Charles Blow offers the best rejoinder I’ve seen to the pernicious — and false and self-serving — conservative attacks on protests and protesters, like this one that has been circulating on Facebook:
Disruption is not a dirty word; in this environment, it’s a badge of honor.
Yes, it’s important to show up on Election Day, but it is also important to show up on the hundreds of days before and after. This is what the resistance movements are saying to Trump and his America: Buckle your seatbelts, because massive disruption is in the offing.
Trump is not normal. He is not competent. And we will not simply sit back and suck it up.
Blow’s thinking is not unique. His argument is, in a way, a paraphrase of Martin Luther King’s demand to create tension by action, or Saul Alinsky’s call to keep the pressure on as a way of forcing change. Protest, they both knew, as have so many fighters for equality, is integral to democracy, because it maintains pressure on public perception. It is the only way to influence political power during electoral off years and is one of the few tools we have to keep those we elect focused on doing right.
Electoral politics are important — especially during off years (like this year, when we elect a new governor and the entire Assembly is on the ballot) — but elections are only part of the equation.
The other rejoineder to the above meme bears mentioning — it is crap. See my Facebook response below:
Send me an e-mail.
Hank Kalet 