In solidarity with students across the country, MIT students plan to rally at noon on Thursday, Sept. 20 to argue for a peaceful resolution to the tragedy of Sept. 11. The location is the Dot (between the Green Building and the Science Library).
In opposition to a violent United States military response against Afghanistan and other countries, the students will create a "peace quilt" while listening to speakers including human rights lawyer and Professor of Urban Studies and Planning Balakrishnan Rajagopal and Professor Hugh Gusterson of Anthropology, a Levitan Prize winner.
Organizers emphasized that they will not be arguing against the pursuit of justice for those individuals responsible for last week's tragedy, but will advocate for the use of international law rather than violence to pursue justice. They are also stating that civilians in foreign countries should not face violence for the actions of individuals.
Similar rallies will simultaneously take place at other college campuses, among them Wesleyan University, the University of Southern California, Hunter College, Vassar, Harvard, the University of California at Berkeley, Cornell, Pennsylvania State University, the University of Kansas, Middlebury College, Columbia University, Ohio Wesleyan and Oberlin College.
Groups at all the colleges have signed identitical petitions for peace, which call for "an examination of US foreign policy leading to terrorist opposition, the need for active maintenance of civil liberties, and the use of rational international law rather than hate and haste in pursuing justice."
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on September 19, 2001.
