Why? Is the paralell to close for your comfort?
I just heard the sad news over the telegraph. Noted English Prime Minister and basketball center Neville Chamberlain was found dead in his flat at the age of 133. Early reports are sketchy but evidence indicates that Mr. Chamberlain was assaulted by the Utah Jazz led by a man with a ridiculously small mustache. The mess is reportedly horrendous.
You may not have appreciated his contributions to international diplomacy and Nike ads but there is no denying his impact on the nascent British rapper scene. Truly a British icon.
Well LC, if you hadn’t been so busy getting high…
I have no idea. I know there was at least a small one here in Sacramento.
My question (may become a new thread) for the international Dopers, is this: Does anyone think that the opinion of Italians, Irish or British folks is going to sway the U.S. Policy?
Bluesman, gobear, and Weirddave: enough with the inflammatory remarks. As you can clearly see, this is an MPSIMS thread about people attending anti-war rallies. This is something you may of course disagree with: you’ll find plenty of threads in GD and even the Pit accomodating your desires to debate, or curse those who attend these rallies.
Furthermore, implying that people who are opposed to the war on Iraq automatically support Saddam Hussein is completely disingenious. I have yet to see a person on these boards claim Iraq should be ignored, or that the weapons inspectors should withdraw from their mission. I have yet to see someone claim SH is one heckuva guy, and he’s misunderstood.
In short, take a chill pill. It’s entirely possible for rational people to oppose a war on Iraq. Expressing their opinions by means of an anti-war rally doesn’t make them supporters of a dictator. If you honestly believe so, then GD will be a steep learning curve, and the Pit will be downright devastating for you. But in any case: this thread is NOT the place.
raisinbread, you’re not funny. Not even in all purple.
It’s more about letting our democratically elected officials know what we think of the war, specifically, OUR involvement in it. (I"m using OUR=Irish, in this case)
If US Policy cannot be swayed by US citizen’s opinions, how could we expect our opinions to sway their objectives.
Having said that: 70,000 protestors in Amsterdam. Everything is relative: we’re a small country and only have 16 million people. 
I didn’t attend - not a protest rally kind of guy, honestly. I do oppose a war on Iraq at this stage, though.
Anahita’s right: protesters are mainly going to influence their own governments, which in turn will make the anti-war contingent in the UN stronger. The answer to the true question remains to be seen: will GWB et al give a damn, in the end, or will they just strike anyway?
In the case of Ireland, a substantial impetus for the march was to stop the Irish government allowing US military aircraft to refuel in Shannon airport, since this is unconstitutional. And the rest as Coldie has said.
I’d just like to make a few random personal comments on the march in Dublin I attended yesterday. It was huge: There were nearly 100,000 people there, out of a country of less than 4 million. This was five times the number of protesters expected by the organizers. The police only expected 10-15,000. Numbers like this haven’t been seen in the streets since Bloody Sunday, way back in the early 70s. Meanwhile the protest in London was the biggest in the history of Britain. That has to say something.
However, I was also predictably disheartened: though there were effigies of GWB with blood on his hands being carried through the streets, there were no effigies of Saddam. I know the protest was against US/UK action, but to believe some of the protestors, Saddam is just a sadly misunderstood sweetie, being threatened by the forces of imperialism.
On the TV news last night, exiled Iraqis, were marching in Dublin, were interviewed - they all said “We must get rid of Saddam. But not with war.” And I agree with them. Saddam must be disarmed and got rid of. I’m even glad that the US has brought this to a head. But war, at this point, in this manner, without exploring all other avenues (such as muscular, armed, NSA-assisted UN inspection and destruction of WMD, for example), isn’t the right way. I understand the “but he’s had 12 years” argument, but the truth of the matter is that between the inspectors’ expulsion in '98 and GWB’s SOTU speech in '02, this issue has been on the international back burner. Personally I think the current situation re policy towards Iraq should be considered from that date onwards.
So I was marching because currently the balance of cons outweighs the balance of pros. The last thing we need in this bloody world is a wholesale Western attack on a primarily Islamic country. As far as I can see, the most dangerous enemy the West currently has is Islamism. And if you think we have a problem with fundamentalist terrorists now, just wait 'till the bombs start falling on Baghdad.
So I felt the need to march. And if I get tarred with the brush of all the conspiracy nuts, “No War for Oil”, bandwagon-jumpers, knee-jerk anti-Americans, and unreconstructed leftists, then so be it. I do not agree with them, but I don’t agree with the hawks either. In the end, I marched for my own conscience.
there were about 1000 people at the protest here in detroit. It was a pretty pitiful showing, about 5% of the number of people who show up at any given red wings game(or, even worse, about 1.25% of the average attendance of a lions game).
The London protest was my first protest march, and the fact that I showed up despite my intense loathing of crowds and despite my severe dislike of several of the groups who would also be marching should be some measure of my opposition to the current war plans.
