Well its in the news so it worked. Protest is literally one of the only thing that’s ever actually effected change in this country so stick with it. The more people it pisses off, the better. If a protest leaves people feeling safe and comfortable, it wasn’t a protest, it was a parade.
What exactly is it accomplishing? You think anyone is unaware of Gaza at this point? People don’t care to be blunt. Pissing people off just makes life a little more miserable for people who have nothing to do with the issue.
Blocking traffic in Israel would make a much bigger difference.
Nah, the message is getting lost in the delivery. I support BLM too but had the same issue with their freeway-blocking tactics. Nobody is going to swing to your side of the argument because you blocked their route home…nobody. People have emergencies, parents and kids need to get places…people have important jobs and need to be able to get to work such as doctors, first responders, air traffic controllers etc etc… Yes, Gaza and BLM are both worthy causes but there are many other worthy causes as well. You can’t block traffic for every worthy cause…block people from living their lives to put what you personally feel is the most important social issue at the top of their world by forcing it on them through essentially trapping them. It’s just plain wrong and nothing is going to change that. Yes what’s going on in Gaza is more wrong, and yet it’s still illogical af and morally wrong to pretend that this provides justification to trap people on freeways.
If you think the point of disruptive protest is to win people to your side you are an idiot. The point is to make society stop working.
The same society you are hoping to change…I don’t think you realize how immature your thought process is here.
I love the coy allusion to the possibility that you aren’t a vapid idiot. The suggestion that you might have a point of view but you’re just too shy to say anything worth pressing the ‘reply’ button for.
If I were you I wouldn’t have posted that. But if you wanted my advice now it would be to maintain the illution.
ROFL, how do you take yourself seriously?
By contrast.
lol, uh huh…Not sure I’ve ever seen someone be so convinced of their intellectual superiority with so little reason to be. Intelligent people use their extended vocabulary when necessary to make cohesive and logically sound arguments. You’ve used uncommon words out of trying too hard to bedazzle shallow arguments that are logically and/or morally inferior.
If a solid argument were a fine jacket, your style is more like gluing rhinestones onto a denim one; flashy but not exactly impressive. But hey, you got some attention so I’ll give you a nice pat on the head for that. Pat pat. Now, grow up and finish your education.
Is there anything you feel strongly enough about to protest like that?
In trying to look at it from the perspective of “what could make me do that” I can only think of some downright heinous shit. To get to the point that you’re willing to stand in front of cars and have people hate you for preventing them from living their lives? It’s pretty hard to imagine.
And on top of that, to know that your actions are going to ruin you in some way or another; that you’re facing jail time, bodily harm, or extreme financial burden? Either they’re being both sensitive and stupid or they’re so fed up that they feel like there’s no other recourse. It’s insane to me to think about being pushed so far that that seems like a good idea.
But then I think about how they must have gotten there, and the things that would get me there, and they’re not so different.
It’s all about who’s impacted by the protest. These people could funnel the same energy towards a targeted protest against some company profiting the war, or at politicians they disagree with, or protesting at a government building, at a college stifling speech, or at some high profile event or any other legitimate target. You can do something that isn’t targeted at everyday people, traps them in the protest, and carries the chance of stopping the delivery of critical services. “Sorry the paramedics couldn’t get to gram gram fast enough, but people needed to block traffic for Gaza today” is a bs possibility to allow.
I would say that this kind of protest just makes people mad at you and your cause. If I was stuck in traffic for X hours I would probably be mad at the protestors and not sympathize with their cause.
See, in this image, you would be the one standing in the back pissed off they can’t just get their lunch and would be mad at the protestors.
History happens every day. You need to not be mistaken where you stand in it.
These people are directly involved. The people on the highway have no control over anything in Gaza and it has nothing to do with their daily lives.
Illogical take and a false equivalence. These people could just go somewhere else and obviously do not support the rights of the protesters. In the freeway blocking situation, you’d be stopping the people who support Gaza from getting home to their kids the same as everyone else and they are literally trapped on the freeway vs. choosing to be in this pictured restaurant. You’d be trapping people who might not have water in the car, might not have A/C, might not have the gas to idle and wait, might be rushing to the hospital to meet the ambulance with their wife/child in it.
Your take is morally wrong in a demonstrable way and I hope you can learn to recognize that.
Nah.
Illogical take
Take a shower
Lmao
Firstly, getting food is different than literally being imprisoned in your car. Secondly, they could go to a different place and these people are actively attacking them not being victims of their protest.
I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to ‘order’ than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice
If your devotion is to order, where your allegiance is to the polite convenience you’ve come to accept and expect as a first world consumer, you are no ally of justice.
