Mass protests often get books or films banned, but very few people take to the streets to challenge the right of the State to decide what we can read or watch - it's still someone else's problem.
Demonstrations must be dignified and nonviolent, as the overwhelming protests in Ferguson and Staten Island have been. Do not confuse anarchists who don't want the system to work and thugs who want to exploit a situation with the majority who from day one have operated with impeccable nonviolence and clear goals.
In 1999, I was in St. Louis with Martin Luther King III as we led protests against the state's failure to hire minority contractors for highway construction projects. We went at dawn on a summer day with over a thousand people and performed acts of civil disobedience.
We have witnessed the terrible increases in the incidence of alcoholism, the advent of drug dependency, the protests, marches, strikes and human alienation.
Protest is OK. But protests, according to my King family legacy, should be peaceful.
There was no doubt that sooner or later we will fight. But we will fight not in the way of the dissidents' protests. We understood that we needed to be as professional as possible.
When counterterrorist policies are used to suppress peaceful protests and legitimate opposition movements, shut down debate, target human rights defenders, or stigmatize minorities, they fail, and we all lose. Indeed, such responses may cause further resentment and instability and contribute to radicalization.
The president welcomes peaceful protests - it is a time-honored tradition. The president agrees violence is not the answer in Iraq, and that's why he hopes Saddam Hussein will disarm.
Non-violent protests have reached a plateau. There is no other way but to get into politics to make your voice heard.
Anybody who walks out peacefully, who protests peacefully, that's what this country was built on.
