I think teaching people how protests work is pretty important praxis and is not talked about nearly enough.

Moderates and liberals tend to think of protest and demonstration as the same thing and anything that is not a demonstration is generally though of as bad or counterproductive.

Most of the populace simply doesn’t understand that blocking roads or getting arrested have strategic value. They consider the goal of every protest to be to raise awareness and support and to convince people like them ™️ that any given cause is worth supporting and that their support is all it really takes to a make change happen. It’s a very self-centered view of how political movement work and it seems unfortunately quite obiquitous.

They see a road block and think “that just makes you look bad” and the thought process ends there because now your movement isn’t worth supporting in their eyes. If you try to explain that blocking off roads is often done to cut off supply lines to financial districts or big corporations and put economic pressure on them or the politicians they donate to, they refuse to engage with the idea entirely or claim that it doesn’t actually work and the only way to protest successfully is to win over people like them even though they’ve probably never been to a demonstration, let alone a direct action event and if they did they’d probably do more harm than good given how ignorant they are on the subject.

We really need to educate people about protesting tactics, how they work, what they actually seek to achieve, and how different methods put pressure on different areas to get different effects and I think you probably can’t teach this to older generations but younger generations are capable of learning and we really need them to learn this.

Teaching people to think in terms of systems and take a structural approach when trying to change a system is paramount because, in the current state of things, the common belief seems to be if enough people wave signs from the sidewalk, things magically work out in the end.

  • @abraxasEnglish
    13•5 months ago

    I’m sorry, but I think in many cases a road block does “just make you look bad”. There was growing support for BLM in Massachusetts and it got popped like a ballon when those dumb kids blocked 93N.

    Nobody was talking about how the cops dealing with the situation were one of the most racist police organizations outside of the Deep South. They were busy talking about how those dumb kids could be killed and the traffic they caused affected ambulences and some patient almost died.

    off supply lines to financial districts or big corporations and put economic pressure on them

    Again, using BLM as an example… Don’t you want to have those corporations SUPPORTING the BLM movement? I mean, unless your protest is laser-focused on anti-capitalism, hurting businesses for no good reason just alienates the 99% of the population that isn’t Tankie.

    That same topic about “educating people how to protest” is “pick ONE thing you want to change, or your protest doesn’t have a meaningful message”. If you’re protesting for the environment or protesting for women’s or gay or trans or minority rights, you shouldn’t be protesting against businesses. You should be recruiting them. I wanna walk into the office (after no traffic jam) and see someone having anonymously put up “Gay rights are human rights” posters everywhere. I want my place of employment to offer to match donations for these causes. Etc.