re: #240 The Ghost of a Flea

Ahem:

A lot of Indians were beat to shit for laying in the street and quoting Gandhi.

Indeed, you could summarize the entire Satyagraha movement as: “You will lie on the ground and be beat to shit, but keep lying on the ground and remember this quote from Gandhi.”

That protestors can and do suck does not means that individual law enforcement agents don’t abuse their power or engage in their own, equal-and-opposite exercise of entitlement to do as they will.

One could argue that non-violent protest is most (or only) effective when met with violence. And the violence has to be met with general outrage by the larger population that can make the change desired.