"Hipocracy" - (alphafem). Now that way of spelling it may or may not have been a typing error. But it's a neat term anyway, and I can see a lot of good use for it.

However I'd use it not so much for those who stick their necks out by taking part in direct action, as for those of us who don't like nasty things like child labour and degradation of the planet by big business and corrupt governments, but who don't actually do anything about it except maybe wear a T-shirt with a slogan, much more than for. And I'd probably include myself in this these days.

Some nasty things happened in Seattle for which it is possible to point a finger at protesters. Soome of this will have come from the crazies whom you always find anywhere, some from agent provocateurs, who had been either carefully placed there, or freelance, and some arising from ordinary people losing their head in a difficult situation.

But that's how it's always happened. It happened around Gandhi, it happened round Civil Rights and Martin Luther King and Vietnam, it definitely happened in South Africa and in Ireland. We all know that the apologists for oppression are going to seize on anything they can use, and there is always going to be something. But if we are in volved in protest we shouldn't see friernds who bring it to our attention as enemies.

Whatever happens or doesn't happen some innocent people are going to get hurt. Stores getting trashed in Seattle are a bit more visible than countries gettingn trashed by the WTO, but that doesn't mean it's unimportant. It's just that it's not the only thing that's important.

The action in Seattle and elsewhere has put the whole issue of the WTO on the front pages where it belongs.

"God writes straight with crooked lines"