2010-2020 saw more mass protests around the world than at any other point in human history, but the societal changes that resulted were often the opposite of what protesters demanded. Author Vincent Bevins explains why.
  • Jaysyn@kbin.social
    82·
    1 year ago

    The answer is a general strike, but I have no fucking idea how we’d pull that off in the USA without the majority becoming homeless.

      • SlikPikker@lemmy.caEnglish
        9·
        1 year ago

        Cops can’t stop general strikes

        Crackdowns only turn supporterts to active rebels, and sympathizers to supporters.

        State Violence only strengthens the movement.

          • Godric@lemmy.worldEnglish
            7·
            1 year ago

            And once your there, will they grab your hands and use them to make sandwiches or type code or whatever you do for a living? It’s much easier to deny living space than compel action.

          • nymwit@lemm.eeEnglish
            1·
            1 year ago

            Are they going to stand there with a gun pointed at me making me work? Will they bring you home at the end of the day? Hell, I’m thinking I could cut my commute costs and probably get more done!

    • BolexForSoup@kbin.social
      13·
      1 year ago

      Historically it has been sustained, smaller, local action that has produced results far more frequently than attempted general strikes. Everybody wants to do this the quick way and they aren’t willing to roll up their sleeves and put in the time to do it locally. They think that everybody’s just going to nod and stop working and it’s all going to be glorious, but that’s just not how it goes down. You can count the number of truly successful general strikes that were clear victories on one hand.

    • eatthecake@lemmy.worldEnglish
      12·
      1 year ago

      Consumption strike. Just stop buying nonessentials. Rent strike, mortgage strike. Protests are worthless if you’re still buying crap from amazon and eating at chain restaurants.

    • fiat_lux@kbin.social
      22·
      1 year ago

      I guess that depends on who ‘we’ means? The September climate protests were pretty big globally, with 50 countries participating.

      As someone who has been to protests in the past for various topics, my experience is that the media isn’t interested in reporting on them unless they get dramatic eye-catching footage. Which unfortunately usually means just the ones that have a physical fight break out make the front page anywhere.

        • fiat_lux@kbin.social
          6·
          1 year ago

          Then I have to disagree. They’ve been most effective on smaller jurisdiction governments, but there have been a good amount of significant protests the past few years. The Carnegie endowment tracker has a pretty good list.

          Physical protests have limitations though like transport to a central point. I suspect the support is greater than attendees.

            • fiat_lux@kbin.social
              5·
              1 year ago

              and we don’t need new strategies, in direct opposition to the headline?

              No. In direct support of the article body, I agree we need to modify mass protest tactics to create more chaos. Chaos and violence are not necessarily the same thing. It is possible to escalate to something before violence, and escalation from 0 to 100 may not be necessary at all.

              The more innocent people who are killed, the more the survivors understandably want their pound of flesh. It fuels the cycle of abuse and atrocities, and we have thousands of years of evidence that murder has had limited effectiveness at creating a better world too.

      • Honytawk@lemmy.zipEnglish
        10·
        1 year ago

        Climate Action, housing crisis, massive debts, pollution, minimum wage increases, racism, police brutality, rich people not getting punished, politicians not keeping their word, corruption, …

  • fiat_lux@kbin.social
    16·
    1 year ago

    I’m telling you, an army of vuvuzela-players and mimes to follow elected officials around in public, with a shift roster to get 24/7 coverage. No media interviews without the droning hum of a vuvuzela, no photo opportunities without a sneaky mime making an exaggerated lewd pose in the background, no pleasant meals with lobbyists without a distant but audible brrrrrrrrrrrr.

    The media chooses not to report on peaceful protests all the time, but they always give coverage to Gaetz, Cruz and Graham talking absolute shit. Make them edit the videos to take out mimes and vuvuzelas.

          • fiat_lux@kbin.social
            1·
            1 year ago

            And that’s how you get revenge killings and more death and suffering. Humanity has tried murder a few more times than peaceful protest already to “solve problems” and it hasn’t created a safer world for innocent people or better lives for the poor or sustainable environmental practices.

