www.nnomy.org/divestyourbody - en español

CODEPINK, in partnership with an array of peace and disarmament groups, has launched a divestment campaign to encourage universities, religious organizations, retirement funds, mutual funds, private investors, and other financial institutions in the United States to take action to reduce violent global conflicts and slow the hyper-militarization of our world by divesting from the U.S. War Machine. Divestment from the War Machine means divesting (removing invested assets) from companies that derive their profits by supplying and profiting from U.S. military interventions, expansions, and the militarization of our streets. In other words, we are calling for divestment from companies that make a killing on killing.

The National Network Opposing the Militarization of Youth is extending this divestment beyond how we support the vast and socially debilitating war industry with our dollars to include the idea of divesting of our bodies. Of course, from a humanistic point of view, your body is not a financial asset, but like so many things in our contemporary world, we have been reduced from citizens to consumers. And the military factors us in financial terms: the cost to maintain our training, deployment and, all too often, our health from being used as soldiers in endless wars and conflicts.

Codepink Divest Campaign Website at divestfromwarmachine.org

NNOMY has the hope that our participation will resonate with other peace organizations, inspiring them to take up the cause to tell our American youth to divest of their bodies to U.S. militarism, regardless of their prior interest in the military, patriotic appeals by military recruiters, peer pressure, wanting to continue family tradition of service, or wishing to believe that benefits offered by military service will help them determine a direction for their lives.

We realize that this is a great sacrifice for many who are facing limited opportunities provided by our economy, or are not able to pay for a college education at this time to move their lives forward. For NNOMY, this is a moral appeal to not risk harm to innocent others or themselves in a time of unending military conflicts based on a critical assessment of U.S. wars as not serving the security of our country or its citizens.

Many of those youth who seek out community service alternatives to the military will be serving inside their own communities and regions where there exists a great need for humanitarian assistance to aid in environmental and social crises that require our direct intervention. Those youth who can connect the dots of what real community service means for establishing a sustainable economy will be the real heroes challenging the future quality of all of our lives. We need to begin to send the message that the waste of military spending needs to be redirected from war profiteering to enlivening the communities where we live and to invest in renewable energy and away from extractive resources which are the source of much of our war-making.

The National Network Opposing the Militarization of Youth would also welcome Code Pink´s collaboration with us again in an active campaign of counter-recruitment in our public schools, especially those schools who serve our underprivileged students where we find the greatest military recruitment effort against our youth.

http://www.codepink.org/divest

Thank You

For peace and social justice,

Pat Alviso - Military Families Speak Out (MFSO) - National Coordinator, Long Beach, California

Tori Bateman- American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) Midwest Region - Chicago, Illinois

Rachel Bruhnke - Codepink - San Pedro, California

Kate Connell - Truth in Recruitment - Santa Barbara, California

Barbara Harris - Granny Peace Brigade - New York City, New York

Rick Jahnkow - Project on Youth and Non-Military Opportunities (Project YANO) - San Diego, California

Siri Margerin - Before Enlisting - San Francisco, California

Sebastian Munoz-McDonald - Feminists Against the Draft - Dartmouth College - New Hampshire

Louis Raprager - Veterans for Peace - Digital Counter-recruiter - National

Joanne Sheehan - War Resisters League/New England Regional Office - Norwich, Connecticut

From "Divest from the War Machine:"

• 06.11.21
  Divest Digest June 2021
  A few weeks ago, CODEPINK Co-founder Medea Benjamin disrupted the General Dynamics Shareholders meeting to confront the CEO and the board with questions about the company’s weapon sales to Saudi Arabia and other repressive regimes, such as the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt.
  
  
• 12.29.20
  Divest from War Coalition Digest, December 2020
  As we reflect on 2020, let’s remember it wasn’t all bad. Despite COVID, we managed to come together and find creative ways to continue to take on the war machine.
  
  
• 09.12.20
  Divest from War Coalition Digest, August 2020
  What do Jane Fonda and Ben Cohen have in common? They both support the Divest from the War Machine campaign! Jane Fonda invited CODEPINK to participate in Fire Drill Fridays to highlight the cost of war to the planet, exclaiming that the “climate and the peace movement are one”.
  
  
• 03.08.19
  Can We Divest from Weapons Dealers?
  Impoverished people living in numerous countries today would stand a far better chance of survival, and risk far less trauma, if weapon manufacturers such as Lockheed Martin, Boeing, General Dynamics, and Raytheon, stopped manufacturing and selling death-dealing products.
  
