ALL IS CONNECTEDNESS SCENES FROM THE WOMENS PENTAGON ACTION, USA 

Ynestra King tells her story of the WPA. It is not an -attempt to represent the group, she says. "Each of us has her own story, and our collective story could only be written
collectively." The following includes excerpts from Keeping the Peace (Women's Press, 124 Shoreditch High Street, London E16JE ENGLAND).

It was during a conference on Women and Life on Earth: Eco-feminism held in 1980 that the Pentagon emerged as a symbol of all male violence women opposed. The first meeting the Pentagon Action discussed how to connect militarism and violence against women. "Somehow the Women's Pentagon Action had to reflect our feminist principles and process. And we began to talk about what these principles were. We talked about connections between violence against women and the rape of the earth. We talked about racism and American imperialism. We heard from women about the effect of military spending on the human services upon which women depend. We connected the masculinist mentality and nuclear bombs. Lesbian oppression and reproductive freedom were also issues that concerned us. We reflected on the election of Ronald Reagan and what that would mean to us. And we talked about how we might do our action with ritual politics and theatre and images and how many women we thought it would take to reach around the Pentagon. We were defining feminist resistance. Slowly the four stages of our action emerged — mourning, rage, empowerment, defiance."

November 16 and 17, 1980 were the dates for the first Pentagon Action. The second Women's Pentagon Action was held a year later in much the same form as the first except that the black puppet led the defiance. In addition, the weaving took place at all entrances, extending around the Pentagon, with fewer women participating in civil
disobedience (only partly because of expected harsh jai) sentences).

Mourning

"We began our mourning by walking through the centuries of carnage at Arlington Cemetery, where the graves of war dead spread out as far as you can see. ... The slow drumbeat and moans never let up as the black mourning puppet, twenty feet high, propelled along by women holding poles under her skirts, led this first stage of the action. We continued mourning as we made a circle. We stopped on a grassy lawn in front of the River Entrance and began to create our own cemetery, commemorating the women who have been victims of the war machines. We began by laying a gravestone commemorating the unknown woman (and continued) one by one — Karen Silkwood, Yolanda Ward, victims of illegal abortions, rape, war, racism. ... We had no trouble weeping.

Rage

"Then the drum tempo changed and the majestic rage puppet, in red, moved to the centre. The next stage of the action began and we raged and chanted "We won't take it", "No more war", 'Take the toys from the boys". Women railed at the Pentagon."

By now, Ynestra King has moved from interpreting the action for the mostly male reporters to deep involvment as a participant. "I was learning something about the power of
ritual, the power of women together, and the depth of my own sorrow and rage. ... I think constantly about how close we are to the end of the world. And I have believed for a
long time that if any people are going to come up with a way of life and a way of doing politics which can save us, they will be women. Even so, I wasn't prepared for how I
was transformed by that ritual. It felt as if something reached down inside me, grabbed my tears and pulled them out of me. The feelings inside those other women touched the feelings in me and our rage built together."

The drumbeat changed again, and the yellow puppet moved to the front, signalling the next stage:

Empowerment

"We were encircling the Pentagon, hand in hand, or holding scarfs and other women-extenders to help us reach around. We sang songs of the women's movement and songs of the civil rights movement. World came that we were all the way around with women to spare. An enormous whoop filled the air and women waved clenched fists at the Pentagon. The final stage of our action began.

Defiance

"At three entrances women moved up the steps, blocking the entrances with our bodies in non-violent civil disobedience. Mostly we sat down but at one entrance the Spinsters wove the doors shut."

For this action, 65 women were arrested, 43 of whom went to prison.

The Women's Pentagon Action continues to work on making stronger the connections between all the forms of domination, and continues to evolve the aesthetic, participatory mode of action. They continue, too, to work on the internal process of consensus decision-making. When they do actions, they try to be true to all their connections. "At the moment the Women's Pentagon Action speaks to (and from) the feminist movement, the peace movement, and the ecology movement. We say to everyone who will listen that there will be no peace without feminism, for in this world, war is man-made. And there is only one place, this one living Earth, where we can make our feminist world."