Earlier, the Clog asked where we could find inane Berkeley drama if the tree-sitters leave, but perhaps we spoke too soon. On Saturday, a group of over 200 bikers descended on Shattuck Avenue to peacefully demonstrate their support for the troops.

Few aren’t familiar with the demonstrations surrounding the Marine recruiting center, but now the Clog wonders if the bikers were staging a counter-protest. read more »

Here’s something different altogether: a pro-war protest in Berkeley.

Hundreds of leather-clad bikers came tearing into downtown earlier today, waving POW flags and blaring country music from portable stereos. That’s hundreds of protesters, in comparison to the comparative handful - about 80 - that showed up for the anti-war protest this past Wednesday. Many are military veterans. Most are from the areas surrounding Berkeley, like San Francisco and Santa Clara.

We’re not sure what to make of this, since the Clog as a collective entity has already shipped off to the Bahamas, from whence we type ensconced in deck chairs while being attended to by slave boys with fans fashioned cunningly out of palm fronds and Heineken bottlecaps. We’re sorry to miss the undoubtedly rousing rendition of “Have You Forgotten,” to be sure.

Image Source: Harper Rain under Creative Commons
Motorcycle-riding supporters of Marines roar into Berkeley [SF Gate]
LewRockwell.com: Pro-War Bikers Swarm Berkeley [Website]

Berkeley wouldn’t be Berkeley without its resident crazies and young, blooming radicals. Not surprisingly, both groups filled the anti-war ranks on Martin Luther King, Jr. Way during today’s day-long protest, which drew in hundreds of people.

Think this whole recruitment center situation is quite silly and that many of the people involved are acting like children? Actually, many of the anti-war activists at the rally were literally children–OK, high school students, maybe–and they all had strong opinions, an urgent need to be rebellious and an affinity for excessive cussing. The middle-aged conservatives that picked fights with these kids were just as shamelessly childlike. But seriously, where were their mothers?

Don’t tell us they’re all children of this guy.

read more »

This doesn’t warrant a Nuclear-Free Protest Bell post because there’s not a whole lot protesters can do now that the university officially signed the heavily disputed $500 million alternative energy research deal with BP earlier this week. Nevertheless, we thought we’d share our latest crankypants attitude about the critics who’ve got it all wrong.

• The writing’s on the wall. We’ve all seen the scribbled bathroom stall “END CORPORATE IMPERIALISM–SAY NO TO BP DEAL” messages which seem to go nicely with the “Does he really love me?” and the “Stop writing on the bathroom walls! Take care of the Earth!” notes.

  Clearly, bathroom-stall writing is effective on all fronts. “Corporate imperialism” has won, he probably doesn’t love you if you have to ask and imploring bathroom walls to stop writing on themselves simply won’t work.

• The protests didn’t work either. If anything, they called attention to the pitfalls of the early drafts of the BP contract, the later drafts of which, in our completely uneducated opinion, probably encouraged greater accountability and academic freedom that ultimately allowed the various legal staffs of the University of California to approve the final version.

Still, some remain cautious about who does what where and when. We see no problem with criticizing details that make or break a transparent contract, but it is with the bathroom-wallers of the world out there that we take issue. Calling the Energy Biosciences Institute “corporate imperialism” merely because the partnering institution happens to be a corporation gives as much credibility to the critic as it does to the toilet stall it was written on.

