<

Fox Valley Group Advocates Solving Dispute Peacefully
Thursday, September 19, 2002
By Kara Patterson
Post-Crescent staff writer
Contact: 920-993-1000, ext. 215
kpatterson@postcrescent.com

“I think most people think the word ‘pacifism’ comes from ‘passive,’ but it doesn’t,” she said. “It comes from ‘to pacify,’ or ‘make peace.’ A peace activist is, in my mind, the same thing. But some people would be perfectly willing to use violent means to solve a problem if they felt threatened.”

Ever since she returned from a summer peace walk in Iraq, Barbara Hoffman of Neenah can’t help but think that the adults and children she met there may end up suffering like the victims of Sept. 11, 2001.

“The focus of my attention is not the attack on the World Trade Center,” Hoffman said. “I’m putting my energy into contacting my congressman and trying to stop the extension of the war on terrorism into Iraq.”

Hoffman is one of a core group of Fox Valley peace activists who by no means condone the Sept. 11 tragedy but aren’t surprised the attacks took place.

“There are many Arab countries who do not want us there” on Middle Eastern soil, said Donna Marie Van Grinsven of Appleton. “I think it was horrible (that the attacks) took so many lives for what they believed was a worthwhile cause, and I think the perpetrators need to be brought to justice within a world court system. But I don’t believe that bombing Afghanistan and threatening to invade Iraq are going to do much to bring the terrorist network up to the surface.”
(More: Gannett Wisconsin Online News Source)
2002 © The Post-Crescent.

Dan