Billboards Opposing Drone Wars Going Up All Over Syracuse
By David Swanson, World Beyond War
World Beyond War has been raising funds for and renting billboards in opposition to war. We’ve run into censorship from
numerous billboard companies but persevered, and more billboards are on their way.
First we put this message up here in Charlottesville, Va., and then in Baltimore, Md. (see explanation of the 3% calculation here):
Now we’re putting these two images up on billboards in Syracuse, NY, where drone pilots participate in U.S. wars from
Hancock Air Base:
For 8 hours a day for 16 days in March, these two images will be on either side of a billboard truck driving around
downtown Syracuse and the University of Syracuse. Then, from April 2 to May 27 each image will be on two of the four
stationary billboards located at 115 South Street, 700 East Washington Street, 1430 Erie Boulevard East, and 1201-1208
South Salina at Raynor Street. Then, from May 28 to July 22, one image will be on two and the other on one of three
billboards at 700 East Washington Street, 909 East Genesee Street, and 1758 Erie Boulevard East.
Why Syracuse?
The Syracuse area hosts Hancock Air National Guard base where the Guard’s 174th Attack Wing conducts drone assassination
and target identification missions using MQ-9 Reaper drones in Afghanistan and probably elsewhere. It has been announced
that the numbers of drone operators being trained at Hancock will be doubled.
The billboard ads are being undertaken in the context of what amounts to a whiteout of information on drone and other
air operations in Afghanistan. Pentagon reports on drone and other air attacks in other nations are inadequate at best,
and these reports when they come have been inaccurate and have grossly under-reported casualties. The U.S. government
has made no reports and taken no responsibility for the emotional devastation of drone attacks on children as well as
adults, as documented by the Al Karama Foundation’s “Traumatising Skies.”
Syracuse is home to a creative and courageous group of activists who have done a great deal of public education already
and who are continuing those efforts.
Overcoming Censorship
Some companies have refused to rent space for billboards opposing drone wars. No company has questioned the facts of the
messages, apart from one company asking us to say that drone wars “may” make us less safe, adding the word “may.”
It is hardly disputable that drones make orphans, or that they kill innocent children. That drone wars make us less safe
ought to be obvious after what the “successful” drone war has done to Yemen, following the April 23, 2013, testimony of
Farea al-Muslimi before the U.S. Congress that drone strikes were building support for terrorists. But don’t take it
from him or me, when a leaked CIA document admits that the drone program is “counterproductive,” and numerous recently
retired top U.S. officials agree.
For the most part companies have given no explanation for refusals to display these graphics. In some cases, they have
said the graphics made them “uncomfortable,” or they’ve asked that we stick to “positive-oriented messaging.” Those
companies that have written policies that I’ve seen for what they accept have in no case had a policy that explained
their refusal, other than their declaration of their right to refuse for any reason whatsoever.
While some companies in Syracuse said no, and others yes, every company in Forth Smith, Arkansas has, thus far, said no,
without any explanation. These include:
RAM Outdoor Advertising: 1-479-806-7735
Ashby Street Outdoor: 1-479-221-9827
Billboard Source: 1-940-383-3500
Feel free to ask them to explain. Remember that politeness is most effective. RAM Outdoor Advertising did say: “Thanks
for sharing your potential creative. I’ve shared it with the owners and they have decided that your creative will
violate our lease agreements. We will have to decline your ads.” I requested to see the “lease agreements” and received
no reply.
Fort Smith is the home of the 188th Wing of the Arkansas Air National Guard at Ebbing Air National Guard base, which
controls Reaper drones for assassination and target identification. It appears drone operations will expand there also.
Freedom of Speech
World Beyond War billboards are funded entirely by contributions made by supporters of ending war who want to help put
up more billboards. We will continue to solicit such contributions and to work to overcome censorship.
One of the more common, if ludicrous, defenses of war making is that it somehow defends one’s rights. Yet, freedom of
speech and of press is routinely restricted in the name of protecting the war making.
Following the recent school shooting in Florida, we pointed out that the shooter had been trained by the U.S. military
in a JROTC program funded by the NRA, and that this information was publicly available and not disputed. Major media
outlets chose to avoid that story in order to focus, instead, on the undocumented (and, as it happens, false) claim that
the shooter had worked with right-wing groups.
Google, Facebook, and other big forces on the internet are working hard to steer ever more traffic toward big corporate
outlets and away from voices of dissent. Congress has eliminated net neutrality.
Whistleblowers are now up against the risk of prison time.
Protesters at inauguration parades face felony charges.
In my town in Virginia, Charlottesville, we are still forbidden to take down any war monuments, and still have no public
peace monuments, but the local government has just made it a crime to hold a public demonstration without a permit obtained 30 days ahead.
In some airports and perhaps other locations, this story that you are reading will be blocked by internet services on
the grounds that it constitutes “advocacy.”
Is this the “freedom” for which the wars endanger and impoverish and indebt us?
What you can do
1. Politely phone the companies above and ask them to explain their censorship.
2. Send us ideas for good locations for billboards.
3. Send us donations with which to put up more billboards.
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David Swanson is an author, activist, journalist, and radio host. He is director of WorldBeyondWar.org and campaign coordinator for
RootsAction.org. Swanson's books include War Is A Lie. He blogs at DavidSwanson.org and WarIsACrime.org. He hosts Talk Nation Radio.He is a 2015, 2016, 2017 Nobel Peace
Prize Nominee.
Follow him on Twitter: @davidcnswanson and FaceBook.
Help support DavidSwanson.org, WarIsACrime.org, and TalkNationRadio.org by clicking here:
http://davidswanson.org/donate.
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