For progressives, the dark cloud of the Trump presidency has already revealed its silver lining—there’s a newly awakened spirit of political protest and social activism spreading throughout the nation.
Here’s looking on the bright side of the election results: If Clinton had won, it would have been business as usual. While progressives basked in their imagined “victory,” Republicans in Congress would have been as obstructionist as they’d been throughout the Obama administration and little if any new domestic legislation would have passed. Even most Bernie supporters had thrown in their lot with Clinton, seeing no other viable option. Any attempt at reviving a real progressive movement would probably have been dead for at least the next four years.
But instead, something horrible and bizarre and unimaginable happened—Trump actually won. And as a result, millions of citizens are now being driven to activism. So thank you, Donald Trump. Thank you for awakening progressives and driving former centrists to the left. Thank you for radicalizing a large segment of the population that had previously been politically disengaged if not outright apathetic. You may have done more to energize the Left than even the good Senator from Vermont. The silver lining of this national nightmare is that political activism is stronger today than it’s been since the 1960-70’s.
I spent years involved in the anti-war and anti-nuclear movements, handing out flyers, carrying signs, participating in demonstrations and, at one point, committing an act of civil disobedience outside a nuclear weapons plant that prevented the President’s motorcade from entering the gates—an act which got me and about three hundred other protestors arrested. As a long-time political observer, I’m now concerned whether my fellow progressives can harness this new activist energy in ways that are truly useful and not self-destructive. After all, not all political action is equally effective.
I believe it’s important that we spend our time and energy on activities that will be received positively by mainstream America and that have a chance of actually accomplishing something. To that end, I’d like to offer a few suggestions, which I hope my fellow progressives will take in the spirit intended. I’ll start off with a few points that I believe are fairly uncontroversial before moving on to some others that are more likely to raise a few hackles.
Don’t engage in acts of violence or vandalism during demonstrations.
During demonstrations in Washington on Inauguration Day, some protesters smashed storefronts and car windows, set fires, and threw rocks at police. Of course, most of the demonstrators were peaceful, but news stories about the protests led off by discussing the vandalism and violence, so it overshadowed everything else. It should be obvious why such behavior is self-defeating. First, it gives mainstream America the idea that the protesters are just a bunch of hooligans. Second, it undermines the message of peace and compassion that we’re trying to convey. And third, it provides an excuse for the police—or the National Guard, for that matter—to crack down on that demonstration or on future ones.
If you’re participating in a rally and you see someone committing an act of violence or vandalism, please ask them to stop. Don’t approach them alone, however—talk to those with whom you’re marching, either friends or just fellow protesters, and approach the disruptive individual or individuals in a group. If you don’t feel safe doing that, I’d recommend going to the nearest police officer and letting them know so that they can try to stop the behavior before it gets out of hand.
And if you’re at a rally and are interviewed by the news media—please, please, for God’s sake, don’t defend such behavior on the grounds of “justifiable anger.” Instead, be sure to point out that the overwhelming majority of protesters were peaceful.
Don’t block traffic or disrupt public transportation.
Legislation is now pending in at least four states—North Dakota, Minnesota, Indiana, and Iowa—making it easier to criminally charge those who block traffic during demonstrations. The ACLU has expressed concern that the passage of such laws could hamper our ability to stage protests. But it shouldn’t come as a surprise that many citizens would support such legislation. If someone doesn’t already oppose the Trump agenda, we’re hardly likely to win them over by preventing them from getting to work. In fact, they’re far more likely to conclude that we’re a bunch of bothersome troublemakers. Remember, members of the mainstream public are not our enemies, they’re our potential allies. It makes no sense to alienate them.
During a recent protest here in the San Francisco Bay area, a group of more than a dozen people chained themselves to one another and stood in the middle of Caltrain tracks, blocking trains in both northbound and southbound directions and inconveniencing thousands of commuters. And guess what? Not one of those commuters was Donald Trump. San Francisco is one of the most liberal cities in the country and voters in this city already overwhelmingly oppose Trump. So who precisely was the target of this disruption?
