A protest must begin with a disagreement. There must be a conflict in beliefs or ideas that cause enough outrage to encourage supporters to voice their opinions. A protest is in many ways a response that warrents a reaction from a specific audience. They can be initiated by individuals opposing other individuals or groups against groups and could involve a combination thereof.
Protests themselves are more often than not a reflection of the protestor's beliefs or the change they desire. One popular example of this is the monk that lit himself on fire to protest the unnessary loss of life during the Vietnam War. His own protest mirrored his message. Another could include Rosa Parks, who started the civil right movement as she sat in a designated "white" seat on a city bus to portray her belief that black is equal to white and skin color should not determine our judgements of others. These are both instances where individuals protested to gain attention for a cause. In addition to these, groups of united protestors can draw just as much if not more attention to a particular cause. Large groups are often successful in getting the attention of the mass media and thus a society, due to the quantity and location of the people. The March on Washington is widely known as well as the more recent gatherings of anti-war and PETA supporters. Not only is the amount of people important to gain attention, but location is key, too. For instance, if a group wants to protest a piece of legislation, a city hall or other prominent city building would offer the protestors the most leverage in their pursuit of change.
To be successful, I believe that protestors must find a way to be intimidating to their audience. This does not have to include violent actions. If protestors intimidate their audience either by raising sufficient support or physically pose a threat, the intended audience is forced to respond in some way. Substantial boycotts can encourage a change in price or manufacturing process of a product. Large marches show widening support of an opinion and demand a higher level of respect if nothing more, from the audience. Overall, protests can be very effective if the appropriate attention is gained from the action.
4 comments:
I do agree that a protest can only be successful if the cause gains a lot of attention. However, I'm not too sure that the protestors must intimidate their audience. I mean honestly many protestors I see are not intimidating me. When I see rioters on tv, I would find that intimidating. When I think about people passing out the animal cruelty flyers on the drag, I don't think their protest is very intimidating. The vegans are trying to appeal to our emotional sense of right and wrong. They aren't trying to scare us into agreeing with them.
I don't think protests necessarily have to begin with a disagreement; some of them can begin in favor of something in order to promote/advance a position or a belief. The issue of granting amnesty for illegal aliens is drawing a lot of attention from the public and you can find vocal protests that both favor and oppose an amnesty.
This is a great discussion going on here - keep up the good work of responding/adding to and disagreeing with each other's point! I would like to clarify a point from the post, one that Christa responds to: the role of intimidation. How could we clarify this term? What exactly do we mean if we say that a protest must intimidate?
I think in terms of intimidation you can look at in a way in such that the intimidation factor is getting people who aren't normally involved, involved. If you reach in someone a reaction that they usually do not act on by how you protest i think it could effectively make the protest succeed.
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