After September 11th, 2001 public awareness and involvement
seemed to have increased sharply. Now a year or so later, things are
back to their “normal” way. We will just go along with whatever the
politicians say, even if it means going to war and taking the lives
of innocent bystanders. And I’m not sure about other people my age,
which is the magic number of eighteen by the way, but I’m not willing
to go around the world to fight a war without just cause. I have a feeling
there’s something we might not know that our leaders do, and the group
that this issue impacts the most also has the lowest voice, this group
being teenagers.
So you’re sitting there reading this saying to yourselves what the hell
can I do? You can’t vote, and you don’t possess the power to do anything
right? Wrong, there are many different things you can do. Well first
you must become aware, and to become aware you must do research. One
great site that I have just recently discovered is
http://www.axisofjustice.org,
which has the involvement of members of Audioslave and System of a Down.
I will quote Jake "JK" Sexton words found on the site from
a link called “Pardon Our Dust” which greatly illustrates the purpose
of the site and of this article.
Here goes: “You can probably guess that the theme of this site is political
action. The world is in terrible shape right now, and if you want it
to get any better, YOU are going to have to do something about it. We're
not here to tell you how the world should be or what you should do to
make it that way. These are choices that YOU have to make. Our job is
to do our best to give you access to all the information and resources
to help you make those decisions, and to help you act on those decisions.
And if at some point you realize that this site or this message board
are actually hindering you from taking action (e.g. you're spending
so much time on the bbs hanging with your friends to get involved with
activism), you should leave us behind. We've got a world to save, and
we've got work to do.” Could not have said it better myself. There are
other great sites as well you just have to look.
Okay so now that you possess some knowledge of the world, its time to
take action. Some things you can do without leaving your house include
sending a letter to a politician telling them how great or how terrible
of a job they are doing. In this same line, you can attempt to make
some phone calls to politicians. There are even online petitions you
can sign, such as one set up by Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong to
send a message to George Bush to not have war with Iraq, you can check
it out and sign at
http://www.greenday.net.
Truthfully though, groups make a much bigger impact than individuals,
so you could form or join a political action group. With a group you
can make public demonstrations, protest, the works.
Through music we become a unit. Many celebrities have already used their
status to show disagreement with the way things are going, and with
the help of the fans, people like you and me, we can help to make a
choice. The people who live in the country should make the decisions,
and not have a select few do what they think is best, right? You, the
youth, the no-good teens can get your point across, you can drive it
into the old guys in Washington’s heads, you can make a difference.