What I find most bothersome about this tactic is the elitism demonstrated. Because if you’re a salaried, white-collar worker, it might not be that big a deal to call your boss and say, “Hey, I’ll be late getting into work today.” But for most blue-collar, hourly workers, you must make it to your workplace on time and punch in or you’ll be docked pay. Blocking traffic—and even more so, disrupting public transportation—disproportionately affects lower class and minority workers, many of whom are struggling to support themselves and their families on minimum wage salaries. Please think about that the next time you decide to engage in such a tactic.
Don’t prevent those with opposing viewpoints from speaking.
Last month, students at UC Berkeley rallied to prevent former Breitbart News editor Milo Yiannopoulos from speaking on campus. But suppressing speech is not only un-American, it establishes a dangerous precedent—members of the Tea Party are just as capable of preventing someone such as Bernie Sanders from speaking using the same tactic. A better strategy would have been to stage a counter-event elsewhere on campus where Yiannopoulos’ views could be disputed and his “facts” exposed. That’s how the free exchange of ideas is supposed to work.
In general, keep in mind that the Right is taking notes. Whatever tactics the Left uses will be adopted by them as soon as there’s another Democrat in office. So if you don’t feel comfortable with the idea of the Tea Party doing it, you might want to think twice about engaging in the tactic yourself.
Barring further evidence, drop the “Not My President” stand.
Remember two days before the election when Democrats were afraid Trump and his supporters might not accept the election results, and they were lecturing Republicans about how important the American tradition of a peaceful transition of government was? And then, the day after the election, suddenly there were lots of angry Democrats screaming about how they themselves wouldn’t accept the results of the election and that Trump “wasn’t their president?”
Well, I hate to break it those folks, but he is your president. Believe me, I don’t like that any more than you do, but if we expect others to respect the peaceful transition of government, we have to do so ourselves. I think it’s unfortunate that a candidate could lose the popular vote and still take office, but those are the rules. If you want to start a movement to abolish the electoral college system, I’m with you (though I wouldn’t bet a whole lot on our chances for success). In the meantime, we can’t accuse the Right of being crybabies and then engage in precisely the same behavior that we were afraid they were going to engage in. I support my fellow progressives in taking a stand against Trump’s statements, actions, and policies. But taking a stand against Trump being president is useless.
Unless, of course, evidence comes to light showing that Russian meddling really did affect the outcome of the election. In which case, as far as I’m concerned, all bets are off on this one.
Don’t tweet when you’re angry.
Here’s where we get a little more controversial. This one is aimed specifically at Democratic legislators.
On February 7th, during the contentious Jeff Sessions confirmation hearing, Senator Elizabeth Warren, someone I admire enormously, attempted to read a letter from Coretta Scott King about how Sessions had used his power as a federal prosecutor to “chill the free exercise of the vote of black citizens.” Republican senators, led by Mitch McConnell, silenced her. Now, just to be clear, I’m 100% with Warren on this. But then, after Sessions was confirmed, the tweetstorm started. “If Jeff Sessions makes even the tiniest attempt to bring his racism, sexism & bigotry into @TheJusticeDept, he'll hear from all of us,” Warren tweeted. No, no, no. It’s not that I disagree with the substance of what you’re saying, Senator Warren. But couldn’t you have issued a formal statement or called a press conference to express your view in a more dignified way? Given the importance of the issues involved, is sending a nasty tweet really the most appropriate response you could think of? This is far from an isolated incident. When Trump recently threw out his baseless charge that the Obama White House had bugged Trump Tower, Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi—another legislator whom I greatly admire—responded by tweeting that Trump was the “Deflector-in-Chief.” That’s a comment more befitting a lame late night comic than the House Minority Leader.
