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IDK about your local protest. I hope it went well, but mine felt like a joke. Watching the government be torn apart over the last few months and their message was 'vote in local elections.' it feels like we're fighting fire with paper.
The No Kings protests are... I have a lot of issues with how much they feel like controlled opposition and pageantry. Also, weirdly, an excuse for camera nerds to flex (good luck taking that giant DLSR to a "real" protest where you will get tear gassed and people will panic and shove while trying to get away). And I forget if we ever came down on whether the national organizers were shady as hell or not?
But understand that the main point of "protests" like this are to get that list of names and to get people used to actually getting outside (which is also a complaint where it is a twice a year parade on a Saturday morning...). Those names equate to funding and getting more bodies for other protests.
And... the official line is going to be what people can do. And that is very much getting involved in local politics. We can't fix this hellscape through voting but we CAN do harm minimization at home. And understand that voting in local elections is how the christofacists got so much power. When everyone else ignores the school board, they are stuffing it so they can kill LGBTQ+ folk. When everyone else was laughing at not knowing what a comptroller even is, they were getting their people into a position where they can actively kill budgets and social programs. And so forth.
But also understand that a huge part of these kinds of protests is networking. Get to know the community organizers and spend enough time talking with them that they don't think you are a cop. At which point they obviously tell you to vote locally and nothing else.
Maybe I'm just expecting too much, but I was hoping for some kind of reaction to the events since the last no kings protest. Instead I found dwindling attendance and the same very long winded low energy speakers. It's probably just the best deep red Mississippi can muster, but it's disheartening.
I would very much argue that the anti-ice protests were the reaction and escalation. And what "No Kings" should have been in the first place.
There was a problem. We had very specific demands. Folk got out. They stood in the face of violence. They showed they were willing to protect their fellow humans. Hell, they even showed they were willing to engage in a (limited) general strike.
And guess what happened? Ice bitched out and ran away from Minneapolis and Chicago and so forth. Yeah, they are still there to a lesser degree. But the occupation ended and we are back to just a moderate hellscape rather than constant terror of being outside while brown.
Contrast that with No Kings where... there is no actionable anything or even unified message. It is just people standing around dancing and putting on costumes.
Its a cliche but "What do we want? X. When do we want it? Now, but really within N days is fine" is such an effective chant. Because it provides a clear deescalation path that gives the protestors what they want.
It reminded me more of a Mardi gras parade than an actual protest. Meanwhile we're in active shooting warfare with Iran, we've invaded Venezuela while threatening Greenland and Cuba. All while we're trying to sell out Ukraine. It feels like we've gone beyond threatening to send a gold spray painted boot to our state senator, or calling Trump names.
Many of those problems are the kinds of things that will just never get critical mass amongst a domestic population. Because... it genuinely doesn't impact them. Like, let's take the Genocide in Palestine? If you were to believe online lefties? It is the greatest sin ever and THE most important topic on the planet. But most of them never even knew it was a thing until the attack a few years back. And they STILL mostly just know it because their favorite celebrities started talking about it (which is why they still actively ignore all the other genocides...).
But the "good" news is that things are RAPIDLY boiling over due to oil prices. But that will likely manifest more as protesting "the price at the pump" rather than whether we do or don't send the marines to die in Iran.
But yeah. I strongly encourage going to local protests and talking to the organizers. No Kings... I mostly checked in on a few buddies and dipped. Because there are plenty of people who are thinking beyond filming a tiktok of singing a Hamilton song. They just aren't really advertising on social media.
“ICE Out!” varies state to state. Minnesota and Portland are targeted with an increased presence because the regime wants to control the kickback. In my state there’s no mass presence even though the arrests are still occurring. They’re less visible, harder to track, don’t build castles that can be sieged, and the vast majority of the work is being done by local/state police officers because state leadership are boot-lickers. ICE creates bonfires for attention but a lot of the work is being carried out dimly and discretely. It’s a lot harder to take action, organize counter-protests, make local chats, and follow them with whistles when it’s one or two unmarked cops trolling vs a squad of them going door to door.
Yea same. I still go but it’s disappointing. At least there’s a strike coming May 1st
Agreed. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against being vocal and holding rallies but it's frustrating knowing that the real change against what's happening now doesn't come from political theatre. Societal rules no longer exist and attempting to follow them in the face of oppression will get you killed.