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Showing posts with label Protesting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Protesting. Show all posts

Tuesday, January 22, 2019

Punishing First Means Never Having To Ask Questions Later

Almost everyone has seen the picture of the high school student, Nick Sandmann, wearing a MAGA hat and standing in the way of a Native American Vietnam Veteran, Nathan Phillips, who was playing a drum and chanting. According to a Huffington Post article (click here), Sandmann said he was trying to diffuse a tense situation where he claimed that Phillips was yelling at his friends to go home to Europe. In addition, the high school students with Sandmann had been taunted by protesters from another group.





According to Phillips, he put himself between the high school students and the group that was taunting the kids. Phillips claimed that he was simply trying to diffuse the situation (click here). 

I've been to protests. I know what diffuses tense situations. And while leading a protest, I've had counter protesters try obstruct our protest. I don't find Sandmann's account to be credible according to my experiences. I don't see a Native American elder who is also a Vietnam trying to start a confrontation by yelling at the kids telling them to return to Europe. As a Vietnam Veteran, Phillips worked with and/or faught alongside White Americans in far more tense situations than the confrontation in D.C. In addition, the best way to diffuse a situation between another group and your own is to walk away to be passive. And one doesn't diffuse a situation by standing in a face to face confrontation with the group that is challenging you. Once when the group of protesters I was leading were obstructed, we silently waited and the police told those obstructing us to move. Not only did we not have do anything, we didn't need to say anything or challenge those obstructing us either.

But besides the above, Sandmann's school stated that it would investigate and punish the students responsible with possible expulsions. And that is what we want to address here.


Unfortunately, the American first response to most transgression is to punish. Part of that is because of our nation's obsession with individualism. Because of that obsession, transgressions are seen as occurring without any context. When those of us who are privileged read about some crime committed by someone who is not privileged, we often do not take the differences in our status into account when judging the crime. We usually judge those committing crimes as having the same advantages we do and thus we show no understanding for their actions.

In addition, there have been too many times when we Americans have equated punishment and justice. Too many of us believe that the best way to respond to crime is to inflict pain believing that a criminal only needs ecough pain to teach them not to commit another crime. Under such a scenario, justice is spelled 'revenge.' We see this in both criminal justice and in our lawsuits. Little thought is given to correcting behavior through education. And not that we should equate justice and education. But justice should be thought of as having

When Sandmann's school investigates the incident, it could very well be that they find  that the confrontation between Sandmann and Phillips was due to an innocent misunderstanding and thus no punishment would be warranted. But should Sandmann's school find that Sandmann and some of the other students were showing gross disrespect for Philips, I don't think expulsion should be considered. Yes, there could be some punishment. But along with that, Sandmann's school should attempt to find ways for Sandmann and his friends to learn about Native Americans, their history, and their current plight. In other words, Sandmann's school's response to any wrongful behavior committed by Sandmann and his friends should include education along with any sanctions. In fact, his school's response should revolve much more around educating the students involved more than on punishing them. In fact, perhaps our criminal justice system should do the same with many kinds of nonviolent crimes.








References
  1. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/nick-sandmann-native-american-maga-protest_us_5c452fa7e4b027c3bbc2f869

Monday, May 1, 2017

ONIM For May 1, 2017

If you are not sure about the validity of a news story linked to below, you can use mediabiasfactcheck.com to check out the credibility of the source of the story. 


Christian News


World News



Protest News

Syrian Civil War News


Pick(s) Of The Litter





Tuesday, February 7, 2017

Right Ways To Protest The Right

Since Trump has come into power, a number of protests have been conducted against various groups from the Right. Here we should note that the Right is not a monolith. These protests include both peaceful and violent actions. Sometimes the protests target the new figurehead for Conservatism: President Donald Trump while at other times policies or other people have the target of activist events.

The desire to write this blogpost was borne from a strong reaction to the Berkley protests against the scheduled appearance of Breibart editor Milo Yiannopoulos. The protests included violence and all that could be seen by those on the right was the fulfillment of the stereotype many conservatives have of nonconservatives. That stereotype is one of decadence and the desire to control others. Acting out in ways that support that stereotype only hardens the hearts of conservatives. In addition, it is simply morally wrong to act violently and destroy property.



Nevertheless, there is much to protest against now that the Republicans have full control of Congress and the Presidency. This only provides job security for many of us activists, and that is true even for those of us who protest for free. Here we should note that not only are there right and wrong ways to protest, there are effective and ineffective ways to protest. A First Things article tried to point that out by saying that the right way to protest is to sponsor events where issues can be discussed or to volunteer where a need has been created by wrong policies (click here for the article).  The trouble with this article isn't in what it is suggesting, but it is in giving an unnecessary exclusive-or choice between traditional activism and what was suggested by the article. BTW, we should note that the article made a big deal about the profanity of the signs in the Women's March without noting that profanity-laced signs were in the minority at th9se protests. Plus, why should nonconservatives cater to the language sensitivities of conservatives at nonconservative protests?


The two protests that could provide a model for us to follow was the Women's March, because how peaceful it was, and Meryl Streep's speech at the Golden Globes. Not many thought of her monologue as a protest, but it was. It was an actress, we should note that artists are the first secular prophets who can tell us what is wrong with society, using her opportunity to give an acceptance speech to speak out against an injustice she witnessed. Her speech was eloquent, restrained and thus free of hyperbole.




But most of all, the conservative reaction to her speaking out became an admission of guilt. For while Streep was careful to say that candidate Trump had imitated a disabled person, conservatives, including Trump, responded by denying that he had mocked the reporter. Again, she only said he had imitated the reporter. And the videos of his responding to that reporter show that to be the case.

It is very easy for people in their respective groups to scapegoat all other groups for the problems we have in America. As a result, tribalism more than conservative control of the government has become the biggest threat to our democracy. When groups scapegoat others or when they become violent and destructive,  all they are demonstrating is that they want to seize power and control. But this competition for power and control results in an eternal king-of-the-hill battle. Such battle can only ensure that only some people rule in our democracy, not all. And that right there signals the end of democracy.

Noting that tribalism is our biggest enemy, we need to construct our protests in ways that do not trigger tribal responses.




Monday, October 3, 2016

ONIM For October 3, 2016

Presidential Election


Christian News

World News

Pick(s) Of The Litter

 


References


  1.