Young people fighting for our right to dissent

BY EMMA CLANCY

The last few months have been a period of political awakening for thousands of teenagers. Through protesting against the war on Iraq, many young people have gotten involved in political activity for the first time.

But their attempts to change society for the better have been met not with applause, but attacks from the government, the police and the media. Those in power are campaigning to silence young voices and close questioning minds.

The spectacular Books Not Bombs youth protests against the war, involving tens of thousands of students walking out of class, showed not only that young people do not believe government and media propaganda about this war being "necessary’‘, but also that we are among the most willing to stand in solidarity with others in the world who are suffering.

Young people have led the country in organising themselves to oppose the war: anti-war collectives are active on most campuses, as well as many high schools around the country.

Independently organised, active dissent is threatening, however, to the government and to the Labor Party. Young people are told by these pro-corporate pollies to work within the system — not to challenge it and exercise our own mass power through militant protest.

The violent police attacks on student protesters on March 26 and April 2 showed this repression of young people’s dissent in a naked and obvious form. But the media denigration of young people, however, may turn out to be a more far-reaching and long-lasting attack.

Teenage protesters, particularly Middle Eastern students, have been repeatedly portrayed by the media as "violent thugs’‘. This distortion is an attempt to isolate young people from the broader anti-war movement, to limit the size of student protests by making parents fearful of their children’s safety and not allowing them to demonstrate and to divide the youth anti-war movement with racism.

Young people have also been portrayed as being "stupid’‘, "naive’‘ and unable to think for themselves.

As Books Not Bombs coordinator Kylie Moon has explained: "What’s naive is to believe that the corporate media doesn’t have its own agenda, that it’s factual and objective and that the Coalition government is acting in the interests of the people by going to war on Iraq.’‘

Moon described to me some of the questions the media have been asking young people at student anti-war rallies, and in media interviews.

"They have asked things such as, ‘So, do you even know who the president of Iraq is?’, and ‘Can you tell me where is Iraq?’ They are trying to intimidate young people, and make them lose confidence in their views. But most young people know more about why this war is wrong than their interviewers.’‘

Doing a media interview on behalf of Books Not Bombs with right-wing shock-jock Stan Zemanek, I had first hand experience of this idiocy. After being asked where Iraq was, I mentioned the nearby country of Lebanon. "Lebanon? Lebanon? Isn’t Lebanon in Beirut?’‘, Zamenek interrupted. I had to explain that Beirut was, in fact, the capital of Lebanon. The incident didn’t stop him calling protesting students "stupid’‘.

“[Students' critics] will attempt to intimidate and patronise young people, insisting that because they’re older, they’re more knowledgeable, and have more right to have a opinion”, Moon argued.

This problem is not limited to the anti-war movement: young people are told in all spheres of life, particularly at school, that they are too young to think, that their opinions are misinformed and worthless, and that they should just shut up and learn.

What has been possibly even more disturbing than police bans on student protests is the directive issued by the Victorian education department, telling teachers to avoid giving students their opinions on the war. This censorship is more than an attack on free speech, it is an attack on the right of young people to form opinions.

The government and the media are evidently in favour of producing an army of mindless drones, who ask no questions, and make no trouble for them. The explosion of anti-government sentiment, the demands for answers, and our refusal to “just shut up and learn” while there is war for oil being carried out in our name has disrupted this plan.

Young people are radicalising and rebelling against government policy. We are forming and voicing opinions, asking questions and making trouble — and we will continue to set an example by fighting for social justice for the rest of society.

[Emma Clancy is a member of Books Not Bombs and the socialist youth organisation Resistance.]

From Green Left Weekly, April 16, 2003.
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