The National Network Opposing the Militarization of Youth (NNOMY)

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September–October 2005 / Elizabeth Wrigley-Field / International Socialist Review  - WITH SUPPORT for Bush’s occupation of Iraq at an all-time low, reflected in plummeting rates of military enlistment, the antiwar movement has begun to reemerge. At the head of this revival has been a counter-recruitment movement that rapidly developed nationwide last year, particularly in schools, where young people resent being targeted to carry out an occupation they oppose. College students have kicked military recruiters off campuses around the country, while high school students, parents, and teachers’ unions are leading campaigns against recruiters in their schools.

This fall, the movement that began to take shape over the last year is taking steps to cohere itself into a more effective force to challenge military recruitment and the war. Two grassroots initiatives in particular show the potential for building a powerful movement organized around the theme College Not Combat.

San Francisco takes on recruiters

On November 9, voters in San Francisco will have the opportunity to vote for the following resolution against military recruitment in the city’s schools:

Resolved, that the people of San Francisco oppose U.S. military recruiters using public school, college and university facilities to recruit young people into the armed forces. Furthermore, San Francisco should oppose the military’s “economic draft” by investigating means by which to fund and grant scholarships for college and job training to low-income students so they are not economically compelled to join the military.

The resolution, known as the College Not Combat (CNC) initiative, was placed on the November election ballot in San Francisco after activists collected over 15,000 petition signatures—5,000 more than the legal requirement—in an effort to put the city on record calling for military recruiters out of our schools. Alongside teachers and veterans, parents petitioned with their children. This all-volunteer force was able to exceed its petitioning goals and secure ballot access in part because, according to activists’ estimates, about 80 percent of those approached signed the petition. In the words of CNC organizer Ragina Johnson, “It gives us the power to say the city of San Francisco is in favor of students and teachers and parents kicking recruiters off campus.”

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August 25, 2005 / Peter Rothberg / The Nation - In the new issue of The Nation, Karen Houppert investigates how the US military has gone beyond trying to recruit tenth, eleventh and twelfth graders and is now actively chasing children as young as eleven years old. Growing desperate amid repeated failures to meet recruitment quotas and empowered by provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act, military recruiters are working the schools like never before.

Houppert shows how many parents are increasingly resisting these efforts. “A lot of people are concerned,” she quotes one Los Angeles parent as saying, “but don’t know what to do about it.” But now there’s a new coalition designed to aid parents–and all concerned citizens–alarmed by the military’s increasingly predatory efforts to woo teenagers into the armed forces.

Spearheaded by Working Assets, Mainstream Moms and ACORN, the Leave My Child Alone coalition is trying to raise awareness of the military’s often stealthy recruiting ploys and make sure that all parents know that the Pentagon has established a database with the names of 30 million 16 to 25 year olds as a recruitment tool and that their children can opt out of their school’s military recruitment lists and the Pentagon’s database.

The LMCA site offers a step-by-step account on how to opt-out as as well as a raft of educational and activist resources. Check it out and circulate word about this new coalition. (The Project on Youth and Non-Military Opportunities also offers good ideas on how to “demilitarize our schools.”)