Voice your support for Mary Kelly
national |
miscellaneous |
news report
Thursday January 30, 2003 14:46
by Eoin Dubsky - Refueling Peace
info at refuelingpeace dot org
087-6941060
Below is a Letter to the Editor I've sent out today. If you support what Mary did and you have the time, please take the time to speak up about it where you work and live, and through the media. After the letter you'll see the words to a song written by Shannon Smy of radical folk group 'Seize the Day' (http://www.seizetheday.org/) for a similar action in England a few years ago.
Dear Editor,
I want to commend Mary Kelly for her courageous and imaginative,
nonviolent, open and accountable act of disarmament at Shannon Airport
yesterday morning.
The killing of innocent people is wrong. This basic principle can help
us to think more clearly about our part in the planned invasion, and the
on-going bombardment and sanctions against Iraq.
Virginia Woolf says in a booklet I found on Greenham Common: "We can
best help you prevent war not by repeating your words and following your
methods but by finding new words and creating new methods."
The calls to active nonviolence and disarmament "Love your enemy" and
"Beat swords into ploughshares" aren't new by any means. But in a time
when the war drums from Washington and London are almost deafening,
perhaps it takes the clanging sound of a mother's hammer against a
warplane at Shannon Airport to remind us who and what we stand for.
In peace,
Eoin Dubsky
************ With My Hammer ************
By Shannon Smy
You who see injustice all around,
Yet you haven’t got the courage or the will to fight or stand your ground.
We who see but are too scared,
There are not enough of us prepared.
To put our lives at risk time and again.
And then comes a drop of rain to the parched lips of a world that needs to feel hope again.
“We are dying as a people and a nation, A third of our people have been killed in 21 years of illegal occupation.
10 UN resolutions requesting Indonesia to withdraw – they chose to ignore”
And a woman cries, if you are really human you’d stop them sending these weapons to our shores.
Chorus:
With my hammer I break the chain I will not remain in silence.
I will stand and I will defend my right to fight against violence.
No prison can contain the freedom that we gain when we move through fear.
The laws of our civilised land are quite clear,
Selling weapons to dictators who murder starve, rape and torture is illegal.
But there is timber there is oil, on Indonesian soil and there’s money to be made form the arms trade.
‘Our boys need jobs’ you shout it from the rooftops but not one word of the lives lost or destroyed.
I cannot believe, you continue to deceive yourselves in this way,
All the people that you pay to make the jet fighters.
(Chorus)
To think to plan it took a year, to build trust to work through fear.
Then at 3am on a cold January morning at BAE Wharton,
No one saw them no one gave the warning.
Hawk jet ZH955 came alive to the sound of singing hammers, the hanging of banners, the scattering of seeds and ashes on its wings,
And the women waited to see – What justice brings.
For £2.4 million damage done - £13 million for a new one.
“ We are not martyrs or heroines,
We owe so much to our friends,
Who held our courage in their hands.”
(Chorus)
And after half a year in jail they came before a court of law
and the truth the jury heard and saw stunned them into silence.
Then when the verdict came…NOT GUILTY!!
Justice had been done the celebrating could begin again – Laughing, dancing praying weeping crying.
And in East Timor they laughed and danced and cried some more.
And as the seeds of hope begin to settle on the ground a gentle rain begins to fall.
With my hammer I break the chain I will not remain in silence.
I will stand and I will defend my right to fight against violence. (x3)
No prison can contain the freedom that we gain when we move through fear.
With my hammer I broke the chain – I did not remain in silence
**************************************
Listen to the song in RealAudio and read more about the action here:
http://www.seizetheday.org/hammer.htm
printable version
Digg this
del.icio.us
Furl
Reddit
Technorati
Facebook
Gab
Twitter
View Comments Titles Only
save preference
Comments (10 of 10)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10Well, well done on the above.
But to which editor did you send it? Address etc.
You can send a similar letter to your local paper or to regional or national press.
Was it just lying there ready to be picked up? And what was Virginia Woolf actually doing in the book? And how did she manage to fit into it?
could someone explain why they support mary kelly???
the way i see it is that she is a vigilante... if she has a problem with what someone is doing then she can bring them to court... we have a justice system in this country... she should use it...
if everybody behaved like her there would be complete chaos... by her logic the yanks are allowed to break her legs instead of bringing her to court...
also, the irish government have said they wil pay for the damage... nice one mary... how many hospital beds will 500,00 euro get you...
