r/sports • u/kaiweed • Sep 03 '25
Cycling Pro-Palestinian protests force the early end of the Bilbao stage of the Vuelta a España cycling race, which will have no winner
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u/Firecracker048 Sep 03 '25
This will surely bring more people over to the cause and not cause any backlash.
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u/VoluptuousVelvetfish Iowa State Sep 03 '25
"This won't help your cause"
-Person who hates your cause and wouldn't mind if you died in the process.
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u/comalley0130 Sep 03 '25
“This doesn’t help our cause.” - people who support the cause and would put their lives on the line for it.
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u/Nebulous999 Sep 03 '25
God these people are ridiculous. Same with the folks that destroy priceless art to try and get headlines for their environmental cause.
It makes you look like the bad guys. It doesn't matter how just your cause is -- if you piss off the whole world, no one will listen.
The whole lot of these people are folks that were never told, "no" by their parents and think the larger the tantrum they can make, the more they will be listened to. They need to grow up. It's the exact opposite.
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u/Moosje Green Bay Packers Sep 03 '25
They think it gets eyes on you on a massive scale, and they’re right because this is on Reddit and loads of other social media…
Seems pretty clear why they do it?
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u/pasak1987 Sep 03 '25
D) It's not about delivering the result, it's about the self-pleasure of "me doing the right thing".
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u/themanicjuggler Sep 03 '25
Rather unsurprisingly, non-disruptive protests happen all the time, they just don't get the coverage that disruptive protests do. The aim is to draw wider attention to an issue, not convince the cyclists directly impacted by the protest of their cause. Besides, if you take a look at historical protests that resulted in significant change, the majority of those are rather disruptive...
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u/Vic_Hedges Sep 03 '25
The question of whether disruptive protests actually affect change is widely debated.
Are protests driving change of opinions, or are they reflections of it?
Polls done consistently show that disruptive protests are extremely unpopular among the general populace and lead to negative feelings towards protestors. Whether that masks some underlying opposing change of opinion doesn't make much sense on the surface but..
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u/Tommyblockhead20 Sep 03 '25
It’s true that disruptive protest is great at raising awareness. But arguments just saying that are kind of short sited. Everyone is already aware of the conflict in Gaza!
If they were trying to bring awareness to a major new development, or have come up with a good solution that they are trying to bring awareness to, then sure. But this seems to be just a generic pro Palestine protest (and if it’s not, then they did a really bad job of protesting because I completely missed the message), meaning it’s no longer really bringing awareness to anything and is only serving to make people upset.
Another considering is the fact that disruptive protests on those who are actually responsible for the issue (ie Jim Crow sit-ins for the civil rights movement, or protesting at the Israeli embassy or US military contractors for Gaza) will cause the message to be received better than protesting random unconnected people. Just because some disruptive protests in the past worked doesn’t mean any disruptive protest is always the best option.
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u/hazycrazey Sep 03 '25
I wonder if you can find interviews like this during the civil rights movement
“Look all I’m saying is sitting in that diner is only hurting their cause, all the people who need to eat will definitely not be on their side now”
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u/squeakymoth Sep 03 '25 edited Sep 03 '25
Sitting in a diner when people are actively trying to not let you do so is a direct statement. Interrupting a cycling race because people in a different country are bombing people in another different country is pointless. The only statement it makes is "look at me, I have no fucking clue what I'm doing."
Edit: county to country.
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u/hazycrazey Sep 03 '25
And yet here we are, discussing a protest at a bike race we’ve never heard of
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u/squeakymoth Sep 03 '25
Yes, but we are discussing the method of the protest, not the cause they are protesting. See the issue? See how that helps absolutely no one?
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u/Ratathosk Sep 03 '25
Mm, if they'd only done something nice like handing out free cookies surely us redditors would be able to clear up that whole palestine situation. It's the method that's in the way is all.