For those that don’t know and because TropicalDingdong was a ding-dong and didn’t cite their quote, this is a quote from a letter written by Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr during his time in jail after a protest.
Edit: He was a Reverend and a doctor, so I got mixed up getting his titles right.
Again with another poorly thought out opinion that does not logically connect your message with any real measure of virtue. Here you’re excusing the conduct of people who would block traffic by chalking it all up to countering the white moderate preferring an absence of tension, which is not a logical conclusion whatsoever as it could be similarly used to argue for hanging racists in the street. It’s ignoring the severity of the impact of the protest to break it down into a binary of support/nonsupport. “Either you’re with us or you’re against us.” is the mantra of forced conformity of thought. Seriously, do better.
Nah. Its you that needs to do better. No protest needs to apologize for inconveniencing you.
Your hand wringing is precisely what MLK was talking about.
No, it wasn’t…because he was talking about people who didn’t want to see black folks rise up at all if it meant disruption. I would be thrilled to see Gazans gain equality, their own state and be just fine with protestors disrupting the people who could actually affect those changes. Protesting by blocking regular folk from getting anywhere is rock bottom stupid because they don’t have any power to make the change…it’s taking their frustration out at the situation out on innocent people. Instead of speaking truth to power, it’s inflicting their will on the powerless. If you can’t tell right from wrong, that’s a you problem.
If you think MLK would have been all for trapping regular civilians on the US freeways for a war in another continent though, you’re a complete and utter moron.
“severity of impact” – a few hundred people made slightly late to things vs. tens of thousands of civilian deaths. How do you type this without pausing to consider how absolutely monstrous you’re being?
How do you type this without pausing to consider how absurdly hyperbolic you’re being? I don’t support Israel in its war against Gaza whatsoever, I was thrilled to see the war crimes charges against Netanyahu and public sentiment turning against the conditions there but if I don’t support freeway blocking protests in another continent that don’t even attempt to separate out those that support the war, I’m being “absolutely monstrous?” How could anyone be expected to take you seriously here when you exaggerate THAT badly?
Edit: Oh, and “Few hundred people made slightly late”
Gonna stop you right there. You have no idea how many cars get backed up for how long, who has drinking water, working Air Conditioning, emergencies to get to, whether or not someone died in an ambulance stuck in traffic. You’re making up the rosiest scenario, pretending this isn’t dangerous and life threatening, and then pretending that’s the reality as if you could know. It’s wildly dishonest.
You write dumb shit like you’re trying to hit a word count.
“excusing the conduct of people who would” literally delete this entire cringe flourish and you lose zero meaning. In fact you lose redundancy wHerEiN you first refer to what they’re doing and then just say what they’re doing in the same sentence. Sophomoric.
It’s ignoring the severity of the impact of the protest to break it down into a binary of support/nonsupport.
So high off your 8th grade writing level that you don’t even bother building your sentences around coherent thoughts.
You write dumb shit like you’re trying to hit a word count.
I’ve read what you wrote and am firmly in the position of looking down on you due to your poorly thought out and immature views. No amount of writing skill is going to cover up your overall lack of intelligence, and you haven’t demonstrated any writing skill either. You can convince yourself I’m writing dumb shit just because you disagree with it. I don’t care…I just know better.
I dont know what you are trying to get at. I think you should realize that getting on freeway and making everyone mad = bad protest; doing a sit-in and getting the harm visable = good protest.
Its that you make this comment without any comprehension of history.
In 1958, you would have been writing this exact same comment about a sit-in protest being “bad protest”. Your worldview just rewrites you into being on the right side of history on things, when now, when you have the opportunity to be on the right side of history while its happening, you aren’t.
Dude, I literally havent take a side, I am just telling you what I think works and what doesnt. If you think getting people fighting mad on a freeway is a way to win people over, I would have to disagree.
oh noooo, they were stuck in car prison for 20 minutes, with the A/C on and their favorite music playing! the horror 😱😱
“And what is it America has failed to hear?…It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met. And it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice and humanity.”
- Martin Luther King, Jr
well i was going to condemn genocide but then some people who want the killing to stop blockid traffic so now i think its ok to kill people.
sure have fun being mad at the protestors
I mean, you’re right about the people directly impacted, but if you’re on the 405, this shit happens all the time. I was stuck for a few hours cause of a jumper. It’s annoying, and it’s hot outside, and in the moment I would certainly be anti-protester if not anti-everything. But that’s just people there at the time inconvenienced.
