Five Years Gone

WARNING: The following opinions belong to a pretentious college student and do not necessarily reflect the views of any honorable, clean-cut, tax-paying, baby-kissing, apple-pie-loving groups Geoffrey Dobbins may be associated with. He just wants to get something off his chest. Please chill.



Lately, it seems like a lot of us are revisiting the first days and weeks of the war in Iraq and the way it was portrayed by various media sources then. I couldn't resist doing the same. I managed to find something I wrote for the opinion section of Wright State University's student newspaper, The Guardian. It appeared in the paper exactly 5 years ago - April 30, 2003. After reading it again, several thoughts came to mind:

1. Thank God I write a little better than that now. Wow. (In my defense, remember I was a freshman mechanical engineering major then. I think I also had a few unkind edits.)
   
2. Remember when opposing the war and being critical of those responsible put you in a small minority? Wow. There is still widespread support for the war among some reasonable people, but I don't have to tell you how the tables have turned. I almost feel like going back to Dayton and tracking down old classmates and professors just so I can say, "How do you like me now, huh? How you like me now? I... told... you... so..." Burning all that expensive gas would kind of spoil it, though...
3. Seriously, I do wish more of us media types would publicly recall how a lot of us said invasion was a bad idea before it happened. It wasn't just me. Some of our key allies weren't exactly on board, there were protests around the world and religious leaders were coming out of the woodwork all over the place to publicly say this whole thing seemed unethical.

But the mantra I seem to hear now is "Who knew it could have turned out like this?" Well, a lot of us. Not a majority of Americans, but still a large number. It didn't take a crystal ball to see holes in the war planning, have problems with the idea of "preemption" being sold and realize that bloody chaos in war is the norm rather than the exception.

I wrote another opinion piece about the war with a reflective tone about a year ago in a columns and reviews class (Terron Austin probably remembers). I got a heavily (but reasonably) edited version of it printed in UC's newspaper, The News Record, later that year. One of the versions I prefer is below. Rereading this one, I was surprised by how relevant it remains.

Acoustic Imperialism

By Geoffrey Dobbins

John Mayer was my Jeremiah. I know it won’t score me any points with music snobs, but I’ve come to enjoy some of his tunes. Having seen him perform with Kanye West a few times isn’t the only reason, but I must admit that it helped. Between that and a prominent appearance on The Chappelle Show a while back, I think it’s safe for me to listen to him in public without being labeled an “Oreo” by the blackness police. He’s always had a certain funky grit absent from most of the suburban princesses that buy up his records.

That’s why I wasn’t shocked last summer when I heard antiwar sentiment in his song, “Waiting on the World to Change.” But for me, the single revealed a clear vision of the future. Mayer foretold the Democrats winning control of Congress like some kind of pop culture prophet. People slow dance to this guy at high school proms, and there he was talking about bringing “our neighbors home from war.” Remember the Dixie Chicks? If the media machine thought this sort of talk was safe enough for pop radio, it meant American attitudes about Iraq must have fundamentally changed. The results of the midterm elections were just fallout.

Until 2006, I’d lost all faith in our foreign policy. Hadn’t America embraced fear and bloodshed since 2001? Those guys in my college physics class sure did. Days after the invasion we had an argument about the wisdom of the war. I thought Saddam had anthrax then, but I still opposed the invasion. By “opposed” I mean I blasted Public Enemy in my dorm room and wrote sophomoric letters to the school newspaper.

I argued that even if our smart bombs had Ph.D.’s, leveling Baghdad would involve terrible civilian casualties. One of my physics classmates countered with, “Who cares if some Iraqis die? They’re going to die anyway.” That’s the fate of all of the barbarians beyond the reach of Pax Americana, I guess.

Of course, not everybody talked that way. I was amazed by how many people could agree with me and still add up to less than one quarter of America. They were all over the television if you watched C-SPAN as much as I did. Most of the black folk I ambushed with my political queries were also against the war, but terrorism is old hat to us. We’d been terrorized by the Klan before, so I guess we didn’t collectively loose our heads about Al Qaeda the way police action peddlers wanted.