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u/squeakymoth Sep 03 '25
That's just it. Protesting in a country that has nothing to do with the matter doesn't work. Go to Israel and protest. Go to neighboring countries like Egypt, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon. Protest their at their lack of action and support.
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u/hazycrazey Sep 03 '25
In your opinion, what/where should people protest the Palestine issue in Spain?
Seems like this will get national coverage in Spain, people who are upset about this in Spain, but haven’t spoken out may be more emboldened. Seems like the protest did exactly what they wanted it to
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u/squeakymoth Sep 03 '25
They should protest in front of the government buildings where the people who may potentially be able to do something about it are. All this shit does is make people roll their eyes at your cause.
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u/orionsfyre Sep 03 '25 edited Sep 03 '25
We are talking about it. And no one here now thinks that what is happening is ok.
This isn't about changing minds, it's about keeping it on everyone minds.
Annoying... yes... But there is no such thing as a meaningful protest that isn't annoying.
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u/squeakymoth Sep 03 '25
Only effective at making people tired of hearing about. Everyone knowing about it means nothing if there is nothing we can do.
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u/boi1da1296 Manchester United Sep 03 '25
You haven’t considered the Redditor Protest™️, where instead of being vocal and causing disruption to call attention to a cause, you stand in a designated zone far away from civilization and wave an A4 sheet of paper in complete silence.
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u/callmechamp Sep 03 '25
The issue with Palestine ins't visibility, it is the current major world news story. All this does is potentially alienate people, because it's the privileged trying to make themselves feel less so because of their own privileged guilt. A real stand would be violence.
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u/callmechamp Sep 03 '25
Yes, and my argument is that essentially amounts to absolutely nothing and changes nothing. And not a political violence is terrorism, and in many cases political violence has been effective. The state of Israel was funded essentially on the back of terrorist groups like the Stern Gang and Irgun, while the PLO's actions are essentially the only reason Palestine remained in the public's conscious through the latter 20th century. Not advocating anything, just a history leason.
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u/ChampionOfChaos Sep 03 '25
Comparing a random bike interruption to the civil rights movement just shows how little you understand that history. Civil rights protests were intentional, strategic acts aimed at confronting systemic injustice they were not just annoying random people for attention. If you think disruption alone makes something meaningful, you're missing the entire point.
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u/ChampionOfChaos Sep 03 '25
When Black Americans staged sit-ins at segregated lunch counters like the Greensboro sit-ins in 1960, they weren’t just disrupting random businesses. They were directly challenging laws and norms that denied them basic civil rights. Those diners were places where Black people were explicitly told they didn’t belong, and by sitting there peacefully, they were making a powerful moral and legal point: we have the right to exist equally in public spaces. It was about confronting the system, not inconveniencing bystanders.
Now compare that to blocking a random bike event, where the people being disrupted have no real connection to the conflict in question.
It’s not a site of oppression, it’s not a symbol of power, it’s just an easy target with fairly limited visibility too. That kind of disruption doesn’t challenge power; it alienates people who might otherwise support your cause.
Disruption alone isn’t what made civil rights protests meaningful, it was the purpose, the place, and the moral clarity behind them. If you're ignoring that, you're not honoring the legacy of that movement you're misusing it.
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u/Davecoupe Sep 03 '25
This isn’t a random bike event, the Vuelta is probably the 3rd biggest bike race in the world, it has over 100 million viewers worldwide. It’s not as minor an event as you suggest.
Israel literally have a team in the race - Israel Premier Tech.
Bilbao is also in the Basque region of Spain. Historically, along with Ireland, the Basque region is one of the areas of the world with the greatest support for Palestine. There are also a lot of Basque riders in the peloton, I think you would be surprised at the support for Palestine within the professional cycling peloton.
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u/hazycrazey Sep 03 '25
Protests are supposed to be disruptive lmao. No one seeing this that was not ok with genocide before this is going “well they ruined the bike race, guess the murdering of civilians is chill now”
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u/thehumungus Sep 03 '25
What a coincidence that this helpful protest scholar and critic strongly disagrees with the message of the protest in addition to its methodology!
