Question about issue specifc protests

[enigma2517]

From a revolutionary leftist perspective, how important are issue-related protests?

I started thinking about this very hard while recently having a conversation with one of my activist friends.

I love in a town in the USA that has a military base smack in the center of it. They recently built a new "biodefense" lab there. Of course, the only real difference between bio weapons and bio defense is intent. They house some of the deadliest viruses there known to man, including Ebola.

We protested the initial construction awhile back. Now they are having a little public hearing to convince the citizens that all the operations are safe and transparent.

My friend told me to come protest with him, but I've always felt weird about this kind of stuff. On one hand, I don't want it in my backyard, on the other hand its very idealistic to assume that we can just make it go away, there is no material basis for that.

Essentially, the US is addicted to the military-industrial complex. I think it is more or less an inherent characteristic of any modern capitalist state. Its there to stay for good, it provides jobs, its funded by the federal government, and its already built.

He conceded that this was more of a symbolic protest and that we could use it to reach out to the greater community. He said that demonstrations are what create community and solidarity. While I agree, I am not sure if this particular issue will do that.

For me, all of my protests have idealogical roots in a pretty basic demand, a unity and cooperation of the working class to undermine the despotism of capital. I think that class has and always will be the main issue. Thus, you can see why I am uncomfortable devoting my efforts to this. Will it be counter productive? Will people see it as a reason to just elect a Democrat next time? Will it really make one working class person identify with another?

So what do you think...are things like this empowering or alienating?

I might write a little more later to explain this further. In the mean time, please give me your responses/experiences.

[drain.you]

Hmmm...well. Protests are of course, not the way to solve all problems. However it is hard for any government, on local or national level to continue its policies if there is enough public opposition and if its voiced via protests and rallies.

We know people won't always unite together against something they don't like, if they did then capitalism wouldn't exist as the working class would have united and smashed it.
We know that some people are loyal to a political group and will support it no matter what but we also know there are voters who will swing from one party to another depending on policy.

It provides jobs but if it wasn't there another agent of capitalism would be, ready to exploit those who need the money. Do you really want military bases sucking up your taxes anyway?

You probably can't get rid of it easily but you can create a big fuss and possibly unite the town and eventually get rid of it in the long run, or perhaps just anger the base so much that it begins getting laws passed to stop you protesting near it and arresting people who kick up a fuss.

Empowering or alienating...well...with enough support it is empowering but if you protest for something that only a minority of people agree with then you'll definately alienate people and create divisions.

If I was you, I would protest but thats just the kind of person I am. I like to at least try to change things even if the odds are against me and I imagine you can't be that different otherwise you would have abandoned your leftist ideals long ago.