So, it’s probably a net good for their cause since more people aren’t in traffic than are, although at this point I feel like everyone has made up their mind on Gaza (and honestly, images and recounts from people on the ground there are a thousand times more persuasive than whatever this is)
That makes sense, I would just be mad at them if I was on the freeway. I am personally not very positive on them because they do things that seem pretty shitty on a regular basis.
Exactly, the worthy message is completely lost in the immoral delivery.
I can see it would be good if it were done on a smaller road that is visable, but fuck keeping people stuck in their car when they dont have any way around it.
Inconveniencing people, and more specifically disrupting industry, is the only way that protests actually do anything.
I am just saying what would be effective and what would make people hostile to their cause. If they set up a line of people in front of one of the weapons manufacturing locations, I think that would be an example of an effective protest.
Protesters accuse Raytheon of abuses, block plant entrances
It’s amazing how protesters already tried that and nothing happened.
18 people facing charges for allegedly defacing Raytheon sign during protest in Tewksbury
Somehow, the “effective” protests you recommend don’t seem to be doing anything. Do you have any other bright ideas? Maybe something that the average person will actually learn about?
How was that not effective, they got a news story and more news stories when it comes to their court trials?
Yep, I think what people aren’t getting is that if any protest group undemocratically gives itself the right to block freeways, then any protest group could claim the same rights. What if pro-life people start blocking freeways next, then pro-Israel protestors next. The level of passion about the topic does not grant automatic acceptance of the method.
I think it would just turn harsher punishments for protesting.
I agree and would also say that society demanding harsher punishments for this kind of protesting is a pretty dang good indicator that it’s morally wrong.
Would you think its okay for pro life people to do this on the freeway?
“Americans will tolerate anything [(even genocide)], provided it doesn’t block traffic.”
No need to single out Americans. Most of the developed world, including a lot of the “nobler than thou” European peoples that some Americans love to worship, are equally complicit.
It’s just a relevant quote given the post.
This leaves me thinking that maybe we should be protesting our own prison industrial complex this way.
Not sure how shutting down roads has anything to do with Israel, but I’m glad the roads are shut down. If only it could be done permanently.
The occupied state of Palestine’s settler invaders would evaporate overnight without the constant military and financial support of the Great Satan. Harming the economic output of the US is directly in line with opposing the genocide. In fact it’s the only thing that will actually work, short of armed struggle.
Sort of too late for this
Elections are coming up. Now is the best time to start disruptions. They will not listen outside of election season.
Because West Los Angeles is just full of people who have any say about what happens in Gaza… 🙄
Local and state governments absolutely have a say through their investments to Israel. It’s just as important to pressure them for divestment as the federal government and corporations on the BDS list.
Not only are state and local lawmakers more accessible to constituents than federal lawmakers, but local investment portfolios also hold billions of dollars in funding to Israel sourced from the everyday taxes of community members. State and local governments across the U.S. hold more than $4 trillion in all investments in their investment portfolios. At least $1.6 billion in Israel Bonds is held between state governments, municipal governments, and public pension funds nationwide. Those investment dollars come from every individual, household, and business within the municipal or state borders that pay property taxes, income taxes, and sales taxes, making them some of the most representative pools of dollars invested on behalf of the public. Saper says that campaigns targeting the investment of these local dollars “invite people to reckon with how implicated we are here at home with the atrocities we are witnessing abroad.”
Let me paint you a picture of the fucked up situation in the Middle East.
If the US withdraws support of Israel, Iran attacks, they have pretty much openly stated that they would if that were to happen. If Iran attacks and Israel is out of options, Israel uses nukes. If Israel uses nukes, Pakistan uses nukes. Then India. During all of this, due to the massive amount of destabilization, extremist warlords start popping up. Russia and China start sticking their fingers into things, and not just in the Middle East, but any country/territory they’ve had their eye on, such as Taiwan. All of this takes place a stones throw away from European countries in NATO, and if any of them get hit, all of NATO is obligated to respond. That’s not getting into the shit places like Turkey or North Korea would start during the chaos.
It’s not as fucking simple as just cutting off Israel. It’s a big, complicated, shitty machine that is likely to fucking explode if you remove the wrong pieces. And as shitty as it sounds, 40k casualties over 10 months is a lot less than the millions that would die within a week were shit to hit the fan.
The premise of your idea, is wrong. Iran is threatening to retaliate unless Israel agrees to a ceasefire
And as you also mentioned, this has been going on for many, many months. And the context, the immediate context anyway, is a very simple one here, which is that Hezbollah has made clear, Lebanon has made clear, as other — as Iran has made clear, that as soon as there’s a ceasefire in Gaza, all of these support fronts will stop pretty much instantly. So this is the context, and in the meantime, people are just waiting for the response.
