and then our exile

Bah.
I am disgruntled with things. And with people.
ECAWAR in particular.
And the military as an institution on top of that.

Some of us (at the protest) tried getting inside the Butterdome, and were hurled back when they found incendiary material (read: a report on how the FBI coerced false affadavits from "witnesses" to extradite Leonard P) in the backpack of one--a white guy not even carrying a sign. "This is private property", they said. If it is "private property" then bloody don't announce that it's open to the public!! :@ Actually, they meant it was open to the public if the public had nothing to do with the protest.
Our main problem (and this was to be covered on my rant on ECAWAR) was that they decided to go for the "outside in the MINUS 18 DEGREE WEATHER SO YOUR TOES FREEZE OFF AND REYNO'S IS HAUNTING YOU weather with all the pretty signs FOR ALL THE PRETTY CARS TO HONK AT" instead of silent and solemn in the back of a WARM BUILDING where you can actually SEE THE EVENT and CAUSE A DIFFERENCE and BE VISIBLE and HECKLE CELLUCCI and ACTUALLY GET TO SEE HIM and CAUSE A RUCKUS and DO SOMETHING. At 7.30, we could've entered the building--but at 8.00, when a group of us (tony s, matt, me, others i've forgot) were wanting to go inside, they'd "tightened security", and weren't letting anyone in.
Bloody consensus.

It is fun going to such with Babaji, though: everyone looks at him. We were joking on the way home: "so all these soldiers go to Afghanistan to search out terrorists, al-qaida, the taliban, whatever, finding 'em and liquidating them. and so, they come home and want to get awards, and here they see one!" Just, people don't keep beards and wear clothes like him. It is style.

The way i see it, there were three components to tonight's protest: directly voicing opposition to Cellucci himself, inputting to the media, and letting all the brave soldiers know that we don't support them if they do bad things. The only one of these three that was accomplished was the second; there were a lot of media around, taking lots of pictures. The CBC, CTV, Journal, Edmonton Sun, UofAExpressNews and others. And all the soldiers going in were examining us (well, they had no choice--we were in front of the entrance, you see.) and some made faces.

What we should have done, instead of freezing our fingers off, was to go in as early as possible and just sit down nicely wherever we found a spot. As soon as Cellucci began to speak, we would all get up, move to the back/wherever, in a visible place, and stand united in a line silently with smuggled-in-banners and so on. We wouldn't need to say a thing--Cellucci would be very aware of us; we wouldn't get mobbed, as because the event had already started, the soldiers would have to observe a "minimum of protocol"; the media-cameras would swivel over to us; all would be well. That's not my own plan, but one thought up by my father beforehand, and we would've followed it, EXCEPT FOR THE CABAL.
Seriously: i have no more patience for such.

There were about 20 people there altogether.
Our prospected signs:
Innocent Blood Cries For Justice
US Govt's Hands: Dripping Innocent Blood
Terrorizing Afghanistan: Not In Our Name

~~
I think my "but totalitarianism is effective, you can't deny that!" made Glen unhappyish at me.
But at the very least, my frustration with ECAWAR precipitates the necessity for our own organization, free from the bureaucracy and blahness of externalities. Into the stage enters TONIGHT, of which more shall come in future days. Watch this space for details.

Basically, it wasn't as effective as it could have been, and i blame this on the decision reached at the ECAWAR meeting last night. I should have gone--Tony S was the only one who proposed going inside, and no one supported him; against him were DM and his followers, and alone he stood no chance.
When the Movement gets bogged down in cat fights you know something's terribly wrong.

Ah well. At the least, we're in the media.