  
• 03.06.19
  If America can find $716bn for the military, it can fund the Green New Deal
  Funny how some politicians have no qualms about ballooning the deficit with tax cuts for the rich but balk at investing in the long-term health of our people and communities. Just as peculiar: the fact that military spending cuts are virtually never mentioned as an option for freeing up funds for social good instead of war.
  
  
• 09.17.18
  Merchants of Death: How the Military-Industrial Complex Profits from Endless War
  The Real News Network / Interview with Medea Benjamin
  A look into how the military-industrial complex fuels endless war for corporate profits. CODEPINK’s Medea Benjamin discusses her new report on the five largest US weapons manufacturers and their arms deals with Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Egypt
  
  
• 04.19.18
  Shooting programs taught by the military don’t belong in our schools!
  Divest From the War Machine / Militarism in our schools is a major contributing cause of gun violence in America. Almost 2,000 high schools have school shooting ranges affiliated with the Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (JROTC) program. Our young people are introduced to our national war culture in their high school cafeterias, where military recruiters forge relationships with kids during lunch.

   

  Other News Reports from the Divest From the War Machine campaign

Resources

• "Welcome to the War Machine" - CodePink Divest Campaign

  What are the dangers military enlistment poses to young people? How is JROTC, the Marksmanship Program, the ASVAB, and High School military recruiters related to the militarization of youth?  Find out more by visiting our website https://www.nnomy.org/divestyourbody and by considering divesting your money, your body, and your mind from the war machine! Visit https://www.divestfromwarmachine.org/ to find out what more you can do to help curve militarization in our society!

• Divesting Our Youth from the War Machine: A Guide to Countering and Resisting the Militarization of Youth 2017-2018

Cessation of Military Recruiting in Public Elementary and Secondary Schools, American Public Health Association (APHA)

Recruiters for the various US armed forces have free access to our nation’s public high schools, as mandated by the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). Military recruiting behavior in the nation’s high schools has become increasingly aggressive and predatory. Although adults in the active military service are reported to experience increased mental health risks, including stress, substance abuse, and suicide, there is evidence that military service for the youngest soldiers is consistently associated with health effects far worse than for those who are older. This suggests that military service is associated with disproportionately poor health for those in late adolescence. These negative outcomes for teen soldiers, coupled with significant evidence that the adolescent brain is not equipped to make accurate risk calculations, leads APHA to conclude entry into the military should be delayed until full adulthood. For these reasons, the American Public Health Association opposes military recruiting in public elementary and secondary schools. APHA should encourage the United States to cease the practice of recruiting military enlistees in public high schools, specifically by (1) removing the No Child Left Behind Act requirement that high schools both be open to military recruiters and turn over contact information on all students to recruiters and (2) eliminating practices that encourage military recruiters to approach adolescents in US public high schools to enlist in the military services.

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Commit: Take the Pledge 

I pledge to work to Divest from weapons companies and invest in ethical, life-affirming solutions
The only way we can achieve a peaceful world is if we reduce the power of those who profit from war.

Visit the Divest from the War Machine Printable Resources & Guides Page:

You can visit Codepink's Divest from the War Machine website at https://www.divestfromwarmachine.org/  

Revised FC 10/10/2023

Progressive individuals, organizations, foundations and media all have important roles to play in confronting the conservative, corporate and military influences in our educational system. Below are lists of ideas for action and groups that offer useful resources and background information.  Source: http://www.savecivilianeducation.org

Five Avenues of Resistance:  Opt-out, ASVAB, JROTC, Marksmanship, and Recruiter Access. 

I   Opt-Out

• Federal law requires schools to release the names, addresses, and numbers of all high school students to military recruiters.
• Many state public school systems also provides recruiters a child’s: date and place of birth, of education, degree received, and the most recent previous school attended.
• Parents have the right to “opt-out” in writing from having their child’s information sent to military recruiters.
• Schools must notify parents they have the right to opt out.
• The law is weak. A single notice provided through a mailing, student handbook, or method is sufficient. Consequently, most parents are not aware there’s an easy way to opt-out of having their child’s info sent to recruiters.
• Most do a lousy job informing parents of the right to opt out.Many Minnesota school systems have an “opt-out” form that online or part of a student handbook.
• Maryland is the only state to have a law that requires all parents to complete the opt-out form.
• We must make completion of the opt-out form mandatory. Sample Bilingual Forms For Opting Out
  
• JAMRS is the Pentagon’s Orwellian Joint Advertising, Marketing, Research Systems database.It is the Mother of all Databases, collecting detailed information on 30 million American youth from age 16 to 24.
• See the JAMRS Opt-out form (doc download) produced by the New York Civil Liberties Union  – Yes! There are two opt-out procedures.