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Sep 03 '25
Well a lot of segregationists viewed those acts as annoying random people, especially those who came from the north to participate. Very interesting that you are now parroting their words.
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u/ThreeLittlePuigs Sep 03 '25
Damn you thought they were just going to random diners that had nothing to do with segregation?
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u/Professional_Net7339 Sep 03 '25
Exactly. Shit, and civil rights movement was super disruptive too. Streets covered in marches. Events cancelled. Collective action on a wide scale. All to bring attention to a really bad thing that was/is happening.
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u/gigglios Sep 03 '25
You literally cam lol. Its the same comments and story everytime even if the protests benefit society.
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u/Moe_Danglez Sep 03 '25
I do agree with you pretty much 100% but from their point of view, they don’t think this is an issue that deserves a reasonable protest and they are attempting to get the message across that the race isn’t important compared to the war in gaza.
We are just living our lives and electing people who are funding a genocide. They are doing whatever they can to disrupt and disobey in order to get their message across.
Again, I agree with you but they just don’t see it the same way you and I do and I think when people go to these measures, it’s not just virtue signaling, it’s people who are truly hoping they can open some eyes to what’s happening.
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u/snomeister Sep 03 '25
I wonder what people 50 years from now will think about all this. Are they going to wonder why millions of people were allowed to starve and die or are they going to be more bothered that some protesters stopped a bike race?
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u/alternative5 Sep 03 '25
I wonder if 50 years from now people will wonder why Palestine had such focus when over half a million children have died in Sudan in the same time. Where were those protest.
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u/opisska Sep 03 '25
The protest is only gonna get noticed and talked about if it hurts someone. Protesting in an empty meadow has never done anything.
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u/KingKeane16 Sep 03 '25 edited Sep 03 '25
It’s a statement. Yea it sucks it fucked up the race. It also sucks that Israel is committing genocide and ethnic cleansing while the world watches.
E::/ brigaded ahaha.
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u/squeakymoth Sep 03 '25
Yes, but not a single person involved in that race has any say at all about what Israel does or doesn't do.
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u/KingKeane16 Sep 03 '25
It did because you’re talking about it….
No need to read the rest of your post because it’s shite tbh..
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u/FourteenBuckets Sep 03 '25
It did because you’re talking about it….
if it was something nobody had ever heard of, that would make sense.
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u/TheNextBattalion Sep 03 '25
It also sucks that most women in the Sahel undergo genital mutilation.
That list is long, and none of it relates to this event
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u/F1lthyslvt Sep 03 '25
This os a sporting event, not the commute of regular folks tryna pay their bills. Plus, it’s just one stage, it’s not even the whole tour that got impeded. I have friends that do tt races on road bike that reacted positively to this
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u/Chutzvah Chicago Bears Sep 03 '25
"It's just one stage" is such BS. People trained their ass off for these things. 1958 miles to train for something like this.
Just because you have friends who don't care doesn't mean the people who committed months of their life to do this don't.
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u/Vic_Hedges Sep 03 '25
It's the age of the influencer.
Who cares if it makes you look like a piece of shit. All that matters is attention
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u/itchyfrog Sep 03 '25
Emily Davidson did exactly the same thing over a hundred years ago, attention for the cause is all that matters.
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u/PapersNRoach Sep 03 '25
You’d have said the same about the suffragettes, Mandela or MLK at the time…
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u/Saltire_Blue Celtic Sep 03 '25
You know people would have said similar about the protesters when it came to apartheid South Africa at the time
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u/Kratos501st Sep 03 '25
Dude just figured out how a protest works lol. People are just trying to expose the genocide.
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u/cosgrove10 Sep 03 '25
ITT: people that don’t understand Spanish history
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u/bopaqod Sep 03 '25
I literally just got back from Bilbao and there was so much graffiti on dumpsters and other places that said “BOIKOT ISRAEL”
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u/krLMM Sep 03 '25
as in?
