Some called it an Anti-War Demonstration, while others called it a peace march. Whatever it was, it was a great day with lots of smiles, hope, unity, and convergence. People from all walks, many races, different religions, and different classes came to denounce the way of war. Peace and respect for human life, with an underlying feeling of love were the ideals on display that day. At Least in Toronto on the Eleventh of January, a day of widespread peace rallying. Over Ten Thousand in Toronto, they say fifty thousand in Washington D.C. and hundreds of thousands of people worldwide (maybe millions)! Noam Chomsky had pointed out that this level of anti-war sentiment has never been seen before a war(paraphrased from an interview). Of course, those who’ve been watching, have noticed that war has been ongoing. It’s just that now, America is stepping it up. Calling it war, trying to drag the rest of the world into their fear based reality*.

Reading everyone’s signs was a lot of fun. We ended up making one that said What would Jesus/Allah do? It’s a bit religy, but it sounded good at the time. I think I originally wanted to put Who Would Jesus/Allah Bomb? Which is a little more funny or something. Oh well it was fun to have a big sign. After a while I stuck Amanda with it so I could hand out hemp seeds to Activists. Hemp is Relief (www.jamhub.ca), and it was cold that day. There were cops as well. They weren’t aggressive, but definitely present. They were blocking non-existent traffic and came in many different wardrobes. The first bunches were in Casual Street gear. The first street was blocked by cops in Riot Gear, who had billy clubs. Then the next bunch were in a swanky yellow getup, more approachable. Next, there were cops on horseback, some of whom were probably present on June 15th (www.OCAP.ca). It was just interesting to notice the different levels of intimidation they like to convey. It’s trippy, really.

All in all, I’d have to say it was a great demonstration of peace, and I didn’t even get into the drum circle.

*Stylized American reality: "Oh no, we’re going to run out of oil one day down the road, especially if we keep driving these wicked SUV’s. Mine’s got a killer 8 cylinder engine, 4 wheel drive, Knobby tires, an extra big coffee holder and T.V’s for the kids. If we run out of gas, everything we’ve worked for won’t work. We’d better just take it while we can. Better now, before anybody gets any ideas to curb our consumption. I mean, Iraq’s got weapons look everybody, they’re bad. We better find their weapons, take their weapons and kill 'em. Come on everybody, let’s get them. They’re gonna Terrorize us if we don’t get them first. Because they suck they don’t even like McDonalds. Ok, If ya’ll aint up to the task, Ole’ uncle Sam just gonna hafta go down in there an’ teach all a ya’ll a lesson, ya got that? Ya’ll are the United Nations of pussies. All right come along now, poor disenfranchised ghetto youth, come and fight for your country. We’ll pay you more than minimum wage and you get to travel the world! After all, you want to be free don’t you? You gotta fight for what you believe in. Nike, Coke, Pepsi, the Gap, KFC, Exxon, Tommy, they all need you. Why without the help of the American Military, business wouldn’t be half as efficient. There’d be less of a foreign labour market, boosting the cost of production. Trade would drop. Natural resources would be more scarce for Americans, and steak would be rare, because South America would just refuse to clearcut Rainforest in order to raise cattle. With no one in charge, the whole world would become Communist, or Muslim or vegetarian or something. Hey, It’s the natural way for one culture to dominate over all the others. Just look at historry... Rome, for example, they dominated for a good eight hundred years, and that’s when Jesus was alive. America can become just like Rome was. Hail Ceaser! We’ll call it the New World Order, and it will be good for our leaders." (dubyadubyadubya.com).

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Johannes Chapman, Pure Hemp Caravaner