Why aren't there mass protests in the USA?
Why aren't there mass protests in the USA?
I'm shocked that I haven't seen one protest yet. Is the media suppressing them? If there aren't any, why?
Bernie and AOC just got 34,000 people at a protest they did. Check out 50501... They seem to be rallying point. You might need to check them out here or on Blue Sky though, tik tok is deleting comments about them and Facebook will soon also probably. But yeah, for some reason the protests are not hitting the media
The revolution will not be televised
There are regular protests of thousands of people all across the country, but it never hits top headlines. There aren't nearly as many as there should be, but we're largely a broken people, a collective beaten dog cowed in the corner. We're burnt out. Literally every direction we turn, things are falling apart. The working class is almost entirely one or two paychecks from homelessness. Minimum wage hasn't increased in 15 years despite year after year of record earnings and productivity. A third of the country genuinely believes a rapist conman is their literal biblical savior.
We're fucking tired, man.
This is the fucking answers.
There are many, but nobody reports them.
Millions protested against the invasion of Iraq, the USA invaded Iraq anyway. Mass protests are ignored by the oligarchs.
Now if the USians grew spines and organized a general strike, that might get the ruling class's attention.
Can’t get a general strike to work when the majority of utility workers are magats. The algos target the blue collar industry for this very reason. Look at what the conservative / fascist media arms of your own country are targeting very specifically. Its core services for corporate enablement.
Transportation, construction, farming, police force all fine if we try a general strike tomorrow. Most upper middle class also are magats. So bank services, middle management, accounting and financial CIO / CEO teams all also are not participating.
General strike happens tomorrow and protesters in the streets will be arrested - people who are Dems or anti fascist will lose their jobs and houses.
We are in a no win game.
Ok so everyone wants one, right? Feels like it'll be dramatic and big and change and fix everything, even if it gets violent.
But there's problems with that, not only in execution but also results.
One problem is the US is massive. It would take almost as much planning as a moon landing to effectively organize a protest that large, even if you only do the continental 48 states. Some of those states alone are as large as some European countries, some are larger, so the size alone gets in the way of things.
Then you have the problem with getting all the people protesting to agree to a cohesive protest. Where to protest, what to protest specifically about, and to have a solid list of demands. Trying to get that amount of people to agree on anything alone would be huge. Like my mother says, it's like herding cats.
And then there's the matter of getting that info out there. Occupy wall Street and BLM did have a comprehensive list of demands but the media pretended they didn't. Almost all media is owned by like, six corporations, so even getting the instructions for that protest would be incredibly hard. And lest people forget, those media companies are final, so most of the media in other countries hearing about this will have just as much information surpression and do already. So it would be incredibly hard to get a comprehensive plan, demands, and instructions out el to everyone.
Also don't forget that we have the technological spying that didn't exist before. Cameras are everywhere. Not only in your phone, but on almost every street. People even put those Ring doorbells on their homes and that company sells it's video footage to the police, and doesn't turn off, so any protest could be monitored and nipped in the bud. We have whole agencies devoted to surpressing protests and entire handbooks in infiltrating them.
Then there's logistics and provisions. Most Americans can't afford to travel, much less take a week or two off of work, or a month, to protest long term. We can barely afford to keep ourselves fed with what we're getting paid, and if we were protesting in one specific location, most of us couldn't take the time to get there much less afford to. We have to feed the majority of almost an entire continent in one location for an extended period of time.
And if it was one specific location, the hospitals, hotels, grocery stores and restaurants would be so overwhelmed that they couldn't handle everyone.
Speaking of hospitals, if, as in when, the police and military attacked the protest, most people could never afford the medical treatment to be able to get patched up, much less their lives saved.
And speaking of the police and military, we have the most militarized police force on the planet. Our police don't have just batons, they have live rounds of ammunition and full on tanks. And they are more than willing to use them on civilians, especially in protesters. Look up Blair Mountain and the Kent State shooting. Not only could this crush a protest, but people would have to be ok with the idea they would very likely die.
And our prison system, being for profit, would salivate at the idea of getting more slave labor en masse, and the current administration is more than happy to detain people over trivial things. So everyone would have to be ok with life imprisonment if they didn't get shot.
On top of that, not everyone is on board. About a third to a half of the country is in favor of what's happening and have a cult around Trump and Musk. A lot of people voted for this and are in favor of it, because they really, really hate the liberals, Democrats, gays, minorities, etc. There's a whole media pipeline for this that they listen to, especially young people who normally are the type to protest this stuff. So there would be resistance from civilians on top of not everyone being in favor of the protest.
