I guess it is a stupid way to get your idea across... and it does tend to alienate people.

[MADem]

99. Martin Luther King never burned a flag. Nor did anyone following him.

He never advocated, endorsed or condoned violence.

Let's bring the discussion back to the OP, shall we, and not drag every black person who ever threw a brick through a storefront during a riot into the fray? That's a broad brush of gargantuan proportions. I won't even start in on why that kind of "rioting in black communities" argument is offensive, too. If you pull the string it will come to you.

Here's the point: The OP is attempting to compare two sit-ins to a flag burning. I reiterate that this is a nonsensical comparison.

I don't think Rosa Parks ever lit a flag on fire--yet somehow she managed to play a vital role in (your words) "getting the required changes enacted." See what she wanted was to sit where ever she damn well pleased on that bus. That was her purpose. That was her focus. That was her GOAL. That was the "change" that she targeted.

And she got it, without ever having to Flame On Old Glory.

Still want to try explaining how firing up the Stars and Stripes got "the required change enacted?" I'm just not seeing it, or feeling it. Unless the "required change" was making a lot of "uncool" 99 percenters think that a bunch of jerks purporting to act for the OWS movement made asses of themselves in Oakland.