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CHOOSE HEALING JUSTICE OVER VENGEANCE

An AFSC Open Letter to the LGBT Community

(Originally issued in a slightly revised form on 9/18/01)

From Kay Whitlock
National Representative for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender (LGBT) Programs
Community Relations Unit
American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)
Telephone: 406-721-7844
Fax: 406-728-2314
Email: kwhitlock@afsc.org
Websites: www.afsc.org; www.afsc.org/JusticeVisions.htm; www.peaceresponse.org

Together with millions of people throughout the U.S. and the world, the American Friends Service Committee's national LGBT program was stunned by the unconscionable and horrifying attacks that occurred in New York City and Washington, DC on September 11, 2001. We grieve deeply for those lost and injured in the attacks, and for their families and friends. In the name of justice, the individuals and groups responsible for planning and carrying them out must be held accountable. But what vision of justice is large enough to confront this violence with responses that lead to healing rather than the spilling of more blood?

LGBT people know only too well what happens when we are cast in the role of the despised other and our rights and humanity are denied. If we look deeply into our own hearts, surely we will find the courage to declare that we must never do the same thing to other people, or stand by in silence while our government undertakes actions that are a mirror image of hate violence. We have a special obligation to act with care, compassion, and integrity in this perilous time.

A dangerous mood is being fueled across the land. Who will call us home to our more just and compassionate selves? Our political leaders have taken us in the direction of war, of officially sanctioned destruction that is, in its turn, bringing violence and devastation to civilian populations elsewhere who have already been suffering the harms of war, repression, poverty, and dispossession. Moreover, the impulse to destroy those who have hurt us is leading to terrible forms of "vigilante violence" within our own country. Where is the justice in this?

At the root of all hate violence, war, and injustice is the violence of "us" versus "them" - those considered "good" (worthy), and those who are "evil" and therefore expendable. To fully claim our common humanity, it is necessary for all individuals, all political and identity groups, all nations to stop locating violence outside ourselves and recognize a painful but necessary truth: that we who are victims of violence and injustice in some situations may also be, in other situations, perpetrators of violence and injustice.

Increasingly, we see people stricken by grief and rage in this country threatening and targeting for harassment and assault people who are Muslim and of Middle Eastern and South Asian descent. Already, several people have been murdered. Automobiles in some locales carry signs reading, "Kill the Arabs." People who are or are presumed to be Arabs are being physically, emotionally, and verbally assaulted. A Hindu temple has been firebombed. Mosques have been vandalized. Muslim schoolchildren are being threatened.

We urge all people to stand publicly in solidarity with Middle Eastern and South Asian communities, and to speak out boldly in defense of the constitutional, civil, and human rights of all, without exception. The American Friends Service Committee understands and shares a sense of uncertainty and vulnerability today. But we are not willing to use unjust means that cause suffering to others to try to protect ourselves.

Cluster bombs, ground troops, virtually unlimited police authority, and the surrender of fundamental rights cannot purchase authentic and lasting safety. Already, so-called "anti-terrorist" legislation has been passed that effectively suspends many constitutional protections for all people. The already widespread use of racial and ethnic profiling by law enforcement authorities is escalating. The U.S. government has now openly authorized the strategic use of political assassination. The use of secret evidence against persons suspected of being or associating with terrorists - virtually any person of Middle Eastern or South Asian descent - has been contested with some success in various courts in recent years, but is now likely to enjoy new support. Due process rights have long been in jeopardy and are being seriously violated today, especially within immigrant communities. Now, powers are being given to the federal government to detain and deport "suspects" on the basis of no evidence at all. Such broad powers invite wide use and abuse.

However unjustifiable the attacks of September 11, they arise within a broader social, political, and economic context. Can our hearts open sufficiently to realize that that the U.S., too, is implicated directly and indirectly in the violence, injustice, poverty, disenfranchisement, and despair felt by many in the Middle East and elsewhere around the world? People within the U.S. are capable of great generosity and compassion, and have shown it time and time again. Yet too many of our own nation's policies and actions - including the use napalm, cluster bombs, anti-personnel fragmentation bombs against civilian populations; covert actions; carpet bombing; and sales of arms and other support to undemocratic, repressive regimes and groups that rely on torture, terror; and death squads -- have often caused great hardship and unimaginable suffering to families in other parts of the world. Fear, hatred, resentment, and the desire to obliterate those perceived as "enemy, " thrive in such violent and unjust conditions.

Massive military retaliation and repressive policies abroad and at home will further inflame hatreds and cause the violence to escalate, on all sides. If the suffering is to cease, only imaginative, bold, and ceaseless public activism and international diplomacy rooted in universal affirmation of human rights and commitment to social and economic justice for all offer us hope for a different, more just, less violent, more secure future.

Within the larger LGBTQ/queer community, we have before us the opportunity to allow our own experience of violence and injustice to illuminate our understanding of the destructive power of hatred and strengthen our determination that no peoples shall be dehumanized and considered expendable.

Let us redeem the lives of all those lost to this senseless violence by finding practical ways to transform the ashes of destruction into the love of healing justice, in which the integrity of means and ends is ultimately life giving for all.

The American Friends Service Committee is a Quaker organization whose work for social justice, peace, and humanitarian service is carried forward by people of many religious and spiritual traditions. We seek to give practical expression to the belief that there is that of God or sacred spirit in every person and all peoples. Our programs are rooted in the radical faith that the power of love, given tangible expression in our social, economic, and spiritual struggles, can overcome violence and injustice.

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