Meatspace,

[Harmon Seaver]

Faustine wrote:

>
> >Um, you should review the 60's groups like the SDS and such.
>
> Exactly: those weren't the groups that made the real impact when it
> actually came to getting down to business and changing policy. Blame
> MKULTRA or whatever you want, but the bottom line is that they fell apart
> (and had their members killed or put in jail) whereas groups who didn't
> espouse violence continue to this day.
>

         What? You are really a bit ignorant -- there are plenty of SDS and
Black Panthers running around today, the vast majority never went to jail.

>
> And while
> >Ghandi certainly didn't believe in violence the same can't be said for the
> >rest of the Indian freedom movement (not all hailed to Ghandi).
>
> Without Ghandi, British policy would have taken a far different turn.

Ghandi was also pissed because the Brits had confiscated all the privately
owned firearms, and spoke out against this -- and from the sounds of it, would
have advocated using those arm to fight the Brits.

>
> Violence hasn't exactly been a stunning success for the IRA, has it.

        Who do you think it was that kicked the Brits out of the most of
Ireland, with a *lot* of violence? If it weren't for Irish picking up the gun,
the whole country would still be a Brit colony. And they will succeed in
driving the Brits out of the rest, and hopefully their progeny, the
"Protestants" along with them.

>
> Not Ghandi, Martin Luther King, Susan B. Anthony, Bobby Kennedy and and the
> vast majority of the people who espoused the causes you mentioned above.
> The ones who made the real difference--the ones who immediately come to
> mind every time we think of their cause--didn't espouse violence. If you
> want to talk about Che and Mao and Chairman Gonzalo, that's another story.
>

      God, what bullshit. MLK preached civil disobedience, not just
"nonviolence" -- if he were doing this in today's repressive political
climate, he would be getting exactly the same treatment as the WTO protesters.
What stopped the war was explicity the growing violence (SDS's Bring the War
Home campaign) and the fact that returning combat vets were joining the
protests in throngs, and new draftees were fragging and shooting their
officers and NCOs in Nam. What does Bobby Kennedy have to do with it? He and
his brother were just another couple of politrixians who got what they
deserved.


> >The reality is, your example of the 'troops in the street willing to gun
> >'em down' (a paraphrase) is apt. The only thing stopping them is knowing
> >that the majority of people don't believe it. They still believe in the
>

     The thing stopping them is knowing that they are vastly outnumbered, and
if they escalate into using deadly force against the protesters, there are
more than enough people who would come back with guns the next day and wipe
them out. If Kent State had happened, for instance, at Berkley or Madison,
there is no question of what would have happened next, and probably that very
same day.
      Geez, just look at the what those Pakistani kids are doing to the cops
in England. And they have no access to guns.

--
Harmon Seaver, MLIS
CyberShamanix
Work 920-203-9633   hseaver at cybershamanix.com
Home 920-233-5820 hseaver at ameritech.net