Home

TheSinner.net

60+ students occupy uni building in protest

This message board is for discussing anything in any way remotely connected with St Andrews, the University or just anything you want. Welcome!

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby Senethro on Tue Mar 03, 2009 1:01 pm

Death to Zionists! God is great!
Senethro
 
Posts: 1796
Joined: Sat May 22, 2004 9:40 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby munchingfoo! on Tue Mar 03, 2009 1:22 pm

exnihilo wrote:What point are you making?


If you say it in the voice of Peter Griffin it's quite humorous, although I am sure that is at the opposite of what RedCelt intended.
munchingfoo!
 

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby David Bean on Tue Mar 03, 2009 2:33 pm

Lid wrote:I'm sorry, David, as much as I disagree with the motives of the incubators, or whatever they've called themselves now, and as much as I agree with everything else you've written, it's your crusade against international law I have to disagree with. This is not a UNSC resolution here, this is from the General Assembly of the United Nations. A country that so defies the United Nations, a place where they quite happily take a seat in, cannot stand in defiance of a resolution of that body, no matter how begrudging it is of it. It's abhorrent.


Well, first of all expressing the opinion that the UNGA once got something wrong hardly amounts to a crusade against international law (if I said I thought it got two things wrong what would that be, a pogrom?), and given that much of international law doesn't actually exist, it'd be hard to imagine what such a crusade would look like if I had any intention of mounting one.

However, you would appear to have missed the wider subtlety of my argument: I was endeavouring to provide a self-referential proof of my earlier point about the irrelevance of our views on the Middle East conflict to university research policy, by providing an example (which I don't entirely believe, at least not to the exaggerated extent I wrote) of a wildly different yet equally valid point of view to that of the PSC members. My real point was, why should someone who holds that sort of opinion be arbitrarily disenfranchised, whilst those who believe the opposite are thrust to the forefront?

Anyone?

Please?
Psalm 91:7
David Bean
 
Posts: 3053
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby RedCelt69 on Tue Mar 03, 2009 2:49 pm

exnihilo wrote:What point are you making?

Uhm... that we already live in a very strange world indeed.
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/membship/veto/vetosubj.htm
Tho' Nature, red in tooth and celt
With ravine, shriek'd against his creed

Red Celt's Blog
RedCelt69
User avatar
 
Posts: 947
Joined: Tue Jul 29, 2008 4:28 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby exnihilo on Tue Mar 03, 2009 3:19 pm

We live in a strange world because countries with the veto power use it from time to time?
exnihilo
 
Posts: 4999
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby RedCelt69 on Tue Mar 03, 2009 5:08 pm

exnihilo wrote:We live in a strange world because countries with the veto power use it from time to time?

If your definition of "from time to time" covers every time the UN seeks to condemn Israeli thuggery, then yes.

It is a strange world wherein the body representing the nations of the world can be muted by 5 permanent member-nations which have the power of veto. Israel is the main example of blatant US misuse of their veto. The matter of immunity from prosecution of US troops in the ICC is another.

Strange, indeed.
Tho' Nature, red in tooth and celt
With ravine, shriek'd against his creed

Red Celt's Blog
RedCelt69
User avatar
 
Posts: 947
Joined: Tue Jul 29, 2008 4:28 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby exnihilo on Tue Mar 03, 2009 5:31 pm

There have been, according to the quickest glance at WikiPedia, 131 resolutions concerning Israel. Of those, how many were vetoed? And of those which were vetoed, how many sought to portray Israel in the same fair and balanced way you just did?
exnihilo
 
Posts: 4999
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby Jono on Tue Mar 03, 2009 7:06 pm

RedCelt69 wrote:
exnihilo wrote:We live in a strange world because countries with the veto power use it from time to time?

If your definition of "from time to time" covers every time the UN seeks to condemn Israeli thuggery, then yes.

It is a strange world wherein the body representing the nations of the world can be muted by 5 permanent member-nations which have the power of veto. Israel is the main example of blatant US misuse of their veto. The matter of immunity from prosecution of US troops in the ICC is another.

Strange, indeed.