            First you are concerned police won’t let people play vuvuzela, but you’re not concerned that they’ll torture and kill you for murder? Or is it because you are ok with letting others do the dirty work for you?

              • fiat_lux@kbin.social
                1·
                1 year ago

                I’m not playing pacifist, I’m trying to determine the best course of action with the least suffering.

                I know they’ll suppress any peaceful revolt, so the only logical step left is active revolt.

                Which active revolts would you point to as successes to model your tactics on? What was it about those that made them succeed? Are you sure it was the violence, or was it other contributing factors?

                but don’t complain when you get killed

                And which target have you chosen to sacrifice your life for? Are you happy to have the hospital your family are in bombed when it’s determined there are “enemy combatants” inside?

                Maybe instead of adding fire to fire, we could try to stop selling oil to the people holding lighters and deciding fire extinguishers are useless when plain water doesn’t work like we hoped.

                The people who benefit from war are the tank makers and gun sellers. Everyone is aghast when industry is causing climate change and then… turning around to fuel the military industrial complex to solve problems war has also failed to solve. Brilliant. It will surely work this time!

            • Streptember@kbin.social
              1·
              1 year ago

              If all there is is suffering for us, then why not ensure that those in power are along for the ride with us?

              • fiat_lux@kbin.social
                1·
                1 year ago

                Because why add to the unnecessary suffering in the world if we don’t want it for ourselves and we don’t need to create it at all?

                For example, I have a chronic pain medical condition. It blows chunks and I wouldn’t wish its effects on anyone - even the people who would kill me for not being as able-bodied as most others. If the people who cause misery experiencing my pain wouldn’t cure me, what would be the purpose? At best they would be more miserable and then inflict that additional misery on others who don’t deserve the extra misery either.

                It seems like a futile and painful self-perpetuating cycle.

                • Streptember@kbin.social
                  2·
                  1 year ago

                  Ultimately, the ideal (but incredibly unrealistic) solution would be a global, coordinated effort to immediately remove from power everyone who abuses their power along with a dedication to continuing to do so whenever another pops up, regardless of the personal cost. Bringing them down with us is only slightly less unrealistic.

                  I ultimately have no desire to see them suffer, I simply want them out of power, and I think that for the sake of the future, it’s worth any cost that they might pay.

                  As John Brown said: “I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood. I had, as I now think, vainly flattered myself that without very much bloodshed it might be done.” And he was right about that. If we cannot achieve a better future with little bloodshed, then we owe it to the future to achieve it with any amount of bloodshed necessary.

                  No amount of suffering that those in power experience could ever match the amount of suffering that forever failing to remedy the problem will cause to the quadrillions of humans that could exist in the future or even just the billions that exist now. If we humans unable to band together to eliminate threats, even those from within, then we will suffer like this forever. It’s better to try and fail than to passively allow it to continue for the rest of history.

      • fiat_lux@kbin.social
        3·
        1 year ago

        So that’s why FIFA and the London Olympics banned them? /jk

        I just want what the interviewee wants. Media that can’t easily ignore the angrily trumpetting elephant in the room.

  • Possibly linux@lemmy.zipEnglish
    13·
    1 year ago

    People expect way to much change from a single protest. You need to contact your representative and get enough people to join in order to get some attention.

    Your protest also can’t be silly like a lot of recent protests are don’t go protest the 2016 election or 2020 election as you will accomplish nothing. Also make sure you have some sort of purpose or end goal. All of the protests I’ve heard about have no purpose.

    • gmtom@lemmy.worldEnglish
      17·
      1 year ago

      So you’re going to ignore the decades of protests about climate action? That have all been ignored because the people in power will never give a shit about your protest if its easily ignored.

      • GalacticCmdr@lemmy.worldEnglish
        4·
        1 year ago

        Small protests are easily ignored. DC climate action protest - 75k people in a nation of 300+ million - even if the muster 1m it’s still peanuts. It doesn’t even move the needle.

