Commentary: Being a Peaceful Warrior From Cannon Falls

 

I grew up on the intersection of a river bend and a gravel road in southern rural Minnesota. I joined the U.S. military when I was 17, with a signed waiver from my mom. That was in 2003, and I needed money to afford a college education. My family was proud of my grandfather’s World War II service, so it seemed natural to me to join the 34th Infantry Division to pay for school and make my family proud while also “defending our freedom.”

I assisted with the occupation of Iraq in 2009 and was honorably discharged from the service in 2011. I earned a BS in Psychology from MSU Mankato during my time in the service and later an MS in Gender and Women’s Studies. I went on to receive an MA in Forensic Psychology at UND Grand Forks and I am currently working on an MSW from Saint Catherine University. I plan to open a private practice as a trauma-informed yoga therapist.

 

 

When he was elected in 2016, I wailed my grief and fear into the night. I wanted to leave the country, flee this hateful regime, and never look back. Of course, I stayed, I marched, I protested, I volunteered, I voted.

My first reaction to the newest iteration of this regime was fear-based. I felt isolated. My second reaction was to reach out for my community. Never one to stand down from a challenge, I decided to look for humans with humanity out here in the “red zones” (rural conservative counties). I found them!

Doom scrolling brings in massive amounts of information but there’s something about standing in a snowbank with my community that can turn rage into something much more powerful. Rage is secondary to fear and when you pull back the layers of winter, it turns out Love is the answer.

Cities are good places to find like-minded people and attend mass organized marches, which are effective and empowering, but there’s something vulnerable and invigorating about being the only person standing out on the icy sidewalk.

I believe it is incredibly important to bring these issues to light in rural communities. I think it’s important for them to see a protester with a sign in their own town. Small-town Minnesota makes finding people a little more difficult, which is exactly why people live out here.

It’s easy for some people in rural areas to think of “all that stuff going on in Minneapolis” as happening on another planet — it’s out of sight and out of mind. They don’t use social media and some only leave their county a few times a year. But they vote and, historically, rural counties have voted red.

It’s incredibly important to have these hard conversations with white rural neighbors. Yes, it feels amazingly empowering to march with 100,000 of my closest allies on the streets of Minneapolis. Yet it’s a different challenge, and maybe equally as important, to stand alone. That takes a lot of courage.

Thankfully, I only stood alone one day — because soon other organizers and community-members joined. There is a growing movement of grassroots organizing happening all over rural southern Minnesota. ‘Tis the season for sowing seeds.

There are so many other women, and some men, who have been doing incredible work for decades. These people are slightly older and a little timid, but they show up. They know a tyrannical government when they see one.

We are getting more proficient and more organized out here. Minnesotans I have gotten to know are postcard-writing white ladies with contacts and widespread connections to other organizations, volunteers, and groups — all working together across county lines and between small towns in ways I’m not sure has ever happened out here before.

There are hard conversations that need to be had: white people talking to other white people. One problem is that some people actually think they’re better than other people because they’ve been fed a storyline and believe they are the main characters. Whether that is neutral, central, or right.

So, we stand, we connect, and we act in the name of Love. We call out bigots and make racism shameful and ignorant again.

I changed my conversational tactic recently from issue-based discussion to algorithm-based discussion. There is so much misinformation right now and we are fed an algorithm that suits our opinions and values.

When we set down our phones and connect, we find that we do agree that people should be treated with dignity and respect, that humans have certain inalienable rights no matter where they go, and the federal government should not have the power to “disappear” people in the street with no due process.

As George Carlin once stated, “Rights are not rights if someone can take them away — they’re privileges.”

What exactly is it that makes America better than any other oligarchy?

Aren’t we supposed to love our neighbors?

“With Justice and Liberty for all,” I pledged every morning with my hand over my heart in school. I swore an oath to defend the Constitution. I’ve been indoctrinated my entire life to honor and defend this country. Was freedom and liberty only meant for certain people? Am I not the descendent of immigrants?

I ask these questions from a position of peace and love, and a yearning for equity.