Blacks Turn Out In N.Y. To March Against War

NEW YORK – Wearing a black beret adorned with a peace button and carrying a sign reading “No War for Empire,” Dionne Figgins isn’t new to the game.
The 22-year-old member of the Dance Theatre of Harlem has taken to the streets on several occasions to protest injustice in her community, her country and her world. Her latest fight is the war in Iraq.
“This war is flat-out wrong,” said Figgins, walking among a crowd of protesters.
“Our government is taking money from education and then coming into our schools to solicit our brothers and sisters to serve in the military.”
African Americans, young and old, sharing these same feelings, filled Broadway in an anti-war rally on Saturday, March 22.
The rally, organized by the grassroots activist group United for Peace and Justice, drew a crowd of 125,000 to 200,000.
“This is the most blacks I have seen out here for a march of this caliber,” said Figgins.
Many marchers’ primary grievance was the disproportionate number of African American soldiers serving in the armed forces. The Washington Post reports that African American soldiers account for more than 35 percent of the total. Half the Army’s enlisted women are black, and African American soldiers represent 21 percent of all military branches, nearly double their representation in the population.
“Our sons and daughters are the ones who will die fighting for a country who doesn’t give a damn about them,” said Peter Western of Brooklyn, N.Y.
Western has two nephews fighting in the Middle East and four friends with children awaiting deployment. He brought his neighbors along to help stir up public involvement.
The Radical Black Congress made its presence known by carrying banners, waving flags and playing brass instruments and drums to show its support for black troops.
People of all races marched, chanted and danced in the two-mile-long parade to festive sounds reminiscent of a historically black marching bands.
“No one should be at home. They should be out here in the streets,” said Dr. Sapphire Mann-Aahmad, a New York physician and member of the Radical Black Congress.
Mann-Aahmad, who also has loved ones in the military said, “All black men in the military should get out of the war and fight for reparations on the home front.”
College students carried signs announcing “This is Not My War!,” urging “Drop Bush Not Bombs!” and calling for the impeachment of President Bush.
“Violence breeds more violence. Didn’t we learn that from 9/11?” asked Malik Sandino, a 20-year-old sociology and history major at St. John’s University in New York.
Saturday’s march was one of several held across the country, in cities that included Washington, D.C., Chicago and Atlanta.
It is the fourth in New York since the United States and its allies waged war against the government of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.