Protest under the palms

[isomeme]

Yesterday evening was exciting.

First, I dashed out early (for me) from work to meet the lovely rosefox  for a quick dinner.  It had been a long time since our last chance to visit, and the conversation zinged wildly from common friends to politics to the economy to our careers and relationships, and points between and beyond.  In retrospect, I'm amazed

Comments

[chimpstop]

The "energy" of "Stone Wall" is still alive and kicking

its my fault

[krishnahermes]

Yeah, I was too intimidated by the prospect of being called into the jury duty when I haven't reached fulltime status yet that I didn't register. Not registering has been key to staying out of the jury pool while its very expensive

Re: its my fault

[contentlove]

Yeah, I was too intimidated by the prospect of being called into the jury duty when I haven't reached fulltime status yet that I didn't register.

You are aware that you can get a dispensation from jury duty if there is a compelling work problem?

Re: its my fault

[krishnahermes]

We need same day registration. Without the growth of same day registration in other states Obama may have lost.

They may have tweaked the jury system since the last time I went. I went before 911 and wore pajamas to court in order to get out of serving.

But if I do fulltime then my employer pays for my jury duty so I'll wind up serving if I don't wind up in contractor limbo.

You can get out of it, but I believe you still have to come into court. But I could be wrong, it may be streamlined where you can just call in on the phone and get out of it, maybe I'm being unreasonable about it.

[slq]

Just curious what led you to describe it as a "riot". The news I've seen seems to indicate it was a peaceful protest. Did you see any violence or property damage?

[contentlove]

Seems like we're thinking the same way here (I comment before reading other's comments in many cases, as in this one).

[isomeme]

http://isomeme.livejournal.com/444570.html?thread=2705306#t2705306

[contentlove]

I'm curious about your use of the word riot here. What I saw (admittedly from a distance) reported was a large demonstration. Usually I think of a riot as being violent and destructive in a large sense, where people get hurt. Did I miss something here?

[isomeme]

"Protest" would have been more appropriate, I suppose. They were intentionally blocking major streets, which annoyed and inconvenienced me, so I characterized it more pejoratively. :)

I find it rather ironic that the areas in which they chose to protest -- Westwood and West Hollywood -- are respectively the most liberal and most gay areas of LA, and thus their protests almost certainly affected vastly more opponents of Proposition 8 than supporters.

[slq]

I don't think the idea was to inconvenience people in retaliation against those who voted for the proposition, but to create a large and visible presence to generate media attention, a strategy which seems to have worked. Hence it makes sense to have the protests in places that are most accessible to large numbers of their supporters.