# protestwarrior.com **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 12, 2004, 9:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433 "2004-12-12T09:59:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/41 "2004-12-13T17:06:39Z")
Manhattan: That, I could agree with, if I did not hear reports of them using… I’ll call it ‘strikebreaking’ tactics. Physical force and whatnot. Not that it’s not easy to get a rise in a protestor… after all, if they weren’t emotionally involved, they wouldn’t be protesting. In short, these people are maroons. Dopes. In theory, it’s a good idea. In practice, it’s a frat boy moronathon. They’ve got almost every right to do it… (except where it crosses to vandalism and physical force), but really, they’re not on our side. Sadly, I was thinking of counterprotesting the protestors of the RNC this summer, mostly for entertainment and education, and I was hoping these gentlemen would have the same idea. I was wrong. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/42 "2004-12-13T18:59:09Z")
> [@](#): > > **fluiddruid** said: > Catsix. nobody is arguing against freedom of speech or freedom to assemble. Why do you persist in trying to refute statements nobody is making? It seems that a lot more people have jumped onto the anti-protestwarrior bandwagon because they’re right leaning than because the protest warrior people are uneducated. Correcting them when their facts are wrong is quite different from saying that they are nothing but ignorant and don’t have any valid ideas. I haven’t seen anyone here yet (and I doubt I ever will) acknowledge anything done by protestwarrior that is a valid point (such as their countering of the ‘Free Mumia’ rallies.) I don’t agree with their politics, but they’re certainly free to protest the legality of abortion, to support the death penalty, and to believe that the war in Iraq was necessary. They may be wrong about the reasons, and often they are, but blindly discounting them as ignoramouses because all of their opinions are right leaning or berating them for marching in the streets certainly isn’t a productive way to deal with them. They may be rightist and wrong, but they are not wrong _because they are_ rightist. Nor are they all college aged frat boys with no brains, but I wouldn’t expect anyone here to learn something about them before dismissing them as drunken teenagers. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/43 "2004-12-13T19:11:53Z")
Catsix: you quoted someone else as me, in which the posters calls the protestwarriors blazingly stupid. Then you _tu quoque_ against the lefty protesters. I, if you read my post, went to protests with the purpose _of_ seeing blazingly stupid protesters. Whenever you carry a slogan on a placard you paint yourself as an idiot, no matter if what you say is basically correct, since coherent policy arguments are notoriously difficult to emblazon on placards. Even if you possess an ability to talk about deep policy implications, you are lowering yourself to the lowest common denominator. It’s just that I haven’t really seen any swastikas, or even druggie slogans, in person, on the lefty protests. They do try to minimize that, but one or two can get on national TV as easy as a couple dozen. On the other hand, if the right were the ones with the huge protests, I’d bet the signage _would_ be harshly controlled, perhaps at the point of armed security. After all, we need to crack down on those who don’t believe in freedom, right? ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/44 "2004-12-13T19:17:17Z")
Sorry, I didn’t mean to misattribute a quote to you. I still think that perhaps people should learn a bit more about the protestwarriors before lambasting them for the things they do get wrong. They get enough facts wrong to hammer away at without resorting to branding them all juvenile college fuck heads and making fun of them because they carry conservative signs. Sign waving in general is not the most intelligent way to get your message heard, but it’s no more stupid when it’s righties doing it than it is when it’s lefties. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/45 "2004-12-13T20:43:04Z")
> [@](#): > > Manhattan: That, I could agree with, if I did not hear reports of them using… I’ll call it ‘strikebreaking’ tactics. Physical force and whatnot. Got a cite for that? I take it as a given that when a group like this comes along, the other side WILL claim that they are being physically abusive, whether they are or not. Standard tactic. So if you ‘heard it’ in the sense that someone on a message board said that someone at a demonstration saw it, then I’ll have to call bullshit. If you could point to, say, a newspaper clipping, that would be much better. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/46 "2004-12-13T21:08:45Z")
I heard it from someone on their side, who is admittedly a friend of a friend. Probability of veracity, about, eh, sixty to seventy percent. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/47 "2004-12-13T21:13:09Z")
