Cindy Sheehan's Gone: Another Loud Female Activist Bites the Dust

On Saturday, May 26 Cindy Sheehan put out on DemocraticUnderground.Com site a letter - reproduced here - that she was quitting the Democratic Party because of her disgust over their caving in on Iraq war funding. She got so much hate mail, it convinced her she had had enough of activism! So on May 28 she issued a letter quitting activism. As she points out below, being an outspoken female activist willing to criticize problems within a movement is a tough job, especially when you are going in to debt to do it.
Photo of Cindy, me and Rachel Corrie poster at White House from summer of 2006.
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Cindy writes in part: I have endured a lot of smear and hatred since Casey was killed and especially since I became the so-called "Face" of the American anti-war movement. Especially since I renounced any tie I have remaining with the Democratic Party, I have been further trashed on such "liberal blogs" as the Democratic Underground. Being called an "attention whore" and being told "good riddance" are some of the more milder rebukes.
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...when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the "left" started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used. I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of "right or left", but "right and wrong."
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.... I have spent every available cent I got from the money a "grateful" country gave me when they killed my son and every penny that I have received in speaking or book fees since then. I have sacrificed a 29 year marriage and have traveled for extended periods of time away from Casey’s brother and sisters and my health has suffered and my hospital bills from last summer (when I almost died) are in collection because I have used all my energy trying to stop this country from slaughtering innocent human beings. I have been called every despicable name that small minds can think of and have had my life threatened many times.
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....I have also tried to work within a peace movement that often puts personal egos above peace and human life. This group won’t work with that group; he won’t attend an event if she is going to be there; and why does Cindy Sheehan get all the attention anyway? It is hard to work for peace when the very movement that is named after it has so many divisions.
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Cindy, yo comprendo!! Though the problem is not just divisions, but powerful individuals committed to getting away with morally and even legally dubious behavior. In the last seven years I've constantly been in trouble for criticizing movement "powers that be." Criticizing those who encouraged young people, even teenagers, to smash things at demos and fight with cops; criticizing street fighting as an activist strategy; criticizing men who harass women and get into physical fights with other peace activists; daring to continue to criticize the state of Israel and the Israel Lobby when men told me to shut up; criticizing machismo, anglo and latino, straight, gay and bisexual; and most recently for criticizing men who joke with their male buddies about cheating on their wives with other men or visiting Asian child sex rings. I mean when people only have a problem with my criticizing those who make or laugh at such jokes, you KNOW you are in the wrong group!
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So, Cindy, I'm pretty disgusted too. Of course, I'll never quit activism! But I am trying to move away from working with people whose behavior is a constant reminder of human (especially male) failings. I'm tired of being a masochist and trying to change those behaviors while remaining in the company of those practicing them! It just puts me in a really bad mood all the time!
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Of course, I have been saying I'd quit such foolishness for 30 years!
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Now that I'm getting into my declining years, however, I am trying to re-focus on how to change human consciousness so more of us are willing to stand up against these oppressive behaviors -- or even refuse to engage in them! Dang, why can't we just all pop a pill and let all the craziness drop away?
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Oh, that's right, that route is illegal. What if drugs really could help liberate people? If people we're TOO liberated after all they'd stop voting, stop paying taxes and secede from the union. Of course, the way the U.S. government is going perfectly straight people are getting more willing to think about those options.
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It occurs to me suddenly, maybe freedom is the greatest form of psychological therapy there is?? No authorities to be angry and frustrated at; no male chauvinists capable of forcing their economic, psychological and physical will on you. Only opportunities to explore and free people to love!
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When Cindy gets bored with her long rest, maybe she'll hook up with the radical decentralist secessionist movement for true human psychological and political LIBERTY.