Not long before the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003, I tried to enter my university's cafeteria for lunch. A bunch of lefty students—all dressed in black—had sprawled across the floor. They were holding a "die-in" to protest the preemptive strike.
I didn't support the war, but this was the dumbest thing I'd ever seen. Did these kids really think George W. Bush and Dick Cheney would notice their brave efforts to keep me away from my cheeseburger? Their theatrics seemed more about ego and attention than practical, pragmatic politics. How many of them had written to their local representatives? How many had bothered to vote?
In February of 2003, millions of people worldwide made a much bigger statement by marching against the war, and the media took notice, but—like my cafeteria comrades—they failed to sway Bush's mind. As an impressionable 20-year-old, I learned a bitter lesson: Making your voice heard doesn't often make a difference to those in power.
Over the next five years as a reporter in D.C., I covered too many protests and counter-protests to keep track of. I hated every one, due to all of the sanctimonious diehards yelling at one another while accomplishing zilch for their respective causes. Marching seemed more like a cultish ritual—primal screams, mindless incantations—than a means by which to change the world on a policy-by-policy basis. Chanting, I concluded, was a substitute for the ability to think; you repeat words along with a crowd only if you lack an individual mind to come up with your own words. All of the lemmings just push each other further and further towards their respective extremes. Why couldn't these knee-jerk wingnuts all shut up, go have a beer, and enjoy their brief time on Earth?
"It's like your whole philosophy is 'don't bother saying anything,'" a friend scolded me, accurately.
Then came Donald Trump's America. Like most Jews, I've been terrified to witness the rising tide of bigotry, xenophobia, and power worship in the United States. The White House told us that baldfaced lies are "alternative facts," a broadside against the concept of objective reality that Ayn Rand spent 977,000 pages defending.
Initially, I responded to all of this by tweeting approximately 70 times per minute until my wife begged me to log off. And yet, it felt hollow, this tweeting. No matter how much I #resisted on social media, it wouldn't necessarily be heard by anyone in power, just like the die-in at my college cafeteria.
So, on January 21, 2017, I marched.
The vibe at the Women's March—the largest worldwide protest in history—was positive and cathartic. After a year-and-a-half straight of acidic division in this country, it felt like a needed moment of hope. The Women's March drove Trump (even more) insane with rage by dwarfing his Inauguration crowd size. A week later, he couldn't stop whining about it.
The next weekend I joined thousands at the local airport for another protest, just as Americans did all over the country. Standing up for what's right—as opposed to sitting down on the couch—felt fantastic. Chanting in unison ("hands too small, can't build a wall," "hey hey, ho ho, Donald Trump has got to go") felt lemming-like at first, but after awhile it was calming, like a Buddhist mantra.
By the end of the weekend, the administration was walking back its stance on green card holders as they relate to the travel ban. While there's still a court battle to be waged over the executive order, here was proof that peaceful protest works, just as our Founders promised it would. Democratic politicians are hearing the outcry and (finally) promising to stand up to Trump, and even some Republicans are acknowledging the unrest.
"Women are in my grill no matter where I go," Republican Virginia Rep. Dave Brat told a conservative meeting earlier this week, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch. "Over the past couple of weeks my office has been inundated with phone calls and emails and comments on social media requesting a town hall meeting, and believe me, I fully intend to have plenty of town halls that are open and transparent."
(However, Brat claimed that protesters are "paid activists on the far left." Where do I send the invoice?)
Most of the people at these events weren't angsty teens in Che shirts, just adult professionals doing a civic duty on their weekends, choosing involvement over apathy. That's making America great again.