> [@catsix](#): > > They get enough facts wrong to hammer away at without resorting to branding them all juvenile college fuck heads and making fun of them because they carry conservative signs. Uh, they’re not being made fun of because they’re conservative, they’re being made fun of because they’re ostentatiously ignorant, and yet say things like “Some leftists may be genuine about wanting to help people, they just have bad data. With them, it is a pleasure to educate them and help them, it’s like bringing someone out of darkness into the light of truth – akin to saving souls.” To make a lofty claim like that on a website selling posters, bumper-stickers, T-shirts, and coffee mugs that are uniformly tainted with embarrassing misinformation is to invite ridicule. Representations of burka-clad Iraqi & Palestinian women? Brilliant. I love the smell of good data in the morning. No one’s saying that protest signs ought to be cogent, self-contained arguments. The idea is just to show numbers, usually. Humourous or sardonic signs have their place, too --but signs that betray ignorance of the basic facts of the situation don’t serve anyone’s interest, no matter which side of the political spectrum they’re on. Of course there’s no shortage of yobbos on the left carrying manifestly stupid signs. The difference is, that guy with the “U.S. Out of North America!” placard made it himself with a jiffy-marker and a cardboard box he pulled out of the bin behind his basement apartment. He’s just an idiot in a crowd. You roll your eyes and wish he’d go away. Now, if he set up a website selling his brilliant brainwaves to other morons, exhorting people to help him spread the light of truth and “educate” the poor deluded conservatives, and he started getting some press coverage, well then, that’d be something to talk about, wouldn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![manhattan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manhattan/32/7_2.png) [@manhattan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manhattan)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/48 "2004-12-13T22:11:11Z")
> [@Larry Mudd](#): > > Now, if he set up a website selling his brilliant brainwaves to other morons, exhorting people to help him spread the light of truth and “educate” the poor deluded conservatives, and he started getting some press coverage, well then, that’d be something to talk about, wouldn’t it? Funny you should mention that. I am pleased, though of course not surprised, that someone would want to eradicate ignorance like that. The main sponsor – and by “sponsor” I mean permit-holder, organizer, flyer-maker, etc. for the big rallies these days in New York and Washington is [these guys](http://www.iacenter.org/) and their apparent affiliate [here](http://www.internationalanswer.org/). Have at 'em! ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/49 "2004-12-13T22:35:36Z")
> [@](#): > > **Larry Mudd** said: > Some leftists may be genuine about wanting to help people, they just have bad data. With them, it is a pleasure to educate them and help them, it’s like bringing someone out of darkness into the light of truth – akin to saving souls." Is this always wrong? If not, what’s wrong with them saying so on their website? > [@](#): > > Now, if he set up a website selling his brilliant brainwaves to other morons, exhorting people to help him spread the light of truth and “educate” the poor deluded conservatives, and he started getting some press coverage, well then, that’d be something to talk about, wouldn’t it? Maybe. Maybe he’s also got some causes that I wouldn’t be inclined to immediately write off as idiotic. For one thing, I’d at least listen to what the protestwarrior people have to say about firearms rights. Maybe it’ll be a lot of incorrect bullshit, maybe it won’t. If it is, maybe I can help them not look like dumbasses as they try to sway the liberals. Although, I’m not willing to dismiss _everything_ that might ever come out of that website and write off every single person there as a moron. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2004, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/50 "2004-12-13T23:31:08Z")
> [@manhattan](#): > > The main sponsor – and by “sponsor” I mean permit-holder, organizer, flyer-maker, etc. for the big rallies these days in New York and Washington is [these guys](http://www.iacenter.org/) and their apparent affiliate [here](http://www.internationalanswer.org/). Have at 'em! **Manny** , do you really see an equivalence there? You’ve linked to an extremely detailed, text-heavy activist website, where _actual arguments_ are presented. This is not a leftist version of Protest Warrior. Conservatives have [grass roots organizing websites](http://www.conservative.org/), too. No, an oppositely-slanted version of Protest Warrior would be a site that sells T-shirts and bumper stickers that say things like “End the U.S. Occupation of Iran Now!” and “Conservatives and Paedophilic Serial Killers- United for the Spread of Democracy Abroad, Fiscal Responsibility at Home, and the Rape and Murder of Preschool Children Everywhere.” > [@catsix](#): > > Is this always wrong? If not, what’s wrong with them saying so on their website? No, it’s only wrong when you’re not actually making an effort to educate anyone, you’re just distributing ridiculous signage. Real conservatives come by their opinions honestly and present actual arguments for them. They _do_ sincerely wish to propagate their views by giving people information and reasoning they may not have previously heard. Attention given to yahoos like PW undermines their cause, just as the antics of ignorant, irrational, and sub-literate protesters on the left work to undermine _their_ cause. ---
**Author:** ![manhattan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manhattan/32/7_2.png) [@manhattan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manhattan)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/51 "2004-12-14T00:21:36Z")
> [@Larry Mudd](#): > > **Manny** , do you really see an equivalence there? You’ve linked to an extremely detailed, text-heavy activist website, where _actual arguments_ are presented. This is not a leftist version of Protest Warrior. Uh, A.N.S.W.E.R. is better because they have bigger lies with more text? C’mon, seriously check out the stuff on there. I recommend such highlights as > [@](#): > > [July 27, 1953,](http://www.iacenter.org/korea_aug8.htm) the historic day when the U.S. army was compelled to sign a truce and cease its military aggression against the DPRK. The U.S. had prepared and instigated the Korean War in June 1950 with the aim of crushing the young DPRK and robbing its people of their chosen form of