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Peter Coyote, on protesting

It is nice to share a nation with people like you.

But I'm not like you.
 
I hope Peter and the rest understand this truth carved in history’s bones:
No peaceful protest has ever truly stirred the soul of power to change.
Not without the echo of defiance,
not without the fire of those so desperate, so raw with injustice,
they’re willing to wager flesh and blood for a sliver of hope.


When the voiceless rise,
limping toward freedom with nothing but rage in their hearts
and courage in their veins,
they will meet men with guns—men sworn to preserve the rot
just as it is.


And when those two forces collide, the earth drinks deeply.
The streets run red,
until either the dreamers are silenced in full
or the executioners grow weary of the slaughter.

Diving Mullah
 
And police still attacked peaceful protestors during them.
In Los Angeles? I don’t really recall.

Protesters did protect some Black Bloc wannabes from aggressive police charges — the small group wasn’t doing anything more than walking together.

I think the size of the antiwar marches discouraged obvious and hostile attacks.

I think the presence of an older/more mature demographic discouraged hostile attacks.

Smaller turnout, young crowd, no monitors — chances greatly increase for aggression by LAPD. Just my opinion.
 

“When it gets down to having to use violence, then you are playing the system’s game.
The establishment will irritate you – pull your beard, flick your face – to make you fight.
Because once they’ve got you violent, then they know how to handle you.
The only thing they don’t know how to handle is non-violence and humor.”​

 
True—yet deeply ironic—that those who most often speak of peace are the ones who so often meet their end in violence.

Let’s count a few...
Gandhi—both of them.
Martin Luther King Jr., Robert Kennedy, Yitzhak Rabin, our dear John Lennon, Benazir Bhutto.
Abraham Lincoln (where the list practically begins), Archbishop Romero, Anwar Sadat...
Each one chased peace—and paid for it in blood.
And as much as I love Lennon, he was wrong on one point: a hunger strike didn’t end the Vietnam War.
It was angry, grieving veterans.
It was students in the streets getting beaten, gassed, and shot.
It was resistance with calloused fists and tear-stained banners.
Same with the end of slavery.
Same with the suffrage movement.
Same with civil rights.
Peace isn’t handed over—it’s wrestled into existence.


Diving Mullah
 

Hey, I guess you missed it when I warned that there is no guarantee that there won't be blood.
 
How about we expect the white liberal moderates to make sacrifices for once?
That reminds me of JFK’ famous quote.

Ask not what you can do for your country—Ask what someone else can do for your country.
 
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