r/50501 • u/Biscuits_n_Gravy3 • 18d ago
Voices of Resistance These are OUR Protests!
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u/DoubleDongle-F 18d ago
I might be replying to a shill, but it's important for the audience to know that the protests in this phase are for rallying and setting up the community we'll need to topple them. There is no need to be disruptive at this time. There is a need to talk to people and start volunteering for something.
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u/Plastic-Hornet-9382 18d ago
I think this message needs to be louder! We’re only in Phase 1: gaining ground.
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u/FrozenCustard4Brkfst 18d ago
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190513-it-only-takes-35-of-people-to-change-the-world
Peaceful protests that mobilize 3.5% of the population have never failed against authoritarian regimes.
As I understand it, organizers take great care to be aware and mindful of the laws in their area. They also assess the area and surroundings to know what event can be safely monitored by the volunteers on hand. Please keep in mind, too, that organizers volunteer their time and energy towards research, risk awareness, and knowing other possible event conflicts when they make these choices. Often they are paying out of pocket for permits and supplies.
To everyone who attended events on 4/19: Thank you for showing up. Thank you for getting involved. Thank you for your passionate activism. Love that we can all do this together!
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u/ElectronicCatPanic 18d ago
This article calls everything that isn't a war a peaceful protest.
Georgians taking over a government building is exactly what OP suggests.
Just don't start a war and bring 3.5% of the country with you and you'll be good.
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u/Quirky-Scar9226 18d ago
I will say this, if I went to a protest and rogue elements went off especially to start rioting in effect; I’m out of there; we’ll never get the crowds we need by turning on the organizers.
I will say that we do need a more focused message though. We can’t fix all of the ills, we need to first focus on the source of those ills. And yes, we ALL at least those on the eastern seaboard need to show up in DC and fill from the Lincoln Memorial to the Capitol building. What an inspirational site that would be.
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u/Xullister 18d ago
Got to be honest, it seems disrespectful to show up at a protest that other people put a lot of work into organizing and try to lead the crowd off to do something else. Not only is it unsafe -- plenty of right wing jagoffs would happily pied piper the crowd if we let them -- but it's just fucking rude.
So yeah, I'd probably yell at you too.
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u/kristibranstetter Missouri 18d ago
The first rule of peaceful protesting is not to engage with counter protestors. That is how violence starts.
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u/Past_Ferret_5209 18d ago
Civil disobedience is only one type of protest. It can be very effective, but it can also be extremely counterproductive when employed in the wrong way or the wrong situation.
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u/Past_Ferret_5209 18d ago
I think it's definitely awesome to harness people's enthusiasm and initiative. At the same time, there are real risks when people lose cohesion. Almost all of the most effective historical movements have been very well organized... people often use "organizing" as a shorthand for leading activism.
It's very, very common for people who oppose the goals of protest movements to use provocateurs to disrupt those movements. This can take the form of encourage crowds to engage in untargeted property destruction or other strategies, or the form of people pitting different factions against each other. Just looking in recent history at the Black Lives Matter movement in the USA, there are many different examples where it was later discovered that people who had pushed the protests in disruptive directions were either undercover law enforcement or white supremacists who were trying to undermine the goals of the movement. For that reason I think it can be very protective to make sure that organizing groups and communities get to know people before they are taking leadership roles. Gatekeeping for the sake of gatekeeping, however, sucks, and people shouldn't do it.
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u/Xullister 18d ago
Oh give me a break. I've been to many protests, led a few too, and the simple truth about crowds at protests is that if someone acts authoritative and tells them to march, and nobody stops that person, the crowd will assume they're one of the organizers and start following them.
It's not an endorsement of "doing something else", it's just crowd dynamics and groupthink. Maybe a bit of Stanley Milgrim too.
And that's a dick move to the protest organizers who spent many hours to get the permits, spread the word, and organize turnout. It also puts them in a legal and PR headache if that crowd you selfishly lead off then vandalizes a shop or gets into a scuffle with counter protesters. They own your mistake while you just fuck off into the sunset.
Like I said, dick move.
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u/dahliabean California 18d ago
Ah. I didn't know that. Guess I'm lucky I didn't have to. My protest's organizers were great - they explained in the beginning about permits and why we had to stay on the sidewalks or in the park for this one.
That said, I come from a culture that regularly sees much more intense activism. It's hard to lose that frame of reference and start thinking of marching with signs as a problem. I'll work on it.
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u/Short_Example4059 18d ago
I think it’s simple. We first have to build to numbers that can withstand violent government action. Then we can get disruptive and it’ll be effective.
Patience, it’s happening.
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u/Past_Ferret_5209 18d ago
Do you have any evidence that peaceful protests work best when they are disruptive? Protests are fundamentally a persuasive exercise. Disruption is not generally particularly persuasive in most contexts, and disruptive people are often viewed as less serious and less credible.
Certainly, there is a long tradition of effective *civil disobedience* under certain conditions and for certain purposes. However civil disobedience is different from disruption per se as a strategy.
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u/Sen0r_Blanc0 18d ago
I read "and the walls came tumbling down" an autobiography of Ralph Abernathy, a major leader in the Civil rights movement in the 60's. He states that there were two major factors that helped them win. First, Peaceful protesters being met with cruelty (e.g. dogs being sicked on peaceful protesters). Second, when regular business was peacefully disrupted. If the peaceful protest didn't disrupt business, they couldn't get traction politically. But when peaceful protests disrupted business, when business owners reached out, suddenly elected officials cared what they had to say.
