Sitting in his Birmingham, Ala., jail cell, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote a response to a group of clergymen who insisted King should seek political activism off the streets and within a courthouse.

‘I must confess that I am not afraid of the word ‘tension.’ I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth,’ King wrote in 1963.

For Andy Mager, a member of the Syracuse Peace Council, King’s message on sparking social change is simple enough. If you believe in something, you cannot let anything hold you back. Those limits, those hesitations — ignore them. This is a message Mager and the council live by.

‘He very articulately said that sometimes you need to go beyond those means,’ Mager said. ‘We are very much in line with that approach.’

The SPC, founded in 1936, is one of the nation’s oldest local grassroots peace organizations. Dispersed throughout Syracuse, the SPC is dedicated to spreading peace and social justice throughout the community.

It operates with three distinct goals in mind: ‘To educate, to agitate and to organize.’

Sometimes this is done with a simple classroom discussion in a local high school. Other times it’s done with a few nights in jail.

Educate

‘We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.’ King, 1963

The SPC believes everything is connected. From the war in Afghanistan to the surveillance cameras on the Westside, the group aims to show others that all of the world’s dots are connected. The war out there affects the war at home, said Carol Baum, a staff member of the SPC.

One of those dots connects to the Syracuse high schools. With their ‘Youth in Militarism’ program, the SPC visits several high schools, including Nottingham, Henninger and Fowler high schools, to dissuade students from joining the military.

‘You’d be amazed at the number of military recruiters that come to high schools, especially in the cities,’ Baum said. ‘Especially where they perceive that students don’t have a lot of good choices after high school.’

Though reverse-recruitment rarely causes problems with the individual high schools, two SPC members tabling at Fowler High School were told to leave the building a few weeks ago for handing out fliers that read, ‘You can’t be all you can be when you’re dead.’

Syracuse City School District Communications Director Michael Henesey said the flier displayed content that had not been agreed on between the SPC and Fowler High School officials. He said the high school would meet with members of the SPC this week to discuss the matter. The SPC will not be allowed to table in Fowler High School again until after the meeting, Henesey said.

But Mager said the SPC’s main goal is to put the information people have into context. He, too, believes the SPC must connect the dots among the world’s issues. Every issue, even recruitment, is connected to a deeper institutional problem, he said.

Agitate

‘Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored.’ King, 1963

 

All four staff members of the SPC have been in prison, Baum said.

 

It’s not that their jail time defines them, but the SPC firmly believes in the power of nonviolent civil disobedience. The members draw their inspiration from Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights era, but they aren’t looking to change the law. The SPC’s protests and sit-ins are merely ways to draw attention to issues that would otherwise be forgotten or ignored. The SPC thinks activism has to occur on the streets, where it will gain the most attention.

‘In my mind it’s a basic piece of who we are as an organization,’ Mager said.

One of these issues takes place in Fort Benning, Ga., where members of the SPC travel every November to protest. The SPC joins other protesters around the country to speak against the military training that occurs at the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, which is at the fort. Several graduates of the training program have committed human rights violations in Latin America, drawing questions about the actual training that occurs at the institute. Several SPC members have been arrested for protesting the training, but some members, like Ed Kinane, believe they’re going to prison for a good cause.

‘Spending a few months in prison is nothing, really, compared to what people in Latin America suffer as a result of graduates of the schools of America,’ said Kinane, a Syracuse resident. ‘When people hear you’re going to prison for what you believe, they’re much more likely to pay attention.’

Organize

‘Injustice must be rooted out by strong, persistent and determined action.’ King, 1963

The SPC requires no formal membership. Mager said if anyone feels like an SPC member, then he or she is one. Beyond having four part-time staff members, people can be as involved as they wish to be. As a local grassroots organization, group involvement tends to fluctuate, Kinane said.

Participation ranges from protesting on the streets every week with Kinane to writing editorial pieces in the SPC’s monthly Peace Newsletter. The group aims to effectively engage the public and showcase injustice. Mager said meaningful social change does not happen through individual action, it happens through collective action.

The SPC works with other organizations to help call attention to issues. In April, the SPC worked closely with the Syracuse University students who protested against having Jamie Dimon as the 2010 commencement speaker.

‘We really enjoy working with students and want the Peace Council to be a resource to students who want to make the world a better place,’ Mager said.

Amelia Ramsey, a former State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry student, said college students rarely have time to be politically active because they are busy finding their place in the world. They get so wrapped up worrying about the future and what job they are going to get that important issues around them are swept to the side. Since becoming politically active, she said, she feels like she has sparked social change, bringing that necessary growth in society.

‘We are the next wave of peace activists,’ Ramsey said. ‘So we might as well be effective.’

ansteinb@syr.edu

Published on November 3, 2010 at 12:00 pm