bitch at pulpculture.org wrote:
>
> Like I said, I
> think they have their purposes, but my reading of the typical anti-war
> liberal is that they aren't into demos since they haven't accomplished a
> whole lot.
Demos are at the core of any mass movement. For that matter they are at the core of a revolution: The Shah was overthrown by a series of huge Easter Parade-like marches. Well dressed people walking quietly and slowly, endlessly, day after day, until the Shah's generals told him to scram because they could no longer trust their troops to obey orders.
But this (mass movement) takes thousands of demos and rallies and forums, large and small, tiny even, in small and large and towns and cities. Peaceful and not so peaceful, kept up over a number of years -- kept up even when they lag and the numbers are smaller. Only then will the fact that they accomlish nothing begin to provoke not a feeling of what's the use but feelings of rage at the state's refusal to honor them. And if all goes well the central demand and the militancy of that movement will provoke off-shoots, locally, regionally, nationally (e.g., for decent health care, which will never in itself provoke a mass movement). That is because there are thousands of little groups that for years or decades have been vainly pushing this or that local or state or national issues, and they will begin to interact with the larger movement.
So you name the key political problem facing the anti-war movement, convincing people that it is worthwhile to demonstrate even when it doesn't accomplish anything, because demos never accomplish anything without first for several years not accomplishing anything. We must fight not with the expectation of winning but merely with keeping the fight alive.
Carrol