Friday, 3rd Week: The power of (a play on) words

Protest.

Pro-test.

See the subtle difference there?

OK, some background. You may have heard about the new medical research lab being built in Oxford (actually, just a stone's throw away from where I am now). Animal rights groups, ALF and SPEAK (whom I deliberately group seperately) have been organising regular protests against its construction. The Cherwell has several reports on the nature of the protests; in addition to these legal protests, several Oxford colleges have had their boathouses burnt down; and recently Oxford Architects suffered several acts of vandalism at the hands of the ALF.

A recent ALF statement read: "This is just the beginning of our campaign of devastation against anyone linked in any way to Oxford University. Every individual and business that works for the University as a whole is now a major target of the ALF. We must stand up, do whatever it takes and blow these f****** monsters off the face of the planet." (My asterisks).

Oxford students are, to tell the truth, not impressed, and certainly not intimidated. On a recent trip to Oxford, the boyfriend of an Oxford student decided to take a stand. Read his blog post here. One of the comments in reply to this post was from myself - and in it, I happen to make the pun as detailed above. I wasn't quite expecting for it to become the name of a new, pro-lab protest movement, Pro-Test!

SPEAK are seemingly worried: in response to the formation Pro-Test they published an article that, rather than addressing the issues on the table, decided to instead launch a personal attack on Pro-Test's founder. I'm not going to dignify it with a link from here.

The first Pro-Test Protest is scheduled for the 25th February.

In other news: I want to program using this language.