NEW YORK (Reuters) - About 200 activists swarmed into New York’s Grand Central Station on Thursday, hung banners and chanted “Fight AIDS (news - web sites), not war” on the day President Bush (news - web sites) accepts the Republican nomination at his party’s convention.
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Police officers arrested about a dozen people who sat down around the information booth in the train station’s main concourse and refused to move at the height of the morning rush hour, witnesses said. Police did not have an exact number of arrests.
“This administration has abrogated its responsibility to the American public and people infected with HIV (news - web sites) and AIDS,” said Errol Chimloi of Housing Works, a group that advocates for poor people with HIV and AIDS. He said government money “has been spent on the Iraq (news - web sites) war instead of in our communities.”
Protesters from the AIDS activist group ACT UP released two banners and colorful balloons in the high-ceilinged concourse as thousands of commuters were arriving in the city for the work day. The banners said “America has AIDS” and “Cure AIDS.” Then 200 protesters strode into the building chanting “Fight AIDS, not war” and other slogans.
Police said more than 1,760 people have been arrested in a week of convention-related protests, a record for a U.S.
Protesters are generally the loud-mouthed irrational types (on both sides of the fence). They do get the attention they seek but I can’t imagine they sway that many voters
In my experience it is difficult to get anywhere by protest. It does make a good cover for illegal activity. I remember well when SDS radicals raided a certain ROTC armory and “acquired” 200 M14 automatic rifles one year in the early 70s while the police were involved with a takeover of another campus building…
Protestors (regardless of what they are protesting) have EVERY right to make their opinions known through peaceful protest, but they have NO right to disrupt the lives of everyday folks who are trying to go about their daily business and could not care less about what is being protested about. PERIOD, END OF SPEECH!
And how did we ever get the abomination of LAUS instead of LAUPT? Maybe someone could help here: some terminals have run-throughs, some stations terminate runs or are actually terminals(I think in SF it was 3rd St Station, and Ferry Terminal, yet both were terminals).
Lots of things make good cover for illegal activities; business, government, the internet. You name it, there will be illegal activites occuring in some form under guise of innocent and lawful activites. On the more recent protest scene, we’ve seen anti-abortion activists murder doctors in Buffalo and Florida and staff at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Massachusetts. Incidents like these and the one you quote are often cited as an example why lawful protest should be discouraged, limited or banned.
Of course it is difficult to get anywhere by protest. Protest is, by nature used in difficult situations. But if you are familiar with the history of this country, you will remember that it wasn’t polite discourse that won the basic human rights granted under the Voting Rights Act of 1965. It wasn’t a letter writing campaign that got the vote for women. It wasn’t a phone call to industry owners that got us an 8 hour workday and basic health and safety laws in the US. All these things required “loud-mouthed irrational types” going out into the streets, giving up their time, often their liberty and sometimes their lives so we might enjoy the luxury of belittling their efforts in public forums today.
Democracy can’t be beat but getting and keeping it isn’t always pretty.
Ronald Reagan had it right…crack down on Majuiwanna Dealers and users leave cocaine alone(Till Glen Bias) that way you get the hippie protesters off the streets and Oh yeah raise the drinking age so Collage students do have drunken peace riots (Peace Riots?)
Anyway “Grand Central Station” is a importtant point in “Interstate Commerce” and disrupting it is fedaral crime…
Now here is my idea…Get 5000 protester to buy Metro North Tickets and then have then get on the 5:15 to New Haven and chant anti-war slogans to a captive auduance for the hour and half ride out there[}:)][}:)][}:)]…
Sure…by writing a letter to the editor in the local paper, such as when they ran an article that headlined “Railroads are a dangerous travel mode” and citing over 1,100 people died on the rails. The article made no distinction between derailments and all the car-train and pedestrian-train collisions, and I set them straight. Yes, they published the letter (I resisted the urge to write about culling the herd, etc.)
And should I ever get into a flight 93 situation, then yes, stand up and fight!!!
But would I stand in front of a grade crossing (or the newspaper’s HQ) waving a protest sign? No way!!
I agree with the other post, where people have the right to protest. But don’t block the highway or station or terminal or airport, etc.
Holding a protest sign and going to jail is a poor way to change the world. Much better to be a TV pundit with the good life guaranteed for life as long as you sell the party line. Better to be a Ranger or Pioneer and politicians can’t get elected without your money. Better to own Fox news. Better to go to a Bush rally and shout a question but not get fired for it.
I grew up in a country where anyone could hold a protest sign practically anywhere and not get arrested but now protesters are “with the terrorists” and no longer have the rights Americans gave their lives to defend.
They have the right to protest. We have the right not to listen, but they don’t recognize that. When they get in the way of people who are trying to go about their business, the protesters have gone too far. When they commit crimes, they should be arrested and prosecuted.
In the 1960’s the Civil Rights demontrators protested for equality under law, which is/was a nobel cause. They broke bad laws and took their punishment which brought attention to the fact that the laws were unjust and eventually the laws were changed.
Many of todays “demonstrators” think they should not be punished for breaking laws because they are “demonstrating”. But the laws they break almost always are necessary laws, breaking them harms others, that have nothing to do with their cause.
Note to Muddy Creek: I was not referring to the Civil Rights Movement in my earlier post, but to a number of the “movements” that have happened since then.
One trouble with most, not all, protesters is the don’t believe those who disagree with them have any rights. I believe it was Thomas Sowell who said their motto is “You are only free if you agree with me”. They do not understand that in order to really have rights, one must respect other people’s rights.
“Act-Up,” the AIDS group at Grand Central, is the same group that disrupted the Republican convention (posing as members of the “Young Republicans”).
Many years ago, my Mother’s cousin from Italy came to visit us in New Jersey. My Mother took her to a mass at New York City’s St Patrick’s Cathedral. During the mass, members of Act-Up stood, announced themselves, and threw condoms (into which Communion Host Wafers [that are used for Holy Communion] were inserted) onto the alter and the Bishop. The group was protesting the Catholic Church’s teachings on homosexuality.
I never said there wasn’t a right to protest or petition the government, I am however against protests that are violent, incite violence in others, are schemes designed as diversions (as in my example) or otherwise are not true expressions of speech.
I had a conversation with protesters last week. I ask them if they voted…The answer was a flat out no. I have been voting since I was 17 and ran for local office once and got 500 votes. I ocasionaly show up at City consil meetings and am constinly harrasing my local transit authority for better service. Sometimes they listen to me and actualy get something done. I feel it is better to work inside the system.
Saw a photo in the Chicago Tribune this morning of a protestor in NYC who had been arrested and held for a while outside the RNC convention. She was talking on her cell phone and crying…MOOOOMMMMMMMYYYYYY, COME BAIL ME OUT, BOOOO HOOOO!
Whatever happened to the good old days when it was a badge of honor to be arrested as a protestor? Oh, we miss the 1960’s era (NOT!).