April 28th YouthAnti-War Protest

Youth Against War and Racism Sonoma County had our first action on April 28th. We had a march in downtown Petaluma. We opted not to do a walkout this time, simply because we wanted a larger turnout and felt that if we did the march after school, it would be better attended. Turns out we were wrong, and about the same number of people showed up. We had two simultaneous marches, starting from the two high schools in town Petaluma and Casa Grande, and they were set to converge in downtown. Each march had about 35 people. Both contigents were guarded by the police, with about 6 or 7 cop cars following each and keeping us out of the streets. As the Petaluma contigent made its way downtown, two kids were randomly arrested, and one was falsely charged with resisting arrest. At this time, people got really scared, and we decided to cut our march short, and rally in a downtown park. We took that time to get signups for YAWR and talk to people about the next step of our movement. The cops maintained their strong presence. We rallied on the sidewalk with our signs and flags. As we did this, many youth who were hanging out downtown joined our rally. on the other side of town, the march was also being followed by 7 cop cars. no arrests were made though. when they met up with our rally, we took over the streets with about 70 or 80 kids and marched down one of the busiest streets in town. We then rallied in another park, some kids gave more speeches, and we got more signups. Finally we marched to the police station to rally in solidarity with the two kids who were arrested. The group stayed there for about an hour and then dispersed when we found out where our comrades were and that they were ok.

Overall, we had mixed feelings about the event. it was very well promoted, yet not especially well attended. We received almost no press coverage, unlike previous events (put on by the People's Revolutionary Oganization, or PRO of Sonoma County). We received alot of support from the community, and from the participants, most of whom were very young and new to the movement, yet incredibly insightful. we have a meeting scheduled for May 13th to decide where the movement goes from here. our next big march is on July 15th, and after that we will be focusing on building up a strong counter-recruitment campaign for the next school year.
in a related victory, Petaluma high school announced that the recruiters will not be coming back to campus because the students won the right to table counter-recruitment info next to the recruiters.