patrick.net

I'm highly skeptical that protesting has ever accomplished anything. Perhaps that cynical, but it seems that the only way to effect political change is to discover sexual scandals involving politicians who violate our rights and work against our interests. So you're better off snooping the politician's trash than protesting.

What about doing something that raises public awareness? There must be ways to put an issue into the mainstream's consciousness?

Dan8267 says

I'm highly skeptical that protesting has ever accomplished anything.

I would say that is not true with Martin Luther King, Mohandas Gandhi, Rosa Parks, the tank guy in Tiananmen Square, Thomas Paine, the Boston Tea Party, Voltaire, and I'm sure many more.

Saul Alinsky has some damn good advice for potential activists in his book Rules for Radicals. Perhaps this is why there was a campaign to discredit and vilify him. I even tell my teabagger/second amendment freak colleagues this; they don't listen.

I've done a lot of protesting and some street theater in my time. Sometimes our activities made the mainstream news; other times I have met strangers who remember seeing our actions, years later.

NOT doing ANYTHING is not an option to me. Silence=consent. It is empowering to paint up a big sign and stand on a busy street in your own community.

...and on another note. https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=786336931394705&set=a.468988593129542.119781.424053540956381&type=1&theater

Maybe we are a police state, and maybe its more than not accomplishing anything, maybe its dangerous.

indigenous says

Dan8267 says

I'm highly skeptical that protesting has ever accomplished anything.

I would say that is not true with Martin Luther King, Mohandas Gandhi, Rosa Parks, the tank guy in Tiananmen Square, Thomas Paine, the Boston Tea Party, Voltaire, and I'm sure many more.

I'd really like to be wrong on this, but it doesn't seem like any of those people were really successful.

MLK was assassinated and then cartoonified. Eventually some civil rights legislation passed, but many years after protests.

China has gotten worse since the Great Tank Man of Tiananmen Square stood his ground. You can't even Google "Tiananmen Square" in China.

The Boston Tea Party didn't convince the British to drop taxes. A violent revolution ended up being fought.

But at least the protest put the issues into the consciousness of the mainstream and got people talking.

Dan8267 says

MLK was assassinated and then cartoonified. Eventually some civil rights legislation passed, but many years after protests.

Bullshit we have a black president WTF are you talking about. Maybe you are too young to remember how it used to be. Dan8267 says

China has gotten worse since the Great Tank Man of Tiananmen Square stood his ground. You can't even Google "Tiananmen Square" in China.

I would say the Chinese government has a tiger by the tail. The people in China have infinitely more power than in 1989.

Dan8267 says

The Boston Tea Party didn't convince the British to drop taxes. A violent revolution ended up being fought.

How many colonies in the world went to war with the mighty England?

This is how PR and genuine leadership works. It is a matter of galvanizing people to higher purpose. As trite as you mutts may think it is liberty and the pursuit of happiness has made this world a much better place.

Imo if not for Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington this country would not exist.

indigenous says

Imo if not for Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington this country would not exist.

Yet, the present government ignores their words and jeers at their laws. If we don't wake up this country will not exist as the democratic republic those men struggled to create, it will become a gross plutocracy of criminals and apathetic minions.

hrhjuliet says

indigenous says

Imo if not for Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington this country would not exist.

Yet, the present government ignores their words and jeers at their laws. If we don't wake up this country will not exist as the democratic republic those men struggled to create, it will become a gross plutocracy of criminals and apathetic minions.

It is easier to motivate people when there is an emergency we are not there yet but it is coming up fast.

Unfortunately they are just as likely to listen to a mad man as someone who is sane.

History has proven that unfortunately.

Rally here!

The MAIN ENABLER of sizable asset price bubbles is keeping the real price histories out of sight.
http://www.showrealhist.com/yTRIAL.html

Do you know folks who had kids in order to have somebody to sell bubble-high to?

hrhjuliet says

it will become a gross plutocracy of criminals and apathetic minions.

This is a done thing.
There has been what Simon Johnson called "The Quiet Coup".
We have had no effective push-back from within or from outside the system.

I have, painfully, moved through the 5 stages of grief to Acceptance, and now watch the closing of our society with sad detachment.

indigenous says

It is easier to motivate people when there is an emergency we are not there yet
but it is coming up fast.

Yup. With close to half the population in some form of welfare, are they going to raise against the hand that feeds them??

lostand confused says

indigenous says

It is easier to motivate people when there is an emergency we are not there yet

but it is coming up fast.

Yup. With close to half the population in some form of welfare, are they going to raise against the hand that feeds them??

No when it stops feeding them. This time will be known as SHTF

For better or for worse, I'm too busy working to get overly involved. For the moment, politics is nothing more than a spectator sport