Do some people protest too much?

Protesting is a good thing; an exercise in the expression of our freedom of thought and voice in a democratic society. What I fail to comprehend however, is how people find the time to exercise their right to protest so fucking much. And it’s always the same people.

It seems that certain individuals simply want to express dissatisfaction with “things”. If someone held a protest over general things. perhaps this would allow for all the pent up anger to be expressed in one bitesize chunk.

The voices of protesters would be heard across campus shouting “that thing is wrong” and “I disagree with that thing” and all would be said and done in one brief frolic.

As it is we have daily protests and the same person who cares about gender equality also seems to be particularly concerned about installing new light fittings in every building in Sierra Leone.

These are of course worthwhile issues and some are genuinely concerned for human rights and more, or they could be other things.

They might be busybodies who enjoy doing what students are supposed to do and be bothered by things. They wear fleeces and push pencils around their desks till there’s something annoying enough to build a placard for.

Student Sarah Jones summed it up perfectly: “Protests at warwick come more often than the U1” she said.

Scott Miles. a maths student, said:  “It won’t be long before people start protesting against walking”. Although Scott’s worries may be unfounded, it does seem that people can find anything to protest about.

On a more serious note, the violence at the Free Education protest has sparked a further protest to take place on Thursday 4th December. This protest has been named on Facebook “End Police Violence Against Students #COPSOFFCAMPUS”.

There are certain issues with this protest. Firstly “Police Violence Against Students” is not a thing. Something occurring once is an isolated matter; it does not provide weight sufficient for it to hold a protest against that thing.

They should be protesting against what happened in an isolated incident. But instead, it’s a misguided attempt that leaves the movement lacking.

On the whole, the police are not violent to students. This is a protest that has gained huge support on the social media site simply because of a communal sense of solidarity with those who were pepper sprayed by the police, not because it is a ‘thing’.

From this we move to the major issue of “#COPSOFFCAMPUS”. Really? Students of the University of Warwick want “COPS” aka the Police aka Britain’s primary unit of crime prevention to be banned from campus.

What a good idea. It’s not is it? It’s a shit idea. Without the threat of Police intervention what would be there to dissuade criminals from having a right jolly jape in our little hub?

The issue is the single-mindedness of those protesting who become so hell-bent on acquiring their desired result that in many ways reason and rational become a superfluity.

Fortunately for protesters though, although not extending their efforts to get free education, this backlash has indeed given them something else to protest about.