks silly...100 people doing it together looks impressive.
This puppet represents the people's willingness to resist tyranny. He is banging on pots so that the powers-that-be can not help but hear him. (they do this a lot in Argentina.)
Here are a group of pot-bangers. (If you say pot-heads, congradulations...your the 4,879th person to think of that.)
Catholic priest in front of the SOA. Seeing so many Catholic clergy at this event renewed my love for the Church. I was never prouder to be a Catholic than this day.
Gate of SOA after the protestors did some decorating. :)
At first blush, this picture may not look like much, just a group of peaceful adults & children. Look at the back-ground...note the sniper-tower.
Feeling safer yet?
Feel free to come to your own conclusions.
Picture of the Indigo Girls giving a concert. Yes, it's a lame picture...but I never said I was Ansil Adams.
A "die-in" in front of the SOA.
The height of the protest comes when everyone is given a cross with the name of someone who was murdered by soldiers trained at the SOA. (Thousands of victims.)These names are read out loud and the crowd chants "presente" (Here) Very powerful.
Here we see a few people about to engage in some civil disobedience by trespassing onto the SOA.
I took a picture of her as they took her off to jail. I never caught her name.
The Bra picture image that made Cyrus famous.  On the way back the younger members of the group goofed around on the bus and made the return home hilariously memorable.
 

Brainshrub