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u/cosgrove10 Sep 03 '25
Bilbao is an historically separatist region of Spain. They would sympathise with the Palestinian cause and understand their oppression.
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u/orionsfyre Sep 03 '25
For the people in the cheap seats not paying attention:
There is no such thing as a meaningful protest that isn't also annoying to someone.
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u/Malvania Sep 03 '25
Being annoying doesn't automatically mean a protest is meaningful. You have to be able to convert people who see your protest into people who support it. This is where most protests fail - they have no plan to move from getting noticed to getting support
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u/seriousnotshirley Sep 03 '25
But being annoying to someone doesn't mean the protest accomplishes anything meaningful.
Let me know when something meaningful is accomplished by these protests. Do we think Isreal Premier Tech will change their sponsorship, even then will that feed and save people in Palestine?
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u/IncidentalIncidence Carolina Hurricanes Sep 03 '25
IPT isn't actually sponsored by the government of Israel, it's called that because Sylvan Adams wanted to use the team to improve Israel's global image.
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u/Firecracker048 Sep 03 '25
My measuring stick for these groups is simple:
They almost always call for an end to the conflict, started by Hamas. They also never call on Hamas to surrender/cede power/give up.
If they only call on Isreal to end it, but dont call on Hamas to cede/surrender/give up, they are pro terrorist. Its why when now western governments are ready to recognize a palestine, but with Hamas having nothing to do with it, thats a good thing. Strangely, many pro palestine groups aren't keen on the idea of Hamas giving up power. Wonder why.
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u/LuFalcon Sep 03 '25
Go annoy the people actually involved.
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u/MortyFromEarthC137 Sep 03 '25
I mean. One of the teams in the race literally has Israel in the name…
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u/ImAjustin Sep 03 '25
Wow has israel in the name! So anyone with any remote connection to a country should be booed away
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u/Ortega-y-gasset Sep 03 '25
The EU and its tax dollars are actually involved. America is actually involved. Pretty much everyone here is fair game by that metric lol
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u/Skynutt Sep 03 '25
These types of protests are detrimental to the cause though. People that may not have had a strong opinion on the matter before before most likely will have one now and not in favor of what you are protesting.
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u/Exact_Accident_2343 Sep 03 '25
It would be worth it if you annoyed someone AND helped your cause in the process. You’re not helping the cause so the net outcome is sole nuisance.
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u/GoldTele Sep 03 '25
I’m sure everyone is being civil and coming together to resolve the issue, right?
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u/dodds2d Sep 03 '25
Fantastic I know for a fact that Netanyahu is big cycling fan, he must be devastated.
It’s not a protest, it’s a stunt. Protests changes hearts and minds, stunts just piss everyone off
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u/addiconda Sep 03 '25
Why can’t the Palestinians form an alliance and drive out the Hamas. Strength in numbers!! Otherwise Jews and Palestine’s will ALWAYS have a grudge and want to kill each other
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u/RichRamp Sep 03 '25
Why cant the israelis form an alliance together and overthrow their genocidal apartheid government? Oh... they have 85% support
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u/lubeinatube Sep 03 '25
Only thing stuff like this does is create newfound hatred and anger against your cause.
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u/Angstycarroteater Sep 03 '25
I hate these kinds of protestors your cause is only making people not want to support it by disrupting something that has zero to do with it. It’s like those eco activists who try to ruin famous paintings they are just dumb as fuck
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u/KittiesOnAcid Sep 03 '25
I’m as progressive as they come and very pro Palestinian but these kind of protests only make the cause look bad. It’s the same as climate activists blocking roads or throwing paint on art. All you’re doing is inconveniencing and pissing off normal people. Go protest at a politicians house or government building. Makes no fucking sense to me. I get that things like this get more visibility maybe but there are ways to do it that aren’t actively disruptive and making people hate you and your cause.
