April 20, Washington, D.C. — Normally I try to avoid
large public demonstrations on Hitler’s birthday, but ostensibly
that’s not what this one is about — the anti-globalization
protests in April are practically becoming an annual event in
Washington. But I’m guessing that in previous years there were not
large numbers of people holding signs and flags with swastikas on
them.
This year with the war on terrorism in full swing, the
anti-globalization movement has made some strange bedfellows. In
addition to the “Mobilization for Global Justice Rally,” “United We
March for Peace and Justice,” and the “International Act Now to
Stop War and End Racism (A.N.S.W.E.R.)” coalition, the “Palestinian
Solidarity March” has been added to the docket. As thousands of
demonstrators converge on Freedom Plaza to make the final march
down Pennsylvania Avenue to the U.S. Capitol, a quick survey of the
crowd reveals that the most popular sign is the blue and white
Israeli flag, only the Star of David has been replaced with the
aforementioned swastika.
But even for the other groups at the March who believe in the
Palestinian cause, it’s hard not to believe that they don’t find
the swastika hyperbolic and offensive. Of course that’s not the
least of it. A man is holding his child with one hand and sign that
reads “Sharon Can’t Live Without Drinking Blood: VAMPIRE” with the
other. It’s especially ludicrous that he’s repeating this old
racist libel, marching 50 paces ahead of a large group of people
holding a 30-foot banner that reads “Jews Against the Occupation”
— one of several Jewish anti-Zionist or pro-Palestinian groups in
attendance at the march.
Similarly I wonder how the aging hippies and hordes of college
students holding signs that say “World Peace” and “Stop the
Violence Now” feel about showing solidarity with Palestinians
holding signs that say “God Bless Hezbollah” and keep cadence by
chanting “Viva Viva Intifada.” (Such is the state of
multiculturalism, that people now call for violence simultaneously
in two different languages.) And once I hit double digits, I
stopped counting the number of signs that spelled “Israel”
wrong.
Yet, give the Palestinians their due: while they may not have
produced the numbers of the pro-Israel rally the previous Monday
they are nothing if not committed. As for the rest of the
anti-globalization crowd, they’re committed as well (40 of them
were arrested for blocking traffic the night before), but what
they’re committed to is hard to tell. A running tally of what
they’re marching for: Reforming the International Monetary Fund and
World Trade Organization, the U.S. Navy out of Vieques, legalizing
marijuana, striking factory workers in Ohio, Free Tibet, Animal
Rights, protecting old growth forests, stopping the war,
Coca-Cola’s treatment of workers in Africa, Third World debt,
Marxism-Leninism and, hand-to-god, one marcher is wearing a T-shirt
that says, “The English System of measurement sucks. Go metric
now!”
Desperate for anyone that can explain this hellbroth of ideals,
I turn to one last remaining cause: The anarchists. Dressed in all
black with jackboots and bandannas covering their faces, they’re
more conspicuous than they realize. I approach one who can’t be
over 20 years old, wearing an “Anti-Flag” T-Shirt, the name of a
punk rock band with radical politics. He won’t give me his
name.
I recite the laundry list of causes I’ve seen that day and ask
him: Do you believe in any of these causes? All of them? Or because
you are an anarchist, is this exactly the kind of random, shapeless
dissent you want?
He pauses for a second and responds with a resounding “F—K
You,” and walks away. I look up at the sky, which is now the color
of old dimes — it’s quite literally threatening to rain on this
parade. I tuck my notebook into my pocket and head home, realizing
this kid has just given me a better explanation than I ever could
have hoped for.
Mark Hemingway is a writer in Washington,
D.C.
