The Iraq War anniversary weekend of protest included two days of action in the borough of the Bronx. Veterans, students, and various left groups converged on an obvious target in the people's midst: the armed forces recruitment station at Fordham Road and the Grand Concourse.
The streets were thick on Saturday with the usual throng of shoppers on the commercial strip of Fordham Road. Not surprisingly, the recruiters were also out in force around noontime, both at the station itself and on the traffic island across the street. They were out in all their finery: the new pixelated "digital-cami" uniforms of the Army and Marines, along with a tricked out (civilian) Hummer outfitted with screens showing Army recruitment pitches and speakers blasting reggaeton (at levels for which one usually earns a citation from the NYPD).
That was changed, however momentarily, when protesters showed up. A group of Vietnam Veterans Against the War as well as the grouping that officially called the action, Bronx Educators and Students to Stop the War, came on the scene to picket the location; the Hummer and recruiters quietly disappeared. Police arrived soon after. The location was picketed and leafleted for over an hour. Afterward, the group at the recruiting station marched together on Fordham Road to the offices of a local charity for a film showing. The film showing had previously been scheduled for Lehman College, but organizers had encountered difficulties with the college bureaucracy.
The following Sunday, ANSWER gathered at the corner of Tremont and the Grand Concourse to march to the same Armed Forces recruitment station. The station was closed at the time that the group got there. Groups in attendance included a large contingent of Philippine solidarity groups as local community activists, and ANSWER's parent group the Party of Socialism and Liberation. After arriving at the recruitment station a speakout was held, where many expressed frustration with the simultaneous impoverishment of the area and recruitment in the area.
A sentiment that spanned both days of protest was a sense that action, hitherto mostly confined to Manhattan, needed to be taken within the Bronx and other similarly poor and working class communities.
The streets were thick on Saturday with the usual throng of shoppers on the commercial strip of Fordham Road. Not surprisingly, the recruiters were also out in force around noontime, both at the station itself and on the traffic island across the street. They were out in all their finery: the new pixelated "digital-cami" uniforms of the Army and Marines, along with a tricked out (civilian) Hummer outfitted with screens showing Army recruitment pitches and speakers blasting reggaeton (at levels for which one usually earns a citation from the NYPD).
That was changed, however momentarily, when protesters showed up. A group of Vietnam Veterans Against the War as well as the grouping that officially called the action, Bronx Educators and Students to Stop the War, came on the scene to picket the location; the Hummer and recruiters quietly disappeared. Police arrived soon after. The location was picketed and leafleted for over an hour. Afterward, the group at the recruiting station marched together on Fordham Road to the offices of a local charity for a film showing. The film showing had previously been scheduled for Lehman College, but organizers had encountered difficulties with the college bureaucracy.
The following Sunday, ANSWER gathered at the corner of Tremont and the Grand Concourse to march to the same Armed Forces recruitment station. The station was closed at the time that the group got there. Groups in attendance included a large contingent of Philippine solidarity groups as local community activists, and ANSWER's parent group the Party of Socialism and Liberation. After arriving at the recruitment station a speakout was held, where many expressed frustration with the simultaneous impoverishment of the area and recruitment in the area.
A sentiment that spanned both days of protest was a sense that action, hitherto mostly confined to Manhattan, needed to be taken within the Bronx and other similarly poor and working class communities.
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