Oppressed in Rhode Island wrote:
tenrun wrote:just say "its not cross country practice, its just that all the kids on the xc team and the coach just happened to be using the park at the same time!"
This has been a two year battle with them. First off, this tactic will not work.
Second, we are trying to teach the kids that there is a process for opposing something like this. Sneaking around is not an option. We need to handle it in a civilized legal manner and if we lose in the end we have to accept that we will never again be allowed to practice there whether that is right or wrong.
Well then you need to teach them the reality of the world -- preserving or attaining rights is not typically achieved by petitions, especially on-line petitions signed by a bunch of people who don't live in Rhode Island, don't fund the park with their taxes, and are not impacted at all by who uses the park. There is no lack of examples in history to study regarding how change can be effected. Perhaps you should have your runners study some of those examples and make suggestions about what to do, AND THEN HAVE THEM ACTUALLY DO IT.
I read in the petition that a coach was fined a large amount of money. Was the fine litigated in a court of law? Did anyone bother to seek out a high powered attorney to litigate it pro bono, because either he or she is a runner or his or her child is on a cross country team? Is the fine legitimate?
Instead of running in the park, have teams walked in the park, passed out fliers to get support, talked to other park users to gain their support? That cannot be illegal (First Amendment). Perhaps you could run while passing out fliers and kill two birds with one stone.
How about getting a bunch of teams to simply stand on sections of the trails to make them impassable to equestrian riders? Make everyone's life difficult.
Who controls the park and whose taxes fund its operations? Are elected officials responsible for it? They respond to one thing only -- votes. Have protested protested outside elected officials offices?
At the end of the day, this is running in a park. I am not saying that people should get arrested or get beaten by police sticks circa 1960s civil right protests in order to effect the change for this particular topic. But you have to do more than an online petition. Perhaps you are. But if things like those above are not working (and I am certain the students themselves can come up with far more creative ideas than I can if they actually care), an on-line petition will not work.
Social media can bring great change, but it can only go so far. Sometimes you have to get your hands dirty and actually make a sacrifice to get something you really want but face opposition in achieving it. Now that would be a good lesson for any teenager in 2017 to learn.