 
II    ASVAB - Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery
 

• The ASVAB is the military’s 3-hour enlistment exam.
• About 700,000 students in 12,000 high schools now take the ASVAB across the country every year. 
• Military regulations say the primary purpose of the ASVAB “Career Exploration Program” is to find leads for recruiters.
• The ASVAB provides coveted information the Pentagon purchase of find on social media the cognitive abilities of kids.
• The ASVAB also collects social security numbers, a practice prohibited by many state laws.
• The military proctors the test with the assistance of school staff.  If the schools gave the ASVAB, the results would be deemed to be educational records and thus, subject to the federal law that calls for parental consent before information on children is released to third parties.
• ASVAB results are the only student information leaving our nation’s classrooms without parental consent.
• To prevent testing information from reaching recruiters, schools must tell the military before the test that “ASVAB Release Option 8” must be used for ALL the students who are tested. Option 8 means the military can’t use the results to recruit kids.
• Schools select release options, not parents.
• Just 20% of the high schools across the country select Option 8 for their students who take the ASVAB.
• Maryland, Hawaii, and New Hampshire have laws mandating Option 8 while 2,000 additional high schools have selected Release Option 8.
• Some states allows high school students who fail mandated exit exams
  to take the ASVAB as an alternative assessment.
  
  

III   Junior Reserve Officers Training Corps – JROTC
 

• JROTC programs exist in 3,402 high schools nationwide – 65% of them in the South – with a total enrollment of 557,129 students.
• JROTC textbooks teach a reactionary brand of U.S. history and government, while classes are often taught by military retirees with no college education. Meanwhile, every other classroom teacher in the nation typically must be certified and hold a Masters after a few years.
• The unit on citizenship is entitled, “You the People.”
• Students should never be placed in JROTC classes without parental consent.
• Request the JROTC enrollment statistics for each school. If any units have fallen below a total of 100 students two years in a row, agitate to remove them as required by federal law.
• Many states allows students who take JROTC to also satisfy P.E. credits.

 
 
IV   Marksmanship

• The Pentagon embraces the seductive power of the trigger as a recruiting device.Realizing the potential, the military exploits video games and weaponry to recruit and cultivate adolescent killers.
• 2,400 high schools have Marksmanship Programs affiliated with JROTC and the congressionally-chartered Civilian Marksmanship Program. The kids regularly attend tournaments hosted by the NRA.
• Schools allow shooting to occur during school hours in classrooms and gyms that are contaminated by .177 cal. lead pellets fired from CO2 air rifles at 600 fps.
• Lead fragments become airborne and are deposited on the floor at the muzzle-end and at the target backstop. Kids track the lead throughout the school. Loose enforcement of regulations creates a health hazard for students and custodial staff.
• Verify which schools currently have firing ranges.
• Demand the closure of marksmanship programs. At least demand they stop using lead projectiles in school buildings.
• If shooting ranges are present, determine if the school is adhering to the “Guide to Lead Management for Air Gun Shooting” published by the Civilian Marksmanship Program.

 
V   ACCESS 
 

• Federal law says military recruiters are to have the same access to kids as college recruiters – not greater access. Military recruiters may eat in the cafeteria while college recruiters meet with select kids in the guidance office. Military recruiters also perform dozens of volunteer tasks in the schools.
• Demand that military recruiters never be allowed to be alone with kids.
• Get counter-recruitment information from NNOMY (National Network Opposing the Militarization of Youth) and Project YANO (Project on Youth and Non-military Opportunities) into your schools.
• Make sure recruiters are not regularly occupying guidance offices.
• Federal courts have ruled you have the right to counter the message of recruiters in the schools.

Source: http://www.studentprivacy.org/

Other Strategies for Countering School Militarization

• Tabling opposite the Marines at McCallum HS
• Winning The Peace: A National High School Intervention
• Guide to High School Leafleting (Registered Access Only)
• A fuller list of ideas that can confront expanding militarism
  in your schools and community

Next: Contact NNOMY to learn how we can assist your activism

 Please consider becoming a supporter of The National Network Opposing the Militarization of Youth
And our work to demilitarize our schools and youth.
Donate Here

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Revised / 11/04/2023 - GDG