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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (1782)	7/19/2005 10:01:11 AM
From: epicure	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541741

If you asked me to join you in a political protest I really wouldn't know whether it was going to be violent or not (I wouldn't think you would be violent, but that's because I know you). That's why I didn't take my kids to the anti-war marches- because some of the anarchists ARE violent when they mount their political protests, and they were part of the marchers (not a huge part, but they were there)- it's part and parcel. Our founding fathers were violent in some of their protests (terrorists, even)- that's the way freedom is. Freedom will involve a certain level of violence- because part of freedom, and free speech, is the constant possibility of people making their points violently. I happen to think it's worth the risk. Seems to me you want free political speech without any risk- you can't have that. Democracy is always in "big trouble"- that's part of its charm. A democracy is constantly on a kinfe edge- because there are always people who want to take their freedoms too far, and people who want to curtail freedoms for the sake of "safety". You can make an easy, rational distinction between peaceful political protest, and violent political protest, by simply saying "peaceful political protest" and "violent political protest". IMO

To: Lane3 who wrote (1782)	7/20/2005 4:31:20 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 541741

Some, maybe a lot of, terrorism is a form of protest. Some protests involve terrorism. But not only is it true that most protests are not terrorism, its also true that not all terrorism is a form of protest. So I think I agree with you that it is more accurate to consider them separate things than to consider terrorism a subset of protest. The sets overlap but neither is entirely contained within the other. Even if you do consider it a subset it has more differences than similarities between terrorism and most forms of protest. Technically when a spec of dust from a meteorite that burned up in the atmosphere impacts your house, your house has been hit by an extra-terrestrial object. You could put that in the same category as an asteroid the size of Delaware hitting your house but most people would not. :) Tim