Student Action Network: displayed boots to represent fallen Alabama soldiers.
The demonstration and display of shoes seen on Cater Lawn today was organized by both the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker organization that “believes that every human life is precious and therefore we oppose all war,” according to the flier they handed out to students, and the Auburn Student Action Network.
The SAN was formed in Oct 2007, and was granted provisional status after a dispute with the College Repulicans and a three-time hearing in the SGA Senate. The College Repulicans organized a counter demonstration this morning, but the SAN members were encouraged by the support and interest they had received from students throughout the day.
The display includes 68 pairs of combat boots which represent US troops from Alabama killed in Iraq since the beginning of the conflict. Also arranged in stark lines, interspersed between the combat boots were 200 pairs of everyday shoes — from baby size sneakers to tennis shoes — representing the number of civilians killed in Iraq for every one US soldier. Each pair of combat boots bears a tag stating the name, rank, and age of the deceased soldier, while the civilian shoes are tagged with Iraqi names and ages.
SAN member and graduate student in soils science Mike Mulvaney said his organization was “hoping to fill a niche on campus ... to meet an unfulfilled need by addressing the war and its effects on our nation.”
Mulvaney said the goal of the demonstration today was to “raise awareness, get people dicussing government policy, and so somehow to arrive at a rational concensus regarding the postion of our nation and the war.”
Mulvaney said that the SAN is commited to raising awareness about “issues that aren’t being addressed.”
According to the flier handed out to students, the SAN is working with other campus organizations to “seek solution to social, economic, and political problems.”
Kay Smith, the state coordinator of the Eyes Wide Open Exhibit from the Birmingham Friends Meeting, a Quaker organization, said that the primary goal of today’s event was to “remind people that there is a cost to this war, a cost that we haven’t been allowed to see. We want people to ask ‘is it worth it?’”
Similar demonstrations have been going on around the country, but so far in Alabama have only taken place at UAB and Auburn.
Mulvaney expressed furthur comments about the government policy in Iraq.
“Bush has never attended a soldier’s funeral,” Mulvaney said.