government so as to take over the whole of Korea. First the U.S. split Korea in two by establishing the Republic of Korea. Then, under the false banner of defending one country against an attack by another, the U.S. in reality waged a savage, genocidal war of annihilation against the DPRK by means of a continual, devastating bombardment and the widespread use of biological and chemical weapons. The heroic, self-sacrificing resistance of the Korean People’s Army inflicted heavy losses on the invading U.S. forces and eventually forced them to retreat behind the original demarcation line. The DPRK survived, despite the onslaught, and has now progressed through 50 years of peaceful development. and > [@](#): > > [The legacy of Yasser Arafat is inextricable from that of the entirety of not only the Palestinian people, but all those struggling for freedom.](http://answer.pephost.org/site/News2?JServSessionIdr010=fea1azdip1.app2a&abbr=ANS_&page=NewsArticle&id=5621&security=1023&news_iv_ctrl=1621) The Mumia section, predictably enough, is also a scream. These are the _organizers_ of the protests. The ones about whom you said > [@](#): > > protest organizers generally do try to keep placards on message. There are designated folks who try to explain why problematic signs are unwanted to people who are carrying them. If they can’t be reasoned with, people coordinate to try to keep larger placards in between morons and conspicuous cameras, as damage control. I’ve seen this up close several times. (Of course, I’m talking about garden-variety counter-productive crap, like the loser who couldn’t be persuaded that his “SMOKE DOPE, NOT IRAQ” placard really wasn’t helping.) > > I think in most large crowds, any nazi creeps that show up are liable to end up minus some teeth. I’m saying that may be true in Vancouver, but here it’s not. The organizers _are_ the extreme far-left nutjobs. They _are_ the ones superimposing swastikas over Stars of David. You seem a pretty reasonable guy. I’ll let you play on those sites some more and invite you to get back. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/52 "2004-12-14T00:33:19Z")
Let’s not forget another major organizer of rallies: [The Worker’s World](http://www.workers.org/). Nutjobs. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/53 "2004-12-14T00:35:37Z")
And prominently linked from the [Workers.org](http://Workers.org) site: [Millions 4 Mumia](http://www.millions4mumia.org/)! ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/54 "2004-12-14T01:26:14Z")
> [@manhattan](#): > > Uh, A.N.S.W.E.R. is better because they have bigger lies with more text? C’mon, seriously check out the stuff on there. What the…? I had no idea it was a front for a raving Marxist group, and didn’t take the time to start wading through their site. You’re right-- up here, radical loons have little to do with organizing – although they show up around the fringes and cause a certan amount of embarrassment. A [little research](http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=15&ItemID=2527) on non-loony anti-war activists’ dependence on ANSWER’s organizing has been enlightening and surprising. > [@](#): > > WWP holds many views that we find abhorrent. It considers North Korea “socialist Korea” where the “land, factories, homes, hotels, parks, schools, hospitals, offices, museums, buses, subways, everything in the DPRK belongs to the people as a whole” (Workers World, May 9, 2002), a fantastic distortion of the reality of one of the most rigid dictatorships in the world. Okay… I’m with you… > [@](#): > > In none of IAC’s considerable resources on the current Iraq crisis is there a single negative word about Saddam Hussein. There is no mention that he is a ruthless dictator. (This omission is not surprising, given their inability to detect any problem of dictatorship with the Soviet-backed regime in Afghanistan.) There is no mention that Hussein is responsible for the deaths of many tens of thousands of Iraqi Kurds and Shi’ites. IAC’s position is that any opponent of U.S. imperialism must be championed and never criticized. Yes, you’re talking sense… > [@](#): > > An important purpose of antiwar demonstrations is to educate the public, so as to be able to build a larger movement. If the message of a demonstration is that opposition to U.S. war means support for brutal regimes, then we are mis-educating the public, and limiting the growth of the movement. To be sure, some true things we say may also alienate some members of the public, and often that is a risk we must take in order to communicate the truth and change awareness. But to tell the public that they have to support either George Bush or Saddam Hussein is not true and is certainly not a way to build a strong movement. People are not wrong to be morally repelled by Saddam Hussein. An antiwar movement that cannot make clear its opposition to the crimes of both Bush and Hussein will of necessity be limited in size. Not so much “reasonable” as “astonishingly obvious.” Go on… > [@](#): > > The second problem with IAC-organized demonstrations is that the day-to-day practice of IAC cadre often shows a lack of commitment to democratic and open behavior. It is not surprising that those who lionize the dictatorial North Korean regime will be somewhat lacking in their appreciation of democratic practice. Well, duh. > [@](#): > > Does this mean that people who reject these abhorrent views of the IAC shouldn’t attend the October 26 antiwar demonstrations in Washington, DC, San Francisco, and elsewhere? No. Uh… what…? > [@](#): > > If past experience is a guide, IAC demonstrations will have programs skewed in the direction of IAC politics, but without excluding alternative voices. In general, the IAC speakers will not be offensive so much for what they say, but for what they don’t say. That is, they won’t praise Saddam Hussein from the podium, but nor will they utter a critical word about him. However, as long as other speakers can and do express positions with a different point of view, the overall impact of the event will still be positive, particularly in the absence of other options. :smack: This is the kind of stupidity that comes of neo-fascists having those cussed overdeveloped organizational skills. Here’s a ten-foot-pole, you lazy twat! Don’t use it. There _are_ other options. Like, I don’t know, doing the organizing yourselves, and not letting the whackjobs near the lecturns. Jesus. ---