The Veto might be (arguably) undemocratic, but it just reflects a fact of life! Without the economic and military support from (some of) the nations with the veto, any action by the UN would be toothless. Without an army to enforce it's peacekeeping, or economic blockades.In short, international law can roundly be considered the law of the battlefield. Whoever has the biggest stick wins! The veto is merely a less threatening way of imposing a political will, without having to resort to rolling out the tanks.
Now some people weren't happy about the content of that last post. And we can't have someone not happy. Not on the internet.
Jono
Moderator

User avatar
 
Posts: 1252
Joined: Wed Nov 02, 2005 9:44 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby RedCelt69 on Tue Mar 03, 2009 7:26 pm

exnihilo wrote:There have been, according to the quickest glance at WikiPedia, 131 resolutions concerning Israel. Of those, how many were vetoed? And of those which were vetoed, how many sought to portray Israel in the same fair and balanced way you just did?

Good question. Of those 131 resolutions which the USA didn't veto, how many actually passed? (ie didn't require a US veto). Have they ever supported such a resolution (not vetoed and not abstained)?

Do you believe your portryal of Israel is "fair and balanced"?

Jono wrote:The Veto might be (arguably) undemocratic,

Arguably? o.o

Jono wrote:but it just reflects a fact of life! Without the economic and military support from (some of) the nations with the veto, any action by the UN would be toothless. Without an army to enforce it's peacekeeping, or economic blockades.In short, international law can roundly be considered the law of the battlefield. Whoever has the biggest stick wins! The veto is merely a less threatening way of imposing a political will, without having to resort to rolling out the tanks.

The UN already is toothless... certainly militarily. It relies on the US (and their allies) for putting actual troops on the ground on those occasions when peace-keeping duties are insufficient. Sadly, far too often, peace-keeping has meant standing idly by whilst people are killed. Still, the aftermath of genocide is a peace (of sorts) that is easy to keep.
Tho' Nature, red in tooth and celt
With ravine, shriek'd against his creed

Red Celt's Blog
RedCelt69
User avatar
 
Posts: 947
Joined: Tue Jul 29, 2008 4:28 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby Jono on Tue Mar 03, 2009 7:44 pm

That should read, arguably insofar as the UN general assembly is itself undemocratic. Why should a nation of 2bn people have the same voting rights as a state with a population of 2m? Why should a repressive dictatorship be afforded the same voting rights as a secular democracy? The veto is just one of many, many problems with the UN.
Now some people weren't happy about the content of that last post. And we can't have someone not happy. Not on the internet.
Jono
Moderator

User avatar
 
Posts: 1252
Joined: Wed Nov 02, 2005 9:44 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby exnihilo on Wed Mar 04, 2009 12:28 am

RedCelt69 wrote:Do you believe your portryal of Israel is "fair and balanced"?


I don't recall offering one...
exnihilo
 
Posts: 4999
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby munchingfoo on Wed Mar 04, 2009 10:23 am

pwnd
I'm not a large water-dwelling mammal Where did you get that preposterous hypothesis? Did Steve
munchingfoo
Moderator

 
Posts: 5108
Joined: Fri Dec 06, 2002 2:09 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby mhuzzell on Fri Mar 06, 2009 12:19 pm

Jono wrote:Is this what the protest was all about then? The SA is a bit bureaucratic, so lets go protest instead?
...
The old guard might think that the Association is made of “bureaucracy and fail!” (As somebody put it to me the other day). Sure. I know better than most that the wheels turn very slowly, and that the hoops are more plentiful than we’d like. Yet plenty of us have navigated them successfully this year! We’ve even managed to eliminate some of them.
...
With that in mind, I’m throwing down the gauntlet. I want to see each and every one of you involved with the occupation who isn’t graduating this year, standing for the Association elections. Nominations open the week after next, so you have ample time to research the roles available and formulate some kind of campaign team. Moreover, win or lose, I expect to hear of an active involvement with the Association next year (whether through the SRC, societies, subcommittees, or whatever else).
...
The Association happens to be the best (read: the only) way for the student body to affect any kind of influence on the University. If any of you want to affect a real change, you’ll take up my gauge, put your money where your mouth is, and some other rhetorical flourishes too!


