The War Protest: Vanouver vs LA

So the war protest turned out to be pretty lame. We arrived at a local park around noon on Saturday and milled around with a group of about 1000 other protesters or so. There were several groups represented, including the Quakers:



The Communist Party:



And, the "Raging Grannies," who sang anti-war parodies of broadway tunes:



God, those grannies were so cute.

Right on time, the protest started. All thousand-or-so anti-war protesters walked calmly down the protest route. Mostly we walked in silence, or chatting among ourselves. Only occasionally someone would raise a mild peace chant, like, "What do we want?" "PEACE! "When do we want it?" "NOW!" The mood was very calm:



This calmness was a far cry from the Los Angeles anti-war protests I had been to in the past. Here's a pic from March 2003 to give you some idea of the mood back then:



In Los Angeles, everyone had a sign, everyone was screaming and chanting and ANGRY! It seemed like every other person had a megaphone and were broadcasting much more controversial chants, like Bush is Hitler. I remember actually walking away from several people with megaphones in Los Angeles because they were just too angry. I mean, I was angry too, but not as angry as these guys:



These two people were hotly arguing about the war in the middle of a LA anti-Bush protest. I think the woman was a Bush supporter who had come out to support Bush against the protestors. The anti-war guy she is arguing with looks kind of... confused.

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Here in Vancouver, there were no pro-war protestors to argue with. Just in case some pro-war supporters showed up and things got out of hand, the Vancouver police were out in full force to keep an eye on things:



Hee hee.

The incredibly small number of police officers dispached to the protest was very surprising to me, especially compared to the amped-up police action we had encountered in Los Angeles:



(This pic is from my arty period, when I had eschewed my cheapo digital snapshot camera in favor of a 35mm black-and-white manual.) I love the way the female cop on the end is looking at me, like "WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING AT, CITIZEN? GET BACK OR I WILL STOMP YOU."

But the police lineup in the picture was just the tip of the iceberg at the LA anti-war protests in 2003. There, the police lined up in groups of 30 or more, everywhere. Sometimes they were in riot gear. They were often videotaping the protestors, like they were going to take the tape back and analyze it and report all of us to the anti-patriot board. It was scary and very threatening. It seemed like they were against the protestors, and it really led to a huge us-against-them feeling for me in Los Angeles. Really, they are there to keep the peace, so why do they have to be so threatening? No one was threatening them.

Anyway, back to Saturday, we all marched on through downtown Vancouver. At this point, I realized that this mostly silent protest was not fulfilling my need to, well, protest. I wanted to RAGE and YELL but the mood was very soft and these people did not seem to share my anger at all:



When I saw the "Lawyers against the war" sign, I thought, "This is SO LAME." Not only was this march not fulfilling my need to protest, there wasn't even a whole lot of good people-watching to be had. Then, it started sprinkling. I knew we were done.

In true American fashion, we took off in the middle of the march and went to see a matinee. Thus ended the great Vancouver Anti-war protest of 2005.