UC Berkeley Officially Signs $500 Million Partnership with Energy Giant BP [Daily Cal]
It’s a Dealbreaker [Daily Cal]
UC Berkeley, BP finally sign contract for research project [SF Gate]

Berkeley may be back, considering the veritable flurry of recent protests.Between GSI near-strikes, tree people and the last few years’ worth of ruined convocations at the hands of picket-sympathizing speakers, there seems to be little room left in our overextended hearts to care about protests over the BP deal or I-House working conditions.And while we do care about trees and alternative energy research and living wages and other liberal hippie crap like that, we feel we are lately simply inundated with protests.At this rate, it looks like people in Berkeley are protesting for no other reason than to be contrary about everything in this world that has wronged them.The Clog (or at least this Clogger) could likely find ways to care less about whether the athletic department gets new facilities or the GSI’s union pressures the university for more money. We fully support free speech and human rights and all the rah rahs that come with that, but we find ourselves commiserating with the sentiments of Dangierre, who suggests the protesters “get their heads out of their asses.”Maybe we wouldn’t be quite so harsh on our activist brethren. But the medium’s message these days is just so … Free-Speech-Movement cliche. Perhaps “ration the rally call” or “choose battles wisely” is more our style.Image Sources: Justin Gonzaga, Yaou Dou, Daily Cal; edited by Krista Lane40 protest UC Berkeley research deal with BP [SF Gate]Employees Protest I-House Conditions [Daily Cal]Hundreds Rally In Support of ‘Jena Six’ [Daily Cal]

University of Michigan, or at least some of its students, seems to want a lot from everyone else: Coach Tedford from Cal, labor standards from clothing manufacturers and reimbursement for upwards of $6,000 in fines incurred against 12 protesters sitting in against labor standards for the companies that force six-year-olds to make university-licensed clothing without benefits.

Cry us a river. If students in Berkeley were willing to starve for their beliefs (even if for a totally unrelated cause and only questionably successful), we don’t see why Michigan should get its panties in a bunch over less than a month’s worth of rent. We pay our own legal fees.

Besides, protesting sweatshops is so two years ago. Even Stanford and Columbia caught on, students staged sit-ins or, in UC Berkeley’s case, naked picketing outside California Hall.

And maybe size doesn’t matter, but let’s take a look at each protest’s attendance:
* Stanford: 11
* Michigan: 12
* Columbia: 15
* UC Berkeley: 100

Oh, and did we mention our Campanile is bigger?

Image Source: Eli Weissman, Daily Cal
Protesters Demand Reimbursement for Arrests [The Paper Trail]
U of M students occupy Coleman’s office to protest sweatshop labor [Arbor Update]

Filmed in the spring of 1970, this featured YouTube clip follows a “typical” protest of the time. None of this nansy-pansy nudie stuff. This is teargas and cars/flags on fire.

During 1970, President Nixon was dealing with Vietnam. Governor Reagan had major issues with UC Berkeley at this time, saying that he would “clean up the mess at Berkeley.” Apparently, the cleaning-up process involved constant police presence and an even angrier student body.

Makes you wonder why the Berkeley College Republicans like to celebrate Reagan’s birthday on Sproul. We’ll never understand that logic.

1970 Berkeley Riots - My First Quarter at Berkeley [YouTube]

Last week’s supposed Oakgate explosion is apparently not so related to the oak protest, according to the Daily Cal. The Clog is very disappointed.

In other news, every protest will now be declared lame if at least part of it isn’t 30 feet off the ground. This is an attempt to raise the level of debate, if nothing else.

The tree-sitters, who said they are members of a newly formed student coalition called the Phoenix Coalition, announced their motivations to students on Cal Day, the day-long open house event Saturday.

This new coalition includes many anti-something groups including
* Students Organizing for Justice in the Americas
* Berkeley Stop the War Coalition
* Student Coalition to Save the Oaks at the Stadium
* Stop BP-Berkeley

The tree-sittings mark the debut of the coalition, said senior Matthew Taylor, a peace and conflict studies major and a spokesperson for the coalition.

Is this more peace studies or conflict studies? As ridiculous as it is, we gotta give them credit for keeping Berkeley interesting.

The Chron has some banner banners to quote:

“We can build the world we want to live in together,” one banner read.

“Activate your life force,” read another.

Students Take to Tree Near Sather Gate in Protest Of Campus Policies [Daily Cal]
Berkeley student group climbs campus redwoods in protest [SF Gate]