Originally Posted by andrew22

If everyone (and everyone does) thinks "violent protests detract from the real messages", well then then everyone has seperated the two groups, and you're only being arrogant to think you've separated them and no one else has.

1) You assume that everyone with an interest in current events is the same as the general voting populace

2) Even if you know the difference they do distract. I imagine if there were relatively little violent protest they might actually take the time to report on the grievances many of the protesters have.

Originally Posted by arathbon

1) You assume that everyone with an interest in current events is the same as the general voting populace

2) Even if you know the difference they do distract. I imagine if there were relatively little violent protest they might actually take the time to report on the grievances many of the protesters have.

1) yah, im making a fair assumption, im not gonna be all "i get this cause i have interest in current events. too bad so many other people are clueless"


2 has a boring answer, so uuuhhh yes, and no.

weren't you that guy from hamilton talking to that yankee philosphy TA that one time a couple weeks ago btw? maybe im way off idk

Originally Posted by macsci

French Revolution, go read about it? Lots of movements out there in the world we live in. Violence should be a last resort!

Precisely. A movement built on violence will succumb to violence.

Any movement that is born from violence cannot simply assert that it does not accept violence as a means to an end (since it most certainly saw nothing wrong with violence when it was struggling against its oppressors) once it has achieved power because it would then be a hypocrisy, subject to challenges to its legitimacy and, therefore, destined to fail.

Luckily, I have read extensively on the French Revolution. We must remember, we are on the 5th

Monarchy, Revolution, 1st Republic, Counterrevolution, Napoleon, Napoleonic War, 2nd Republic, 2nd Napoleon, Franco-Prussian War, 3rd Republic, 1st War, 2nd War, Occupation, Vichy, 4th Republic, Algerian War, 5th Republic.

The Revolution held some rather beautiful principles that could have changed the course of humanity forever. Sadly, the revolutionaries chose violence as a means to achieve their ends and, therefore, stalled their goal of a free, unique, equal French Republic.

wow this is dragging all night, i can see police taking shifts but what about the protester or the bystanders? good luck pulling all nighter after you break starbucks.

Originally Posted by Ownaginatios

lol, it's actually more like 20,000 cops.

About 5,000 on shift at any given time, with 20,000 working in total.

They outnumber the protestors? hahahaha

Hmm all the news channels are not broadcasting, any other source of news throughout the night?

Originally Posted by c.erl

Precisely. A movement built on violence will succumb to violence.

Any movement that is born from violence cannot simply assert that it does not accept violence as a means to an end (since it most certainly saw nothing wrong with violence when it was struggling against its oppressors) once it has achieved power because it would then be a hypocrisy, subject to challenges to its legitimacy and, therefore, destined to fail.

Luckily, I have read extensively on the French Revolution. We must remember, we are on the 5th

Monarchy, Revolution, 1st Republic, Counterrevolution, Napoleon, Napoleonic War, 2nd Republic, 2nd Napoleon, Franco-Prussian War, 3rd Republic, 1st War, 2nd War, Occupation, Vichy, 4th Republic, Algerian War, 5th Republic.

The Revolution held some rather beautiful principles that could have changed the course of humanity forever. Sadly, the revolutionaries chose violence as a means to achieve their ends and, therefore, stalled their goal of a free, unique, equal French Republic.

A history-pwn to you, sir! Well said. However, I do think revolution can sometimes be sought by a people as a legitimate avenue for socio-political change, especially when the group one is wishing to revolt against is not willing to listen to peaceful activism. (I think that if I were a Romanian under Ceauşescu, or a Cuban under Batista, I would be willing to revolt)

The situation in Toronto, however, is a completely different matter, and here I agree with you about the nature of violence. If one is going to deliberately cause civil unrest when previously none existed, that person isn't a protester, an anarchist, or even a rioter. That person is just looking for a fight - they're a testosterone-jacked loser who enjoys breaking things. I believe it would be appropriate to officially call them evolutionary throwbacks.

I have nothing else to do on a Sunday afternoon. I'm considering checking it out to see what the fuss is really about. I feel like a few bad apples have ruined everything.

I'm down with protesting when there's cause for protest. But I watched this protest about a week ago: http://fullcomment.nationalp ost.co...-these-idiots/

I actually was purposely late for school because I was so intrigued by how incredibly ridiculous this protest was. They basically were asking for magic, as if we could just turn off the oil supply and be a-okay, and that the gulf oil spill can be sponged up and they're doing nothing.

I find a few too many protests fall under this category, a.k.a. people who see their side of the argument and only their side and protest it strongly. We have an incredible country, and we can never avoid conflict/issues. Like I said, protesting for things like indigenous rights, freedom for tibet, and gay pride etc. is an incredible priviledge, but there is just so much crap out there, and I want to see what it's all about.

Hey, better than sitting on my butt watching the horribly ridiculous coverage on Citypulse/CBC... Just a thought haha

Originally Posted by andrew22

1) yah, im making a fair assumption, im not gonna be all "i get this cause i have interest in current events. too bad so many other people are clueless"

Maybe its cause I know a lot of people who don't have an interest, but in my experience, many of them lump all of the protestors together.

2 has a boring answer, so uuuhhh yes, and no.

An answer just isn't an answer without a reason.

weren't you that guy from hamilton talking to that yankee philosphy TA that one time a couple weeks ago btw? maybe im way off idk

What the heck does that have to do with anything?

wow i disagree. The amount of issues the G8 and G20 summits are covering are way more in number and importance than the olympics. Regardless of whether or not the officials made a big deal of it or not, the same amount of protestors, the same amount of damage would have all occured. Its a huge worldwide event and many people are going to be passionate about it. Its ridiculous to say that the publicity around the event has made it worse. If anything, it has warned many residents of toronto to remain out of the downtown core (which they have) and told many of the peaceful protesters where to protest safely.

Originally Posted by marissac42

wow i disagree. The amount of issues the G8 and G20 summits are covering are way more in number and importance than the olympics.

A lot of the issues protested for the G8/G20 were protested at the Olympics:

• Indigenous rights to land, culture and sovereignty
• Homelessness and poverty
• Capitalism
• Environmentalism
• Concern by citizens that the event was going to ruin their city

These of course being some of the more broad ones.

Originally Posted by Marlowe

Some things to keep in mind:

-Police were showing restraint not just out of compassion, their primary objective was to protect the heads of state. They had to maintain the security around the perimeter of the G20, while the rioters ran away from that area. It would have been much more dangerous to weaken the security in that area.

Um, not so much...unless their definition of restraint is grabbing random people who are standing around doing nothing and beating them before dragging them off to be arrested...

http://twitter.com/spaikin
http://vimeo.com/12883752

Any Media Player 3.0.4

Error: unsupported media type.

If the video doesnt play, click here.

Originally Posted by Maegs

Um, not so much...unless their definition of restraint is grabbing random people who are standing around doing nothing and beating them before dragging them off to be arrested...

http://twitter.com/spaikin
http://vimeo.com/12883752
http://vimeo.com/12883752

If you were watching the television coverage of the arrests, the police were arresting those who were either suspected black blocers (who the media reported had changed back into normal clothes to hide), or people who weren't following orders, or people who were interfering with the arrests of those previously mentioned.

The only people I saw "beat" on the tv coverage were those who were resisting arrest. If you're resisting arrest don't think the police are just going to let you go.

By the way I didn't see anyone "beat" in that video, and there's no way to tell if the journalist had his media badge on. Was he the one they asked questions about at the news conference last night that had been going around with black bloc rioters without a media badge because they wouldn't let him follow them with one? Is it possible the police thought he was a black bloc rioter? Possibly.