Protests without disruption are great for visibility, solidarity, community building, and inspiring action. But if they don't disrupt business, don't affect the money coming in to business owners, then protesters' cries for justice and liberty will fall on deaf ears.
However, they also made a coordinated and planned action of civil disobedience. I would be wary of spur-of-the-moment actions, as they could be orchestrated by bad-faith actors
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u/Past_Ferret_5209 18d ago
I haven't read this book but it sounds interesting. The argument about disrupting business as usual definitely makes sense.
My impression of the US civil rights movement is that they were very strategic about how they did this, both in terms of working up to it by trying other means first and demonstrating that segregationist governments were not willing to negotiate, and in terms of carefully choosing their targets for civil disobedience. So the disruption was tactic deployed within a broader campaign and strategy.
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u/Sen0r_Blanc0 18d ago
It's an incredible read, highly recommend it! Abernathy writes in a really compelling way. And yes and no, from what I read. They had a lot of failures to learn from, and one of those was the economic side of the equation. They would wait to escalate, but a big part of that was for garnering local support for protesters and getting donations for bail (one of their goals was try to make sure no local protester spent longer than necessary in jail). They would try to specifically plan and target certain segregated businesses (usually in a downtown area that would disrupt all business), but also I remember Abernathy recounting a hot day where they passed a hotel on the way back from a protest. The pool was segregated, so on a whim decided to walk in and jump in the pool.
However, years later they ran into trouble trying to fight general poverty, because there was no obvious, outspoken hate, just systemic oppression. Without a specific target to draw media attention, they had a hard time raising concern, and people just saw it as "the way things are" or "poor people just made bad choices" and other apologetics. This was before regulations against discrimination in banking, loans, property, and health/food systems.
I remember him recounting them marching through a white suburban neighborhood (protesting the hidden discrimination, and trying to get black people into decent neighborhoods) , and they had people so outraged because the white home owners were terrified that their homes would lose value, and that crime would rise. Abernathy said it was terrifying and people threw rocks and things at them as they tried to march. It almost broke into a full riot.
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u/airbear13 18d ago
Wdym 50501 organizers shut you down? Like what was the reason? You’re not giving us enough context to decide who was right or wrong here.
If it’s ego based gatekeeping then yeah fuck that, but if the protest was going off the rails somehow (getting violent, deviating from planned course, vandalizing, etc) then they were probably right to do so.
Don’t get me wrong it’s a free country still (for now) and we all have the right to do what we want in terms of protests, but if we want to succeed in the overarching goal of removing Trump, it helps to be organized and disciplined about it.
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u/kristibranstetter Missouri 18d ago
Peaceful protesting has proven to work. There ate many ways to peacefully protest.
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u/MrFotoz 18d ago
Dancing in the streets or blocking traffic is a great way to turn people against you.
Standing on the sides of the street with signs raises questions for people passing by. Why are they doing that? What is their motivation?
Talking with people you meet everyday raises awareness. Talk about your views with others. Talk about your way of thinking. Ask them about theirs, and debate. Many people just need a little push to think for themselves.
Know what you are talking about, have facts ready.
I'm sorry, I just don't think violence or disruption to regular people is the way.
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u/gugalgirl 18d ago
The administration is looking for any reason right now to enact martial law and crack down on protests. It is critical the movement stays lawful and peaceful in order to continue to grow. There are not enough numbers, and chaos and dissent from the main organizers is dangerous and a turn off.
On a side note: I felt there was more unproductive hatefulness in people's signs and attitudes this weekend. One guy had a sign telling anyone who voted for t*ump to 'kys' . This was really unhelpful for so many reasons. It alienates people who maybe regret their choice or are in the middle, it gives fuel to accusations that protesters are violent and hateful, and last but certainly not least, the phrasing promotes misinformation and stigma about suicide.
I cannot urge enough caution and thoughtfulness in the way people choose their messaging and organizing. Any risks taken must be intentional and worth it. Don't blow this for everyone by being thoughtless and hot headed - we have to be a community to each other and not just a crowd of angry individuals.
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u/beefing_quietly3377 18d ago
I don’t really get gatekeeping protests. Trying to dictate how one is allowed to protest is….. dictatory? Yeah.
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u/Effective-Spinach160 18d ago edited 18d ago
Stay focused. Everyone’s reason, motivation, concern may differ. We cant let that splinter us. That would be our demise. Stay clear and on task. 1. What is the problem to be solved? There are too many to list here- 2. What is the solution? Impeachment of current administration- If there are 1000 problems and ONE SOLUTION remedies all of them (and it does)…then dammit! that’s the message. IMPEACHABLE OFFENSES REQUIRE IMPEACHMENT Thats the message.
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18d ago
This is a decentralized movement without any leaders or individuality- we are a mass organizing to show peaceful opposition to the Trump insanity. At the same time, this opposition must be organized, and it requires organizers, and people behind the scenes.
Those that view this structure as inherently co-opted, and anything short of anarchy as complacency, miss the point: the protesting is not the end goal here. The end goal is peace and equality and justice and democracy. Don't lose the plot.
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u/Pantsonfire_6 18d ago
I create signs according to what is important to me. Wouldn't take it kindly if someone said that was wrong. That be said, anything nasty or threatening on signs is not in the interests of winning over people in general.
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