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ALTERNATIVES TO MILITARY SERVICE

COUNTER IT! TRAINING

 

 

  

PROJECTS
Alternatives to Military Service

Our public schools are a top target for Pentagon strategists aiming to alleviate their military over-stretch. The Pentagon is stepping up its efforts across the country, hiring more recruiters, armed with more financial enticements, and a sophisticated new database containing the personal information of tens of millions of youth.

Further, there is a vicious cycle of an ever-expanding military budget which grows at the expense of social programs like education. As our public schools deteriorate and as university tuition skyrockets out of reach, growing numbers of youth face a bleak future of dead-end, unstable jobs after high school. For many the military appears as their only chance to escape a life of economic hardship.
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That's why the Youth Resistance Project is collaborating with Veterans for Peace to launch the Alternatives to Military Service campaign in Minneapolis schools. We believe that youth have the right to know the full details of life in the military, not just the versions presented in the slick brochures and television, magazine and Internet ads. We want to expose youth to discussion and debate on the role of the military in society and alternatives for their future, in order to allow them to make their own decisions about their lives and their society.

This campaign aims to set up tables inside Minneapolis schools that will provide access to information on alternative viewpoints on military service, staffed by trained volunteers including youth, veterans, and community anti-war activists. In February 2008, the Minneapolis School Board unanimously passed a resolution granting equal access to organizations providing alternative viewpoints on and alternatives to military service (as well as banning military recruiters from hallways and school cafeterias). 

In May 2008, four Minneapolis recruiters were suspended after a Fox 9 investigative report revealed a variety of misconduct, just the latest in a series of reports of wrongdoing by recruiters across the nation. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcSf_Ygp-BU

We also hope to develop and train youth who are prepared to staff the counter-recruitment tables themselves, or alongside community activists. We plan to organize regular training sessions aimed at both high school youth and community volunteers to develop their knowledge and organizing skills.