The Agony of the Feet

The Agony of the Feet The next day, the pantomime Gongsters are gone from Copley Square. In their place are shoes--thousands and thousands of shoes. Multitudes of boots are arranged carefully on the lawn, with a sign explaining, "These 907 pairs of boots represent the U.S. soldiers killed in the Iraq war." Then there's a sloppy pile of shoes with another sign: "These 1,000 pairs of shoes represent a small fraction of the estimated 16,000 Iraqis killed in the war."

There are no million shoes for Saddam Hussein's Iraqi, Iranian and Kuwaiti victims; only his American victims seem to matter, and only those Iraqis killed in connection with a U.S. military intervention. Come to think of it, there also are no 3,000 pairs of shoes for those who died at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon--even though the group sponsoring this display styles itself Sept. 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows.

We approach a middle-aged man of ample girth, who seems to be in charge. "How many shoes do you have for Saddam Hussein's victims?" we ask.

He stands silent, facing us. He seems to be staring us down, but we have no way of knowing for sure, as he's wearing sunglasses, even though the day is overcast. Finally, after perhaps 15 seconds, he breaks the silence:

Families for Peaceful Tomorrows.

I doubt if you'll see this same group putting crosses or using baby shoes if they don't like crosses on greenspace to represent only a fraction of the millions of aborted babies. They wouldn't grace the city dump with them, I fear.

The shoes (boots and pile of "civilian" shoes) were on display for a day in City Hall Plaza in Boston last week. I saw them laid out from my office, and took a short break to see what was going on.The boots all appeared to be size 12, some were encrusted with dirt, others were not. The pile of civilian footwear appeared to have been looted from a Goodwill store. Misleading to say the least. People going to see this were mainly gullible dems convinced that the boots actually belonged to each serviceman who has died, and the folks running the display made no effort to say that it was simply something symbolic (I'm not sure how a Quaker group would have gotten their hands on the actual footwear of those who were killed, but that's for them to explain)And then there's the matter of the convention being a huge bust for local businesses. It's a shame for them. Not many people here (outside of the mayor's office) were enthused about life being disrupted in such a major way for this crap. The only people coming out somewhat ahead (besides hoteliers and top-end restaurants) are the police - not to knock them because they are doing a fine job, but they must be making a killing in overtime. That's boosting the economy, MA style...

Thanks for the report and your observations.

Some of these dramatic displays and bids for attention to causes are eventually going to have a net negative effect (I think). People will get weary of everything, every day, 24/7, being politicized. These "statements" appeal to the emotions, and you can only handle so much emotionally before you start turning it all off.

The other negative effect is that people are more and likely to go over the top. The democrats especially have been behaving like raving lunatics.

Americans are all too painfully aware of the price our soldiers and civilians have paid and are paying in Iraq, and they don't need a pile of old shoes when they are out and about to remind them of it.

We didn't used to be so polarized and bombarded with idealogy everywhere we went - except for Burma Shave signs :-).

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