[free-sklyarov] EFF to Meet Friday July 27 with US Attorney's Office

[mike castleman]

On Wed, Jul 25, 2001 at 05:40:26PM -0400, Izel Sulam wrote:
> When the EFF tells me "We respectfully request that protests be postponed." 
> I hear "We respectfully request that protests be postponed, nudge, nudge, 
> wink, wink."

Well, if everyone else read this, then I'll have to assume that's what
they meant. Still, in the future, it'd be clearer if they were to
write "The EFF will not be participating in any protests" or "The EFF
is not calling for any protests" or somesuch.

> With that said, EVERYONE knows that EFF has no power to stop independent 
> parties to protest whenever they want, against whatever cause they
> want.

For better or worse, that's not strictly true. One or two cities (and
possibly an uncertain number of individuals) decided not to protest on
Monday out of respect for what they perceived to be the EFF's
wishes. Being vague while still getting your point across is a tricky
business, and it's not certian that the EFF has fully mastered it yet,
although they're making progress.

> So there you have it. EFF is involved in official negotiations, and they 
> cannot associate themselves, officially or unofficially, with any protests 
> that may simultaneously happen on the same day at the same location.

I'm not certain that it's always true that the same individuals can't
be involved in both negotiations and protests. Sometimes, negotiations
can be more productive if the protestees (is that a word?) feel they
are negotiating with someone that can speak directly for the people
yelling outside. I personally have attended protests of a committee
that I served on, and can honestly report that being able to
more-or-less speak for a group that everyone knew was very vocal
strengthened my position for the committee's deliberations.

mike

-- 
// mike castleman, mlc67 at columbia.edu
// cell: +1 (646) 382-7220
// "facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored." - aldous huxley
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