Outrage flooded social media after a video showed an activist being arrested mid-interview at a pro-Venezuela protest, fuelling questions about the state of free speech in the United States.
In the now-viral clip taken from Grand Rapids, Michigan, 22-year-old teacher and activist Jessica Plichta can be heard criticising US foreign policy towards Venezuela, arguing that American involvement abroad is inseparable from domestic accountability.
“This isn’t just a foreign issue,” she said moments before her arrest. “It’s our tax dollars being used to commit war crimes, and it’s the responsibility of the people to resist a Trump administration committing crimes both at home and against people in Venezuela.”
Seconds later, local police move in. As she is escorted to a patrol vehicle, Plichta repeatedly states, “I am not resisting arrest.”
Local outlet WZZM, the city’s ABC affiliate, later reported that police said Plichta was arrested for obstructing a roadway and failing to obey a lawful command. In footage from the scene, an officer tells a bystander that demonstrators had been instructed to relocate their protest to the sidewalk, and alleged that the group instead blocked intersections until the march concluded.
I know people want to say that protests work. I want to believe they work. But only being able to protest in certain areas at certain times doesn’t really feel like it’ll change anything. I know people hate protests that cause traffic congestion, and the drivers that are made late to their jobs probably incur some penalties. But those protests actually seem to do something. No Kings was a great turnout, but rather than several million people walking around, waving flags, having a good time, what did it actually do? The regime doesn’t care how unpopular their decisions are. They’re just gonna keep escalating, poking bigger and bigger bears, and the rest of us are going to be the ones to suffer. Apologies for the rant. Just feeling very defeated right now, what with the…gestures broadly
Protest are not for changing something with a protest. They are about building, organizing, and recruiting.
Not every protest is a “no kings” event that everyone feels good about and goes home and does nothing for the next 6 months. But even those are opportunities for recruiting and radicalizing people.
It takes time. The decades where nothing happens are what build us to the weeks where decades happen.
If protest are not your thing find another way to get involved.
I mean, it was a large factor in the Women’s Suffrage and Civil Rights movements.
But were these protests organized, planned and approved by officials?
And mostly was it peaceful protests?
I mean, yes and no. One of the if not THE most prominent figures, Dr MLK Jr was adamantly peaceful. Suffrage was pretty peaceful too.
There were certainly others that weren’t and they still had net positive gains.
But I get your point. It certainly seems like the only way out of this is more violence. But we could do this nicely through extreme collective action. That’s a hard thing to hope for though.