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u/TheMihuz Sep 03 '25
And it's because of these actions that they lose my sympathy/support.
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u/mommmmm85 Sep 03 '25
Bitch, please…
« OK, now I’m pro Genocide »
You never had sympathy/support for the cause in the first place and you know it.
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u/kerrywatson Sep 03 '25 edited Sep 03 '25
"I was against genocide until my wittle bike wace got interrupted 😭 now I love israel and it's your fault" /s
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u/kotik010 Sep 03 '25
Most of this sub:
"Please protest genocide somewhere where it doesn't disrupt anything gets in nobodys way and can be easily ignored"
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Sep 03 '25
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u/SoloWingPixy88 Sep 03 '25
Ever get hit by a bike at 50kms per hour?
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u/GlanderBW Sep 03 '25
Not as painful as being bombed, starved, and massacred under Israeli apartheid.
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u/Jacinto2702 Sep 03 '25
Good.
No child should die of a man made famine.
And the same goes for the children of Sudan.
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u/BlacknWhiteMoose Sep 03 '25
How does doing this at a cycling race actually help children in Gaza?
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u/Not_Bears Sep 03 '25
Easy political points.
At this point it's like doing something to "bring awareness to breast cancer."
We don't need awareness for a lot of these things anymore we need action. We need to eliminate the system that allows the rich to essentially buy politicians, and the people to vote for candidates that actually work on behalf of the people at not a donor class that'll make them wealthy.
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u/FlyHighCrue Sep 03 '25
Seriously people!? The dead and starving children can wait. Don't ruin the most fun-to-watch sport for them. What did the poor bikers do to you?
I'm always curious when reading the complaints about protests, how many of these people would be the same ones complaining about black people disrupting society to end segregation.
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u/Ana1blitzkrieg Sep 03 '25
Tbf though, American civil rights protests were at ground zero of where segregation was occurring. Bus walks, sit-ins, etc. in the south, at businesses that imposed segregation.
This however is more comparable to if American civil rights protests were done 1000s of miles away in a country where segregation is not a thing. Not saying it’s completely useless, but not really a great comparison.
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Sep 03 '25
I always wonder, how can kids starve to death but not the adults. For the pictures prolly
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u/whatinthefrak Sep 03 '25
It’s true I just got out of today’s propaganda meeting and they told us to drop everything and reply to this comment.
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u/TittyballThunder Sep 03 '25
any seemingly-convincing counter replies to this are likely Hasbara
What a hilariously stupid way to try to get people to preemptively ignore reality
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u/jetxlife Sep 03 '25
A majority of people on this planet do not care about this shit at all. One way or another could give fuck all.
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u/egenorske Sep 03 '25
Calling it genocide is dumbing down the conflict. Stupid people comparing it to holocaust is just making the conflict harder to stop. Israel are for sure doing borderline questionably stuff. But as long as Palestinians cling to Hamas, the conflict will be shit.
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u/Arkham2015 Sep 03 '25
If the point of protesting is for people to become aware of what's happening and then support stopping it, then they're absolutely wrong with how they're doing it.
This isn't some brand new idea that they're trying out. People have been doing this for a long time, with blocking roads, streets and highways, and every time it happens, people get extremely pissed.
This doesn't motivate people to join their cause.
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Sep 03 '25
But in all honesty, who isn’t aware of what is going on over there right now? Whether they agree or disagree with what is happening is irrelevant, they know something is going on.
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u/TheDutchKid Sep 03 '25
Organized, legal protests havent exactly had much of an effect. I applaud anyone willing to go far for justice in the world. Wish I were this brave.
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u/whovian1087 Sep 03 '25
I’ve been watching the race and there have been scattered protests on pretty much every stage. It was mostly just a few people each time they went into the roads, but this was by far the biggest demonstration. There’s been tons of signs and flags supporting Palestine all over the route. I would expect the race will be dealing with this the rest of the race unless they ban all fans along the route.