AI AND WILD STRAWBERRIES

Amnesty International has called the Control Yuan (監察院) to investigate "excessive" use of police forces during against the protests and riots of the ARATS visit. They also urge "Taiwan's police force to comply with international guidelines on the use of force and crowd control at the planned student protests on Sunday 7 December."

(http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/ASA38/001/2008/en/97891491-c13a-11dd-9368-1fd51b1be7bc/asa380012008en.html)

I support how the AI is "calling" and "urging" governments and people to do and believe in things; some things which are totally absurd, but do not matter because nobody really listens to them.

Also included in the useless "call to action" is information about yesterday's illegal Wild Strawberries march. Now, I am not against amending laws to have the ability to break up violent protests or ones that mislead the public, because there is still a possibility that DPP zealots will be elected to central government and we need a "right" to overturn them. Otherwise, I think their cause is totally pointless.

But no, I do not argue that it must have been a very fun activity for the college students - marking the end of their month of stupid happiness. They dressed in fun costumes and played happily. The police, only issuing warning signs, did not attempt to break up their happy fun family (grandparents and parents were there also) Sunday picnic. One act I find very funny is dressing Chen Yun-Lin as emperor and Ma, his cabinet members, and the police chief as the emperor's eunuchs. The cross-straits relations would be much simpler if it were that way.

It is not also extremely ironic that the protesters can protest, despite their claims that "civil rights is dead in Taiwan": the police probably correctly identified them as happy picnickers.

(Just a side note: TSEC Weighted jumped up today by 193.26 points (4.57%).)