On November 3rd at 4:30 p.m., Professor John O’Hara’s Dissent in America class performed a play in the Campus Center Theater. I went because a good friend of mine told me she would be in the play and had promised me that I would be entertained. As I sat there, I was beyond amused; I was being educated on an event that I had never known about. The play was about the trial of Catonsville Nine, where nine defendants stole a couple hundred draft files during the Vietnam War and burned them with homemade napalm. The play demonstrated only the key events of the trial, and on a screen behind the actors, there were pictures of the people who were tried and the memorable quotes that were said by them. The play was powerfully moving, and had me questioning whether or not I would support these people’s actions.
Once the play was over, the professor asked the audience what they thought of the play, and asked if they had any questions. Many had their own reactions to the performance, but one particular man stuck out to me. He was an elderly man, and he spoke quietly but with a voice that made it clear that he had some sort of connection/memory of the event. He explained why the defendants did what they did and how, during that time, it was not uncommon for the people to try and intervene with the war on a personal level. I never like to get involved with politics and I never shed my opinion of what I thought of war or goes on in the battlefield because I always felt as though I did not have enough information. Who am I to try and intervene with the drafts; who am I to say that war is a complete crime against humanity, who am I to make judgments when I never had any of the experience? I never fought in a war, I was never in a war-zone, and although I know that war kills more lives than it saves, I cannot say that it serves no purpose. I always remained neutral on such topics because I feel as though I have not yet been fully educated enough to make a proper decision, but the play had me wondering if I should stop stepping aside and start questioning what goes on beyond my small view of the world, and I should start demanding answers.