hard-of-hearing primitive doesn't want to keep moving

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025434085

Oh my.

Actually she's a nice person when not hanging around with the primitives on Skins's island.

Then she turns into a rabid bitch.

<<<knows.

tblue37 (14,005 posts)    Sat Aug 23, 2014, 05:57 PM

I am making an OP out of a reply I posted on this GD thread: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=5434063
 
The clearly unconstitutional requirement that protesters and journalists keep moving, never stopping to rest, pray, conduct interviews, or take pictures, makes it difficult and downright dangerous for older people and/or those with disabilities to exercise their right to assemble and to petition the government for redress of grievances--or for journalists to exercise their constitutionally protected function.
 
I am 64, overweight, and not in great health. I use a cane and have high blood pressure and heart problems. If I lived nearby, I would absolutely want to join the protests, but I cannot stand or walk for long periods. I would need to have a portable seat of some sort and to take breaks from standing and walking--but that sort of brief pause has gotten protesters arrested in Ferguson, as has participating in brief group prayer circles. Journalists and protesters have also been arrested when they pause for a picture or a short interview.
 
For someone like me--or like the brave, decent man featured in the thread linked above--being forced to continue marching for hours, with no opportunity to rest, especially in the horrendous, humid heat of a Missouri summer, is brutal and potentially lethal. I kept thinking of the death marches forced on prisoners by both the Nazis and the Japanese in WWII!
 
Oh, sure, that man could always just go home, and if I were there, so could I. But to make it virtually impossible to engage in peaceful protest except for very limited time (and in a manner so convenient for the repressive authirities one wishes to protest against!) is to defang protest altogether and to essentially deny many people any right at all to participate.
 
The ACLU has briefly mentioned this aspect of the violation of protesters' (and journalists') rights, but their emphasis has been mostly on the assault on press freedom, not on the fact that this "keep moving" rule is so obviously and brutally unconstitutional.
 
Even worse, some idiot of a federal judge refused to strike down that disgusting rule. At least the ACLU did say in its press release that this rule denied the First Amendment rights of older people, sick people, and people with disabilities. I hope there is a big lawsuit that focuses specifically on this aspect of the authoritarian suppression of the protesters' and journalists' rights, so that it doesn't get lost in the shuffle.

Oh, bwah bwah bwah.

<<<am deaf; have participated in things where compliance with rules made it difficult, if not impossible, for a deaf person to be in on things.

However, once my situation was explained to the proper people, the authorities had no qualms about making me an "exception" to such rules.

This has happened even in those instances where the authorities would rather not have had to deal with me.

I suggest to the primitive that it doesn't hurt to ask, and if one asks, one's given permission.

And then there's this silly reaction from a tritely-silly primitive:

NYC_SKP (60,317 posts)    Sat Aug 23, 2014, 06:17 PM

7. I agree and hope a civil rights suit occurs.

[thundley4]

NYC_SKP (60,317 posts)    Sat Aug 23, 2014, 06:17 PM

7. I agree and hope a civil rights suit occurs.

DUmass, the ACLU tried and lost already on the issue.

[franksolich]

DUmass, the ACLU tried and lost already on the issue.

I'm really pissed about her comparison of such an ordeal with the ordeal of men who actually starved and died on those long-ago Death Marches; it's nowhere near the same thing.

She's slapping real courage and tenacity in the face.

Bitch.  It's not the same thing, not even a million miles within being the same thing.

[ChuckJ]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025434085

Oh my.

Actually she's a nice person when not hanging around with the primitives on Skins's island.

Then she turns into a rabid bitch.

<<<knows.

Oh, bwah bwah bwah.

<<<am deaf; have participated in things where compliance with rules made it difficult, if not impossible, for a deaf person to be in on things.

However, once my situation was explained to the proper people, the authorities had no qualms about making me an "exception" to such rules.

This has happened even in those instances where the authorities would rather not have had to deal with me.

I suggest to the primitive that it doesn't hurt to ask, and if one asks, one's given permission.

And then there's this silly reaction from a tritely-silly primitive:

Of course your situation was probably explained politely instead of like a raving hate-filled harpy.

I remember back during the "terrible" Bush economy when everyone had more work than they could do I had a guy call me needing some work done. I give him a price that was agreeable to him. Then I told him that it would be about four weeks before I could get to it because of people that were on the schedule ahead of him. He asked, very politely, if there was any thing that he could do to get moved up on the schedule. I told him no. That we tried to treat everyone equally and that it'd be wrong to shuffle someone for him. I told him that if anyone cancelled I'd try to fit him into their place. He told me that he completely understood and that he would really appreciate letting him know if someone cancelled because he had terminal brain (I think it was) cancer and the doctor only gave him about two weeks. He said that he just wanted to get as many things out of the way as possible before he died so it would be one less thing that his family had to worry about. He was polite the entire time. After hearing his story I told him that I'd be there to do the work the next morning at 7:30 and would just work the weekend to keep my schedule intact.

He was a very nice guy. I think he ended up living three weeks.

[franksolich]

Of course your situation was probably explained politely instead of like a raving hate-filled harpy.

Yes.

And my similar experiences even include dealing with "law"-enforcement in the socialist paradises of the workers and peasants too, not just here.

Good manners and requesting rather than "demanding" can get one pretty much total freedom to do what one wishes.

[I_B_Perky]

Of course your situation was probably explained politely instead of like a raving hate-filled harpy.

I remember back during the "terrible" Bush economy when everyone had more work than they could do I had a guy call me needing some work done. I give him a price that was agreeable to him. Then I told him that it would be about four weeks before I could get to it because of people that were on the schedule ahead of him. He asked, very politely, if there was any thing that he could do to get moved up on the schedule. I told him no. That we tried to treat everyone equally and that it'd be wrong to shuffle someone for him. I told him that if anyone cancelled I'd try to fit him into their place. He told me that he completely understood and that he would really appreciate letting him know if someone cancelled because he had terminal brain (I think it was) cancer and the doctor only gave him about two weeks. He said that he just wanted to get as many things out of the way as possible before he died so it would be one less thing that his family had to worry about. He was polite the entire time. After hearing his story I told him that I'd be there to do the work the next morning at 7:30 and would just work the weekend to keep my schedule intact.

He was a very nice guy. I think he ended up living three weeks.

H5 Chuck!

[67 Rover]

I kept thinking of the death marches forced on prisoners by both the Nazis and the Japanese in WWII!

Just made a comparison of protesting in Missouri to the Bataan death march. Un-friggen believable. I wish you  total consciousness on your death bed. 

[ChuckJ]

H5 Chuck!

Thanks, but I don't know if I deserve one for that. I think most normal people would have done the same.

[franksolich]

Just made a comparison of protesting in Missouri to the Bataan death march. Un-friggen believable. I wish you  total consciousness on your death bed. 

In thinking of my own experiences with law-enforcement kindly making accommodation for my deafness, allowing me to get away with stuff they don't allow hearing people, only one of them was at a protest, and a pretty violent one at that; lots of people were clubbed and hauled away.

It was in May 1995, when William and Hillary Clinton visited Kiev, the capital of Ukraine.

I joined a protest, protesting their presence.

Unbeknownst to me, it'd been organized by old hard-line Communists, but they looked okay to me.

I had a big sign, DOLE IN '96, the only one around in both the Latin alphabet and English.

Of course, an advantage--if one wishes to call it that--I have over other deaf people is that my deafness is visible, starkly visible; a guy without physical ears isn't likely to be a hearing person.

The police beat up a lot of people.  They looked at me, and for some reason, just left me alone.