Cheney Protests: Commencement

The Commencement protests were today! They took place on the corner of Bulldog and Canyon, near the big BYU sign. There were quite a few people who showed up. There was also quite an interesting response from passers by. Since everyone in cars, there were a lot of honks. My friends in the protest told me that they'd gotten a lot more honks of support than honks of anger, but while I was there, I saw quite a few people drive who were either ridiculing the protesters, or shouting out some pretty mean stuff. Reminded me of my mission, to be honest.

I thought this was kind of interesting. A lot of people say that even if you disagree with Cheney as a person, you should still "respect the office" and not protest because it's the Vice President. I don't really understand that logic, but that's what some people have said. This is an interesting counter argument.

That's Diane Bailey with the flag, president of the BYU Democrats.

Carl Brinton. He is the most involved student I know of on campus, and probably one of the busiest people at BYU. We had the same Arabic class this last semester, and we were both finalists for the Presidential scholarship. He's a really cool guy.

The girl on the right saw me walking around with a camera, and asked me if I was the guy with the onelowerlight blog! I remember that she was on the crisis team for the Utah Colleges Exit Poll this last year, and that she really helped us out a lot when I was with my team down in Elk Grove, but I don't remember her name. I was really surprised: I think that's the first time somebody's recognized me from this blog (it's especially surprising because I'm trying to retain at least a little bit of anonymity). I was surprised and flattered that someone would recognize me by my blog. This sign says "peace" in a bajillion languages, including Arabic, by the way.

Various signs. This protest differed a lot from the previous protest, in that it was just a general peace / anti-war rally, rather than a specifically anti-Cheney rally. As a result, there was a wide variety of signs. I honestly felt that it watered it down a bit and made it more generic, but I appreciate that the protesters got out and expressed their views in a respectful manner.

"Do you want to be on TV?" One of the many reporters at the protest interviews one of the protesters.

Hmmm...either this guy has a beard card, or he isn't a BYU student. There seemed to be a lot of people from outside of the BYU community who participated in this protest. As I overheard a cameraman from Channel 5 News say to the reporter, "this isn't just BYU students--it's anyone with an ax to grind."

One thing that I think watered down the protests and made them less significant than the on-campus protests earlier this semester was that there were several people from outside of BYU who came to protest, while many of the BYU students who were part of the other protests had apparently left for the summer. So, in short, the crowd consisted about 40% of students, 30% of non-students (most of whom didn't even seem to be part of the BYU community), and 30% of reporters and people with cameras.

I think that the BYU protesters have always tried to make it clear that they are not anti-BYU or protesting against the First Presidency or the other church leadership. This sign seemed to be an attempt to convey that they weren't trying to ruin anyone's commencement.

I liked this picture--I took it as I was walking to the protests. White is the color that the BYU Democrats chose for all of the Cheney protests.