Then there's the problem of what that protest would actually accomplish. Even if you pulled it off, because of the supply issues, it would be short lived. Maybe a week or two, being surpressed by the military and police, and demonized in the media. The oligarchs would simply wait it out. It wouldn't enact long term change, even if everyone could agree with what they want changed in the first place. So it might not be effective even if it was pulled off.
And the primary opposition party, which should be doing anything, has adapted a strategy of self preservation. Concede to the fascists for now, bide your time, then come election season tell everyone that you are the better and only choice (because winner takes all so they are the only alternative) and hope for a blue wave in four years. Can't make any changes if you're not in power, so do what you can to keep it now and believe that if things get bad enough now people will come crawling back. So very little actual support for a protest would come from on top.
And then, if we look at history, a lot of rebellions needed other countries to support them in order to be successful. Most of them had outside influence from other major powers. The other major powers right now are either in favor of the government, turning fascist themselves, or if they did intervene would risk starting a war with the US which has the biggest military in the history of humanity. So not a lot of help would come from the outside, if any.
So while we also would like a massive protest, there are huge issues in the way of effectively pulling it off.
So what's been happening has been local efforts. You might not hear about town hall protests or stuff in individual state capitals in other countries, but those smaller fires are burning. There's been economic protests, like the backlash against Tesla and the no buying day, which apparently was started to get people to dip their toes into a national protest. There's been a lot of smaller community organizing, which hopefully adds up. I think and hope there will be more individual direct action, perhaps more Luigi strategies on specific individuals, as things get worse. Maybe more guerilla tactics, French resistance style efforts, are what is going to happen rather than a massive protest.
Tldr: We ARE doing stuff here. We hate this more than anyone. The change will have to come in less exciting ways than a big, national rebellion, so sorry you're not getting as much of a spectacle, we'd like that, too, but there's a lot of prep work that would need to be done to pull it off that needs to happen first. We aren't sitting by and letting this happen, and we are working towards fixing things.
It's going to take a unifying event that is unifyingly abhorrent.
Until that show drops, no movement will take enough momentum with it.
Wait until a Mayors daughter gets sent to gitmo for protesting at college. Wait until the social security checks bounce. Wait until the next viral George Floyd police killing.
The tension is simmering.
I think that the thing that made the protests for George Floyd and Covid policies so widespread was people were out of work. The capitalist system has done a very good job of binding us to our jobs. we need a change that will put large amounts of people on the streets with little to lose. An economic collapse might do it.
this is the classic Rosa Luxemburg vs Lenin dichotomy of revolutionary spontaneity vs vanguardism. do we organize, wait for the opportune moment, both?
I've been posting and reposting my little "Eggsecution" short story everywhere I see eggs come up in politics.
I'm hoping the egg economy goes tits up, we have the great American egg famine, and then once rid of the impending bird flu pandemic, egg economy goes the other way, and the masses just toss Donnie and Elmo into a concrete pit and pelt the. with eggs until they're drowning in broke shells and egg yolk.
"Eggs. Eggs. Eggs."
You also have to understand the sheer size of the USA. It's not like everyone can go to DC that easily. The protests are taking place in all states.
to have the biggest effect though we really should be blockading DC. blockading the capital is the most effective form of demonstration as evidence by MLK's March on Washington, EDSA, Euromaidan, basically any successful protests.
protesting at your own state capital is okay for state level changes (see the state-by-state results of BLM).
protesting at the financial center is pointless because the rich don't actually do work (see Occupy).
if you want national change you demonstrate at the national capital for long enough to make the dictator flee the country (or whatever your goal is)
There have been dozens.
There are. And from what I know, apparently the media avoids reporting about them.
Well yes, media was one of the first pillars of democracy to be captured.
Some states also have laws that allow drivers to run over protesters
What the fuck America?!?
where are you? are you in the US, outside the US, rural, urban? I'm in a relatively small urb and even i see protests, and have attended them. if you're not seeing them reported, you need to change your information sources. if you're not seeing them in person, well, that's a question of whether you're in a dense enough area for protests to make sense
I dunno about you bro but there's a protest every other day in Denver. We're getting there.
The question is how Dumbfuck will respond. There's an unverified rumor the Insurrection Act may be invoked on April 20th owing to an executive order signed on January 20th. If it gets to that point, we will find out how far our military is willing to stretch its service to the Constitution.
