When Barack Obama delivers the commencement speech? I started to think about this not too long ago, when I happened to get this e-mail that was mass mailed yet aimed towards seniors graduating from Notre Dame asking them to not show up for their own graduation, and instead, attend a protest ceremony being organized by people who are outraged that the school decided to have pro-choice/pro-abortion individual such as Barack Obama speak at their commencement.
Since the petitions and demands that Notre Dame withdraw their invitation failed, it's time for "Plan B" - attention drawing protests. As mentioned earlier, there have been at least a few lists begging Notre Dame seniors (which I am not one of, by the way) to skip out on their graduation, and instead scream about how Barack Obama wants to murder babies.
OK, so you don't want to go to your college graduation. Fine. I skipped out on my high school graduation, and I have absolutely no regrets for doing that.
Past that, we are once again in mid-April, only instead of teabagging, we're talking about Obama, abortion, and Catholic beliefs.
Which leads to the next question: How many of these protesters will be Catholic? The core of this argument is that the face of Catholic schools (admit it, when you think Catholic schools, you think Notre Dame) is allowing for a pro-choice/abortion/infanticide individual like Barack Obama to deliver a speech (will the TOTUS be there too? Had to go there ;) ), correct? I know, I probably made it sound like a "if you're not Catholic, stay the hell out of my protest" kind of thingy, but this is something that you would think has little do with people outside of Catholicism. I somehow doubt there would be as much outrage if he spoke at a non-Catholic Christian school (like a Methodist or Lutheran school).
Also, how many of these protesters will have signs relating to the subject at hand? I somehow think that there will be a good amount of signs that will be about Obama and about Notre Dame that have nothing to do with the subject at hand. Some signs about Obama will probably be re-used from the teabag protests (like the Sieg Heil Obama poster, the "ism" posters, among others), and there will probably be some signs about Notre Dame that will be re-used from attempts to get on ESPN's College Football Game Day pre-game show.
And also, will FOX News be providing exclusive coverage of this event? Will they have Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Newt Gingrich and Chuck Norris on campus wailing about the whole thing? I mean, surely they can't get a good protest about Obama go to waste.
In relation to the core subject, I can understand why Catholics are a little upset about the whole thing, and it is a fair issue - Catholics are very strongly pro-life (and to their credit, they are consistent on that subject - anti-capital punishment, anti-war, anti-euthanasia), and there is going to be some backlash when a Catholic institution brings in someone whose beliefs contradict that with the Church, especially on a strong subject like abortion. But is that what the protests will be about, or will it be another premise to have another sore loser protest about Barack Obama?
Originally (IIRC), the tax day protests was supposed to be a protest promoting the FairTax. How strong was that subject during last April's protests?
I know, I may have to save this and bring it back out July 4...