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The people that decide to go/no-go to war are not protestors that say "Bomb Iraq". They are (I hope most are) smart people with alot of information on their hands. I see alot of you that can't seem to realize that its a possibility. You think everybody is an oil company owner and I can't understand who/what brought you up to think that way.
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I think you're saying people that are for bombing Iraq are smart and have a lot of information on their hands.. which as a generalisation as opposed to people against the war is bullshit.
just like the anti war people there is a gut reaction to 9/11 and the culture of fear in America at the moment that makes a lot of people want to bomb Iraq, not scholarly research.
Both sides have their blind followers.
In any argument here I see more educated opinions from both sides than stupid ones ( if you take out the "turn iraq into a parking lot" semi-jokes)
I don't know where the oil company owner thing came into this.
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Yes it is. For many people its fun to be in a protest. They feel good being in a large public. The more bored they are with their lives the more its fun. The more they look for meaning the funner it is. The younger they are (16-20) looking for ideals to embrace the more fun it becomes to go and protest (all are general rules not only for anti-war). It does not make protests irellevant. Only a fact to consider.
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most people don't get off their fat asses and turn off the tv to join a bunch of people they don't know walking down the street unless they believe in it. Otherwise you'd have all protestors protesting all the time. theres a reason the anti-war rallies are so big, and thats because so many people disagree with it, not because it's "fun". Contrary to what you might think protesting isn't considered cool and usually gets responded to with condescending criticism.. it takes a fair bit to get people to do it. by even mentioning this as a factor (which im sure it is for a small percentage) you're willfully misunderstanding the motivations of the vast majority that aren't doing it to meet girls or whatever.
It's much cooler to hate arabs and say "kill ragheads" and fit in with that group than be called a french loving pussy.
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The thing is, I've seen a lot of videos of interviews and never have I seen someone talking much sense. I'm sure there are some, but they blend in the huge crowd of uninformed/dumb..
And as one woman shouting in the UK protest ... "1,2,3,4 we don't want your racist war. 5,6,7,8 palestine is here to stay"
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as i said in a large protest movement most people are relying on a gut reaction.. im not going to pretend they're geniuses.. they just stick out more than the dumb people they're opposing because they're out in the street.
In a protest where they march for a long time they chant all sorts of different stuff thats related so they're not saying the same thing over and over again, The UK woman was obviously just chanting related material, probably after yelling pro Iraq stuff for the last half hour.
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You realize wrong. The dumbness of many of the protestors come before the accusation. So its not a tool to denigrate their beliefs. just an inspection and pointing out the facts. Do a search for sites about anti-war-iraq and look at the real motives of the majority of the anti-war movement.
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Actually you "realise wrong" it IS a tool to denigrate their beliefs most people don't march to be popular.. its just as simple as that.. if you think they are then.. well you're being ignorant of the facts of why people are marching. it's the same as calling them middle class, or "latte drinkers" it infers they are doing something for fad reasons so you don't have to take their objections seriously.. it's used time and time again.. it's the conservative version of calling someone a "redneck" it's like calling the people that are pro-war "bandwagon jumpers" because it's popular.. it's just stupid namecalling that doesn't address the issues of why people believe what they believe.
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I just see it as alot of people wanting to express feelings rather than thoughts and opinions. The other part are political agenda-driven people that has their interests on the other side of the fence so to speak.
These protests should be allowed to take place since its the only way a democracy can survive. But no democracy can survive by NOT protecting itself against dangers like the Iraqi leadership and N.Korean leadership (and the French leadership ;) ) etc...
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yeah I agree.. it's a gut reaction for most people.. and a general feeling that it's not the right course to take.. but by calling them "fad jumpers" means you don't look at whats producing those feelings, and the breakdown of what the protestors believe.. which isn't just "anti-war." If had approached the situation more diplomatically a lot of the protesters wouldn't mind.. there would always be a hard core element that protested whatever decision was made, but there are varying degrees of involvement that people can tolerate.. less people would protest if more countries were involved and the UN gave the OK. less people would protest if it wasn't a full on invasion likely to kill so many civilians.. less people would protest if they thought Bush was going after the right people first, less people would protest if they weren't as worried about getting terrorist attacks in return (which goes back to getting the right people in the right order, frankly Iraq isn't at the top of the list as far as terrorism is concerned).
People protesting want protection but they don't believe that this is the way to do it. In fact many think that this particular course of action will create more terrorists than is kills.