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Video Clips (NLN on YouTube)
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Video of Teen Mania, Counter-Demonstration and Carl Dix Speaking
(Thomas Good / NLN)
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B/W Stills
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New York, NY - February 8, 2008. 'Battle Cry For Our Generation' is a
campaign of a Texas based parachurch organization known as Teen Mania
Ministries, headed by founder Ron Luce. Backers include Pat Robertson
and other prominent leaders of the Christian Right, many of whom
subscribe to 'dominionist' (theocratic) beliefs. The core precept of
dominionists is that Christians must engage in political action to
replace secular law with biblical law. In practice this would mean an
extreme authoritarian state. Battle Cry activists are working towards
this goal and they brought their message to New York's Times Square on
Friday, February 9. They were met by counter-demonstrators from the World
Can't Wait, the Harlem Revolution Club and Movement for a Democratic
Society (MDS).
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Teen Mania NYC: a number of well scrubbed youth in protest pens...
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Joan from World Can't Wait talks to some of the event participants...
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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West side of Broadway: Times Square's Military Island
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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East Side: A Counter-Demonstration With An Atheist Message
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Teen Mania Used The Recruiting Center - Without NYPD Interference (?)
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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"There are very foul and reactionary things that these folks want
to bring forward" - Carl Dix, Protester
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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NYPD allowed protesters to swarm the recruiting center
which remained open - hoping for recruits?
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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A World Can't Wait (WCW) member (right) explains to onlookers
what the protest was about...
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Teen Mania erupts - on cue...
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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...then quiets again when the media moves on
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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True Believers and Heretics exchange views
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Counter-Demonstrators
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Color Stills
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The counter-demonstraters in Times Square were able to engage with the
Christian youth when several of the Teen Maniac faithful crossed Broadway
to speak with their opposite numbers. Exchanges were sometimes sharp but
most were almost colleagial - it was not uncommon to see protesters from
both camps hunched over a bible, citing passages to make their case.
Many of the teens appeared genuinely surprised to find that the non-believers
did not have horns and indeed had some interesting observations to offer.
Atheist protesters were also occasionally surprised.
Todd Eaton, a counter-demonstrators at the Teen Mania event, told NLN that:
"I was expecting the usual formulaic Christian hate-wrapped-in-compassionspeak
from some 'saved' zombie for hire. What I was not prepared for was what Battle
Cry actually sent over to talk to the atheists' counter-demonstration. A
doey-eyed nineteen year old former drug user - who asked with painful and disarming
sincerity, "Excuse me, sir? What's a fascist?"
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The core precept of Dominionism: replacing democracy with theocracy
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Teen Mania files into the protest pens on Military Island
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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"Battle Cry:" The cooptation of revolutionary symbols
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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WCW activist Joan interacts with the Christian youth
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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The atheist presence: on Military Island...
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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...and on the opposite side of Broadway
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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"There are very foul and reactionary things that these folks want to
bring forward...they want to impose as the law of the land. They are
promising that they are going to bring a big time Black preacher,
T.D. Jakes, to town to speak to this crowd. What they're trying to do
is to rope some Black people into this and we gotta look at that:
what they're doing is they're trying to use religion, on the one hand,
to bring forward fascist stormtroopers while at the same time they're
trying to chain down the oppressed..." - Carl Dix, protester
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Carl Dix, speaking on the East side of Broadway
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Teen Mania...
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Carl Dix is interviewed as Clark Kissinger looks on
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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The view from the counter-demonstrators' vantage point
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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NYPD negotiating with counter-demo organizers
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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A young free thinker is interviewed
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Exchanging views...
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Todd Eaton
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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Debra Sweet (right)
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)
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