TAME - Truth and Alternatives to Militarism in Education

Here's the issue: A group in Madison wants the U.S. military out of the public schools.

Military ads have no place in our high school gyms

Are you aware that Army recruiting advertisements have been placed in the gyms and on the football field scoreboards of all the Madison high schools? Accepting these military recruiting ads was a very bad idea for so many reasons.

Our schools spend 13 years helping students learn to resolve difficulties nonviolently. Advertising the Army runs counter to the school district's zero tolerance policies regarding violence and weapons. The district also has policies barring discrimination, while the U.S. military openly discriminates against gays and lesbians.

The Madison Metropolitan School District's own Policy 7541.3 states: "All military recruitment materials shall be appropriately labeled or identified and placed only in the Guidance Office." Large signs asking "Are You Army Strong? To find out, call ..." are certainly recruitment materials and have no place in the gyms or on scoreboards. In fact, the very placement of these ads takes advantage of the adolescent desire to prove oneself through physical challenge.

When the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice recently wrote to School Board members to ask them to reconsider this decision, we got this response from Lucy Mathiak: "The same paid advertising opportunities are available to peace organizations, an option that you may wish to consider in the future." It's outrageous to suggest that peace groups could ever compete with the military's annual recruitment budget, which exceeds $4 billion tax dollars (National Priorities Project). And it's ironic that we're now selling access to the students in order to have the resources to educate them.

School Board members were elected to represent the community's values. The 2006 Bring Our Troops Home referendum, in which 67 percent of Madison voters called for all troops to be withdrawn from Iraq immediately, is a good indicator of those values. This same community would not endorse expansion of military recruiting in our schools.

Military recruiters have countless times been revealed to lie to young people in order to entice them into enlisting. And military contracts include a clause that states that the military can change the contract at any time, but the contract is still binding for the enlistee. These goals and practices simply do not fit with what we should be advocating in our schools, no matter what the income from the advertisements.

Some protesters showed up at the school board meeting Monday night.

Board members weren't swayed. First, the issue wasn't on the agenda, so it wasn't discussed. Second, the schools need the ad revenue.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- Dozens of protesters made their point to Madison School Board members last night.

...The demonstrators got their chance to tell board members that the military is bombarding students with recruiting tactics.

The group Truth and Alternatives to Militarism in Education (TAME) doesn't like the Army advertising that appears on scoreboards at high school stadiums and gyms. The ads have the Army logo and slogan and a phone number for a local recruiting office. The advertisements are part of a 3-year, $17,000 contract with the Army.

School board members say the district needs the advertising dollars. It took no action.

TAME makes it sound like the Madison public schools are indoctrination centers meant to turn the innocent little children into killing machines.

Here's more on the protest:

Dozens of peace activists, teachers and students showed up to the Madison School Board meeting Monday night to protest several new U.S. Army advertisements at district athletic stadiums and high school gyms.

Although protesters marched outside the Doyle Administration Building for 90 minutes and gave public comments to the board for more than two hours, the board could not discuss the issue Monday because it was not on the agenda.

John Rademacher, a science teacher at Madison West High School, brought his 6- and 7-year old children to the protest, holding signs that read "Ads Influence Me" and "Don't Sell Me Out. "

Anti-military Rademacher is a teacher at a Madison high school. Apparently, the schools aren't packed with pro-military proponents.

I think it's inappropriate for Rademacher to trot his young children out to hold signs at the protest. He's exploiting them, using them as props.

...Rademacher said the military ads, which ask "Are you Army Strong? " and give a phone number for a local recruiting station, were "particularly troublesome " because they go against values schools teach, such as conflict resolution.

Will Williams, a Vietnam veteran and member of several local peace organizations, stressed that many of the protestors were not anti-military.

"We know there is a need for military, " he said. "But students are being bombarded."

No, they're not anti-military.

They believe the ads run counter to the values schools teach, but that stance shouldn't be confused with being anti-military.

I wish the protesters would be honest.

They are anti-military.

I wish they'd just admit it.