3 Ways to Protest

With all due respect to the folks pouring their hearts and souls into occupations and protests these days, today, the National OWS Day of Action, I’d like to offer two facts about the first dozen years of this century:

1) Progressives have marched and protested and marched some more.

Wikipedia lists 45 protest marches in Washington DC over the last 12 years. All but four of them were progressives who took to the streets. An accounting of protests and marches outside of DC is a bit more difficult to compile, but by available measures – categories of protest on wikipedia, news searches, etc. – it seems the national trend is no different than the DC trend. Progressives have been marching, dammit.

2) Conservatives have been winning.

Sure, progressives have won some skirmishes and even some big battles. The White House and a few years in the majority in the House and Senate are nothing to sneeze at. But conservatives are winning the war. Wars. All of the important ones. Enter the litany of progressive frustrations here: two costly wars, the hollowing out of the social safety net, gutting government services, fleeing from science, gaping and growing income and wealth gaps, entrenched poverty, etc.

So consider a third fact, based on the evidence: maybe marches aren’t the best tactic to change things.

Maybe progressives don’t need a better, more nationally coordinated day of marching. Not today or any day.

Progressives need to dig into the long term work of wresting back power. Conservatism is winning the day because conservatives set about winning from local office and policy up to federal office and policy over the past several decades. They took control of the GOP and from there took control of the chambers of power – City Councils, Governor’s mansions, state legislatures, Congress (regardless of the Party in power, conservatives rule there now).

So instead of marching, protest as an individual, or help your organization participate in protest, by doing three things that might help move the ball:

1) Figure out what you want. Seriously. “No more corporate greed” is a protest chant, not a political demand. Dedicate half the time you might have spent marching to researching the issues, figuring out what you think, what organizations and elected officials you find closest to representing your values, and where you can plug in. Serious challenges require serious responses. Protest today by getting serious about what winning means.

2) If you haven’t already moved your money from a Wall Street bank, do it. This is more than symbolic – the associations and PACs of the independent community banks play different politics than the Wall Street banks. The more power the independent community banks have, the more progressive the influence from the banking industry. A big deal.

3) Research who’s running for office in your neighborhood – from dogcatcher on up – and pay particular attention to Primaries. If you spent half of your alloted protest time to figuring out what you want, then spend a second half to asking your current and would-be representatives where they stand on what you want. Sign up to help those that are with you.

Protest by winning.

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