Naked activists protest WTO meeting
Having been to Cancun just a couple of months ago, I can think of a number of great reasons to get naked on the beach. A political protest, however, is not among them. Theater of the absurd is just not a great way to effect political change.
CANCUN, Mexico (AP) -- Activists marched in the streets and stripped on the beaches in an attempt to derail a meeting of the World Trade Organization, at which representatives of 146 countries will try to increase global commerce without throwing millions out of work.
At a beach resort best known for turquoise surf and drunken U.S. college students, trade ministers huddled in conference rooms of five-star hotels in preparation for the meeting, which begins Wednesday.
Away from the hotel zone, thousands of anti-globalization activists from around the world set up camp, renting hammocks and swatting mosquitoes, and vowed to derail the meetings with protests and marches, as they did in Seattle in 1999.
In many respects the goals of these protesters may well be noble. The execution of the protests, however, leave much to be desired. No one is going to take a group of destructive, wild-eyed radicals serious when they have no alternative to offer but to protest against the current system. The same is true for naked protesters.
Yes, capitalism is and can be oppressive. It's an imperfect world, and people will not have equal opportunities across the board. In a democratic system, some succeed by hard work, some by fortune of birth, and some by sheer blind luck. It ain't pretty, but it's all we've got, folks. Those who have a better alternative deserve the right to present them, but the problem is that there ISN'T a better alternative to capitalism. Violent and destructive protests aren't going to change that. Nor will naked ones.
