AFS Cinema
Follow Your Conscience
RECEIVED Mon., Aug. 9, 2004
To the Chronicle,
Thanks for Lee Nichols' piece "Jail, Exile, or Iraq" [News, Aug. 6] describing the dilemma faced by a local Army National Guard soldier who may be deployed to Iraq following an involuntary extension of his enlistment agreement. Clarification is needed about one point: Conscientious objectors do not need to prove "opposition to all acts of violence, period." Enlisted persons may seek discharges as conscientious objectors based on deeply held moral, ethical, or religious objections to participation in all organized forms of war. Such beliefs must have "crystallized" since a soldier's enlistment – recognizing that many soldiers change their views about participation in war based on their own experiences of war's realities. To claim a conscientious objector discharge one does not have to object to all forms of violence, nor does one have to predict how one would react in every conflict situation, real or imaginary. Unfortunately, the law does not recognize selective conscientious objectors – that is, those who object to particular wars but are not opposed to all wars. Many U.S. soldiers have legitimate moral, ethical, or religious objections to the current war against Iraq, yet if they are not conscientious objectors as defined by the law, they have little recourse for discharge. For more information contact the Center on Conscience & War at www.nisbco.org, the GI Rights Hotline at 800/394-9544, or Nonmilitary Options for Youth at 467-2946.
Thanks for Lee Nichols' piece "Jail, Exile, or Iraq" [News, Aug. 6] describing the dilemma faced by a local Army National Guard soldier who may be deployed to Iraq following an involuntary extension of his enlistment agreement. Clarification is needed about one point: Conscientious objectors do not need to prove "opposition to all acts of violence, period." Enlisted persons may seek discharges as conscientious objectors based on deeply held moral, ethical, or religious objections to participation in all organized forms of war. Such beliefs must have "crystallized" since a soldier's enlistment – recognizing that many soldiers change their views about participation in war based on their own experiences of war's realities. To claim a conscientious objector discharge one does not have to object to all forms of violence, nor does one have to predict how one would react in every conflict situation, real or imaginary. Unfortunately, the law does not recognize selective conscientious objectors – that is, those who object to particular wars but are not opposed to all wars. Many U.S. soldiers have legitimate moral, ethical, or religious objections to the current war against Iraq, yet if they are not conscientious objectors as defined by the law, they have little recourse for discharge. For more information contact the Center on Conscience & War at www.nisbco.org, the GI Rights Hotline at 800/394-9544, or Nonmilitary Options for Youth at 467-2946.
Susan Van Haitsma