As expected, words of warning from Coretta Scott King and Desmond Tutu were ignored. Jon Stewart’s satire stirred laughter, but inspired little serious thought. Everybody from the Pope to Lenny Kravitz had our backs. But even my fellow college students looked at war critics like something had flown over our cuckoo’s nest.

So then we few, we disgruntled few, looked on as President Bush’s band of frat brothers went once more unto the breach. A few guys in the dorm down the hall counted down the seconds to “shock and awe” like it was New Year’s Eve. They were literally entertaining company with chips and drinks. Needless violence was winning again, and America was applauding from the couch with a grin.

Few people are smiling now. According to the most recent Gallup polls, well over half of Americans think it was a mistake to invade, and about two thirds of Americans disapprove of Bush’s handling of the war. Hopefully, this antiwar trend can force better policy. But I suspect we’ve only reached a slightly higher plane in the gutter of our collective social consciousness.

Not long ago I found myself talking politics with people at a Socialist Worker newspaper sale on UC’s campus. In passing I mentioned to one of the self-described leftists in attendance that the Rev. Martin Luther King opposed the Vietnam War. I was shocked at what came out of his mouth in response. “I didn’t know that.”

There’s a day named after the guy. King called the U.S. “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” And somehow this college-educated leftist hadn’t heard? That’s how little traction nonviolence has in our society.

Many have turned against the war in Iraq, but few are willing to reject war as a way of life. Despite the widespread anti-war feelings among Americans, many anti-Bush Democrats like John Tester, Jim Web, and Hillary Clinton continue to market themselves as leaders that are “strong on national defense,” which means forking over vast resources to the military industrial complex.

Public acceptance of these circumstances seems to prove the Neo-cons are right about at least one thing. The antiwar trend may not be an ideological shift as much as a lack of resolve. We might just be tired of war. That’s a little better than being energized by it. But we still think the strength of our military will protect us better than our justice or our compassion. We still like Caesar. We just want him to mellow out into something more like Jack Johnson and less like Metallica.

The current civil war and occupation in Iraq comes from a militaristic view of the “real world” as a place where making “us” safe must require making “them” unsafe. If only we could beat our swords into plowshares. Translated for my friends that never made it to Sunday school, synagogue, or mosque that means using resources to heal and nurture life rather than to destroy it. It’s from Isaiah.

The country continues to think the dangers of the “real world” demand that we be like Mike Tyson, even though hippies like John Mayer spend less time apologizing. As Mayer would say, I just found out there’s no such thing as the real world. Just a lie you’ve got to rise above.

~Geoffrey Dobbins
UCABJ, Vice President

Tune In, Listen Up!

Our very own Alicia Gaynor, UCABJ's secretary extraordinaire, now has a talk radio show on Bearcast, the university's student-run radio station. Listen to her from 5 to 6 pm on Thursdays all quarter long!

UCABJ E-Board - 2008-2009 nominations

Want to be on the UCABJ executive board next year? Please throw your hat in the ring by email President Terron Austin at 4ucabj@gmail.com no later than Thursday, April 10.

2008-2009 POSITIONS:

President
The president shall be the chief executive officer of UCABJ, and shall have the responsibilities of:
1. Calling and presiding over the meetings of the Organization as well as the Executive Board.
2. Implementing this Constitution and decisions made by the Executive Board and special committees.
3. Having discretionary power in working decisions that can neither be conveniently submitted to the general assembly nor Executive Board. However, the president must notify the general membership of his actions within a week.
4. Appointing chairpersons and members of standing committees as well as create ad hoc committees deemed necessary. He shall also have the power to remove chairpersons and members from such committees and terminate ad hoc committees for the duration of his term.
5. Acting as an ex officio of every committee.
6. Requesting information from the Executive Board, standing committees and members, as deemed necessary to operate the Organization effectively and efficiently.
7. Overseeing all external affairs concerning the Organization by acting as its official spokesperson.
8. Serving as a conduit for relaying information between the Chapter and other parties within the National Association of Black Journalists – most namely other student chapters, the national student representative, the regional director, the regional student representative, and the deputy student representative.

