Listen / Read
So, it didn’t turn out so peacefully after all. Violent clashes, acts of vandalism and one death. Perhaps more adventure than a mild mannered Associate Lecturer might want to engage with Biblically.
The majority were peaceful protesters, but it was inevitable there was going to be some violence. The police may even have invited some of it when they let on that they expected and were preparing for a summer of rage. But in these circumstances and with this level of anger ready to pour forth, it was going to happen either way. Though it is only spring still.
A government that ignores the sentiments of popular peaceful protest, as with the march against the Iraq war, in turn encourages violent protests, when people feel that their presence and placards alone are not being taken notice of.
I think Draper may have missed the point of the protests, as well as the protests themselves. What the protesters stand for is revealed by what they choose to stand against. We live in a complex world with various interrelated issues converging simultaneously. There’s no one solution, no singular, higher cause. It’s not that simple. There’s climate change, which converges with consumerism, which converges with capitalism, which indeed converges with the military-industrial complex.
Now I’ve said that, a singular, higher cause does come to mind. Be less greedy.
So now I’ve talked myself into agreement with Draper on some level, let me just take issue with the idea that, one day, the last will be first. Isn’t the point that no one should be first? The first actually need to drop back to what is currently the middle, and then the last can catch up. And we can all be in the middle. Only there won’t really be a middle any more, so we’ll all just be… really boring.
Which, again, is more or less Draper’s point. And the way he made it.
Fuck.