Comments on Arrests at World Can't Wait Protest

Flags "weren't allowed"? Who gets to make a no-flags rule for a public park?

If they wanted to protest, they shouldn't have done it in Soviet America.

After all, free speech is only for European Union citizens. We here in America must swear our loyalty to our King and never question his Royal Decrees.

Or we'll end up in GITMO.

in soviet russia, car drives you.

What's dumber? That the police consistently overreact to a bunch of melodramatic kids, or the fact that we continue to pay attention to them?

my bet: they had outstanding warrants.

Drive out the Bush Regime? Is this supposed to be some sort of insurrection? If so, this seems to b the stragegy:
Step 1: Build giant puppets and wave flags
Step 2: Something else happens ...
Step 3: Bush is driven out of office!!!!!

This protest seems like a huge waste of time and effort. Perhaps they could have put all of that energy into campaigning for Democratic candidates. I think that this sort of silliness just says: "I'm mad at someone, but I don't care enough to do anything effective. I just want to vent and bother people."

But, HIM - how could the police KNOW that until they ran ID checks?

Unless of course, all SPD personnel have now had MemRecall 2.0 instant facial identification wetware installed via their cranial I/O ports...

And geez, why didn't one of those kids think to wave a big ole' American flag? Can you IMAGINE the headlines:

"Protestor Arrested For Waving 'Old Glory'"

Now THAT would have given TPTB a major headache.

Are there fitness requirements for SPD? Some big guts there!

Why do people in this town like to protest so damned much? It doesn't seem to do anything...

/attention whores
//do somthing for real and VOTE

I got there after the arrests. I overheard some guy on his cell phone saying, "Yeah, the cops didn't like their sign so instead of asking them to remove it, they arrested them." That is all.

Most cops know exactly who the baddies in the neighborhood are very well.

Conspiracy theorists should note that the protest proceeded as planned minus those two guys. Much ado.

I waved at the gal holding a "RIP Habeas Corpus 1787-2006" tombstone in the U-District march as I was driving past. But the bozos in the face masks are an insult to real masked protestors in places where they cover their faces for a reason. Protests like this accomplish nothing, actually a small net loss for truth and justice....

All I noticed as they passed by was a cool sign that read "The Rapture is not an exit strategy" (yay!) and at least a dozen kids who should have been in school instead of marching (boo!)

It's a jump to conclusions mat.

"This woman who, ironically, was not arrested "

That not a woman! it's fuckin pugsley!!! trying to get some t.v. time

oh and p.s. to the anarchist. WTO payback is a bitch!

I hate these fucking protests. On the bright side, they get away from their bongs and get some exercise other than kicking a hacky sack around. On the downside, it takes away from actually doing something useful, like passing out campaign literature, doorbelling, manning phone banks, and the like. I really would like to ask them how many of them actually voted in the primary. Instead, the assholes just blocked up traffic and accomplished nothing. Protest marches are nothing but political masturbation.

Protest marches are nothing but political masturbation.

How sad then if this is our only meaningful form of expressing our views? As many total wackos were in the march today, it's still important - and noble - to be out there.

Jason, it's not important, not important at all. It's not noble either. It's completely ineffective. The people who were protesting can be totally written off by the GOP. King County voted for Kerry 65-33. San Francisco County favored Kerry by 83%. Los Angeles County, Dem 63%, Hartford Dem 58%, Denver County, 69.6%, Cook County 70.2%. Guess what. All of these counties contain major metropolitan areas, and these protests are all taking place in major metropolitan areas. What's the use of all of us marching around and going, "Down with Bush," when Bush knows we didn't vote for him or the GOP in the past and we're not going to in the future, why should he listen to us? The only way a protest would work is if we were protesting against someone that we would conceivably vote for. In addition to being masturbation, these protests are utterly narcissistic.

They encourage dialogue, however, and may cause some apathetic people who see them to take interest in the issues.

People are weird about protests. In my young-ish, conservative-ish office, they have a gut reaction against ANY kind of protest.

The other day, some co-workers and I walked past the Westin, where the hotel union was picketing (the Westin is a dreadful place to work. I know - I used to work there) None of them would take the flier they were handing out. I did, of course, and was reading about how the housekeepers are having problems with injuries.

The co-workers were all complaining about the protest, even though none of them have any idea of what the situation is, or how difficult it is to work as a maid.

Sheep. The funny/sad thing is that most of them are IT people, and think they have endless amounts of job security. In reality, they are closer to the TV repairmen of the 60's.

WE WOULD STILL BE FIGHTING IN VIET NAM IF IT WERE NOT FOR YEARS OF PROTESTS ---- THE SIMPLETONS WHO DISCOUNT PROTEST AS AN EFFECTIVE PIECE OF LARGER STRATEGIES ARE STUPID AND WITLESS.