First and foremost, I want to correct what seems to be a widespread assumption: that the "old guard" were the ones who set up the occupation. That there is an 'old guard' at all is merely mythical. Several of the people who were involved in setting up the Gaza solidarity occupation were involved in some campaign or another at this university previously (eg, Lower Rents Now or the renewable energy campaign, though in all but one case probably not both; I don't think any of them are old enough to have worked on Ethical Investment or FairTrade), but they were by no means all or even the majority, for all I know -- being among what some might consider the 'old guard' myself, and having been totally uninvolved in the planning of the occupation.

Second, that the people in the occupation were in any way homogeneous. We were not; many of us probably would not have agreed about many political issues besides this one. We were not even all leftists -- the occupation included many who considered themselves moderate, apolitical and even conservative.

Third, I'd like to clarify that the bureaucratic stumbling blocks in dispute are not, at least primarily, the ones set up by the Students' Association. Rather, the University itself makes it difficult for students to voice their opinions or actually effect change in the University. Instead, we may only beg and plead with the Union, who, if they choose to listen to us (as they didn't with LRN, but do with most sustainability issues), are permitted to come, tamed and cowed, to the University's governing bodies and there, with proper supervision, are sometimes allowed to -- as you aptly though perhaps accidentally put it -- affect change.

Now, don't get me wrong, I think the SA has the potential to be a really good, really powerful force for students' interests -- especially with Dr Richardson being so much more open to dialogue than Brian Lang seems to have been. However, I also think it's important that they not be the only negotiating tool available to students. On which note, with Dr Richardson's pledge to keep open office hours to hear from all sections of the university, I am -- as I still am for Obama -- cautiously optimistic.

As for your gauntlet-throwing: I don't know about all the people in the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign, but I've had words with several who were there who I'd like to see elected for other reasons, and many of them are reluctant. Given the testimony of all of us who have experienced the thankless, harrowing, degree-draining slog that is the SRC, can you really blame them?
I FOUND JESUS... he was behind the couch the whole time!
mhuzzell
 
Posts: 137
Joined: Thu Jan 18, 2007 4:47 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby David Bean on Fri Mar 06, 2009 5:51 pm

Thank you for your measured, reasoned, engaging post. Please don't take this in the wrong way, but as I'm sure you're aware the duty of the Students' Association officers and members is only to do what they honestly believe to be the right and best thing, and although public opinion, so far as it can be ascertained, will always serve as one guide to what the right thing might be, it won't entirely dictate what they do or believe. Accordingly, it won't do to complain that they 'don't listen' to the pleas of other students (either as individuals or in groups) on any particular issue; the way to ensure that a view is represented is to have that person stand for election and lay their beliefs out for people to make their own decision about. This doesn't work in every case, of course - issues often come up that nobody had even dreamed of at the time of the last election campaign, and also most of the portfolios won't have anything to do with any given issue, so it's not as though the election campaign is likely to have been fought on that basis anyway, so there's no way of knowing whether the people who were elected happen to have views that reflect those of the majority. But still, it's the system we have, and I think it's the best one - ultimately it works a bit like a classical republic, where students are elected based on their character, and the students put their faith in them to do what's right. So whilst students are of course free (and encouraged) to lobby the Association and its officers, ultimately if the answer is 'no' then there should be no hard feelings - ultimately they're all volunteers (most definitely including the sabbaticals, whose salaries are enough to live on and not much else), and in it to serve the student community.

Since we have a reasonable member of the PSC here now, can I repeat my question as to why the PSC feels that its members, or students more generally with a particular view of the Israel/Palestine situation, should receive special treatment by the university when it comes to representation on committees deciding on research partnerships, when students with opposing views are excluded? I'll admit that this started out as a debating point, but now I really am curious, I genuinely want to know what their take is on this. To me, the idea is unthinkably hypocritical, and I'd never have what I'd see as the arrogance to assume that my opinions entitle me, or those who agree with me, to special representation, but am I missing something here? Can it really be as it appears, that you're all so puffed up in self-satisfied certainty as to the absolute objective correctness of your own opinions, and that those who disagree with you are equally objectively wrong, that your overall strategy becomes one not of engaging and convincing freely, but simply of finding ways to impose your truth on a less enlightened world?

