How to protest
- Details
- Category: Your Opinion is Wrong
- Published on Wednesday, February 15, 2012 - 14:58
- Written by Tom Z
Here’s an interesting article titled “How To Be Outraged in America” from the website Common Dreams. The article discusses the similarities and differences between the Susan G. Komen/Planned Parenthood controversy, and the outrage over M.I.A.’s middle finger during the Super Bowl.
Let's call the kind of outrage Komen's decision ignited the healthy kind of outrage, in diametric opposition of PTC's childish pseudo-indignation, an informed and electrifying kind of reaction that had the wonderful consequence of alerting tens of thousands, even millions of people to the fact that not only is one of the nation's leading charities violently lopsided, fundamentally misguided and not so deserving of your dollars, but that Planned Parenthood is, well, just the opposite.
I’ve written about M.I.A.’s finger previously. To recap: I don’t give a shit. As far as the Planned Parenthood controversy, I actually side with the Komen foundation on that one. They do enough good already by fighting breast cancer. If they don’t want to solve the teen pregnancy issue, that’s their business. Do you want them to teach your kids Spanish as well? Get birth control at one of the 8 million other places and let Komen focus on women with breast cancer.
Now I want to talk about the real issue. Protests. There are way too many of them going on in America right now. How do people do it? Even if I wanted to protest something, I wouldn’t have the time. I have shit to do. When it comes to protesting, it seems like caring about institutional change is the secondary requirement. The number one requirement is having nothing else going on. Also, protesters have to do a better job advertising what exactly they’re protesting. This weekend I saw a protest that featured a guy with a billboard hanging around his neck, someone with a sign urging drivers to honk, and a guy dressed as Uncle Sam. I couldn’t tell if it was Occupy Wall Street, a local union protest, or a Presidents’ Day Sale at Bob’s Discount Furniture. Hire a marketing guy, for Christ’s sake.
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