[ssf] Re: [matilda] Remember Falluja...

atw againstthewar at totalserve.co.uk
Mon Nov 14 10:15:24 GMT 2005


dan> If not, does anyone fancy helping me organise a silent vigil some
dan> time in the next week or two?  Which would only involved deciding
dan> a date, time, place and then telling people?  Definitely not
dan> something SWPy and shouty!

I find vigils fundamentally disempowering affairs that seem to achieve
little if anything at all. As media events they don't work because
they are always ignored. Therefore the only people who see them are
passers by at the time of the event, and often its not clear what
"that funny group of people over there" are even doing anyway.

I suspect many people feel like this as vigils frequently get low turn
outs.

It seems to me that the prime goal of the vigil is to alleviate the
guilt of those responsible (us). We feel we 'must' do something, so we
just do anything, however completely ineffective. The nice thing about
vigils are that they are completely risk free. You don't even the run
the risk of criticism since it's hard to have a go at someone for
simply remembering the dead.

Afterwards we can go home feeling slightly better about ourselves.
Switch on TV and watch the horrible stuff happening in the world with
a slightly clearer concience. "At least I did something," we can tell
ourselves. But did we?

There are surely better things we could do. Even small demo's are
better than vigils.

steve



-- 
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.1.362 / Virus Database: 267.13.0/167 - Release Date: 11/11/2005



More information about the ssf mailing list