Overcast with no breeze, the four o’clock weather is cool. The temperatures are in the mid-fifties. Near where I stand leaning against one of the barren and trimmed trees that line Civic Center Plaza, the click-pound hammer of staple guns echo above the chants of the protesters. We gather for yet another march against the American government and Tr*mp’s fascist policies. About 30 feet behind me, a group of starlings scattered and hopping about on the ground trills, clicks, and whistles their little starling chit-chat. A faith-based group, maybe Unitarians, rivers in sombre silence through the crowd. Each one wears a paper poster around their neck. Each poster is the picture of someone killed by ICE or who died in an ICE detention center. Walking around the edges of the gathering crowd, a woman wearing a Putin mask parades a tiny Tr*mp marionette. The crowd chants Renee Good’s name.
Yesterday, I attended the nationwide walkout protest here in San Francisco. It was the fourth or fifth march/protest that I’ve attended in the two years that I’ve lived here. If asked why I show up, I’m not sure I’d have a good answer other than I suppose somebody has to show up. This can’t stand. I don’t yell, I seldom carry signs, I’ll usually wear some sort of “resist” or “live united” t-shirt. Yesterday, it was a green shirt with a black cartoon cat angrily kicking a crown “No Kings in America.” I’m usually quiet and observant. My body and my presence are my voice.
If asked what I’m protesting, I’d struggle to narrow the list down to just one or two things. I think that’s part of the problem. I think that’s part of the administration’s plan. Everything all at once. Flood the zone. Attack Venezuela, threaten Canada, threaten Denmark, say we’re taking Greenland, detain American citizens, tarrifs on / tarrifs off, demand people on the street show their papers, bust car windows, leave kids parentless and crying in the cold, pardon criminals and insurrectionists, reward cronies, fleece the American public (and the world), self-deal, lie, cheat, steal, send troops to American cities, deport people to foreign prisons, make racist and bigoted remarks, take away women’s rights, take away LGBTQ rights, weaponize the Department of Justice, persecute political opponents.
The list goes on – enough so that when listed out (much less shouted out through a bullhorn), one begins to feel and seem like an alarmist crackpot. And that’s the point – create so much chaos that no one thing stands out, nothing coalesces. They can’t hit you if you keep moving. Create so many narratives and sow so much distrust that reality itself breaks and buckles under the weight and noise of the moment. We live in weighty and noisy moments.
Nearly every time I attend a protest or a march, I walk away with mixed feelings. On the one hand, I’m glad people are showing up and speaking out. On the other, I’m afraid it’s not enough. We might have had a few hundred people (maybe a thousand) show up. We need more. I also walk away with mixed feelings because the messages themselves seem so mixed. At yesterday’s event we heard about Venezuela, we heard about Palestine, we heard about corporate greed and billionaires, we heard about ICE raids on our communities, we heard about the power of love and community to overcome, we heard about fighting and winning and seizing power. At previous events the focus shifted from LGBTQ rights to Free Palestine to protecting immigrants to Roe v. Wade. The common thread is this administration’s abuse of and assault on decency, fairness, human rights, and dignity – that thread when presented through the loudspeaker of a broad coalition often feels loose and frayed.
Yesterday’s slate of speakers spoke for an hour – much of their rhetoric felt the same. We have to fight. When we fight, we win. We have the numbers. We must stand up to tyranny. We must stand up to fascism. We must stand up to ICE. We must protect each other. We must stand together. After a while, I felt numb to it and somewhat uninspired. One angry person after another. Belly after belly full of indignation. Maybe because there was no story arc, I felt lost. All struggle, little redemption. Then we marched.
When the procession reached Sixth and Market (one of the city’s notorious problem areas for fentanyl use), I thought “now would be a good time for the group to pause and talk about inequality and injustice.” When the march made its turn towards the Mission district, I peeled off. I was hungry and thinking about dinner. I was wondering if I had post-nasal drip or a cold coming on. I paused and went back to see how long the march was – maybe two or three blocks, a few hundred people, maybe a thousand. We needed more.
Walking home, I went through the Tenderloin – partly by accident and partly because I was too lazy to go around it. I had already walked a few miles to the protest, stood around for over an hour, and marched another mile in the wrong direction of my apartment – besides, it would only be a few blocks and any of the more direct routes would have involved a steep hill.
The Tenderloin (the TL) is one of the roughest parts of the city. It’s roughness isn’t so much defined by danger as it is by unsightliness. In some portions, you thread the needle and walk the narrow path with people slumped over and/or doing drugs on both sides of the sidewalk. They’re usually too occupied fidgeting with small pieces of foil or fumbling through the few possessions they have scattered about to notice anyone walking through: empty food wrappers, toiletries, broken appliances, mangled carts, piles of clothing. Passing through the TL, I thought about inconvenience, and inequality, and privilege, and what it means to bear witness. I thought about my little bubble of the city, safe and anesthetized against the seedier parts. I think we need to be inconvenienced from time to time. I think we need to see how other people live to strip away our certainties of “the right way” to live a life, to strip away our understanding of normalcy. There but for the grace of god go I.
When not swerving around people and dogs, I mulled over the protest, its messages, its turnout. Speaking up is messy, organizing is hard. The protest numbers were low because it was hastily assembled and took place on a Tuesday night. This Greenland shit only ramped up and got real over the weekend. Last week it was Venezuela. It’s hard to hit a moving target. A more convenient time would have been on the weekend. Authoritarianism doesn’t wait for weekends.
Sometimes, I think I should do more than just show up. Sometimes, I feel like I should do more than bear witness. I don’t have that fire in me to want the bullhorn. I’m not much for yelling – which isn’t to say that I’m not seething and shocked and disappointed about what is happening in America. I just know that my form of protest is a quieter form of protest. I’m more likely to dress in a suit and stand alone on a busy intersection or outside a billionaire’s home holding a poignant and piercing sign. I’m more likely to pen a letter to the world letting them know we are not ok with this.
I don’t know what my tipping point will be. I don’t know what will spur me on to move beyond my current level of participation nor what something else looks like. I think a lot of people are asking themselves the same question. I think a lot of people are saying this is not ok. America is not ok.