An Unreasonable Woman

Diane Wilson; Foreword by Kenny Ausubel

Associated Articles

Female Antiwar Activists Plan for Peace Day

Women's eNews
By Jennifer Friedlin
September 19, 2006

On Sept. 21, Code Pink, the women's antiwar group, will be joining other peace activists to protest the war in Iraq. In July, the group's Diane Wilson led a hunger strike that echoes some of the urgent activism of British suffragists a century ago.

(WOMENSENEWS)--As Congress prepares to adjourn for fall elections that are being closely watched for a reading of the country's attitude toward the Bush government's prosecution of the war in Iraq, Code Pink, the women's peace activist group, is joining other groups to observe International Peace Day on Thursday, Sept. 21.

This is the latest action on the part of a group that has been in the forefront of peaceful protests since 2002, including a recent hunger strike. The title of the organization is a play on the Bush administration's color-coded terrorist alarms; pink is a peace alert.

Code Pink activists have been asking Americans to sign their Declaration of Peace pledge, their latest effort to maintain anti-war momentum. The declaration calls for a timetable for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, the establishment of a peace process and an increase in funds for human needs.

Earlier this year, the group conducted an attention-getting hunger strike to pressure the administration to end the war and start bringing--or planning to bring--U.S. troops home.

Deciding that the antiwar movement needed a fresh jolt of energy, Diane Wilson, a cofounder of Code Pink, announced plans for a hunger strike at a Mother's Day rally. The "Troops Home Fast" began on July 4.

Wilson said that 5,000 people from 22 countries, including such celebrities as Susan Sarandon and Sean Penn, joined the strike, many on a rolling basis, meaning that individual fasters each gave up food and drink for a day.

Activist Cindy Sheehan and other members of the Venice, Calif.-based Code Pink and Global Exchange, an international human rights organization based in San Francisco, also participated in the strike. Most fasters drank juice or returned to food after a few weeks.

Wilson's Fast Ended in Jordan

Wilson, who originally said she was prepared to live on water only for 60 days, ultimately maintained her foodless vigil, mostly spent in Lafayette Park, across the street from the White House, for one month. The decision to end the strike came after a plea from an unexpected source: Iraqi government officials.

In late July, antiwar protest groups received a call from a delegation of Iraqi government officials who also seek an end to the U.S. occupation, asking for a meeting in Amman, Jordan. Within three days, the fasting protestors, including Wilson, Sheehan and a handful of others, packed their bags and headed to the Middle East.

During the flight to Amman, Wilson said her legs and feet became swollen. Perhaps it was Wilson's elephantine legs or the gaunt look on the Americans' faces, but the Iraqis asked the Americans to eat.

With their Iraqi hosts, including a number of members of parliament as well as representatives of about 175 other political leaders, both Sunnis and Shiites, the Americans broke bread with a meal of kebabs, hummous and pita.

"They were taken with our willingness to do a hunger strike," Wilson said. "They had talked with a lot of NGOs (nongovernmental agencies), but to do a hunger fast shows the sincerity."

Over the course of two days, the Americans and Iraqis discussed the urgent need to press for getting U.S. soldiers out of Iraq. The groups vowed to try and arrange another conference in which U.S. politicians who support an immediate end to the war would be invited.

Wilson said the Iraqis claimed that about 80 percent of the "so-called insurgents" were just regular civilians trying to defend their country from the United States and that much of the violence would die down once the military pulled out.

After the meeting, some members of the U.S. contingent went on to Lebanon to assess the damage caused during its war with Israel, which was then raging.

Gained Iraqis' Attention

Upon returning to the United States, several of the fasters said that they felt the fast had achieved its purpose by garnering official Iraqi attention, if not support from the U.S. government.

One of the hunger strikers, peace activist Gael Murphy, called the fast an "absolute success."

"We ventured into the fast not knowing what it would bring about. But we felt that if we put out the intention something would happen and there would be a shift," said Murphy. "We had been feeling Iraqi voices were needed in the process."

Other female peace activists, however, questioned the wisdom of a hunger strike as a tool to oppose the war.

Carol Schneider, president of Another Mother for Peace, of Beverly Hills, Calif., said that while the hunger strike may have given activists a common focus, it would have little impact on decision-makers in the White House.

Referring to the Bush administration, Schneider said: "They don't care about people dying. Why would they care about people starving?"

Female activists have a history of using hunger strikes as a political tactic and have long raised questions about how effective they are.

Striking for Suffrage

Suffragists in England and the United States, for instance, gave up food in their efforts to get the vote during the turn of the last century.