Because if that really is it, if there really isn't a better account that you can give of your behaviours, objectives and motivations, then you are, objectively in the true sense, a monstrous horde of totalitarians who would have been welcomed warmly into the ranks of the Spanish Inquisition, the Salem witch-burners or the Stasi.
Psalm 91:7
David Bean
 
Posts: 3053
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 12:00 am

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby mhuzzell on Fri Mar 06, 2009 9:52 pm

Of course I am aware of the representational -- as opposed to directly democratic -- structure of the Students' Association. That aspect is, in fact, precisely why I find it so disingenuous to claim that they are the "proper channels" and that we "should have gone to them first". In short, that's why I think direct action was justified; it is therefore strange to see the SA used as a point against the tactic.

While I'm giving short answers: the reason the PSC was promised representation on the review committees is that we demanded it! However, there is a more subtle rationale -- or at least a precedent. It's a bit like how members of the Ethical Investment campaign were put on the EI steering committee when it was set up. It's because they are the students with a relevant interest in the topic at hand, and who are most keen to see it move forward. Besides which, the PSC is not a member-based campaign, so at least in theory anybody could get involved with the campaign and thereby the review processes. I am in favour of open committees myself, but this is what the university agreed to.

Finally, I have to object to your implication that I am the first 'reasonable member of the PSC' to have shown myself on this thread (at least, I assume you mean me since I am the only self-identified occupator to have posted recently). This thread descended to a fairly base level of discourse shortly after it started, and it was not the protesters who pushed it there. Those writing from the occupation were having to defend themselves and their actions against savage attacks (no pun intended) from almost the very beginning. I'm not saying that they/we were entirely blameless or reasonable, but we were no less reasonable than our opponents.

Even you, you know, have not been entirely innocent. Just now, simply in the course of constructing your clever linguistic trap -- with your opinions couched in a poisonous shell of loaded but unargued-for assumptions and claimed 'objectivity' -- you have compared we poor "pointless people" with "the Spanish Inquisition, the Salem witch-burners or the Stasi". Do you really believe that, just because your searing barbs of rhetoric are eloquently phrased, they hurt any less, or are any less likely to put their victims on the defensive?
I FOUND JESUS... he was behind the couch the whole time!
mhuzzell
 
Posts: 137
Joined: Thu Jan 18, 2007 4:47 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby Jono on Fri Mar 06, 2009 10:52 pm

In a vain attempt to placate the inevitable backlash, I would ask that readers read the following as it was intended; a light-hearted caper with a serious undertone. Above all refrain from interpreting this as a sarcastic polemic upon the PSC.

mhuzzell wrote:
First and foremost, I want to correct what seems to be a widespread assumption: that the "old guard" were the ones who set up the occupation. That there is an 'old guard' at all is merely mythical. Several of the people who were involved in setting up the Gaza solidarity occupation were involved in some campaign or another at this university previously (eg, Lower Rents Now or the renewable energy campaign, though in all but one case probably not both; I don't think any of them are old enough to have worked on Ethical Investment or FairTrade), but they were by no means all or even the majority, for all I know -- being among what some might consider the 'old guard' myself, and having been totally uninvolved in the planning of the occupation.


Yes yes! You're a participatory democracy that mystically absorbs and spontaneously represents each and every opinion that happens to stay for more than five minutes (Hey, I guess that means my portfolio of making Magic: The Gathering a mandatory pastime is now part of your manifesto). The very fact that your experiences with the SRC are discouraging people from standing would intimate that the fewer, more experienced, are influencing the mass of newbies. That isn't meant as a criticism, so please stop taking it as one. As I said before, the many follow the few; this is the way of things!

Second, that the people in the occupation were in any way homogeneous. We were not; many of us probably would not have agreed about many political issues besides this one. We were not even all leftists -- the occupation included many who considered themselves moderate, apolitical and even conservative.


I agree. I doubt there was a single point of the petition I agreed with (or at least had a firm opinion in favour of). For the record though, I don't consider myself part of the PSC or the occupation merely by turning up to play board-games.

Third, I'd like to clarify that the bureaucratic stumbling blocks in dispute are not, at least primarily, the ones set up by the Students' Association. Rather, the University itself makes it difficult for students to voice their opinions or actually effect change in the University. Instead, we may only beg and plead with the Union, who, if they choose to listen to us (as they didn't with LRN, but do with most sustainability issues), are permitted to come, tamed and cowed, to the University's governing bodies and there, with proper supervision, are sometimes allowed to -- as you aptly though perhaps accidentally put it -- affect change.


