[pp.int.general] Resistance methods

[Richard Stallman]

In
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/nov/24/new-leader-union-alliance-of-resistance-cuts,
the leader of a main UK union made a statement that reflects both of
the sides of the issue that people have been arguing:

    Asked if he feared that co-ordinated strikes could be interpreted by the
    courts as being political and might fall foul of the law, he said: "Do I
    believe the law is sacrosanct? Absolutely I do not. If there are bad
    laws not only is it right to oppose them but your duty to do so.

    "[Nelson] Mandela may have taken that position over the laws of
    apartheid and [Mahatma] Gandhi may have taken that position over the
    laws of colonialism and imperialism, and the Suffragettes might have
    said we do not accept the law of the land. So I do not think we should
    get hung up in this belief certainly as trade union leaders that the law
    is given down from Mount Sinai and we cannot challenge it."

    But he added he was not going to be self-destructive: "I have got no
    intention of playing the bosses' game of being dragged into cul-de-sacs
    and courts, and having to be fined by courts with our members' money.

    "I am not stupid. We will engage and we will fight in every way we
    possibly can without being stupid, and without ruling anything out."


-- 
Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation
51 Franklin St
Boston MA 02110
USA
www.fsf.org, www.gnu.org