Advocacy

The David Project is an organization that teaches students how to advocate for Israel, specifically on the college campus. My program offers a course every Tuesday, I'm taking it. Last Tuesday night one of our teachers invited us to a talk he was having with some Irish tourists, who he hinted might be a bit anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian Arab.
To sum up, they were. Well, at least the ones who spoke. There was a whole large group, and we all sat around in a rough circle. We (the students of the class) were basically instructed not to talk, as this was supposed to be a learning experience for us, and we'd only had a few advocacy classes, so we couldn't really be expected to do a good job. They (the Irish tourists, and I only mention that they were Irish constantly, because their accents were very cool) mostly didn't talk. It came down to about four very loud, insistant people and maybe five people who actually waited their turn. It was clear that anyone who spoke had a pre-existing Pro-Palestinian Arab bent. Some were a bit more obvious in their bias, accusing Israel and demanding explinations. One guy tried to give the whole thing a religious basis, but he was also pretty anti-Israel. One woman was a little bit over the top (she claimed that you can "blame the victim" - at least when the victim is Israel.) but on the whole they were pretty polite. It was astonishing how wrong their facts were a lot of the time. How can you argue against things that aren't really true? They were nice peole before and after the talk at least.
It's a taste of what might come, but when we spoke about it in class the next day, some teachers expressed their personal beleifs that the whole process might be futile. I'm inclined to agree with them. Maybe it's the cynic inside me, but I don't really think anyone who has clearly made up his or her mind is going to change it, especially based on one hour-long talk. I do think it's important to do this, as peaceful discourse is always a plus, but most advocacy is not peaceful, sit-down discuccsions with people who want to talk. It's rarely a sit-down discussion with people who don't have an opinion. So...important skills to have, but it's not the most important part of advocacy. Intersting experience, though.