In England, some militant women, imprisoned for taking actions as drastic as arson, staged hunger strikes, which prison authorities counteracted with forced feeding. In one 18-month period, Emmeline Pankhurst, who was now in her 50s, endured 10 of these hunger strikes.

In 1917, U.S. protestors, including Alice Paul and Lucy Burns, went on hunger strike while in prison. Their militancy earned them some measure of sympathy, but others thought the action went too far.

The efficacy of the suffragists' hunger strikes, however, is a matter of debate. Some academics say the imprisonment of women's rights activists, particularly in Britain where the conditions were appalling, had more to do with their eventual victory than the hunger strikes.

"The arrests were more controversial and publicized than the hunger strikes," said Ellen Carol Dubois, a history professor at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Wilson, a medic during the Vietnam War, has carved a prominent place for herself in the history of female hunger strikers.

In 1991, the shrimper from Seadrift, Texas, stopped eating in an effort to protest toxic dumping in the waters that sustained her. It worked. Within two weeks the Environmental Protection Agency demanded that a local chemical company conduct an environmental impact study before building a new plant.

Her 1991 strike was almost revolutionary in her home state of Texas, where people--including environmentalists--told her she was nuts for trying. Wilson says that after two years of trying tamer strategies, she knew she needed to try something new.

Since then, Wilson, 58, has completed seven other hunger strikes, most recently her 30-day water-only fast to oppose the war in Iraq.

"A hunger fast has a spiritual component," said Wilson. "Gandhi called it soul power."

Jennifer Friedlin is a writer based in New York.

Anti-War Group to Break Hunger Strike on Jordan Trip

Axcess News
By A.N. Hernandez
August 1, 2006

(AXcess News) Washington – Diane Wilson, on her 28th day of a hunger strike, lugs three bags slowly through the center of Lafayette Park across the street from the White House.

"Any type of walking just gets your heart beating fast, and your breathing is more like panting. Your mouth just gets really dry, and any type of exertion, especially in the sun, will just drain you," Wilson, 58, said Monday as she sat under the shade of a large tree.

The city was under a heat advisory, with afternoon temperatures in the mid-90s.

Wilson, of Seadrift, Texas, is an environmental activist and co-founder of CodePink, a women's anti-war group. The group arranged the Troops Home Fast, which began July 4. The fasters are calling for the Bush administration to pull troops out of Iraq. Every day, a group of CodePink fasters meets in the park.

Some participants have done one-day fasts, others fast for as long as they can last. While some drink juice, Wilson subsists on water. She said she's lost about 20 pounds from her 5- foot-7 frame, but maintains she is not hungry.

"I don't experience hunger. People seem to think it's very painful, maybe in its last stages, but I feel all right," Wilson said. "It's just the weakness."

Wilson originally planned to fast as long as her body allowed. She even has a will ready. Others planned to fast until Sept. 21, International Peace Day.

Now, Wilson, and a few fellow CodePink fasters, plan to break their fast this week when they meet with Iraqi parliament members in Amman, Jordan. They leave Wednesday.

They plan to meet with five Iraqi parliament members, religious leaders and political analysts.

Wilson, former U.S. diplomat Ann Wright and CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin will be among those visiting Jordan to discuss a 24-point Iraqi reconciliation plan, unveiled July 23 by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

"This is a good goal the fast accomplished, to be recognized by people all over the world and by members of the Iraqi parliament," Wright said. "I am humbled."

Wright, 60, is a retired U.S. Army colonel and former U.S. diplomat. She is also on her 28th day without food. She is not adhering to a water-only fast - she drinks carrot and apple juice in addition to water.

After 29 years of military service, Wright served as a U.S. diplomat for 16 years in many countries, ending in Mongolia. In 2003, she was one of three U.S. diplomats who resigned to protest the Bush administration's invasion of Iraq. Now, she is a full-time activist and member of CodePink.

She said she is not worried about her safety when she travels to Jordan.

Israel and Hezbollah forces in Lebanon have been fighting since July 12.

Since the fast began outside the White House, several CodePink members have been arrested.

On Friday, five anti-war protesters, four of whom were involved with the CodePink fast, were arrested for demonstrating without a permit. CodePink spokeswoman Meredith Dearborn said the group lost its permit to demonstrate when CodePink members blocked an entrance to the White House during British Prime Minister Tony Blair's visit. Park police asked them to move, and when they refused their permit was revoked. They were arrested and received citations.

The group was granted new permits Monday to demonstrate on the sidewalk in front of the White House and to gather in Lafayette Park.

Wilson said her arrest was worth it.

"I don't know how or when it's going to happen, but we're going to be a catalyst for something, we're going to bring the troops home," she said.

Earlier in the week, Benjamin was arrested by U.S. Capitol police for disrupting Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's speech to Congress. She was cited for disrupting Congress.

