The
Really Green Party
or
Why a Green Party
Webpage Banned Me
by
Mike
Raymond
Several
months ago, when I spoke up and suggested that our party leader, Dr.
Jill Stein, not run on a Green Party ticket for President because
Senator Bernie Sanders holds nearly identical views with Dr. Stein, I
encountered a number of Green Party supporters who castigated me
soundly for that position. My defense was that we should focus our
resources on support for Green candidates at lower levels of
government and not compete with Senator Sanders for the White House
since he has a better chance of winning that race than Dr. Stein has.
My rationale has been that Bernie Sanders can take our Green causes
and ideals to a national stage whereas Dr. Stein more than likely
could not.
The
Democratic Party race and convention will be front page news next
year, and if a candidate speaks up for Green ideals even though not
being in the Green Party, I thought that would be a better way to
help more people see the value of causes such as the preservation of
our environment, stopping war and teaching peace, ending government
corruption, eliminating the theft of wealth by the one percent,
healing the rift in race relations, and improving the health and
stability of the working class in America.
The
causes and ideals that the Green Party represents are what I feel is
in the best interests of the future of the United States and of the
world in general. I speak up for these causes; but I am not under
the illusion that these noble ideals must be wrapped only in the
Green Party banner.
If a Democrat, Libertarian, or even a
Republican were to say, for example, we must stop polluting our water
supplies and dumping oil in our oceans, I would cheer and support
that person in that endeavor. As the old saying goes, “The proof
of the pudding is in the eating.” I don't care if it's served on a
ceramic plate, in a wooden bowl, or wrapped in a newspaper.
The
causes are greater than any one person; the ideals are more valuable
than any one party. For comments and questions along these lines, I
was thrown out of the Green Party USA Facebook discussions and banned
from contributing to or even reading that page any longer.
Dr.
Stein and the Green Party hold high ideals and harbor a love for our
country and our world that is rarely matched among us. But let's stop
being party shills, break the mould, and start being spokespeople for
ideas. It is ideas that have power and yield consequences, not
political parties. A political party is a messenger for its ideas,
not an end in itself.
The
Green Party presidential candidate wants to be in the presidential
debates, and that would be a beautiful step in the direction of
democracy in America. I suggest, though, that in the interest of
integrity and honesty, Green Party operatives stop punishing their
own people for expressing their opinions and offering their ideas.
We are not mindless robots meant simply to drone the party mantras.
We
should allow free discussion without resorting to emotional outbursts
or excessively legalistic wrangling and nitpicking. If we won't
allow free debate among ourselves without censorship or banning each
other, then by what right has the Green Party to ask the nation to
let our candidate debate the other candidates in a national forum?
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