Cindy Sheehan, who made headlines last summer as she held a vigil outside of President George W. Bush's Crawford, Texas ranch, made a stop in Princeton Saturday, where she was honored by the Princeton-based Coalition for Peace Action (CFPA).
Ms. Sheehan spoke for about 15 minutes after a dinner reception at the Trinity Church on Mercer Street that kicked off an entire weekend celebrating CFPA's 25th anniversary.
The tall, soft-spoken Ms. Sheehan argued that parents should take counter-recruitment initiatives and promote pacifism. A California native who labeled herself a pacifist, she said she'd been "shocked," but had supported her son, Army Spc. Casey Sheehan, when he told his parents that he had joined the military.
"Casey tried to soothe my worries when he came home" after joining the Army, Ms. Sheehan said, but "his dad and I were still stunned.
"We would tell him that you always solve your problems with your words: you never use your fists; you never kick."
Spc. Sheehan, 24, died five days after his tour began when his unit was attacked with rocket-propelled grenades and small arms fire in Sadr City, Baghdad.
Ms. Sheehan said that after her month-long stand in Crawford, dubbed "Camp Casey," the idea of counter-recruitment --- discouraging potential recruits --- has increased.
"People have become more involved, they want to know what to do.
"It's so simple: people in these communities probably have a vigil and hold signs once a week, but it's so easy to go down to the recruiter's site."
Ms. Sheehan quipped that success can be gauged in the "amount of peace signs and middle fingers you get," but added that "you're getting mostly peace signs and honks now.
"We have to make sure this doesn't happen again," she said of the war, adding that even in times of peace, when anti-war statements are few, "peace movements" should continue.
"It's not a sign of weakness to work for peace, it's a sign of strength."
Ms. Sheehan explained that she currently schedules speaking engagements because of the increased interest in her message: "That's why we get up every morning because there's people still in harm's way."
Also honored at the event was Princeton University physicist Robert Nelson, who conducted a study of so-called "bunker buster" nuclear weapons that indicated that the damage from bunker busters would not be limited but widespread. Funding for the weapon has since been stopped.
The awards dinner was followed in McCosh 10 on the Princeton University Campus by comedian Ira Shorr's "Make Jokes, Not War" stand-up routine.