George Clooney arrested outside Sudanese embassy

[Dalton]

Linky

No, it wasn't for a movie. Actor George Clooney, long a political activist, was arrested and handcuffed outside the Sudanese embassy in Washington for protesting the country's blockage of food and aid from entering the Nuba Mountains area of the country, as well as its treatment of its people.
Clooney's father, journalist Nick Clooney, 78, was with him and was also arrested, as were Martin Luther King III, NAACP President Ben Jealous, Rep Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) and Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) and former Rep. Tom Andrews (D-Mass.). They were taken away in a Secret Service van.
Speaking before the large crowd that gathered to watch the protest, Clooney said "we need immedate humanitarian aid into Sudan before it becomes the worst humanitarian crisis in the world."
He went on to say that the group wanted "the (Sudanese) government in Khartoum to stop randomly killing its own innocent men, women and children. Stop raping them, and stop starving them."
Half a million people in Sudan's Nuba Mountains and Blue Nile regions risk starvation due to the blockage of supplies, and the coming rainy season will only make it worse, the actor told the crowd.
"It’s about to start raining, and once it starts raining there, thousands of people are going to die," Clooney said.
Because the embassy is private property, Clooney and colleagues knew that refusing to move would end in arrest. They were warned three times before police moved in to make the arrests.
The group held a sign that read "Sudan: Stop Weapons of Mass Starvation," the Associated Press reported.
On Thursday, the actor testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about what he saw in Sudan; then met with Secretary Hillary Clinton and President Obama in the Oval Office. The Washington Post later reported that Clooney said Obama promised to push China's president to aid in forcing Sudan to open its southern region to relief efforts.
He later told reporters that "people turn on the news and see an awful lot of bad stories," but added that the United States "is still the most generous country in the world and truly the most compassionate."

Knew he would get arrested, did it anyway. Question is, did he do it more for PR or more for personal beliefs, and did he do it because he knows his star status would instantly bring attention to the issue?

[Akhlut]

Why would he do it for PR? He's generally one of the best-regarded actors currently, and has about $160m. Perhaps not as rich as he could possibly be, but living large regardless. So, I assume he's doing it more for personal beliefs and knew that if he got arrested, it'd bring a lot more attention to bear on the subject than a few random people associated with the cause who aren't multi-millionaire celebrity actors.

[Rahvin]

I don't particularly care about his motivation. If his participation helps save lives, that's all that matters to me. Why feel the need to be suspicious at all, when his inner motives bear no relevance to the actual consequences of his actions?

If the road to hell can be paved with good intentions and we back well-intentioned idiots who do great harm...shouldn't we praise those who do great good even if their intentions were less noble? Doesn't utilitarianism cut both ways?

Hell, I'd like to encourage any self-serving motivation that leads to trying to save lives.

[Phantasee]

Clooney has always seemed to be the kind of guy who does things because he believes in them. What benefit will he receive from being arrested? At the same time, his arrest was one of the biggest stories I've heard all day, and all week for that matter. He got awareness.

[JME2]

Clooney has always seemed to be the kind of guy who does things because he believes in them. What benefit will he receive from being arrested? At the same time, his arrest was one of the biggest stories I've heard all day, and all week for that matter. He got awareness.

Agreed. It really seems like he was he doing this to bring further attention on the issue.

[weemadando]

Crosspost from the Kony thread (relevant as it goes towards "awareness")

"The conflict is a conceptual mess that eludes simple definition, with many interlocking narrative strands. The New York Times, one of the few American newspapers with extensive foreign coverage, gave Darfur nearly four times the coverage it gave the Congo in 2006, when Congolese were dying of war-related causes at nearly ten times the rate of those in Darfur." - Jason Stearns, Dancing in the Glory of Monsters

Darfur is an easy thing to talk about because you've got defined ethnic, tribal and religious divides and a clear "narrative" you can talk about, despite the fact that in the scheme of things, it's neighbours have it far far worse, but you can't talk about them in 30s soundbites of "Bad muslim northern government oppressing southern christian tribesmen", hence Darfur became an easy cause celebre.

