“I have learned from first hand experience that war is the destroyer of everything that is good in the world, it turns our young into soulless killers and we tell them that they are heroes when they master the ‘art’ of killing.”
-Kevin Benderman

“One man has stopped killing. One man has chosen to find a path other than war. One man has taken the right road, the only road that leads to sanity, and leads to peace. That man and his wife hope that one more man will follow, and another after that; And the duty they adhere to will be saving a life.”
-Monica Benderman

Help with publicity

• email this page to friends
• Download and Print the Fliers Below
• contact Megan, meganvitw at yahoo dot com, or 773-784-8065 or 773-784-6144

Download Flyer

• Download The Color Flyer
• Download The Black & White Flyer

• Download The “Pro-Soldier, Anti-War” Version Color Flyer
• Download The “Pro-Soldier, Anti-War” Black & White Flyer

Voices in the Wilderness is pleased to bring Kevin and Monica Benderman to Chicago

Saturday and Sunday, April 9 & 10

Find a Speaking Event Near You:

Saturday, April 9, 11:00 AM

Grace Place
637 S Dearborn, 1st floor
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Kevin and Monica Benderman will be the guest speakers at a press conference and public panel on the militarization of youth
Sponsored by: VITW, CCOMY, AFSC, VVAW, SSC

Saturday, April 9, 4:00 PM

University Church, Hyde Park
5655 S University Ave.
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Sunday, April 10, 4:00 PM

Lake Street Church of Evanston, MacLeish Hall
607 Lake St (NW corner of Lake St and Chicago Ave)
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Please Help With Publicity

Voices in the Wilderness is seeking help with publicity. Please e-mail this page to friends. Flyers are available

Please contact Megan
meganvitw at yahoo dot com
773-784-8065 or 773-784-6144

Sign up on our Benderman’s Chicago Announce List. Or, you may wish to sign up to our Chicago Area email list. The Chicago list is used to alert you of all upcoming Chicago area events and action Voices is affiliated with.

This is a fantastic opportunity for you to hear the firsthand account of not only the transformation of Soldier to Conscientious Objector, but to also hear what we can do together as a people of the world. Please Join VitW with Kevin and Monica Benderman the weekend of April 9th and 10th.

Learn more about Kevin and Monica Benderman below

Kevin and Monica Benderman (photo: Savannah Morning News)

The only way to bring peace to the world is to let the people of the world decide for themselves what they want to spend their efforts on. I feel that in this day and age governments start wars, and not people, and since the governments want the wars then why don’t we let the government fight the war? All of the politicians that want to fight a war are free to trade places with me at any time. I will gladly go and learn war no more.
-Kevin Benderman

People want to know if it was stress, PTSD which caused him to change his mind. They want to know what terrible things he saw that made him make such a drastic change. People want to know if there was thunder and lightning, an awakening, an epiphany. I stand in silence, words escape me. Have we gone so far away from Truth that people actually believe war and killing is right, and that a man must be crazy to want to walk away?

There was no “bright light.” There were no angels, no mighty bolt of thunder. There was only reality and facing it with eyes wide open. All the sensationalism of preparing for war, the “glory,” the “honor,” the absence of reality in any training and any preparation, the illusion of the fight, and the altered perceptions of what we would face, not only in combat, but as a family dealing with the effects of war and its consequences were not strong enough to keep us from seeing the reality when it slapped us in the face.

WAR IS WRONG. War brings nothing but death and destruction. War takes away all humanity, not only from the people who die, but also from the people who do the killing. War is insanity, and killing is the pleasure of the truly insane.
-Monica Benderman

I want people to know that the longer I thought about just how stupid the concept of war really is, the stronger I felt about not participating in war. Why do we tell our children to not solve their differences with violence, then turn around and commit the ultimate in violence against people in another country who have nothing to do with the political attitudes of their leaders?
-Kevin Benderman

Information About Kevin and Monica Benderman

• Kevin Benderman Defense Committee Website

Interviews and Articles

• Why I Refused a 2nd Deployment to Iraq, by Kevin Benderman
• Catching Flack, by Monica Benderman
• Bending It, an Interview with Kevin Benderman by Omar Khan

Three Direct Ways You Can Support Kevin Benderman Today!

1. Express your support to Kevin and Monica. If you want your letter entered into the Congressional Record by Kevin and Monica’s Congressional Representative, Cynthia McKinney, click here. If you just want to write Kevin and Monica privately, click here.

2. Email Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, asking what purpose is served by court-martialing Kevin Benderman (click here to go the Department of Defense Comments website and then click on the “Ask a Question / Make a Comment” tab).

3. To make a donation to help cover Kevin’s legal defense costs, visit the Kevin Benderman Defense Committee website.