“The future ain’t what it used to be.”

-Yogi Berra

  • 24 Posts
  • 706 Comments
Joined 3 years ago
Cake day: July 29th, 2023
  • TropicalDingdong@lemmy.worldtoLemmy Shitpost@lemmy.world•EU vs USA
    5·
    18 hours ago

    MLKs strategies were effective because they were novel and the state hadn’t built up the tools to deal with them. They had been caught off guard.

    The state long ago developed strategies to deal with protest including the use of media for narrative management, and the long term the socialization of “peaceful protest as the only acceptable form of protest” among left wing populations.

    The state adapted and evolved to be able to safely ignore peaceful protest, and also ran a long term propaganda campaign that “peaceful protest” is the only form of protest acceptable, and even further, has propagandized to convince people it’s the only form of protest even possible or effective.

    MLK was effective because the state hadn’t dealt with those strategies before. They adapted to deal with those strategies, then built funnels for grievances to focus exclusively on the tactics they had adapted to be able to ignore.

  • TropicalDingdong@lemmy.worldtoLemmy Shitpost@lemmy.world•EU vs USA
    29·
    17 hours ago

    It’s an inflammatory comment but it’s one worth repeating: a protest with a permission slip is a parade.

    There is one obvious permission structure and one non obvious permission structure at play here. The first and most obvious permission structure at play here is the state, and what the state is willing to accept in the form of protest. The other, less obvious permission structure, is what we as a collective society are willing to accept and consider valid as a form of protest.

    We often focus on the first without acknowledging the latter. There are some absolutely legitimate criticisms to be made of protests which seek permission from the state.

    What we don’t often talk about is that protest, for it to be effective, also needs to make the other members of society around you uncomfortable. the discomfort is the point, and modern protests in the US are done in a way to reduce discomfort and inconvenience for all, both the government and the protesters, but also society. And if the discomfort created isn’t so bad, protest can and will be readily ignored.

    The elephant in the room is that while peaceful protest worked, it was effective in a time where it was fairly novel and society didn’t have great ways of compartmentalizing it. The state and society adapted tools to be able to manage the inconveniences created from protest in such a way that protest is basically 100% ineffective in the US.

    If a protest is safe, it can be safely ignored. If a protest doesn’t inconvenience people in a manner that causes them to change behavior, it has no teeth.