MEDIA ATTENTION IS GREAT FOR ANY ISSUE, NEED TO GET INTO THE STREET FOR YOURSELF ---- SURE AS HELL BEATS SITTING AT A SCREEN POSTING TO SLOG ALL DAY ---

OH, BUT IT IS NOT COOL --- GO BACK TO MIDDLE SCHOOL.

TIME HONORED, USED IN ALL MODERN CULTURES AND SOCIETIES, AND THEY ARE EFFECTIVE AS ONE PIECE OF STRATEGIES FOR CHANGED.

BY THE WAY, THE ACTIVIST WHO DO THESE A LOT IN THIS TOWN ARE VERY SKILLED --- AND THEY ARE NOT JUST SOME UNCOOL --- LOW BROWS.

Hey jack, Quit tripping like you did on LSD in the sixties dude and get the hair gowning in your old deaf ears and quit yelling!

Whom are you calling simpletons do you think it made a differences to walk and block the streets? Can you tell me what the larger strategies is so us stupid and witless can get the fuck out of town. Oh wait you will be in the streets again is that the bigger strategy?
Thank god for the Cocktober Surprise! Now that is what works a guy trying to fuck little boys. We will get more power from that then making signs and blocking the street.
You are right Jack, the Activists are Very skilled at self-love and beating the meat.

Jack, the reason protest had an effect in the 60s is because it was a relatively new technique and the power structures hadn't learned to deal with it. Incumbency wasn't as powerful back then and gerrymandering hadn't made so many safe seats. There really was a chance that those people were going to vote against you and have a direct effect on your race. You think Jim McDermott needs to be told the Iraq War is wrong? And do you think Denny Hastert is gonna change his position because Richard Durbin's constituents are upset?

No, protests are slacktivism. The participants can feel like they stood up to the man without having to do any real work. They skip out on school or work and hang out with a bunch of like minded friends on a long walk with some rousing chants. That's fun. Now do as I've done and walk around in the rain in nice clothes ringing doorbells in Bothell. Go to the zoo on Mom and Me Day and gather signatures for initiatives. Man a phone bank for GOTV efforts. Decide not to buy that Phish CD and donate the money to a progressive PAC. Vote! It's frustrating and hard work, and but I know it has an effect.

I wouldn't necessarily assume that all, or even a majority, of the protestors, aren't doing all the other things needed for regime change. Most of the people I know who attended the protest are out there doorbelling, working on phone banks, registering voters, donating time and money to campaigns, etc. I wouldn't assume the one necessarily cancels out the other.

Vietnam-era protests prolonged the war. They did not shorten it. The early pacifist protests obviously had an effect, but later when the hippies and yippies got involved, nothing good came of it, or could possibly have. Those protesters, and these protesters here, scare the shit out of ordinary people, because they are so obviously loons.

There's no comparison with union pickets whatsoever.

Another thing about the sixties protests: there were a lot of people involved. A hundred stragglers accomplishes zilch. When most of them are goofballs with bandannas across their faces, and idiot stories about anarchist flags or whatever, it's actually less than zilch.

"Look, Marge, these idiots are protesting again. I can't stand this Bush feller, but if these guys are against him he can't be all bad".

Yeah, I have to say, guys...

Please, please, don't assume that just because we're marching, we're not doing other things as well. Sure, I marched with Cindy Sheehan, and I'm proud of it.

I also started a movement on my campus called "The Facts", where we posted clips from news articles about the war in Iraq, and the paper that the clip came from. An example: "American Cordon Sanitaire Around Fallujah Sends Estimated 10,000 Back Into City".

I could be way off on the number...this one was a year ago. But we had a lot of positive feedback, and we had some very constructive discussion from the people who e-mailed us in disagreement with what we were doing.

I went to DC with Sheehan because I'd never marched in a protest. Yes, part of why I went was to have fun. You're totally right, marching with your friends and people you've never met but who share your opinions IS fun.

Is flag-burning useful? No. Not at all. Is wearing handkerchiefs over your face a nice political statement? Not really, no. Nobody's lobbing teargas into the crowd, and nobody (hopefully) is photographing faces for later arrests, and as someone said, this seems a bit like mocking the people who really do deal with those conditions.

Someone said protests were a relatively new thing in the sixties...and woah, is that wrong. Want to read about some stirring protests? Check out the Fenian movement in 1800s Ireland, before it devolved into a failed rising. Anyone heard of Theobald Wolfe Tone? Check out Gandhi's salt march, and the socialist movement in the US in the twenties and thirties.

Protesting is and has always been a form of political expression when the people of a nation feel that they have no other way to address their government. Perhaps there have been too many protests and people who would normally be sympathetic are now just apathetic or openly hostile - that's a possibility, and it'd be the protesters' fault. But not all of us are 'politically masturbating' to appease our need for liberal orgasm.