How did we get here? Where did everyone suddenly get the idea that name-calling and sending snide tweets was an appropriate way to discuss important political issues? Oh, right, I remember now—from Donald Trump. With his constant stream of inane, ill-informed, and downright unhinged tweets, Trump has done more to lower the level of political conversation than any president in our lifetime. But every time a Democratic senator or congressperson engages in similar behavior, he or she effectively hands the president a victory. We are normalizing Trump’s juvenile behavior and contributing to the further deterioration of political discourse.
I understand that when arguing with a child, it’s tempting to start acting childish ourselves. But we must resist the temptation. We’re supposed to be the adults in the room. Despite what Trump and some of his supporters may think, discussions of public policy are not for people with 140-character attention spans. So let’s please stop acting as if they are.
Can you imagine President Obama expressing himself by sending nasty tweets? No, of course not. Obama brought to the office of president the maturity and dignity it deserved. So to Democratic legislators everywhere, I suggest the following rule of thumb: If you can’t imagine Obama sending that tweet, then don’t you send it. Stop stooping to Donald Trump’s level.
Hold protests that emphasize diversity, not exclusivity.
Sounds pretty uncontroversial, doesn’t it? But this is the suggestion that’s going to ruffle the most feathers. Because, yes—I’m talking to you, Women’s March on Washington.
Donald Trump was the most divisive, polarizing candidate of our time, trying to turn Americans against Mexicans and Christians against Muslims in his bid for power. This divisiveness is one of the things that many Americans found most offensive and un-American about his behavior during the campaign. Wouldn’t it have been great if the rally in Washington on the day after his inauguration had responded with a show of diversity and inclusiveness? Instead, it was an event specifically geared to only one segment of the electorate. How many Mexican-American men do you think attended the Women’s March on Washington? How about Muslim men? My guess is probably zero. Neither of those groups were in attendance because neither was invited. On a day that should have been about diversity and inclusion, about rejecting the polarizing effect of Trump’s politics, the major political event was a march geared toward and attended by one group—college-educated white women.
This isn’t an isolated incident, but represents a serious problem for the Left and for the Democratic party in particular. There are many reasons why Trump won this election, but one factor almost all analysts seem to agree on is that the Democrats ignored their traditional base, which for generations has consisted of working class, blue collar men. Over the years, many of those former supporters have grown to see the Dems as the party of “special interests,” thereby making them increasingly easy pickings for the Republicans. If Democrats ever expect to win another presidential election, they must work to dispel this “special interest” label and to reclaim the base that rightfully should be theirs. The party needs to show that, contrary to Republican charges, it does still care about working class men and that its policies are, in fact, in the best interest of all citizens.
But instead, on the very day after the inauguration—right after losing an election, at least in part, by alienating this segment of the electorate—the Dems/Left seemed to deliberately embrace the Republican characterization. “You think we don’t care about working class men? Damn right we don’t! Let’s prove it!” Having blown the election by conceding the working class male vote to the Republicans, the Democratic Left decided to double-down on their own short-sightedness. Regrettably, the event reinforced the mainstream public’s worst perception of the Democratic Left as the party of special interests. From the standpoint of political strategy, the Women’s March was wrong-headed, poorly-timed, and reeked of elitism.
And then there were the hats. Oh, dear God, the hats. Based on statements made by Trump about how he had grabbed women’s crotches without their consent, somebody decided it would be an effective form of political protest to knit wooly pink hats with cute little kitten ears. The idea caught on, and thousands of women attended the march wearing these hats. What most Americans saw of the Women’s March on Washington, then, were the images marchers themselves posted on Facebook and other social media—thousands of photos of middle-class white women, grinning for the camera while wearing their cute, fuzzy pink “pussy” hats. Meanwhile, Republicans sat back victoriously in the White House and, most likely, laughed their asses off. The imagery was so cringe-worthy, I originally suspected the hats must have been secretly orchestrated by Republican operatives in some sort of underhanded Lee Atwater-style dirty trick maneuver.
