Allen Nelson, Vietnam war veteran and peace activist from the U.S., shares his extraordinary experience in war, his personal transformation, his work for peace in and outside Japan, and his hopes for the future at a time when U.S. militarism shows no sign of slowing down.

EXCERPTS

….Nelson himself had a message for Barack Obama, in a letter he says he wrote and sent to Obama during the campaign: “I reminded him that he said that he would remove the troops from Iraq. But I said ‘not only please remove the troops from Iraq, but remove the troops from everywhere’ — from Okinawa, from mainland Japan, from Germany, from England — from all the places that we have. Please bring these people back home to America. This is where they belong.”

…

The events of 11 September 2001 brought back strong memories of Vietnam for Nelson as well. He watched on TV that day the scenes of panic in New York City, where he lives, and instantly recognized the look of fear on people’s faces as they ran through the streets.

“I was watching the scene, they showed these people running through lower Manhattan,” says Nelson. “And I was looking at their faces and two things that hit me: No. 1, Vietnam had come home to America. No. 2, when I looked at the faces of the terrified Americans, it was the same faces of the Vietnamese people when we would go and burn down their villages — their villages that were a thousand years old. There’s no rebuilding a thousand-year-old village, man. Their ancestors’ ancestors’ ancestors’ bones are born here. And I just remembered, I flashed in my mind [on 9/11], how the women and the children would come and beg us on their hands and knees not to burn the village down, crying and screaming for us not to burn it down. And we would burn it down anyway.”

Nelson was among the many military veterans and peace activists in the United States who stood up and spoke out about the U.S. government’s actions after 9/11. On 19 March 2003, the day the U.S. began its invasion of Iraq, Nelson joined an anti-war rally at Bryant Park in New York City’s West Village. Suddenly, during his speech to the crowd, he says, he was hit from behind by a group of attackers and knocked to the ground. He was kicked and beaten, falling unconscious. When the attack was over, he had four broken teeth and a swollen face. Nelson and his fellow peace activists suspected the attackers were working with law enforcement.

“I don’t know how many there were, but they were police. They were in plainclothes,” Nelson said. “And the reason why we suspect that they were police is because the real police in uniforms did nothing to arrest them. And we’ve been having this type of harassment in New York constantly since 9/11. They’ve been trying to silence the critics of the war. But I have to tell you: I was so proud to be beaten. I was happy. I went home, I said, “I got beat!” [laughs] My wife said, ‘Oh my God, look at your face!’ …I felt that this was my confirmation that I was doing the right thing. Because if you’re not doing anything, if you’re ineffective, then they don’t care. But if you’re hitting that nerve, when you’re touching that point, then they’ve gotta react. …I was happy. So the next day, I went to the next rally, all swollen up….”

A couple of months later, when Nelson took up yet another invitation to come and speak in Japan, he was still missing four teeth and walking unsteadily. Collections of monetary support were taken up at Nelson’s speaking events, with one sympathetic Japanese dentist in an audience reportedly even coming up to Nelson and offering dental treatment. Nelson ended up getting his teeth fixed back in the States….

Full article

Over the past week and a half, an unprecedented political crackdown has been enacted in advance of a series of economic summits around the country. Despite this, the brave workers of Kamagasaki stood up against the stiff security environment in riots against the brutal beating of a day laborer over the past five days. The twin situations of repression and revolt deserve to be examined in more detail.

— [editor's note] this article had been originally posted in June 2008 just before the crazy-summit as an comment to an article on Kamagasaki "Riot" (釜ヶ崎〈暴動〉| resistance action against police in Kamagasaki), and recovered today from our archive.

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日本政府の調査捕鯨副産物である鯨肉について、捕鯨船団乗組員による業務上横領告発のために証拠品として鯨肉入りの箱を確保したグリーンピースの2人の職員に対し、青森裁判所は本日、10日間の拘留を決定しました。

by Paul Arenson

 http://tokyoprogressive.org

BACKGROUND

Regarding Mad Cow Disease and the push by the US government to force Korea to accept untested cattle, it has been very frustrating to read mainstream US reports which claim that Koreans are being irrational in the face of purported scientific evidence from the OIE (World Organisation for Animal health) that US beef represents a　low risk.

The implied conclusion is that countries like Japan or Korea are unjustified or simply emotional in banning or restricting the import of beef. Our instincts tell us that something is being omitted. That either the OIE is not as impartial as it is made out to be, or that the report is being used by pro trade groups to justify the assertion that imports are ok.

釜ヶ崎では、西成警察署員による労働者への暴行と拷問に対する抗議行動が続いている。これは90以来18年ぶりの「暴動」として記憶されることになるだろう。

12th June, just in the afternoon before the G8 Finance Ministers Meeting had began in Osaka with amount of guards and excessive security, one of daily labours in Kamagasaki tortured by police. From the next day 13th, many of daily labours and neighbourhood youth began to resist against the police repression & violence. Most of Japanese mainstream media just copied the official announcements by the police and reporting this as a "riot" for the first time after 18 years from the last one in 1990.

　★「フリーターユニオン福岡」のブログ:福岡県警による「フリーター／貧民メーデー」への弾圧に抗議する


★ 【写真】自由と生存のメーデー2008

★ 【映像】自由と生存のメーデー2008

★新宿“プレカリアートの反攻”デモ

★大輪まつり、今年もやります！
＊第5回長居公園大輪祭りは全国独立系「ゴールデンメーデーウィーク」のトリでもあります。
freeter-union.org/mayday/p8.html

｢クィア｣をキーワードに、性とそれに関わる暮らしや生き方をテーマにした映像作品を集めて上映するお祭りです。2005年7月に２日間の日程で約1200人の参加を得て第1回が開催され、次回が4回目になります。

【春！ヘンタイする季節　2008年春 三都連続 上映会】は、関西クィア映画祭がお届けする、春の三都連続上映会です。
2009年1月下旬の映画祭まで待ちきれないあなた！
これまで見逃した作品があるあなた！
新しい出会いと変化+変態の季節に、
関西クィア映画祭のプレ企画に出かけよう(^^)v

大阪（4/26）♪　神戸　（5/18＋5/24）♪　5/31　第1回 京都トランスジェンダー映画祭

♪♪♪♪♪

Can't wait for the Kansai Queer Film Festa (January 2009)? We have help for you: April/May Screenings of wonderfully queer films in Osaka (4.29) and Kobe (5.18+5.24) and the 1st Kyoto Transgender Film Festival (5.31).