Grammar-Pedant! If we're going to be pedantic, the Union is the services side of the organisation, and has jack-all to do with representative decisions. The SRC, or the Association if you please!

You've probably got a point there. The greatest flaw in the Association is the one-year tenure of its officers. The General Manager, et al. mitigate this somewhat, but the fact remains that by the time most people have learned to answer the phones, the year has come and gone. Yeah, it puts us at a disadvantage when facing down the decision-making bodies of the University, who can generally play for time, and hope that next year's positions forget all about it.

That said, we all have to work within the existing power structures and framework (be they the University, or whatever else). The SRC is an institution which has existed since the 19th century in one form or another. The University has every right to expect student representation to come through those channels (as they did in this case). Its a structure that will not be torn down without a serious fight. Even if it were, we'd probably end up with an alternative (i.e. no student voice whatsoever) that nobody would like! As I said, Its the only institution we have... which leads on to:

Now, don't get me wrong, I think the SA has the potential to be a really good, really powerful force for students' interests -- especially with Dr Richardson being so much more open to dialogue than Brian Lang seems to have been. However, I also think it's important that they not be the only negotiating tool available to students. On which note, with Dr Richardson's pledge to keep open office hours to hear from all sections of the university, I am -- as I still am for Obama -- cautiously optimistic.


What exactly do you propose as an alternative? As I said, it’s an institution that's existed, and (arguably) worked for over a century. We're all supposed to be iconoclasts to the past these days. I say, if it isn't broke, don't fix it (or, if it isn't broke, don't break it). There is danger of having different ports of call for representation. It weakens the message of either, makes it easier to play one off against the other, and in the worst case, polarises opinion leading to hostility within the student community.

I'd personally favour reform to make the institution more open and accountable to the student body, and making it easier to get the best ideas adopted, and the best people co-opted to relevant positions.


As for your gauntlet-throwing: I don't know about all the people in the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign, but I've had words with several who were there who I'd like to see elected for other reasons, and many of them are reluctant. Given the testimony of all of us who have experienced the thankless, harrowing, degree-draining slog that is the SRC, can you really blame them?


Well, speaking as the guy with quite possibly the most "harrowing, degree-draining slog" position within the institution, I certainly can! I wish I had the luxury of sitting in a building for a week playing bongo drums. That would have been a piss-easy lark in comparison!

As I conceded earlier; the Association is a flawed place. I’d vent on here, except the SSC would lynch me (or more probably, present a carefully worded motion to have me strung up, which would, over the course of the debate, be whittled down to a motion of censure on the basis that I’m such a good chap). The problem is, without people willing to give up their time, to put in hard work and persistence (and yes, sometimes at the expense of their academic and social lives), we might as well pack up and go home. A great man once said that nothing worth doing is ever easy (or was it nothing easy is worth doing? The latter is clearly bollocks). For all your flaws, you lot obviously give a shit about something, and that’s what the institution needs; people who give a shit!

Fin.
Now some people weren't happy about the content of that last post. And we can't have someone not happy. Not on the internet.
Jono
Moderator

User avatar
 
Posts: 1252
Joined: Wed Nov 02, 2005 9:44 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby Jono on Fri Mar 06, 2009 11:03 pm

Ooh! Too slow! Methinks I'll pick and mix this time.

mhuzzell wrote:Finally, I have to object to your implication that I am the first 'reasonable member of the PSC' to have shown myself on this thread (at least, I assume you mean me since I am the only self-identified occupator to have posted recently). This thread descended to a fairly base level of discourse shortly after it started, and it was not the protesters who pushed it there. Those writing from the occupation were having to defend themselves and their actions against savage attacks (no pun intended) from almost the very beginning. I'm not saying that they/we were entirely blameless or reasonable, but we were no less reasonable than our opponents.


As I said earlier; nobody forced the PSC to post on the Sinner. You know the kinds of people who lurk here; pessimistics, psycopaths, god-botherers, lapsed union hacks and (worst of all), Delts. Did you really expect anything less than wholesale condemnation? The fact that anything was written in support is a miracle.

Besides, seeing as how the Saint came down so heavily in favour, it serves the tiresome dichotomy!

