Two UP sophomores travel to Georgia to protest alleged human rights abuses
By Jessie Hethcoat
On Sunday, Nov. 22, two UP students were among the roughly 200,000 people gathered in Fort Benning, Ga. to protest the so-called "School of the Americas."
According to the "School of the Americas" Watch, a protest group, the SOA is a U.S.-funded school for training Latin American military. In 2001, the school was renamed the "Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation," but critics say its purpose has not changed, alleging that its graduates are still among the worst human rights abusers in Colombia, El Salvador, Bolivia, Panama, Chile, Nicaragua, Venezuela and Guatemala.
In 1989, Fr. Roy Bourgeois, M.M. began the School of the Americas Watch after members of the Salvadoran army killed six Jesuit priests, along with their housekeeper and her daughter at the Jesuit University of Central America.
Sophomore Kevin Hershey organized the trip to Georgia for the SOA protest. He was joined by sophomore Adrienne Shelnutt, who decided to go with Hershey in what she describes as a whirlwind.
"I knew that what's happening down there [Central America] is really important to me," Shelnutt said.
While on the SOA trip, Shelnutt and Hershey listened to an actor who said he was tortured by U.S.-funded military in Colombia and a woman whose father was killed by the same military forces. Her father's land was also then used for oil.
Hershey and Shelnutt also participated in parades, educational workshops and met many interesting people.
"It was fun to listen to conversations between super Christian liberals and anarchists," Shelnutt said.
While many Catholics support the School of the Americas opposition and Hershey said the Moreau Center was "very supportive," UP administrators said the University could not legally fund the trip to protest the School of the Americas because it could have jeopardized the University's tax-exempt status.
The Rev. John Donato, C.S.C., is the administrator who concluded that the federal regulations prohibited the University from funding the protest trip to Fort Benning.
"By affiliating ourselves with a political group, the University could actually lose its tax exempt status," Donato said. "We have to be really careful."
Hershey and other students found that this seemed to conflict with the vocal anti-abortion campaigns that are active on the UP campus.
"I know that our school has anti-abortion protests and letter- writing campaigns, which are definitely political issues," Hershey said. "Not only that, but the protest is also really popular for Catholic schools and churches."
According to Donato, the abortion protests that take place on campus are done by the Voice for Life club, and do not require significant funding from the university.
Donato also said that most universities and organizations that he has seen participating in the SOA Watch movement have raised funds independent of their organizations' funds to attend the vigils or support the movement.
Hershey explains that the SOA trip had significantly larger interest when the school was partially funding it for students.
Sophomore Katie Griffith was one of the students previously interested in attending. Griffith ended up not being able to attend because of scheduling conflicts, but said that the cost of the trip was a large part of her decision not to go.
"Paying for it ourselves would be kind of an economic hardship," Griffin said.
When Hershey found out that the University was not funding the trip, he was able to raise enough to pay for most of the trip's expenses.
Donato believes that the missions of the SOA Watch and the Voice for Life UP club are similar.
"Where those two examples are intimately linked are in their respect for human life, religious and political," Donato said. "What Kevin and others are doing is very noble."