        Take that same number, 1 million, and have the vast majority be from Georgia marching in Atlanta. Georgia is 10m with 7m available voters. Now we have enough numbers to push the needle.

        Sure it’s not on a Federal level, but politics are local. Federal action is a quagmire unless enough localities begin to gel behind a single direction - then those seeking Federal office will have to pivot.

        • gmtom@lemmy.worldEnglish
          3·
          1 year ago

          I’m from the UK, the biggest protests in my countries history were the stop the war protest in 2003 where 1.5 million people attended and the protests for a second EU referendum where the largest had 1.2 million protest.

          And because they were both peaceful protests, they were completely and easily ignored.

          Then if you compare that to just about any protest in France where less popple protest, but they do so in a way that isn’t easily ignored, they get far more shit done.

          • GalacticCmdr@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            1 year ago

            The UK had its chance with the EU referendum and voted to leave. The populace had a chance to voice its opinion and it did.

            • gmtom@lemmy.worldEnglish
              1·
              1 year ago

              There’s a couple hundred arguments as to why that’s horse shit, but give only a couple:

              The brexit that was promised and voted for was not the one that was delivered, nor was it even possible.

              By the time it actually happened and the protests were happening enough of the pro brexit population had died that if the same vote where to happen the exact same way, remain would have won.

    • Honytawk@lemmy.zipEnglish
      10·
      1 year ago

      If we take out the guillotines, there will be much change from a single protest

  • MedicatedMaybe@lemmy.worldEnglish
    8·
    1 year ago

    Well we should really try a mass protest first. If we can actually get people together we can see if mass protest work. The only other attentive is to compost the rich!

    • Possibly linux@lemmy.zipEnglish
      2·
      1 year ago

      To protest what? That’s the problem with modern times. Everyone is dead set in there beliefs and protesting doesn’t change that.

  • OrteilGenou@lemmy.worldEnglish
    6·
    1 year ago

    We all fart into pillows for hours, then tell the baddies we bought a new fabric softener that smells like peach

  • Hello_there@kbin.social
    4·
    1 year ago

    The only actual wealth redistribution to the working class that has happened in recent years are the flash mobs looting from stores during the pandemic

      • fiat_lux@kbin.social
        3·
        1 year ago

        I would really like it if we could at least try some other non-violent strategies first, but that’s just me.

          • fiat_lux@kbin.social
            1·
            1 year ago

            No, which is why I would like to at least try some other ideas before violence. Because violence doesn’t seem to be doing a lot of anyone any good, historically or presently.

            • BluJay320English
              2·
              1 year ago

              That’s literally what this entire post is talking about, though… I’m not saying violence is necessarily the answer, but we’ve been trying nonviolent methods, and they aren’t working

              • fiat_lux@kbin.social
                1·
                1 year ago

                To be more accurate, they posited that the more chaotic the action, the more effective the protest has historically been, not that non-violent protest is not effective at all. I think that’s an important distinction.

                They also say this:

                People are willing to stand up and ask for it, but all you have to do is just tinker with the tactics, tinker with the approach

                I believe it is possible to create chaos without requiring violence. I agree we need to tinker with the approach. I do not think escalating straight to violence is necessary and that we possess the creativity to modify tactics instead of abandoning principles. We should leave the most damaging options for the last resort.

                • BluJay320English
                  1·
                  1 year ago

                  Alternatively…

                  A bit of tar and feathering is always fun

          • fiat_lux@kbin.social
            1·
            1 year ago

            We have tried some non-violent methods. It may not be the non-violent part that is causing them to be ineffective. It is possible to modify the tactics before abandoning peace.

            We have also tried the violent option for instigating social change thousands of years. I am not convinced that the good to come from those historical examples outweighs the bad, or is even close. I am convinced that people who feel wronged often want equal or greater revenge and it is often targetted really poorly.