Taxi Strike
Since living in the ‘Capitol’ Building I get a great view of the city in its various disguises. Last Wednesday night I happened to be staring out my window as I was eating dinner and saw an inordinate number of taxis on Swanston st. WTF? Not only was there a sense of ‘force’ about them but also camaraderie. I knew something was going on but I hadn’t heard any news of what or why [owning no TV has it's down points]. So I grabbed my Cannon [sponsorship money insert here please] and ran down to see what the fuss was about. What i saw was truly inspiring. The Taxis had blocked off Flinders, little Flinders, Collins and Swanston St and were sitting down in the middle of the busy intersection in a great show of force and fraternity. It was spectacular. Even to someone with an Indian heritage the true depth of the problem facing taxi drivers with regards to racism, physical assult, lax response time etc was foreign to me. It reminded me of how protests live on such a knife edge – there is such beauty in the common ideal and such terror in the way certain fringe groups reassert the power of assembly.
And here
But this protest had such a vocal and unifying message – there were continual shouts for peaceful demonstration and this was adhered to by all of those present. I circled the mass, acutely aware how many protests in India turn ugly very quickly and hoped the police wont be justified in using violence to stop a protest against a violent act – the stabbing of a taxi driver at Clifton Hill and subsequent 2 hour response time from the police in finding him.
Yesterday I was on a tram on my way to a friends house in Thornbury and saw an MX reporting the incident. I was intrigued how they would tackle the many burning questions regarding media I had
# How does the idea of a peaceful RESOLVED protest fit into the general field of social conditioning – will it herald the use of protest as a tool or try to dampen down its effects and ultimately its power?
# How culpable will it paint the assailant?
# How much coverage [protest went on for 36 hours - if anyone knows how to stay awake its a cabbie!!!] will it have of the entire show of force of the many many people there
# How much will it describe the ‘inconvenience’ and ‘gridlock’ experienced by commuters
Sadly although the MX paid token service to the strike it did delve with any great insight into the motivations of the Union requests. The photo of it took up 3/4 of the page though. Covertly Racist? Australia? Surely not…
I don’t mean to sound bitter. I’m not. Just the idea of ‘open’ dialogue and freedom of expression doesn’t really occur from the easily digestible mind snore of MX – although does anyone look for anything of meaning from it?