Even you, you know, have not been entirely innocent. Just now, simply in the course of constructing your clever linguistic trap -- with your opinions couched in a poisonous shell of loaded but unargued-for assumptions and claimed 'objectivity' -- you have compared we poor "pointless people" with "the Spanish Inquisition, the Salem witch-burners or the Stasi". Do you really believe that, just because your searing barbs of rhetoric are eloquently phrased, they hurt any less, or are any less likely to put their victims on the defensive?


Oh, the idea of David Bean being at all innocent! Or objective for that matter.
Now some people weren't happy about the content of that last post. And we can't have someone not happy. Not on the internet.
Jono
Moderator

User avatar
 
Posts: 1252
Joined: Wed Nov 02, 2005 9:44 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby mhuzzell on Fri Mar 06, 2009 11:15 pm

Jono, your wilful misterpretations (or blinkered misunderstanding?) of the last few posts -- indeed, of the occupation in general -- barely dignifies even this much of a response.

Fin.
I FOUND JESUS... he was behind the couch the whole time!
mhuzzell
 
Posts: 137
Joined: Thu Jan 18, 2007 4:47 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby Frank on Sat Mar 07, 2009 11:47 am

mhuzzell wrote:I'm not saying that they/we were entirely blameless or reasonable, but we were no less reasonable than our opponents.


As (subtley? Hoho...) barb-filled as David's post was, I'd hope for a response on at least one aspect of it.

Noting the precedent for 'going outside proper channels' set by the EI, FT, etc campaigns: is it a sensible suggestion that the reason the Palestinian Liberation Front, sorry, PSC, didn't go through the SA is because the various brains behind the campaign were not confident about ensuring that their demands were met via that route?

Whch is to say: There's a few ways of looking at that. 1- That the PSC somehow knew their demands were unreasonable/unpopular enough not to be successful (in the possible guises 'doable' by the occupiers) going via the SA. 2- That the PSC merely wanted faster action than the SA could afford. 3- Felt somehow disaffected by the SA. 4- Felt it'd be nobler to do it distinct from the SA because they wanted representation, but didn't want to speak on behalf of the people they don't represent. 5- Etc.

I'm sure you can see it's a difficult one to expand upon. Even to phrase it as a concise question. I'll try;

What's the game, hmm? Does the PSC want to force change upon students they don't represent? If so, why aren't they doing it through a fairly open and regulated/screened (if bureacratic) way via the SA? Why, instead, are resort to unsanctioned, duplicitous (was the impending occupation mentioned on the petition? <_< ) and somewhat aggressive (if passive aggressive [let's invade somewhere no-one's using!]), intrusive tactics.

Is it merely a case that such methods will be 'effective' in attaining obscure, intangible and ephemereal goals?

(I say this in the view that the occupation was still 'a noble victory for the persecuted!' in light of not-one of their demands being 'met', despite the claim they'd not give up until all their demands are met...)

That David's contribution is dripping with derision is hardly surprising, but I'd say recognise at least that there's valid points in amongst it all.
Frank
User avatar
 
Posts: 1326
Joined: Mon Aug 01, 2005 8:39 pm

Re: 60+ students occupy uni building in protest

Postby munchingfoo on Sat Mar 07, 2009 1:50 pm

mhuzzell wrote:Finally, I have to object to your implication that I am the first 'reasonable member of the PSC' to have shown myself on this thread (at least, I assume you mean me since I am the only self-identified occupator to have posted recently). This thread descended to a fairly base level of discourse shortly after it started, and it was not the protesters who pushed it there. Those writing from the occupation were having to defend themselves and their actions against savage attacks (no pun intended) from almost the very beginning. I'm not saying that they/we were entirely blameless or reasonable, but we were no less reasonable than our opponents.


I was personally attacked (name calling and playground bullshit) by two registered self identified occupators before I had even let people know which side of the fence I was sitting on (if I was ever actually off the fence!)

Apart from the normal contributations by 777 (which everyone who reads the sinner should expect by now) the thread started as a discussion of the pros and cons of this action. The personal attacks (apart from 777s contributions) were started by the occupators.
I'm not a large water-dwelling mammal Where did you get that preposterous hypothesis? Did Steve
munchingfoo
Moderator

 
Posts: 5108
Joined: Fri Dec 06, 2002 2:09 pm

PreviousNext

Return to The Sinner's Main Board

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 15 guests

cron