Vice President
The vice president shall be the deputy executive officer of the UCABJ, and shall have the responsibilities of:
1. Assisting the president and assuming the duties of president in his absence.
2. Establishing connections with on-campus organizations for the purpose of developing partnerships within the Chapter’s mission.
3. Establishing connections with off-campus organizations for the purpose of developing partnerships for community service within the Chapter’s mission.

Secretary
The secretary shall be the chief record keeper of the UCABJ, and shall have the responsibilities of:
1. Keeping records of all meetings of the Executive Board and general assembly, and making sure such records are archived orderly.
2. Maintaining formal records of all correspondence and action taken by the Organization, and making sure such records are archived orderly.
3. Keeping membership lists.
4. Serving as a conduit for relaying information between the Executive Board and general assembly.
5. Serving as the sergeant at arms during all meetings, as the chief interpreter of Roberts’s Rules of Order and the Constitution of UCABJ.
6. Communicating with members of UCABJ about upcoming meetings through email and/or phone tree.

Treasurer
The treasurer shall be the chief financial officer of UCABJ, and shall have the responsibilities of:
1. Maintaining a complete, formal record of all monies received and expended by the Organization during the school year.
2. Receiving and disbursing funds on behalf of the Organization, on order from the president and/or Executive Board.
3. Providing a formal record of all monies received and expended by the Organization during the school year within a timely manner, as determined by the president.

E-board members are expected to attend all UCABJ meetings and programs for the entire school year.

To read UCABJ's constitution and bylaws, click here.

Magazine writing tips

For those of you who didn't make it to last night's workshop, here are some tips for magazine writing:

KNOW THY PUBLICATIONS. Tailor your story pitches to the magazines for which you want to write. If they don't do music or movie reviews, there's a reason why (and it's not because the right person hasn't come along to write them), so don't send them pitches of that nature. If an editor has never heard of you before and you don't have a track record for doing good work, you won't get a feature on your first try. Untried writers should start small by submitting pitches for the front of the book. If you do those assignments well and cultivate your relationships with your editors, when you pitch ideas for features or departments, you may get the assignment.

SET THE SCENE. A magazine story is about description. Describe, describe, describe. Use your five senses to put your readers in your shoes. Check out this description of the way former Harlem drug lord Frank Lucas laughs from an August 2000 article about him in New York Magazine:

Frank's laugh: It's a trickster's sound, a jeer that cuts deep. First he rolls up his shoulders and cranes back his large, angular face, which, despite all the wear and tear, remains strikingly handsome, even empathetic in a way you'd like to trust but know better. Then the smooth, tawny skin over his cheekbones creases, his ashy lips spread, and his tongue snakes out of his gate-wide mouth. Frank has a very long, very red tongue. Only then the soundtrack kicks in, staccato stabs of mirth followed by a bevy of low rumbled cackles. Ha ha ha, siss siss siss. For how many luckless fools like Tango was this the last sound they heard on this earth?

You can see and hear that, right? That’s what you want.

KNOW YOUR STRENGTHS. Some people are great at writing; others are better at copy editing. Know what suits you. Just because you’re one doesn’t necessarily mean you’re the other, too. One may be a superb fact checker/researcher but may not actually be good at writing. Play to your strengths. There are people who have made careers out of being fact checkers and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. There are lots of jobs to do at a magazine.

YOU’RE ONLY AS GOOD AS YOUR LAST STORY/STORY IDEA. Crappy story ideas equals no assignments. No assignments equals no clips. No clips equals no work to your name to advance your career. Get comfortable with coming up with well-researched story ideas, ones that have a real hook. Get even more comfortable with the fact that most of your ideas are probably going to get rejected. Of 100 ideas, about 95 will get thrown back. It’s not personal. Don’t get discouraged by this. Start seeing the world with “magazine eyes” and you’ll find a story in just about anything!

WRITING REQUIRES TEAMWORK. Your editor is not your enemy. If you have this kind of relationship with your editor, it’s because you think your writing is perfect the way you turned it in or that person is a tyrant who needs to change copy in order to feel better about him/herself. Good editors doing their jobs properly only make your stories better. Communicate with your editor as much as possible about what he or she expects to see when your first draft comes in. It may be a tough, awkward, uncomfortable conversation, but it’ll save you a lot of time and headache in the long run.