Fortunately, there have been plenty of effective acts of opposition to Trump as well. So to close, here are my top picks for the most effective ways to oppose Trump.
Participate in town halls and other peaceful, inclusive demonstrations
During Congress’ recent break, many representatives returned to their home districts and held town hall meetings with their constituents. The audiences were filled with angry voters demanding answers to tough questions about their representatives’ support of Trump. Some of the Congressmen ended up fleeing the events early in the face of the angry crowds. No violence, no vandalism, just voters expressing their outrage. And it was all captured by television cameras. Beautiful. It was one of the best examples of democracy in action I’ve ever seen. I don’t know how many Republicans will be brave enough to conduct town halls during the next Congressional break, but if they do I encourage as many progressives as possible to participate.
Support legislators who express your views
Before her silencing by Mitch McConnell (and her subsequent tweet meltdown), Senator Warren’s questioning of Jeff Sessions was impassioned and intelligent, as was her sparring with Betsy DeVos, Ben Carson, and Tom Price. Senator Al Franken has been equally tough and incisive in his questioning of Trump’s nominees. But my favorite moment goes to Senator Kirsten Gillibrand who, during her questioning of Scott Pruitt, Trump’s nominee for head of the EPA, demanded, “I need you to care about human health and really believe that the cost—when human health is at risk, when people are dying—is far higher than the cost to that polluter to clean up the air. I need you to feel it, as if your children sitting behind you are the ones in the emergency room.” If that doesn’t bring a lump to your throat, you might want to check your pulse. Remember, it’s never too early to show your support for legislators who are saying the things you wish you could say. (And of course, you don’t actually have to be a resident of a Senator’s state to support her or his reelection campaign.)
Support organizations that express your views
In addition to challenging Trump’s travel ban in court, the ACLU has filed a Freedom of Information Act requesting government documents to show whether there are conflicts of interest between Trump’s business empire and his political office. The organization is also looking for a business competitor to Trump who would have standing in court to sue. If you support these actions and aren’t already a member, you might want to think about joining the ACLU or other organizations opposing Trump’s policies.
Call legislators and express your point of view
Don’t bother spending an hour a day calling every senator in the country. Calling Senators in solidly Red states is a waste of time. So, for that matter, is calling Senators in solidly Blue states, as they already agree with you. Pick legislators in swing states and contact them about specific policies or Cabinet nominees. Use your time wisely.
Write blog posts and letters to the editor
An intelligent, well-written essay is far more persuasive than simply posting “Resist Trump!” on your Facebook page. When it comes to actually swaying others to your point of view, tweets are no more effective than bumper stickers. (“Gee, I could never visualize world peace before. But now that I’ve read your pithy bumper sticker, I’m forced to reconsider my perspective.”) So take your time, do some research, and build an intelligent argument. Then even if your reader completely disagrees with you, you’ve at least contributed to the conversation rather than just generated more noise.
Support progressive candidates for local offices
House Speaker Tip O’Neill used to say, “All politics is local.” In our current political environment, one could easily make the opposite case—“All politics is now national.” More than ever, progressives are seeking candidates on the local level who have the potential to eventually advance to higher office. That means questions about national policy—from campaign finance reform and income inequality to immigration and military spending—are increasingly seen as appropriate even in races for local county offices. I support my fellow progressive in thinking long-term and looking for progressive candidates to support in their local communities. And although the job may be harder, this may be even more important if you’re the resident of a Red or swing state.
Pace yourself
Finally, this. I wish this national nightmare would be over quickly, but I’m afraid it’s just beginning. Barring unforeseen circumstances, we have at least four years to get through. So don’t burn yourself out. Remember to breathe. Get plenty of rest. Eat well. Spend time with friends. Be gentle with your lovers. Hug your children.
It’s going to be a long fight. Pack a lunch.