Essay on different attitudes towards protests and riots
Staged demonstrations and riots have become a popular way of airing personal and public grievances about an issue. Various people have developed different attitudes towards those acts. I hold a positive attitude towards them and regard them as the language of unheard. I see them as an effective way of communicating bitterness and acts of injustice. However, my friend John has developed a negative attitude toward protests and viewed them as an ineffective way of communicating grievances. He believes these acts cause more harm than good in society.
I believe holding demonstrations, public marches, and pickets are excellent ways of marginalized and discriminated groups to come together against a common enemy. These actions are empowering to the people as they assure them of many people thinking the same. To me, it is also a way of opening a debate and telling the people in power everything is not right. I don’t think the fact that people in power sometimes ignore the protests is enough to regard them ineffective. I see demonstrations as an excellent way of opening debates and arguments about specific positions.
I believe through political protests, we may win through unprecedented ways. Protests about a single incident of killing may indirectly prevent the killing of thousands of people. In my view, demonstrations serve as a way of reminding the people in authority what they are supposed to be doing and what they should not do. Public demonstrations will make people think differently about some things and start a fight against some negative stereotypes. Protests about gay rights have, for instance, brought turnarounds in people’s views toward homosexuality. These actions may not necessarily make sense now, but in the future, people will appreciate the effort to change some status quo through demonstrations.
In his case, John believes that most protests will turn to be violent and confrontational at the end. According to him, even an organized protest will slowly turn to be unreasonable and ungovernable. This change makes the supporters identify with them less and eventually become unsupportive. He views this unfolding to work to the disadvantage of the cause that was being promoted. Aggression behaviors in a protest could make people hate more the protestants and their purpose of demonstrations. John holds the view that all demonstrations are destined to become violent.
John believes active street demonstrations have been out fashioned. According to him, these actions could best work in the era when there were no alternative methods of airing grievances. To him, it does not make sense going in the streets while at long last, the legal procedure will be followed. He believes these actions are a waste of time as they do not change the procedural way of doing things. If, for example, a person has allegedly killed, he or she must be given a fair and just hearing before being sentenced. Protests will, in this case, not help the victims and may also undermine investigations. According to him, these actions can be used by cartels to undermine the justice process. He also believes that most of these protests are organized and prepared by opportunistic people planning to engage in unlawful acts such as looting. The number of deaths reported during protests has made him see demonstrations as creating more harm.