Leading Members of Iraqi Parliament Call for Meeting with Anti-War Hunger Strikers

US Fasters on 30th Day of Hunger Strike travel to Jordan on Wednesday to meet with MPs about Peace Plan and Break Fast, then on to Lebanon

Code Pink
Aug 1, 2006

After 28 days of fasting, anti-war hunger strikers received a breakthrough victory for their sacrifice: Leading members of the Iraqi Parliament invited fasters to join them to discuss their plans for peace in Iraq. On Wednesday, August 2, hunger strikers will travel to Amman, Jordan to meet with these Iraqi MPs and break their fast. The group includes:

- Peace mom Cindy Sheehan,
- Retired Colonel Ann Wright,
- Iraq war veteran Geoffrey Millard,
- Politician/Writer Tom Hayden,
- CODEPINK co-founders Medea Benjamin, Jodie Evans, Gael Murphy and Diane Wilson.

The trip is being sponsored by CODEPINK: Women for Peace and the human rights group Global Exchange.

This invitation comes after fasters were rebuffed in numerous attempts to meet with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki during his visit to Washington last week, including setting up "Camp Al-Maliki" across from the Iraqi Embassy and publishing an open letter to him in one of the largest Iraqi newspapers. Faster and CODEPINK cofounder Medea Benjamin was arrested for disrupting al-Maliki's address to Congress last Wednesday, saying loudly and repeatedly, "Iraqis want the troops to leave, bring them home now!" The parliamentarians, who expressed concern for fasters' health and dismay at the Prime Minister's dismissal of their repeated requests for a meeting, will travel to meet with the US delegation in Jordan on August 3.

The Iraqi elected officials will brief the Americans on the Reconciliation Plan they have been working on at the Reconciliation Conference held in Cairo last week. CODEPINK cofounder Medea Benjamin said, "It is a breakthrough for the US peace movement to meet directly with Iraqi parliamentarians working on a peace plan. We hope to return to the US to build support for their plan."

With the increased violence between Israel and Lebanon, a part of the U.S. delegation will go on to Syria and Lebanon to bear witness to the suffering of innocent victims of war in the region.

For more information on the delegation to Jordan, please see www.troopshomefast.org.

Activists Arrested At White House

Washington Post
By Audrey Edwards
July 29, 2006

Five antiwar activists, four of whom have been on a hunger strike for 25 days, were arrested yesterday for demonstrating without a permit after they blocked an entrance to the White House during British Prime Minister Tony Blair's meeting with President Bush.

The protesters shouted antiwar slogans and held banners calling for troops to be brought home from Iraq.

The group was among several dozen demonstrators who had gathered outside the White House while Blair was inside. The arrests occurred after the five blocked the entrance and ignored police orders to move, said Rae Abileah, a coordinator for the antiwar group CodePink. Three of the people arrested are members of CodePink, including its co-founder, Diane Wilson of Seadrift, Tex.

The others arrested were Ann Wright of Honolulu, Louis Vitali of San Francisco, Martha Odom of Portland, Ore., and Eve Tetaz of Washington.

Wright, a retired Army colonel, said in a telephone interview after her release that the activists had hoped to block the White House gate until Bush and Blair resolved to end the war in Iraq.

Four of those arrested were on the 25th day of a hunger strike that is a project of CodePink. The group has issued a nationwide call for people to go on at least a partial hunger strike, if only for a few hours, to show their opposition to the war in Iraq.

About eight members of the group have been gathering each day in Lafayette Square since July 4.

The group had been issued a permit by the U.S. Park Police. It was revoked yesterday, however, after the protesters refused three requests from police to move from the White House entrance, thereby violating a condition of their permit, said Sgt. Scott Fear, a spokesman for the Park Police.

They then were arrested for demonstrating without a permit. Each was issued a $50 citation.

Afterward, several other hunger strikers lingered in the park. Geoffrey Millard, a member of Iraq Veterans Against the War, said he had been fasting for five days.

"As a disabled vet, I'm also fasting from my medication," he said. "It's a painful experience, but a good one. Until the flag-draped coffins stop coming back, I can't go on with my daily life, move on or forget."

Despite the revocation of their permit, some of the demonstrators vowed to return to Lafayette Square to continue their hunger strike. They expect to stay in Washington until Aug. 15, when they plan to move on to Crawford, Tex. There, at Camp Casey outside President Bush's ranch, they say they will continue the hunger strike until Sept. 21.

Wilson said the protest and the subsequent arrests were worth it.

"I have to have faith," said Wilson, a former shrimp boat captain-turned-environmental activist. "I know it's going to be the catalyst for something, even if this is not going to be big enough to bring them home."