leaders with the most prominent Trump-resistance group organizing “No Kings” answered that complaint Saturday when Indivisible’s Ezra Levin took to the stage in Minneapolis and announced that a nationwide general strike is planned for May 1, modeled after a successful local action that shut down much of that region in January
The one I went to had a food drive and a voter registration booth.
Also protest do something incredibly important that people don’t seem to understand.
They bring people together. People who have ideas.
People who are maybe a bit more impatient, violent, and reckless than the masses.
They motivate those individuals to take more aggressive action.
Protests make such individuals feel like they have the support of the people (and they do).
Like burning down Tesla dealerships.
Like trying to burn down concentration camps.
Because if you study any history, you know that the oppressors NEVER give up their power because someone asks or even demands.
It will have to be taken. At great personal cost to those taking it.
Such people will be inspired to action from the display of protests. They will feel validated in their illegal (almost certainly) actions. And feel like it’s worth the risk.
This is very important.
That’s very different to the one where I am. Here every leftist org shoves anyone wanting violence out and does their best to make sure everyone knows they’re not a part of the movement and should be shunned. They all want to just be peaceful and believe nonviolence is the only way to get anything done.
Well. See the protest movements have to make sure that the public sees them as non violent. Especially when it’s still early. And especially to keep trump from using the military against them.
Remember what happened with BLM? low public support even though it was a very valid movement.
Now firstly, I’m pretty sure a lot of those rioters were opportunists because their targets were just stores with high end goods and not legitimate targets of oppression.
But it didn’t matter. The stereotype of blacks being violent was validated by these people even if they were the minority. And it very much hurt the support of the movement.
You have to warm people up to violence and vandalism. And you have to make sure it looks legitimate. Like with Luigi.
Have a few who start. Slow. Then more people will join in.
I was watching this 2 part pbs documentary about suffragettes.
Basically the historians said that they needed an extreme group and a moderate group.
Because the moderate group looked extreme without a comparison.
When the extreme suffragettes started with their more aggressive tactics like burning down buildings and houses and such, the moderates and their demands seemed very reasonable.
Unfortunately one of the other ways that suffragettes were extreme was that one half of them also wanted black Americans to be able to vote. The other did not.
Now this is definitely a shitty part of history in the U.S.
But if we consider the strategy of this division of extreme and moderate civil rights group and how effective it was, we could apply it to modern day to get compromises that actually are much better than if only the moderates were being considered.
For instance.
Iets say I want it easier for immigrants to become U.S citizens or get work visas. (I do).
But I can instead argue that u.s citizenship should be given to anyone who lives here for 1 year or longer.
The compromise might be that I get almost near what I actually want.
Anyway I’m getting off topic. But yeah.
That’s fantastic they were doing a food drive and voter registration! Let’s hope they organize “turn out the vote” events leading up to the elections.
Hopefully someone is helping people get the necessary documents for voting eligibility, too.