Don't be afraid. Don't look away.
I don't call them protests. I call them "Opportunity to arrest figure heads of whatever movement in order to eliminate momentum and silently kill the cause since no North American protest seems like anything more than cows being led to a slaughter house by cops getting paid overtime to kick heads"
the media is definitely suppressing it….
Find a protest, bang your drum.
There have been protests in every single state for awhile now. At least that is what I have heard through the grapevine. I'm Danish so I haven't seen the protests with my own two eyes, but I have seen pictures, read posts and talked to Americans who are out protesting. From what I have been told, it is unheard of that there are protests for the same cause in all 50 states at the same time. It is historic, but I'm not surprised that the greatest president who ever lived wouldn't want that information to slip out in the media. It would hurt his fee-fees bigly.
Next Saturday is a massive country wide protest at 500 Tesla dealerships and charging stations all across the country. I'm hoping that's too hard for the media to hide.
Yeah all 50 states is crazy. New York and Cali have enough people to get a protest going at the drop of a pin.
Texas has Austin, you get protests there. East coast cities, Chicago, you can get protests.
But there are dozens of states that just don't have that kind of energy or population density, but they do now.
Bread and cicuses, when those run out people will be in the streets.
My friend said that if Steam and Netflix both went down at the same time there would be huge riots. I am not sure they are wrong.
There are. I've been to a few. They don't get covered by the media.
They only get coverage if police get to act a fool.
35k in Denver today
There's been a lot of protests. How massive is mass is up to you though.
Although, a lot of people really like the way things are going, and a lot of anger is just terminally online bozos who don't even live in America.
Estimates show 65-75% of households live paycheck to paycheck. We financially can’t miss a day of work, let alone long stretches. Or we are allowed so little time off that it has to be saved for sick/emergency days (if you get any at all!).
That’s setting aside things like long hours, multiple jobs, unaffordable daycare, lack of medical care on top of hard hitting inflation without any wage changes.
It’s by design. It’s like intentionally under feeding slaves so they don’t have the energy to run away.
Hang on, that doesn't sound like the American dream I've been told about !
The American dream was the freedom to pursue your goals, not those rewards being handed to you. Common misconception. You had a bunch of kids before financially ready or didn't go to the right school, picked up a felony young, whatver you did, that was on you, by the old timers logic. Literal royalty just wasn't preventing you anymore.
Same reasons people didnt act in germany all those years ago. First apathy and that will transition into fear of reprisal.
There have been massive protests in germany over the past years. Even before the pandemic.
I think they are referring to Nazi Germany in and before WW2.
Because, in reality, peaceful protests don't work. We've been taught that they do, but they don't.
The most successful protest going on right now is against Tesla. A bit of anonymous property destruction and a boycott, crashing the stock price, those things actually work. Getting together and holding signs doesn't actually do anything, especially in some place like California.
Good news, Peaceful protests are actually twice as likely to bring about change. Better news, peaceful protests with only 3.5% of the population actively participating have never failed to bring about change. Even better news, we have strong leadership in Bernie Sanders and AOC leading this movement, 34,000 people showed up to a recent rally in Denver.
*Source https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190513-it-only-takes-35-of-people-to-change-the-world
They work. As long as people make sure that the top knows that the alternative are guillotines
r/50501 (I'm brand-new to lemmy so idk what it is here yet) Check out Indivisible
[email protected] (mirror of reddit posts)
I am convinced people have to die for it to be big enough in the US. I'm not trying to be difficult or obtuse. I think with the state of things, it's the only thing that is going to unify us enough to take to the streets and revolt together.
People already are / have been dying. Abortion care deaths / trans and general population - suicide rate upticks / ICE detention center deaths (52 people last Trump term) with people being grabbed on valid visas now / 1 death already of a Ukrainian last month in a detention center - custody (44 year old) Maksym Chernyak was a stroke / seizure but when you understand the conditions 24/7 light - terrible food and sleep conditions makes sense.
Medicaid cuts that made it through will lead to deaths. Due to gaps in care.
Abortion stances will only get worse from here in states and at the federal level for access to medical care on still borns, and general birthing process will be worse.
NOAA cuts will lead to deaths due to alert notification systems of major storms and tornados. (March has already been particularly deadly)
ICE interactions and warrant laws being modified for them will lead to more deaths if they ever get reported.
