Further thoughts regarding my arrest

Unlike my last piece discussing my arrest in Fort Wayne two months ago, which was written for the osteinsible purpose to justify my actions to my employers and with the intent to convince them of my position themselves, and which was organized using some regard for appropriate English composition, this post will just be a collection of thoughts with no editing work. You have been warned.

My arrest keeps coming back to haunt me... or rather, to praise me. I think I'd prefer the former - not because I don't like positive attention (I admit it, I do), but because like it or not, I don't really know what to do with it. It would be one thing if I ran a 5k in world record time or something, but I'm not convinced I did anything special. At the risk of sounding preachy, it's not accomplishment that people like me are out getting arrested. It's a shame that more people aren't. I reluctantly accept speaking engagements and - more reluctantly - my father's constant bragging, but while part of my motive was personal, I never wanted this much attention.

I did want to get arrested for selfish reasons - I wanted to show myself that I could do this, set a precident for being willing to risk the consequences of my convictions, and have the exciting new experience of being thrown in jail. And I did, in a way, want to be a symbol. Not a symbol in that everyone praises what I did, but a symbol in that I hope I can in some way show others that they too can go out and (try to) make a difference, consequences be damned. In terms of how much we're willing to sacrifice for our way of doing things, I think we're still lagging way behind military personnel. That's we, me included, because while I think I would be willing to give up my life for peace, I still seek the luxury of planning out exactly what risks I'm going to take. I'm still convinced Jesus calls us to a more active discipleship than that.

Let me expand on my comment that I want more people to get arrested. According to one diagram (I forget the original source, so I can say it's mine, right? At any rate, I learned this from Matt Guynn of On Earth Peace), a social movement includes four types of actors: The citizen, who earnestly follows a lifestyle reflective of the movement's values; the reformer, who seeks to change the system from within and advocates a patient pursuit of legislative action; the change agent, who recruits others to the cause and supplies information; and finally, the rebel, who wants change now and seeks to bring it about by more radical means (e.g. civil disobedience). The original author of this concept asserted that all four roles are crucial to the movement, and I agree (my favorite is the citizen, actually). But I firmly believe that the peace movement has a great scarcity of rebels, and those we have are often sadly untrained, unfocused and unprepared for their actions. Additionally, many who seek rebellious paths do not show Christlike love for their enemies or a deeply held conviction to nonviolence. This is not to criticize those persons, but to demonstrate the need for committed nonviolent Christians to take part in organizing, preparing for and executing civil disobedience.

Another thing I don't especially appreciate is the indignant response some people have to the Marshals arresting me. There's been talk of my rights being violated - and I can't help but mention, since this is a personal reflection, that the U.S. Marshals did very clearly violate my first amendment rights a few minutes after the arrest - but let's get one thing straight: yes, I should have been arrested. We weren't just visiting our representative, nor were we arrested for praying. Yes, we were in a public building, but we were in a part where there was no staff to supervise us, and the U.S. Marshals told us to leave. We refused. Yes, we were arrested during normal business hours, but we had every intention of staying until we were put in handcuffs (honestly, the early arrest spared us hours of boredom and a late night in the Allen County Jail). If we fight the premise of our arrest then we undermine the very convictions for which we were arrested. If we manage to weasel our way out of trouble with arguments about public property and first amendment rights, then we aren't really making any statement because we're not willing to sacrifice. As Martin Luther King, Jr. stated, a crucial element to civil disobedience is a willingness to accept the consequences, because that shows the highest respect for the law.

I hope I haven't bored you too much. As always, feel free to share my thoughts with anyone you like, but also feel free to just absorb it yourself. If I were going for circulation, I'd write to a magazine.

Foundations

Tinnish noises fall from the speakers that desperately need replacing over the scuffed brown floor of the roller rink, reflecting, *I* think, the hollow noises that still spring forth through voice and pen like harsh laughter at a statement that, you realize a second too late, was never meant to be a joke. Once upon a time there was a place to ice skate on the island in the middle of the dirty brown Elkhart river, but time or tiredness or financial trouble or who knows what wore it down to its very foundations, and now all one can find there is dirt and plants and mosquitos whining incessantly past our bare ears. You have to wonder, really, whether the emotion invoked by those worn-out and abandoned places where teenagers used to hold hands is one of listless romanticism or pure, wistful depression. There is the sadness at such a dreary image, but there is the joy at feeling such sadness. And you - yes, silly girl, you - you know what I'm talking about. I see you standing there staring at the overgrown foundations with a sparkle of what you want to be a tear waiting in the corner of your eye for you to muster enough feeling to force it out, because we all know crying is a hell of a lot better than the tormented in-betweenness I see you living, always drifting between the shores but never quite settling on either one.