On the day you are peacefully protesting and then are maced, beaten, arrested for felony rioting and thereby stripped of your rights and marked as a lifelong felon you will understand

I want to know how we are defining the term "peaceful protest." I'm not saying anything in contrast to you Aurelius nor am I necessarily agreeing with the OP. However, we are prone to justifying our actions through our personal lens of interpretation.

To take a perspectivist approach to crowd dynamics, I think people live up to the anticipated opposition and then justify the actions taken compared to the anticipated or observed hurdles. For example, a few people throwing trash cans in windows don't think they're being violent because they aren't committing assault and they weigh the actions against the pressure of having semi-automatic weapons surrounding them. In turn, law enforcement shot callers justify riot gear, weaponry, and militarized tactics and call it peaceful because of the pressure of needing to control hundreds/thousands of people, some of which are prone to committing violent acts.

It's a classic case of violence meets violence, and because of that it remains perpetuated. The answer is this: protest is violence. People against people, even with words, is violence.

My parting thought is this, it is also important to look at this from the other side. Perhaps it is the protester law enforcement is protecting. I assure you if cops chose to take the night off and let the group rally on bridges and shut down highways, civilians may take harsher street justice with the inconvenience. food for thought.

Jessdickenya, if addressed to me, I believe my point was clear. I was making a point to Aurelius that "peaceful protesting" is a BS statement because most people who are trashing the city still believe they are being peaceful. If addressed to the OP, I think the point is all you fucking hippies bitch and complain when you're not up for the challenge.