POINT:

When it comes to protesting, a little professionalism goes a long way toward making people sympathize with your cause.

This was demonstrated very clearly last winter and spring as tens of thousands of Wisconsin’s public workers took to the streets of Madison to express their displeasure at Gov. Scott Walker’s budget repair bill.

Try as they might to paint the protesters as silly college students looking for “life experience” and lazy degenerates in need of jobs – and maybe showers – Republicans in power lost the PR battle as soon as photos of outrages, passionate teachers, police and firefighters hit the front pages of the country’s newspapers.

Sympathy for the movement died down after a few months as the foul smelling tent dwellers, who did not have anything better to do, became the public face of protests at the Capitol.

Unfortunately for anyone hoping for a new governor at this time next year, this undesirable group of people remains the public face of an entirely different cause – the movement to recall Gov. Walker.

The recall of the governor is intrinsically tied with the notion of bringing back collective bargaining. As Wisconsin’s constitution does not easily allow for a state-wide referendum, this has become the most logical route for anyone looking to gain back that right.

With this in mind, supporters of the recall need to convince public employees who previously supported Walker to join their side.
Last night the signature gathering season officially kicked off … with a pajama party at a bar. While this may seem like a fun idea for those heavily involved in the movement, the workers hoping to bring back their rights to collectively bargain may see it as frivolous or even an event that makes light of the enormous gravity of their employment situations.

Not only are the tactics childish, the people behind them are often – for me – entirely unpalatable. While I was moved last spring by protests, a few faces from back then and in more recent efforts stand out as out of place: The sign-holding Segway rider who asked people to pay his rent in Lucky so that he could continue protesting as a job, the man who somehow felt protests are enhanced by dressing only in candy necklaces and the Madisonian who poured a full beer on a Republican legislator are embodiments of only a few of the many examples of uninspiring behavior that immediately come to mind.

While there are currently serious people involved in this recall effort, the least relatable are currently making the most noise. If recall supporters want to get more than 500,000 Wisconsinites on their side, they are going to have to start making a more professional and appealing spectacle.

Carolyn Briggs ([email protected]) is a fifth year student majoring in English. 

COUNTERPOINT:

It may be true that when it comes to protesting, professionalism goes a long way. However, professionalism has never been the main concern of protestors worldwide, nor should it be.

Cindy Sheehan was just a mom with a cause. Marchers on Tiananmen were students. The original Tea Partiers protested a beverage. And hell, who could have more dirty, disorganized and unprofessional than the counterculture movement during the 1960s? Carolyn makes fun of “foul smelling tent dwellers,” but the young people who affected policy enough to end the war in Vietnam were far more unwashed than their modern counterparts. Yet their cause and victories have been memorialized ever since.

There are other reasons that the recall Walker protestors are failing. As Carolyn points out, Wisconsin’s constitution makes a state-wide referendum difficult. Even if the tent-dwellers and Segway riders in favor of recalling Gov. Walker were disabled firefighting veterans, their cause would struggle because the legislative deck is stacked against them.

Furthermore, it is correct that budget repair bill protestors succeeded because it was not only supported by the public workers it affected but by others who had an interest in seeing them prevail. In this instance, however, there is only one faction – those who want Walker out. It was something special to see many demographics come together in February to demand bargaining rights for our valued Wisconsin educators, and this lent a sense of legitimacy and fellowship to the act. In this instance, however, there exist no differing viewpoints to be joined together in the cause. Ultimately, those who want Walker kicked to the curb are basically the same.

OK, so the recall Walker petition is starting as a PJ party at a burger place. Who knows, though, how it will end? The bargaining rights February protest started when teaching assistants sent valentines cards to legislators and escalated to, at its zenith, more than 100,000 individuals and caused a legal hoopla about constitutional and ethical violations.

Even though at this point the recall Walker protests amount to a man dressed in candy and another on a Segway, it’s still a cause to get behind and may still garner the support it needs. And even if the 540,000 people needed to back the recall smell like a turd covered in burnt hair, who cares?  El pueblo unido jam?s ser? vencido.

Taylor Nye ([email protected]) is a junior majoring in human evolutionary biology, archaeology and Latin American studies.