Food bank funding and other supports have been cut so we will likely see an increase in malnourishment diseases and deaths
VA benefits and mental health support services are actively being cut. So expect more suicide and homelessness from our veterans.
Social security cuts will kill seniors - access to care / meals / warmth - home health aids. These will be seen as increases in fall related, medication mistakes, transfer issues, hospital stay illness upticks, complex wound healing (wounds in the elderly require nutrition to heal if poor they won’t heal and tunnel so sepsis deaths) and other related deaths.
All of these things won’t be clear TRUMP DID IT. But as those statlines tick up. And the average life expectancy and health outcomes of our citizens get worse by the year. It will be because of these cuts. People don’t realize that the death toll is already counting - it’s just that there’s no clear cut bucket to put them in.
Waiting for the big one. Everyone knows it's coming. Just cant go off prematurely.
This is from someone that lived through WWII in Germany.
"Each act, each occasion, is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join with you in resisting somehow. You don’t want to act, or even talk alone; you don’t want to “go out of your way to make trouble.” Why not?—Well, you are not in the habit of doing it. And it is not just fear, fear of standing alone, that restrains you; it is also genuine uncertainty.
Uncertainty is a very important factor, and, instead of decreasing as time goes on, it grows. Outside, in the streets, in the general community, “everyone” is happy. One hears no protest, and certainly sees none. You speak privately to your colleagues, some of whom certainly feel as you do; but what do they say? They say, “It’s not so bad” or “You’re seeing things” or “You’re an alarmist.”
And you are an alarmist. You are saying that this must lead to this, and you can’t prove it. These are the beginnings, yes; but how do you know for sure when you don’t know the end, and how do you know, or even surmise, the end? On the one hand, your enemies, the law, the regime, the Party, intimidate you. On the other, your colleagues pooh-pooh you as pessimistic or even neurotic. You are left with your close friends, who are, naturally, people who have always thought as you have.
But your friends are fewer now. Some have drifted off somewhere or submerged themselves in their work. You no longer see as many as you did at meetings or gatherings. Now, in small gatherings of your oldest friends, you feel that you are talking to yourselves, that you are isolated from the reality of things. This weakens your confidence still further and serves as a further deterrent to—to what? It is clearer all the time that, if you are going to do anything, you must make an occasion to do it, and then are obviously a troublemaker. So you wait, and you wait.
But the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds of thousands will join with you, never comes. That’s the difficulty. If the last and worst act of the whole regime had come immediately after the first and smallest, thousands, yes, millions, would have been sufficiently shocked—if, let us say, the gassing of the Jews in ’43 had come immediately after the “German Firm” stickers on the windows of non-Jewish shops in ’33. But of course this isn’t the way it happens. In between come all of the hundreds of little steps, some of them imperceptible, each of them preparing you not to be shocked by the next. Step C is not so much worse than Step B, and, if you did not make a stand at Step B, why should you at Step C? And so on to Step D.
And one day, too late, your principles, if you were ever sensible of them, all rush in upon you. The burden of self-deception has grown too heavy, and some minor incident, in my case my little boy, hardly more than a baby, saying “Jewish swine,” collapses it all at once, and you see that everything has changed and changed completely under your nose. The world you live in—your nation, your people—is not the world you were born in at all. The forms are all there, all untouched, all reassuring, the houses, the shops, the jobs, the mealtimes, the visits, the concerts, the cinema, the holidays. But the spirit, which you never noticed because you made the lifelong mistake of identifying it with the forms, is changed. Now you live in a world of hate and fear, and the people who hate and fear do not even know it themselves; when everyone is transformed, no one is transformed. Now you live in a system which rules without responsibility even to God. The system itself could not have intended this in the beginning, but in order to sustain itself it was compelled to go all the way.
Suddenly it all comes down, all at once. You see what you are, what you have done, or, more accurately, what you haven’t done (for that was all that was required of most of us: that we do nothing). You remember those early morning meetings of your department in the university when, if one had stood, others would have stood, perhaps, but no one stood. A small matter, a matter of hiring this man or that, and you hired this one rather than that. You remember everything now, and your heart breaks. Too late. You are compromised beyond repair."
"They Thought They Were Free", Milton Sanford Mayer
Who am I to argue with that? Take to the streets. I'm there.
Low density and car based infrastructure neuters protests. I usually work from home but I had jury duty a few weeks ago in the courthouse in my downtown area. There were several protests daily the entire time I was there.
