The Lady Doth Protest Not Enough, Methinks
I am not a natural-born protestor. I’m not that kind of person. I do want justice in the world. I want wars to stop, for people to be able to focus on making new ways to make music instead of new ways to kill, to settle arguments through the power of dance, and turn the Pentagon into the biggest underground dance party this world has ever seen. Genocides— or genocidal behavior— are, in my studied opinion, bad. Yet I never feel compelled to take to the streets to proclaim these things, or even to support something such as, say, healthcare for all, which I also would like.
Protesting is not appealing to me as an activity— I’m not naturally drawn to it as so many others seem to be— and also, I just never got it. I didn’t see the point. Angry people shouting on the streets don’t seem to affect the lives of those in power, and those unaffected players won’t make any moves. And if we’re not changing the minds of those in power, what are we even doing?
For those reasons, I was out. Or in, I guess. As in “I usually stayed inside.”
But then my wife asked me to try going to one. It was small, with just her, me, and 4 or 5 other people holding signs, carrying flags, and causing a ruckus on the street corner. A more intimate one, for lack of a better word. I’ve been to those big rally-like ones that’re almost like a party. You can walk right up to them, stand on the edges, and act like you’re a part of it. Maybe even move into the throngs of people. But it’s always through the people and not with the people. Because you know. Even if you don’t admit it to yourself, you know that any aggression or pushback from outside will probably be aimed at someone else in the crowd. It’s easy to be another face in the crowd, when so many around you are eager to be seen and heard. So I never felt like I was really putting myself out there.
But this one was going to make me vulnerable. And I didn’t want to go. I told myself I had good reasons to get out of it. I was afraid that nothing good would happen and it’d be a nothing burger. Afraid that something bad would happen and I’d get threatened with a knuckle sandwich. And that one-two combo of pugilistic puns was where that lazy and cowardly part of me made its fatal mistake. Because when I notice that half of me is worried something will be so small it won’t be worth it while the other half is worried it’ll be so big it’ll get out of control, I take it as a sign that the truth is probably right in the middle. Not so boring I had to skip it, not so scary I needed to avoid it. And that’s when I knew I needed to go. It’s the one time centrism is actually progressive!
We gathered on a beautiful Wednesday in San Francisco during that golden hour in the afternoon when the sun isn’t too strong but the evening chill hasn’t yet made its way downtown. We stood in the sunshine on a street corner not too far from our home. I was nervous about holding up a sign and might have taken longer to do it if I hadn’t decided it was perfect for keeping the sun out of my eyes.
Our presence immediately elicited a lot of reactions, both positive and negative. We were out there for barely an hour, but it was a lot. I was emotionally spent when it was done and the following twenty-four hours.
Before we’d even properly begun, we drew unwanted attention. An older man stopped his bicycle long enough to get into it with one of my wife’s friends. I missed it because someone else was explaining to me how they thought the US (of A) shouldn’t be supporting any country other than our own, but they couldn’t stay at the protest because they couldn’t stand under the Palestinian flag.
Later someone came by wheeling a small shopping cart with a toy (but real) dog perched on top of her stuff, muttering something about Japan and Russia being the real enemies.
The next three people to vocally push back against us were:
“You couldn't live like that over there”— Sad Woman
“End Hamas” —Angry Dude
“No one cares” —Apathetic Dude
I pointed out these specific quotes because I noticed that many negative reactions were reflections of the same arguments I heard people say against the BLM Movement:
Mentioning Japan and Russia in what sounded like a non-sequitur at best and a ? Yeah, some people will take any opportunity to spout their own theories that sound nonsense.
Declaring that the people we’re protesting for won’t like us— whether it’s in the middle east or the inner city or Black churches— is beside the point. Yeah, it sucks that some people don’t like me because I’m queer or white or western. Hell, some people just don’t like me on a personal level because my jokes don’t always land. But does it really track that a “people must pass some purity test before they deserve help? Compassion? Before they’re allowed to be treated like regular people and not be bombed by a neighboring government or shot or beaten by agents of their own government? Does everyone have to sign off on accepting you or liking you before you’ll speak up for justice?
End Hamas? That’s like pointing out Black on Black crime. Both are also bad. I’m not arguing that isbut it’s, again, not the point of what we’re talking about today.
No one cares? Yeah, that is the point. We want people to care. We need people to care. Your (and most people’s) lack of interest is the problem
And then we had a guy who was just mad that something or someone might possibly get in his way. He was a bicyclist who yelled, “behind you!” This my wife poetically misunderstood as “I support you and this protest!” though I don’t even think she heard either of the words he spoke. A man on a bike (angrily?) warning Monique she was in the bike lane and (technically) “in his way.”
Photo by me, Natasha!
A better and/or more patient writer could explicate the above with more depth and nuance, but I think it maps on well enough to make sense on an intuitive level. And I’m assuming these types of deflections are older than I am, and I’m not the first one to pick up on similarities in tactics employed in countless other ways to shut down those who want to make a change. But these thoughts bear repeating.
Thankfully, we did have people offering support. And they outnumbered the others. Supporters included groups in cars honking, college kids walking by and updating us with what’s happening on their campus, and people waving and smiling as they walked or cycled by. It’s easy to claim that you’re probably on the right side of things if the people who support you are diverse in age, gender, and skin color but that’s only because it’s true.
And those moments were the parts of protesting that resonated for me. Being out there. Showing the world (or our little corner of it anyway) that we haven’t forgotten. That we do care. That the other people who feel the same way aren’t alone. Distilled down to one word it’d be: Community
This post keeps wanting to slide into “Is protesting good?” When really the question should be “Is protesting good for me?” And I don’t have the answer to that. And it took me a while to realize that ending this with that uncertainty is part of the process. I have no answers but I have to keep at it. What else can I do but keep moving forward? Protesting when I can, supporting them in other ways, writing about it to keep the conversation alive, and accepting my limitations even as I’m forced to accept that every day with no change is another day of horror for the Palestinian people. There is no clear solution to any of this. But I can’t ignore it and I can’t stop trying.
