General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: To the older folks at DU from a 20-year-old, about protests, confusion, and love for one another [View all]Lee-Lee
(6,324 posts)Don't protest for a better future for all by doing something that stands to ruin your future.
Getting arrested will harm your future now more than ever. When I was 20 there were no easy online services where you could get a background, Google didn't even exist and if it had newspapers and police reports were not online.
If you wanted a fresh start in 1994 you just moved to a new state. Nobody ran record checks back to other states unless it was a job that demanded it.
That has changed now. You get arrested while protesting for illegally blocking traffic, vandalism, trespassing or anything else and that will end up online- forever. Even if you get your entire record expunged and all charges dropped the online trail remains. Forever. In newspaper accounts, mugshot websites, archived versions of webpages...
Employers will see that- HR departments take who seminars on how to dig into a person past online. People you want to date will google you and see that.
It will stick with you, and harm you, for the rest of your life.
It's easy to get caught up in the fervor and make stupid decisions. Think long and hard about it now so it's one your mind in the heat of the moment. Discuss it with your fellow protesters.
Secondly to go along with this- know the law. Know by doing the research and reading yourself and not going by what other people say because they can and will often be wrong. Know what actions are legal and what are not.
And be sure.
A perfect example comes from the discussions had on here a few days ago about protesters blocking the interstate, with self proclaimed experts saying "the pedestrian always has the right of way it's the law". Well, they just heard that and repeated it, none had actually looked it up. I did look up the Missouri law- outside a crosswalk in fact a pedestrian DOES NOT have the right of way. But the "experts" who didn't look it up were more than happy to dispense their wisdom to people who then would have followed bad advice in good faith and ended up in trouble.
So learn to read the laws and look up for yourself what laws apply to your intended actions. Don't take someone else word for it.
And don't ruin your future trying to make a better one for all.