[Broomstick]

Knew he would get arrested, did it anyway. Question is, did he do it more for PR or more for personal beliefs, and did he do it because he knows his star status would instantly bring attention to the issue?

The latter two - he doesn't need PR himself, but his celebrity status can bring attention to a chosen cause.

It easy to be cynical these days, but sometimes really do act out of altruistic or ethical motives rather than just personal gain. Clooney gains nothing personally by joining a demonstration and getting arrested.

[Dalton]

All interesting responses. I agree; he goes beyond the usual celeb tack of public condemnation and jumps into the fray.

[UnderAGreySky]

I would wager that this is very much not a PR stunt - well, not a stunt to increase his own PR - by Clooney. He has been supporting the end of violence in Sudan for six years now, going so far as use satellite imagery to document evidence of genocide. He's flown to other countries like China to request them to put pressure on the Sudanese government.

[Simon_Jester]

Crosspost from the Kony thread (relevant as it goes towards "awareness")

"The conflict is a conceptual mess that eludes simple definition, with many interlocking narrative strands. The New York Times, one of the few American newspapers with extensive foreign coverage, gave Darfur nearly four times the coverage it gave the Congo in 2006, when Congolese were dying of war-related causes at nearly ten times the rate of those in Darfur." - Jason Stearns, Dancing in the Glory of Monsters

Darfur is an easy thing to talk about because you've got defined ethnic, tribal and religious divides and a clear "narrative" you can talk about, despite the fact that in the scheme of things, it's neighbours have it far far worse, but you can't talk about them in 30s soundbites of "Bad muslim northern government oppressing southern christian tribesmen", hence Darfur became an easy cause celebre.

It's also, theoretically, easier to stop.

In Darfur, all the killing is being done by or at the orders of one group of people. Lean on them and it will pretty much stop.

Elsewhere, as in the Congo, you've got a civil war going on. Trying to stop it by killing, capturing, or intimidating any one man is useless. Killing Kony would not make the war evaporate of its own accord, although it might get rid of his own bandits.

[Luke Skywalker]

Honestly, Clooney striked me as a bit of a douche-bag before this, although I have no idea why. This has certainly changed my opinion of him for the better. Props.

[Irbis]

Knew he would get arrested, did it anyway. Question is, did he do it more for PR or more for personal beliefs, and did he do it because he knows his star status would instantly bring attention to the issue?

You know, this sentence from the article you posted pretty much clears it up:

On Thursday, the actor testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about what he saw in Sudan; then met with Secretary Hillary Clinton and President Obama in the Oval Office. The Washington Post later reported that Clooney said Obama promised to push China's president to aid in forcing Sudan to open its southern region to relief efforts.

The only PR thing I see there is:

He later told reporters that "people turn on the news and see an awful lot of bad stories," but added that the United States "is still the most generous country in the world and truly the most compassionate."

I know bashing people who you'd like to donate isn't a good strategy, but calling USA "the most generous country in the world" is like calling China a shining example of parliamentary diplomacy just because its leaders were elected.

[Luke Skywalker]

The United States is generous, if we are referring to international giving. Maybe too generous for our own sake. Really, how much foreign aid do we give every year? Heck, if a country is devastated by an earthquake or other natural disaster and we don't give aid, we get blasted by countries that never give any. And if we do, we may still get blasted by isolationists, and by conspiracy theorists bitching that we are really just doing it for the oil.

(well, sometimes, we are.)

[weemadando]

The consequences of failing to supply sufficient, timely and relevant aid are generally far greater than the cost of doing so.

[Broomstick]

True. However, much of the aid given by private individuals in the US to natural disaster relief is given out of empathy and just being nice motives, not after cynical cost-benefit calculation. When you consider that private aid from US citizens can outweigh the contributions of the US government for a given disaster (such as for the Boxing Day Tsunami) even when the government aid rendered is considerable, that does make the US population generous. I don't know if it would be proper to call Americans the most generous, but as individuals we do seem inclined to pass the hat for others, even if those others are on the other side of the planet.

Some other countries do render aid in smaller absolute numbers but being much smaller countries that aid may be considerable relative to their size.