[Peace-discuss] to go where no demonstration has gone before

[Robert Naiman]

I agree that the "at least one local person" standard is a good criterion.

On 9/14/07, Stuart Levy <slevy at ncsa.uiuc.edu> wrote:
> On Fri, Sep 14, 2007 at 09:29:48AM -0500, Robert Naiman wrote:
> > Dear Karen et al.
> >
> > I am a huge fan of this idea.
> >
> > I totally agree that there is plenty to do "here." But, I would argue that
> > our notion of "here" ought to extend outside the city limits of
> > Champaign-Urbana, because "here" includes our responsibility to try to
> > pressure Tim Johnson. I think a key aspect of pressuring Tim Johnson is
> > demonstrating that opposition to the war and U.S. policy generally is not
> > confined to Champaign-Urbana, or to C-U and Bloomington-Normal. Obviously,
> > our capacity to do this is not infinite, but the choice before us is not
> > zero vs. infinity, but zero vs. something.
> >
> > I strongly doubt that we would be arrested for a legal demonstration in e.g.
> > Mahomet. The First Amendment also works there. Of course, people who are
> > genuinely afraid should not be pressed to go, regardless of whether their
> > fears are rational. There are no guarantees - sometimes people are arrested
> > for First Amendment activity, as we all know, even in our nation's capital -
> > but it's very rare. Again I wouldn't push anyone to do anything that they
> > wouldn't feel safe doing. But I doubt that if this were the only concern, we
> > couldn't find people to go.
> >
> > As we all know from our own experience, there are people who hate war
> > everywhere, even in "conservative small towns." As Karen suggests, if
> > someone were to organize such a thing, it might encourage folks in the town
> > who feel isolated.
> >
> > I think that choosing an appropriate context would be important. Like, if
> > Tim Johnson or his staff are holding a public event in the place. Then we
> > could say, we're here to protest Tim Johnson, that's where he is, so that's
> > where we are.
> >
> > Let's try it once, and see what happens...
>
>
> I'd be willing to do this, *if* (where) at least one local person can
> invite us in.  We can hope to draw more local support once we're
> actually present somewhere, but I'd hope to avoid being labelled as the
> Invading Leftie Eggheads from Urbana-Champaign.   The rest of that
> label is fine with me -- I'd just want to be acting in support
> of local people, rather than as an invader.
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-- 
Robert Naiman
Just Foreign Policy
http://www.justforeignpolicy.org

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