Well this is certainly interesting. (Wonder if it'll pass?)

"Protesters should be protected by free speech laws, but not given free reign to hold up ambulances or frighten people out of their daily routines."

Amen to that!!


*Since there are some people obviously pissed about this (the article, anyway), I thought I would add to what I wrote to Cheryl, regarding her own post on the subject. Mostly to clarify what I meant by "Amen to that!"

I agree whole heartedly that protesters should be protected by free speech laws. That is one of our greatest freedoms living in the US- having the right to think, feel, say, and do pretty much whatever the hell we want (within reason). At the same time, this "freedom of speech" is being trampled on by people who go a step further and block the streets in masses (I'm sure this falls under the realm of "Civil Disobedience"), where they're in fact disturbing the peace and affecting the same personal rights of other people who aren't a part of the protests. Does anyone believe that it's perfectly A-OK to hold up fire engines, police cars, ambulances, or even cars of our fellow citizens, from driving where they need to go? Taking it a step further, does anyone honestly think it's A-OK to use the event as an excuse to go looting businesses? (I agree that the majority of protestors aren't doing this, but some are). This serves nothing but to shut down a city- for what? There are plenty of peaceful protests, and I have nothing against those. But more and more are turning violent, and those are the protests I have a problem with. And since police can never tell which protests are going to turn violent, we're all (as taxpaying citizens) footing the bill for their presence.

Being jailed for 25 years for being part of a protest? That's insane. Calling protestors/demonstrators "terrorists"? That's wrong. There are just some very passionate (perhaps overly "zealous") people out there. However, I don't think that it's asking too much to keep people from being disruptive to the rest of the living world when they protest something. Blocking people from driving, crossing the street, and simply carrying on with their daily lives, is just uncalled for- and that should be illegal. It just disgusts me that people get so out of hand. You can't yell "Fire!" in a crowded room, so why should you be able to send a city, street, park, etc.. to a screetching halt?

I'm all for freedom of speech. However, taking it to a level of violence should not be permitted (in my opinion, anyway). And I do think those people should be arrested. Jailed for 25 years? Hell, no.. but these people need to quit taking advantage of their rights. It costs us money as taxpayers to pay the police to deal with these people. Why should I pay for that? I dont' want to.. anymore than any one of those folks wants the collective tax payer to pay for a war they don't believe in.