Only Israel can agree to a ceasefire. The US does not make that decision for them. Netanyahu is a war criminal dictator. You think the US withdrawing would be the end of it? Fuck no. And what do you think happens if the US withdraws support and Netandipshit doesn’t agree to a ceasefire?
I get it, you want a genocide to stop. But the thing you are arguing for (US withdrawing support) doesn’t stop the genocide. You think Israel doesn’t at least have the resources already in hand to still level Gaza? Plus, currently the US is the only country sort-of able to talk and negotiate with them, withdraw support and no one can. And again, if they are out of allies, out of options, and other countries start invading, Israel WILL use nukes. It’s not even a question in my mind. Netanyahu will do whatever he can to stay in power.
The people screaming for divestment have no idea what’s involved. In many cases there are contractual obligations that make it impossible.
The people screaming for it have no idea how any of it works, they just want it stopped and will continue to get angry when it doesn’t.
This is nonviolent civil disobedience to protect the financial support of an ongoing genocide. Acting like this isn’t a valid form of protest or that the BDS movement have “no idea what’s involved” when putting pressure on corporations and institutions to Divest is ridiculous.
These kind of protests do put pressure and bring the issue to the forefront of the local and state administrative bodies. The BDS movement was successful in the divestment of Apartheid South Africa, this isn’t too different
“Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue,” King wrote. “It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored.”
- MLK Jr. on the nature of nonviolent protests
MLK protested where the offenses were actually happening. That’s why they were effective.
Yeah dude, that’s why the anti-apartheid protests and BDS movement in the United States were so unsuccessful and not effective when it came to South Africa
The offenses are actually happening in the US, too. That’s where the voters voting for genocide enablers are located, that are sending all the bombs to Gaza to blow up schools and hospitals.
I’m sorry, hundreds of thousands of innocent children. This piece of paper says it’s impossible to stop paying for you to be murdered.
Pretty much, that’s how “contractual obligations” work.
In my state, we’ve been trying to get the state Public Employees Retirement System to divest from oil investments for a few decades now. The big problem is PERS is tied up with contractual obligations to provide a specific return on investment, a return which can’t be made if they dump fossil fuels:
https://www.opb.org/article/2024/02/07/oregon-retirement-fund-carbon-neutrality/
The folks supporting divestment think it’s like a light switch. “Well, just STOP!” and it doesn’t work that way.
It literally does just work that way. A piece of paper is a piece of paper. “But we won’t make as much money” is the part that holds it together. Contracts and laws in general are no more or less than a pretext to exercise class power. They’re broken at will in other contexts. The US was literally founded on it.
Tell me you don’t understand how a contract works without telling me you don’t understand how a contract works.
There are legal liabilities for breaking a contract. It’s not that simple.
Tell me you don’t interact with people without a keyboard without telling me [useless repetition]. Fucking weirdo.
Yes it is that simple. The law is, and only is, a mechanism for people with power to exercise that power under the veil of legitimacy. Ask any Indian tribe. Ask anyone with x amount of money attempting to litigate a contract with someone with 1000x amount of money.
The reality of the system cannot be disputed without looking like a fucking joke.
Ahh yes. Gatekeeping of what is considered valid protest and white liberalism, name a more iconic duo.
An effective protest reaches the hearts and minds of people who can actually have an impact.
Protesting in L.A. does neither of those things.
I’m 100% disinterested in your opinion of what you consider a valid protest.
What you or I consider a valid protest is irrelevant unless we organized it.
Fine, tell me who in LA on the 405 freeway can stop investment in Israel. It’s cool… I’ll wait.
Oh, right, nobody. They are protesting to nobody so they can feel good about themselves while not actually having a chance at changing anything.
Since you seem to lack reading comprehension.
I’m 100% disinterested in your opinion
I’m not interested in the opinions of reactionaries masquerading or deluding themselves into thinking they are revolutionaries.
Well you chose to be in a thread literally about reactionaries masquerading or deluding themselves into thinking they are revolutionaries…
Freeway shutdowns are one of the only actually effective nonviolent protests available to modern civilians, as they disrupt industry. Also these people consciously risked jail time to stand up for victims of genocide. Calling them performative… Fuck you.
An effective protest reaches the hearts and minds of people who can actually have an impact.
A more idiotic and ahistoric statement is rarely uttered
Except every single useless protest ever.
Incoherent doesn’t count as more idiotic. Not sure why you’re trying for it but please stop.
