Moral Monday protests a waste of time
Published February 13, 2015
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Photo by News and Observer[/caption]
Editorial by Lenoir News-Topic, reprinted in News and Observer, February 12, 2015.
We have noted before the pointlessness of the Moral Monday protests at the General Assembly in Raleigh, which symbolically launched for 2015 on Wednesday when the legislature convened to begin doing business for the year.
The protests are pointless not because those leading them stridently assert points that can be and are disputed, often just as stridently, by the protesters’ adversaries in the legislature – after all, Martin Luther King Jr. didn’t protest because he expected to change George Wallace’s mind but because he expected to focus the attention of the world on the injustices of segregation.
No, they are pointless, we have argued, because the scope of the so-called injustices being highlighted are both limited, failing to rouse outrage in general public, and easily addressed by democratic means.
In other words, win an election, and then you can do something about the wrongs you perceive.
But after two years of protests, the leadership of the General Assembly survived unscathed in last year’s election. That would indicate that if the protesters ever hope to accomplish their aims, they need to focus a great deal more energy on building their networks among voters, where they can explain in detail why they want a change, than on getting in front of TV cameras, where each protest gets 15 to 30 seconds on the news and changes no minds.
But we were wrong. The protests now have actually accomplished something.
Upon reading about this legislative session’s first protests, we looked up the old saying, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results,” to see who first said it.
Everyone keeps saying Albert Einstein said it, but it turns out the only sure thing is that Einstein never said it, and no one is quite sure who first did say it.
So, after two years of constant protests and complaints, and the start of a third year of it, there’s one concrete accomplishment: We learned to stop attributing that saying to Einstein.
Tribune Content Agency
February 13, 2015 at 8:16 am
Larry Gracie says:
Just the fact that you write editorials and we're talking about the Moral Monday protest is a victory
February 15, 2015 at 11:40 am
Rip Arrowood says:
Bingo!
February 13, 2015 at 8:28 am
Frank Burns says:
It is indeed a tremendous waste of time but they do get lots of press coverage. I reckon we know what side the press is on. Every social advocacy group comes out of the woodwork and has paid protesters to participate. Those Raleigh nonprofits pay well, ya know. It must be a fun event, you get to visit with fellow protesters, make up silly signs and get arrested so that you gain your left wing badge of honor. Where else can you wear those tie dye shirts?
February 13, 2015 at 7:01 pm
Norm Kelly says:
Proof that The Rev Slayer is even more irrelevant than I've written. It's about time media types figure this out.
Is it possible to draw the conclusion that the majority of voters have decided that extreme liberals are taking states and the nation in the wrong direction? Is it possible to draw the conclusion that the majority of voters are ignoring the extreme liberal rants? Finally! Took too many voters way too long to realize this. And media types still haven't figured out that extreme liberalism is a failure. For some reason, editorial writers, especially at the N&D, continue to endorse extreme liberals, push the extreme liberal agenda, and fawn over socialism as if it's worthy! Liberals are in the minority, and I pray they stay that way for many years. At least so my grandkids can grow up in a free nation, in a free state, rather than some extreme liberals idea of socialist utopia!