To be the most effective we have to be protesting in front of houses of people who actually influence change. I’ve been too far too many protests and it feels like they mean nothing. Only way to make change is to stop taking it to the streets. And taking it to houses of billionaires and politicians who actually are in control of change.
Yes. The media is suppressing them. See c/50501
Explain this?
50501 refers to "Fifty States, Fifty Protests, One Movement" (originally "One Day"). While some states have more presence than others, it has 50 chapters for the 50 states.
I don't think there's as much presence on Lemmy, but lots of media gets posted to Reddit at https://www.reddit.com/r/50501/.
Their website also links to social media accounts covering more of it: https://www.fiftyfifty.one/
one reason is literally fear, the side that they're fighting against literally has all the guns and the psychopaths.
Not only mass media, but social media algorithms as well. Big tech is complicit in the coup
Why the fuck is the media suppressing them?
Canada here. We see nothing about Murcan protests, if they exist. We just hear Canadians/politicians reacting negatively to pretty much everything coming out of the white house.
We ask each other how can Murcans be okay with being treated like this. Don't they understand what's happening?
Don’t they understand what’s happening?
No. Overwhelmingly, no, they don't. The MAGA crowd is stuck to their pants with glee, the liberal crowd is going "oh well, we'll get em in the midterms," and about another third of the country is just brain-dead clueless about all of it. Maybe a few thousand people in the US actually understand just how close we are to cascading systemic collapse.
Thanks! This is the graph I was looking for
To be fair, this doesn't make any statements about attendance.
Denver yesterday - 34,000 people:
Also:
March 25th: Tempe, AZ - 11,300 people
Feb 18th: Nationwide Presidents Day Protest - multiple locations
Feb 5th: First 50501 Protest - all 50 capitals
There wasn't a unified protest movement at the beginning of Trump's first term. It wasn't until BLM started gaining traction that we started seeing real action on the streets. This time around, despite the total lack of leadership from the DNC, there were boots on the ground from day one.
It's important to note that unlike Trump's first term, the mass media now has a vested interest in not reporting the scale and size of the unrest, so they're tamping down coverage wherever they can, and actively manufacturing consent by minimizing the impact of the protests.
I live in the SF Bay Area. There's a website that was set up to track protests (https://www.actiontogetherbayarea.org/calendar). There are more than a dozen today and more than two dozen tomorrow. I think generally the larger protests are at state capitols and Washington DC, which are simply too far for many people to go to. Sacramento is our state capitol and that's about a 1.5 hour drive from here. CA is a big state, Sacramento would probably be an 8-hour drive from Los Angeles.
Also, as others have mentioned, the protests don't get a lot of media coverage.
I'm pretty shocked by this as well.
I always thought that America was on the ready to stand up against fascism and tyranny.
I guess they aren't.
The people who were super vocal about stockpiling guns to “stand up to tyranny” dont think this is tyranny. They are actively cheering for it.
They think tyranny is the government passing laws that amount to “don’t be a dick”. They hate that. To them “freedom” means being selfish, obnoxious, and racist to their hearts content, and Trump has finally given them permission to do so. That’s why they cheer him.
Remember, these are just simple people of the land. The common clay of the new west. You know, morons.
Because a lot of Americans think he is the warrior fighting the evil gub'ment
Many of those same people simply weren't equipped for the media blitz of the 21st century. Commerical Social Media has most of them on a string.
Tens of millions of Americans can't afford a sudden $400.00 expense without going further into debt.
That means they can't afford to miss a day of work.
And that's by design.
Which just means mass protests aren't big enough. It'll take a while, but eventually they'll realize that with enough mass mobilization missing work and going into debt become irrelevant.
The amount of cope in this thread is insanely depressing.
There are but its a big country. Not everyone can walk on DC.
It'd take me over a month to reach DC if I walked there.
There are.
Trump isn't threatening to charge people with domestic terrorism for leaving Tesla dealerships alone, is he?
Thr burning down of tesla cars and dealerships don't happen during the protests so they have no boogeyman to give yet. Once the protests turn violent, which I have no doubt they will eventually if they keep getting ignored, thr media will be quick to pain all protestors as bad and ask "why didn't they try peacefully protesting?"
It's being suppressed, I can't find the graph I saw yesterday but cumulative daily protests this year have far outclassed the protests from 2017, yet there's very little coverage of it from the major outlets.
I was hoping those million women in knitted pink hats would turn out again and do the heavy lifting, but they were busy, I guess.
