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9/2/2008
The irony of Freedom
I got to see an anti-war protest today. A big one. I first heard about it early Monday morning. Saw a headline in a newspaper: the protest was still on! Hurricane Gustav and its effects on the RNC – no Bush and Cheney – wouldn’t stop it! The protest was to begin at 1 pm, starting at the Minnesota State Capitol and proceeding down Cedar St. to Seventh, and there to hold another rally.
That put them just a couple of blocks away from the Xcel Center, and the Republican National Convention.
Sounded great. I’d spent a good deal of time perusing pics and videos of protests from the Democratic National Convention in Denver, and I was hoping for something similar. To be completely honest, I was hoping for something to make fun of.
Well, the actual protest was impressive: police estimated the crowd at up to 10,000, and the vast majority – the actual organized protest – were peaceful.
That’s not to say I came away completely disappointed. In fact, for a little while I thought the entire protest was a fizzle.
See, there were the anti-war protesters, and then there were those for whom such levels of organization totally smacked of the Man, man. They were there to Take Back the Streets. To sow Anarchy. And maybe to get on the news, too!
Such was the tiny group I first encountered.
There were fewer of them than there were cameras surrounding them. There were so many cops around – riot-equipped cops, mounted cops, National Guard military police – that the scene appeared – in fact, was – ridiculous.
No more ridiculous, though, than the protesters themselves. The first speaker screamed into the bullhorn that “we’re spending billions on the war, while here at home, students can’t get free tuition!”
Oh, the humanity.
He went on, declaring solemnly: why can’t our voices be heard? That was through the bullhorn, too, and standing in the middle of a public street. If he understood the irony, he didn’t let on.
The next guy, dressed all in black, dancing around like he’d drunk too many lattes that morning, blamed both Republicans and Democrats, and called Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi a “big accomplice.”
So that was fun, but it quickly became clear that it wasn’t the actual protest. The actual protest was quite huge, and took…oh, I’d estimate forty-five minutes for the entire crowd to make its way down the street, to the final rally.
That had its moments of levity, too: the Che Guevara posters, the occasional 9/11 Truther, the guy with an actual hammer and sickle tattooed onto his chest.
And the day didn’t go along entirely peacefully, either: small groups of anarchists and others made nuisances of themselves, breaking windows, making a mess, and getting themselves pepper sprayed and arrested.
But, all in all, the larger protest was a big success. Hard to say otherwise.
Of course, one might ask exactly what they accomplished. With the U.S. and Iraq beginning to agree on when and how U.S. troops should leave Iraq; with the U.S. now handing Anbar Province over to Iraqi control; with Democrats and Republicans both shying away from “Peace Now!” sentimentality; it’s a little difficult to see exactly what good – from the protesters’ point of view – was done.
But anyway. That they organized something so big, that they brought so many together, that they all marched and chanted and scribbled slogans on quickly-bought (although surely not at Wal-Mart) pieces of tagboard and had their say in full view of the public, not to mention dozens of cameras – that right there was cool. And downright American.
And I say so, even though I went there hoping to make fun of them.
Lance Burri is a contributor to the Badger Blog Alliance and occasionally blogs at his own site as well.
COMMENTS
While driving through St. Paul last evening about 6-7 p.m., I remarked to my wife," this is the most quiet this freeway has ever been and we've driven through here for 20 years." I wondered since I had seen the protest scenes, and now I was driving past the Excel Center what real event or gathering of importance had taken place....dead quiet.
So the protest leader wondered where the the free tuition was coming from, I wonder what value my daughter would hold for her education had we not entered a partnership of saving, working and yes, borrowing to get her to her last year at Univ. of Minnesota?
She has been twice on the Dean's list , successfully completed a semester, fully immersed in a foreign language and completed a summer internship working for a multinational bank while living in an Muslim country.
Would this young woman tried, scraped,saved and worked so hard, had it been given to her? I think not...
Richard Parins (Tue Sep 02 20:32:40 2008)
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