Protesting: it's a Family Value

It was the first day of spring break. The boys wanted to go to the zoo, but Maddie wanted to participate in her first demonstration. She was disappointed that I hadn't taken her to the stroller rallies for married student housing while we lived in Berkeley. On Tuesday night Heather Armantrout and her daughter Sarah made their signs. Rob just threw his together on Wednesday morning, but as always, managed to create a stir.
He sat talking for a while to some guy sitting next to him before he realized that he was Tad Walch of the Deseret Morning News. But we knew that Rob would get attention if he showed up, and I was totally unsurprised that he was quoted. I'm relieved that no one quoted Maddie!

They did manage to get the spelling right on Voldemort eventually. Here is Maddie with several of our study abroad students, opinionated demonstrative folk that they are. When I ran into Will's friend's mother yesterday, she said "I just have one question: Is Rob really a Harry Potter fan?! I've been going to the website and counting down. I can't wait until book seven comes out!". So much for his message, right?

Here are Heather and Sarah, complete with their signs and the cell phone. They called Heather's husband, Brok and told him they were attending and he said "Have fun. Hope you have bail money!" but it was very tame and they all had a good time sitting in a circle by the JSFB, while the poor pro-Cheney rally by the Clyde building was much smaller. They handed out blue arm bands and cookies and wrote thank you notes to Cheney which just shows how little BYU understands protest culture, no?

This is our friend Mary Lee holding another of Rob's signs. This one made people really angry, because your average conservative BYU student felt [I guess] that the only way to be politically active and follow the prophet is to welcome Cheney.

The black shoulder in the corner is Alan Keele who commissioned a sign from Rob saying "Torture is not a family value" and was quoted both by the paper and in the KUER radio news piece. If you'd like to see the morning Deseret News where Rob and Alan are quoted, you can find it HERE. The evening edition can be reached here.

The spontaneous rendition of The Star Spangled Banner was begun by none other than our dearly beloved Rob and Heather, high school choir friends for years now. Some other time we'll have to detail their exploits and pranks around and about Orem High.

The story of the BYU anti-Cheney demonstration was also picked up by the Associated Press and NPR. Rob is pleased as punch that there has been a noted negative reaction at BYU to the vice president's coming visit and that it has received national attention.