I could go on a harangue about this, but really, the thing that kept popping into my head again and again was, “this is the soft bigotry of low expectations.” Sometimes, an inaccurate compliment is far harsher than an accurate insult.
Freddie
Freddie deBoer used to blog at lhote.blogspot.com, and may again someday. Now he blogs here.
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The most moving chant might have been when we walked past the Newseum, with its ginormous carving of the First Amendment on the side, and the crowd spontaneously said “Read that wall! Read that wall!”
That part made me smile.Report
And, no, I’m not accusing you of engaging in censorship, I’m not saying that you need to read the First Amendment again… I was just reading the post you linked to and excerpting the part that I dug.Report
That admittedly sounds like a cool moment.Report
I seem to remember you saying that your name was on the permit for the largest anti-war protest in Connecticut. As such, I’d bet that you probably have experience with this whole protest thing.
I’d be interested in reading your thoughts on the Washington protest and hearing you compare it to the protest that you were involved in.
What did you do right that 9/12 folks did wrong? What did you do wrong (if anything, of course) that, if you had to do it over again, you’d do differently? Do you see the folks in the 9/12 protests repeating any of those mistakes (if any exist, of course).
Is it something where your protest and this protest are so very different that it’s totally apples and oranges and any comparisons won’t be particularly useful?
Reason’s take on it is one that is ideologically aligned (pretty much) with the protests… I’m guessing that your take on yours, when lined up with their take on “theirs”, would make for an interesting comparison.
As someone who was very much involved with the anti-war protests, what is your take on the current crop of protests?Report
It’s tough. Street level organizing…. There’s a divide between process and politics. The first is actually more important than the latter. The problem is that right process inevitably leads to bad politics, or at least, incoherent politics. You can’t tell people they can’t come; you can’t be the movement police. You can’t censor in the name of political expression. But then, you get the Larouchies, you get the Stalinists and Maoists, you get apologists for Hamas and Shining Path; you get Truthers. After a couple years of serious organizing, I emerged just spent, exhausted.
I’m likely as guilty as Welch is in seeing the protests through my own lens. I’d like to think that I’d be honest about the Stalinists in a way that Welch, to my mind, is not being honest about Birthers, or darker elements. But that may just be wishful thinking on my part.Report
Surely you experienced something like spending the day walking through the protest and saw all kinds of good, solid, regular folk carrying signs like “War Won’t Fix This” and “Peace Works” and you spent the day thinking “we had good speakers, the Unitarian Minister was good, the Catholic Priest was good, and our point was made!” and you got home to see the news was showing two guys in blackface burning an effigy of the queen or something like that?Report
Yup.Report
The loonies in either protest movement are of marginal importance — I would think that at least 90% of the protesters yesterday have legitimate concerns. Some in the media picked out the most egregious signs, but from all the reports it appears that the majority were protesting government over-reach and out of control spending — two very legimate concerns. I thought it was a healthy sign of public involvement.Report
You should go ahead and go on the harangue, because it’s not clear what your thoughts actually are from what you say. It’s pretty clear what Matt Welch’s thoughts are, however.
That does look like a lot of people in that footage. I wonder if it’s from yesterday.Report
He did , just not here.Report
And if you don’t want that here, feel free to delete my comment, Freddie. Sorry if that was bad etiquette.Report
It’s fine.Report