On Wednesday morning Dalli told the history of the Icelandic National Protest day that he initiated in 1999 with a close knit group of friends. The philosophy of the protest day has been that it is fully open to anyone to use the opportunity to protest about things that people are passionate about or whatever they like. This started in a way as a ‘tounge in cheek’ initiative but at the same it lifts the argument that all joke includes seriousness. Like our right to say our meaning openly without harassment from the authorities. He demonstrated how a small initiative can grow and spin off various activities. He spoke about the perspective that became formed when the national protests started after the 2008 financial crash. How they had been seen as clowns and non-important in the early years until they are seen as criminals and mobs now when what they are saying actually has started to have meaning in Icelandic society. These days there are court proceedings in Reykjavik over the 9 persons that the police has determined that they overstepped the rules of protesting during the period of late 2008 to early 2009 when the capitalistic government collapsed. Here is a link to the life blog about those proceedings. Dalli showed historical images from the early protest years.
Some of the history is on these links
Dalli holding forward the new Icelandic Constitution
Here are 3 images from Dalli’s presentation. The one in the centre is a statue of the Danish king handing the constitution to Icelanders in the late 19th century and the protesters symbolically burned it. Now we might be making a new one . . . if and only if and many doubt we will be lucky enough to do something about changes to society.
Icelanddialogue 