A lot of protestors seemed not to have gotten the memo about the purpose of the march. I saw a heck of a lot of “Freedom to Palestine” banners, and the Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament was out in force as well (although their signs were at least specifically in opposition to the Iraq conflict). One very confused fellow was waving a “No Poll Tax” sign; one wonders where he’s been for the last 20 years. There’s were some Middle Eastern-looking people waving yellow banners with a picture of an unidentified somebody on them – either a really bad picture of Saddam or perhaps somebody else they think should be in power there. And there was one of those “Frodo” banners as well.
And I was slightly confused by the small group of people chanting “What do we want? Freedom! When do we want it? Now!” . Ummm…you’re standing in the middle of one of the biggest protest marches the world has ever seen. If that’s not freedom, what is? We’re here for peace, thank you very much.
There were, of course, a lot of other, calmer looking folk. I came across a group of Buddhists in Trafalgar Square, and a large group of nuns on Piccadilly. There were old men with war medals and whole families with kids and dogs and all. Several branches of Unison had banners in evidence. In short, there were a lot of people. I left the parade for an hour to get a bite to eat, and it was still going strong when I came out again. One report I heard suggested that the end of the parade (on the Embankment) had finally stopped gathering people at around 4pm.
Despite the cold and the lunatic fringe, it was an amazing day out. Will it make a difference? Who knows? These things are about being heard. The ball is back in the Government’s court now.
With reference to jr8’s lunatic fringe, I was equally annoyed with the bandwagoneers.
I saw a lot of NO WAR IN IRAQ free Palestine banners, which, while I agree with the sentiment of the addendum, was irrelevant.
Must amusing banners I saw:
Axis of evil, me arse
PRETZELS FOR PEACE.
We tried and failed. Now it’s your turn.
DOWN WITH THIS SORT OF THING
(Father Ted reference)
Stupidest hijack I saw:
Alternative power and bicycles
Well, you must have been in a very different part of the march than I was, 'cause I certainly never got that impression from any of the protestors around me. In fact I have heard from many people who were absolutely horrified at the sight of what appeared to be Saddam Hussein flags (which in fact were pictures of Abdullah Ocalan, the Kurdish leader, who just looks a bit like Saddam).
Oh, and my candidate for :smack: banner was the tricolour adorned with the words “Thou Shalt Not Kill - Full Stop”. I mean, God knows nobody was killed to make the tricolour a national flag …
OK, I should clarify: it was the “Bush is a murderer”, “US-Israel = Genocide” banners and stuff like that I found ironic in the face of Saddam’s record. But since it was a march directed against US foreign policy, I don’t really have a right to complain.
I was on the Scottish march in Glasgow and I had a thought that a few surreal signs might have been fun, in particular “And we’ve brought a cave troll.” dunno, guess my mind was wandering.
There were a couple of cool signs particularly “Gonnae no’ dae that!” but you probably need to have seen the same TV shows as me to get the reference.
For what it’s worth I was stunned at the turnout, seeing a see of people wandering up the street is just impressive. From what I understand Tony Blair changed the time of his speech to the conference so he didn’t get to see the protesters – note that I’m not saying that’s why he did it, tho’ it does look suspicous.
It was the first time I’ve done something like that and I’ve got a strange feeling of having done something useful for a change. Some of the speakers at the rally were taking it a bit far to the left for my tastes but it was still an interesting day.
SD
Oo! Funny signs:
Why Not Bomb Alberta? They’ve Got Oil Too!
Stop War! Get Bush an Intern!
So How Did Our Oil Get Under Their Desert?
Sign I most would have liked to see:
LABIA: Lesbians Against Boys Invading Anything (Protest cheer: “We love Bush! We don’t mean George!”
Dateline-Madison, Wis, USA:I didn’t go to the one we had yesterday. I went to one about 2 weeks ago where there were 8,000 people. that was pretty exciting.
The one yesterday was too close, imho, to the previous one. There were only 1,000 yesterday, with a temp of about 15F at gametime. They did the protest at the Wisconsin-Indiana basketball game where 17,000 people attended. Kind of a stange thing to do, imho. There was only one arrest, some fan pushed a protestor or something. Lot’s of signs(make baskets, not war!) and a giant puppet.
I see the signs and puppets and giant balloons that they have in Europe and I’m jealous, ours are so lame compared to theirs.
The Brisbane march was huge as well, close to 100,000 reported, and I believe them. The people were like a river that didn’t stop. As I posted in another thread, the organisers were hoping for 10,000, they got 10 times that.
There were heaps of families with kids and old people, the police were noticeable by their low key presence and there was no drama at all.
Australians came out in force all over the weekend, it was the biggest turn out of protestors in our history. Unfortunately it seems to have had no effect on John Howard at this stage. :mad:
Slackers! Norway has only 4.5 millions and we had 60,000 protesters in Oslo alone. Surprised even the organizers, it did.
I didn’t go. I was planning to, even had my slogan worked out, but spent the day waiting by the phone because my dad was in the hospital after what turned out, thankfully, to be a mild heart attack.