ERIC: I’M NOT A MILITANT
Hello, my name is Eric and I’m an 18 year old male that attends the University of Florida and due to my opposition to torture, drone strikes, and overall US imperialism and drive for hegemony disguised as the War on Terror, I am at risk of being subjected to an extrajudicial killing,with the decision being directly in the hands of Mr. Obama or a future POTUS.
Mr. Obama’s administration has defined “militant” to mean “all military age males in a strike zone”. Ignoring the great unethical nature of the drone program, this very loose definition of what a militant is, allows the President to kill innocent civilians, often times women and children, with no accountability.
I find this to be absolutely revolting and the fact that Mr. Obama personally oversees this to be representative of his blatant disregard for human life.
My brothers and sisters in South and South West Asia have been directly terrorized by this President with consistent drone strikes for the past three years and the world continues to remain silent, specifically the US populace and the media that informs it.
I consider myself to be “militant”, meaning that I vigorously and aggressively support causes that speak to me. Whether that means speaking out against the war on drugs, discrimination in this country and around the world, the ongoing occupation of Palestine, or any other causes that strikes me as being worthy of standing up for.
The President is militant as well but in a different way. He actively and aggressively supports his cause of extrajudicial killings and spilling blood without reverence for whose blood it is.
Will Obama send a drone to my parents or relatives homes without substantial evidence, for me simply being outspoken against his administration and exercising my right to protest? The above scenario might sound far fetched but Obama has set a dangerous precedent and has shown that he’s not above killing Americans indiscriminately as seen with with the death of Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, a 16 year old boy who was targeted by the administration’s drone program last year. No matter, if you’re directly affected by the killings, you have the obligation as a human being to be outraged and to speak out against this administrations destructive policies that despite rhetoric makes us less safe.
There seems to me nothing in line to stop this administration or a future one from bringing this same type of weaponized drone program here to the United States where activists and outspoken dissidents could be subjected to attacks at the President’s discretion. When the execution and prevention of due process to Americans on foreign soil by the Executive branch is allowed to take place, no one including domestically is safe at all.
President Obama: You’re no better than a cold blooded murderer, made worse by the fact that you meticulously target individuals. You shame me as an American citizen and I’m sad to be complicit in your vile acts via being an American. The majority of Americans might not agree with me or even care about what’s going on but trust that your actions are being observed and people are working hard to make you accountable for them. You are a statesman without ethics and undeserving of your position and the trust of not only the American people but those across the world that see you as a progressive force in the world.
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