Mary Kelly is an idiot to do what she did. Just as we were getting our message through by peaceful means she goes and causes half a million Euro worth of criminal damage. And that IS going to have to be paid by the Irish taxpayer, like me for one. She certainly has shown her true colours. It makes a farce of the Shannon peace camp. Anybody I spoke to today felt she was wrong. This approach doesn't work, whether it be smashing windows in Mc Donalds in Oxford Street, blocking the streets of Dublin or wrecking a US Navy plane - it is counter productive. It's one step away from the bullies in Limerick or the bullies in PIRA. Shame shame shame on you Mary for bringing the movement into disrepute.
Mary Kelly's actions should be supported for a number of reasons.
Firslty, when the government ignores the wishes of the Irish people repeatedly, it is clear that it is going to take non violent direct action to see that the will of the people is respected. Opinion Polls have shown that the will of the people is that we play no role whatsover in supporting a build up of military in the Gulf that may lead to the deliberate slaugher of the people of Iraq.
Secondly, rather than just talking, writing letters, holding placards, marching around Dublin (which are all worthwhile actions) Mary Kelly has shown that there is something that we can do to directly challenge the use of Shannon as a war port.
Thirdly her action shows Bush that support for his war mongering is waevering.
Fourthly her action has helped fuel the debate and is helping to bring the situation at Shannon to a situation where "business as usual" cannot be maintained. All Fianna Fáil wants is for this issue to go away. Its up to us to make sure that it doesn't until they respect the wishes of the people.
Finally to say that there is something wrong with disarming an instrument of war only makes sense if you either actively or passively support war.
Cian what Mary Kelly did was violent. Would you like somebody to attack your car with a hatchet because they didnt like you? It's ironic that she condems ths Government for apparently turing a blind eye to an aspect of our law, then goes out and disregards the law herself. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.
Neither will her action stop anything. It might mean (a) extra security at Shannon to prevent more of the same, or (b) the US forces switch to a different airport, perhaps a secure RAF base. So basically her futile attempt to stop a war is foolish, unjustified and counter productive.
What was it that drove her to do such a thing? Obviously she realised that the Peace protest is not really working. If she felt it was, she wouldn't have done this.
I don't know if you're old enough to remember when President Reagan came to Shannon in the eighties. We had almost 10,000 protestors there, totally peaceful. I wonder why the protests there now only generate about 1,000 people - I reckon it is because of the events like Marys that have turned people off. I dont want to be seen with a thug. I dont want to be part of law breaking. I dont want to shout at and insult our Gardai doing their job. I want to set an example and hold my head high. I will protest in my own way, but so long as the Mary Kellys are involved I won't be joining the Shannon womens protest.
The car/hatchet analogy is flawed. Unless of course the car were illegally parked in your drive way and was being used to transport soldiers or munitions or in some other way support an illegal war which has been carried out against the people of Iraq since 1991. And if that were the case, then sure wouldn't you be morally and legally obliged to take a hatchet to yourself?
Mary's struggle against U.S. imperialism is the same struggle of the Continuity IRA against imperialism. Mary will be honoured by the Michael Flannery award in New York this Friday, given to her by the Irish National Freedom Committee, the support group for the Continuity IRA. One struggle, one enemy!
and lots of enemies.
Smashing windows on Oxford Street does not value much per-se.
Though of course there have been days when the total value of damage to windows and things in London if we wish to talk of London have topped 200 million sterling. No smashing windows and stuff just gives other people more work to do.
Smashing US aircraft during the emotive period that all at the peace camp have endured, facing the at time vicious and near slanderous backdrop of constant criticism and attempts to split the anti-war / peace / justice / neutrality movement (/?/?/?/).
Need I link to earlier words and articles on this newswire?
where this woman
the newest
to the club .................which club?
"of anti-militarist global movement of direct action practitioneers"?
of protesters?
of people who "just can´t deal with the lies they here from Ireland´s politicians" in her own words.
Many others before her.
Today a bearded american is photographed and syndicated on international newswires his arms raised in pacifist protest as he stares down the barrel of an Israeli tank.
He is an american peace protester.
We presume he survived.
In Ireland the vipers come out to condemn Mary Kelly. Not matter the agenda of those around her, those who have written "that some will attempt to coast on her bravery", not matter the agenda of many she now sits in assembly with, she sits in our assembly.
Mary Kelly by her action.
her direct action
has joined a special club.
And all over Ireland her friends and enemies are as ever missing the point.
Why did Ahern offer Ireland´s airport to The United States of America in the week september 16-21 2001?
Why has our defence resource been used by the USAF since?
Now some of us look for answers to our constitution and others elsewhere to other constitions perhaps?
but we all need to look.
Mary Kelly is a member of many clubs.
I do not it appears need to start a list.
But as of this week she has a place at my table.
she was a jedi.
now just because you´re a jedi one day doesn´t mean your a jedi the next.
You don´t get jedi exemption from passing go or anything like that.
And I generally prefer if jedi don´t smash windows unless it´s any version later than win98.