**Author:** ![Weirddave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/919ad9/32.png) [@Weirddave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weirddave)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/55 "2004-12-14T01:41:17Z")
In case you missed it, Larry, [here](http://www.antiwarstore.org/resources/page1.html) is the t-shirt store at A.N.S.W.E.R. I particularly like the “End Occupation, No to Colonialism” one. Hopefully, not many people will but them because me and the little lady have just been promised 50 acres and a mule in Afghanistan, and we’d like to take advantage of the offer. ---
**Author:** ![Milkman\_Dan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3da27b/32.png) [@Milkman\_Dan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Milkman_Dan)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/56 "2004-12-14T02:00:10Z")
> [@manhattan](#): > > The organizers _are_ the extreme far-left nutjobs. They _are_ the ones superimposing swastikas over Stars of David. Can you provide some photographic evidence of an organizer of a major protest carrying a placard with a swastika on it, to back up your assumption that they would do that? And remember I said _organizer_, not just some dude who just showed up at a protest. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Gadfly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/aeb1de/32.png) [@Gadfly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadfly)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/57 "2004-12-14T03:02:00Z")
So there are some left-wing nutjobs, too. Noone’s denying that. But does this make marching right-wing nutjobs into any given protest any better? Will it actually solve **anything**? ---
**Author:** ![manhattan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manhattan/32/7_2.png) [@manhattan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manhattan)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/58 "2004-12-14T03:22:20Z")
> [@Larry Mudd](#): > > This is the kind of stupidity that comes of neo-fascists having those cussed overdeveloped organizational skills. Here’s a ten-foot-pole, you lazy twat! Don’t use it. There _are_ other options. Like, I don’t know, doing the organizing yourselves, and not letting the whackjobs near the lecturns. Jesus. Yeah, I thought you’d appreciate the difference. A quick, unscientific survey (also known as a “google image search”) of Vancouver protests indicates that they are indeed, different. Sheesh, I think some of the guys up there were wearing ties! 🙂 So there you have the difference, and the reason I think protestwarrior does good, important work. The fact is that whatever one’s politics – liberal, conservative, pro-war, anti-war, even pacifist – the banner that many Americans march under is way too often far, far, far worse than whatever it is they are opposing. A good old-fashioned taunting, at the least, is in order. In turn, I’d agree that a Vancouver branch of the organization, if they have one, is probably a little silly. ---
**Author:** ![manhattan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manhattan/32/7_2.png) [@manhattan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manhattan)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/59 "2004-12-14T03:39:43Z")
> [@Gadfly](#): > > So there are some left-wing nutjobs, too. Noone’s denying that. > > But does this make marching right-wing nutjobs into any given protest any better? Will it actually solve **anything**? Of course not – exactly like the protests themselves. Do you seriously think _any_ government, left or right, American or non, takes seriously a protest organized under the aegis of unapologetic Trotskyites? Protests that are just general leftist bitchfests where the people who oppose the Iraq war march side-by-side with the Mumia people and the People’s Socialist Liberation Whateveritis? Nah, it mostly just pisses of the far lefties. Like I said, performance art, but without an NEA grant. And from time to time, it might encourage a conversation like this in which people of good will who happen to be on the left can learn exactly what kind of poisonous scum they’re marching with – and whether they realize it or not, for. ---
**Author:** ![MXR90](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c0e974/32.png) [@MXR90](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MXR90)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2004, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433/60 "2004-12-14T03:44:47Z")
> [@smiling bandit](#): > > Actually, the idea of protestwarrior is to kick the ass of modern liberalism, by denying it the appearance of protest by using its own methods against it. The argument goes, in simplicity, that is they choose to protest publicly and bypass reasoned debate, then we’d better use their own methods agains them. I went there and looked at the film footage of ‘peaceful’ protesters pushing and threatening these guys, as outnumbered as they were. From what I am to understand we all have a right to be heard, right? There was a pregnant woman on the PW side who was shoved around by a peaceful anti war protester, me thinks ‘peaceful’ has taken a whole new meaning according the lobbying, protesting critical left. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/protestwarrior-com/279433.md?page=4)