Like a towel drying overnight, they all forgot about the previous Trump administration by the time the next one got here.
50501 is very active, we're hitting the streets all the time. I've been at a demonstration almost every week for the past month and a half. Please, join us!
Edit: From one of my other comments in case you're uneasy about getting involved:
I don’t even like talking to people in the first place.
SAME SAME SAME. When I started confronting these [Trump supporters] people in my life my anxiety would flare up to the point my voice would shake lol. And I never in my life thought I'd be out marching in the streets.
It gets easier, but it takes practice (Prozac helps too). Now the anxiety has become anger. But not anger at them, rather anger at the system. Anger at what we let this country become. Anger at how lazy and complacent I've become.
Do your best, stay safe, and most important of all don't get scared. Get angry.
There are. Heaps of them.
The US is just a big place and very spread out. And the ruling government and its media conglomerates are trying to keep them out of the media.
There absolutely are not. There are anemic little marches scattered here and there.
Americans were protesting George Bush in 2004 more forcefully and in vastly larger numbers than they are protesting now.
Apparently there were about 375,000 people protesting the Iraq War in New York in 2003 compared to about a million people marching for women's safety in 2004 in DC
In the years since there have been about 5 protests the same or much larger than that. In 2017 2.3 Million people protested the Trump inauguration, and protestors also showed up for Trump's 2025 inauguration which was held indoors for reasons including harsh snow. The exact number estimates for the 2025 inauguration protest and the 50501 protests are unknown at the moment, but it is occurring in all 50 states which is comparable to the George Floyd protests.
There is a qulitative change from protest to resistance needed.
My wife and I got babysitters went to the science protests. There's often protestors waiving Palestinian flag downtown during the week - small but consistent group near city hall. I don't hear any reporting either but I see them.
there are pretty significant protests in recent months. Tesla, the federal government, unions etc. It's just that nobody really care about them with all the funny shit happening in the federal government right now.
Realistically, they also won't do much, so you'll have better reach doing more traditional on the ground campaigning anyway.
Just went to one for vets against the VA cuts and haven't heard shit about it since
vet's have literally no administration pool to serve them right now im guessing, even if they did protest, it would probably just lead to the VA going 🤷 because they literally don't have the people to do that work.
We have an extremely effective propaganda system. There are protests. My partner shows me on Instagram videos. But most people are complacent or defeatist (because of the propaganda system since childhood).
Whenever I attend a protest, there is 0 media stations in attendance or covering it.
By design. They're under control.
Honestly, I think everyone's waiting for the masses to be just pissed off enough to kick it up a notch.
I'm going to guess
- poor media coverage
- media is explicitly hostile to protests and pro trump/right-wing-extremism
- many people are living paycheck to paycheck + we have minimal labor protection
- years of left-wing organizations being kneecapped (eg: the murder of fred hampton)
A lot of people are angry but there's not really much organization. As much as I would love someone to take 50,000 of their closest friends, march down to DC, and shoot every republican in the head, without years of organizing that's just a fantasy. Unfortunately, the right wing has been doing years of organizing and it's now bearing fruit for them.
Wholly agree. Vast majority of US Americans cannot afford to lose what little is left. We are two to three paychecks away from homelessness. Economic subjugation has been in the works across political parties.
In Luigi we trust.
I’m glad we have the freedom to say this shit here.
There's no leader. Most people are followers.
I think the reason more people haven't started to openly organize is mostly concerns about self preservation. This govt obviously doesn't care about civil liberties and are openly calling anyone not with them "the enemy". It becomes much harder to publicly and civily organize if there is a substantial chance you'll be branded a terrorist organization. That's obviously just my take from my perspective.
Yes, the media is suppressing news of protests because most of the media companies are owned by billionaires who’ve kissed the ring.
The protests that are happening are also smaller and somewhat decentralized. The media likes a big show and these protests don’t get clicks or eyeballs on screens.
There are many smaller protests happening such as the ones outside Tesla dealerships literally everywhere. This is having an effect on Teslas stock but TBD if it’ll have a lasting effect.
People are also attending town halls with their congresspeople and getting confrontational. This has led to many representatives cancelling town halls or screening for only Republicans like fucking cowards. Chuck Schumer just canceled his book tour because he knows he’ll get run out of every city he shows up in after his capitulation.
Pro Palestine protests continue on campuses.
There’s a lot to dig into on why there isn’t a large mass protest like 2020 but my simple answer is that things aren’t bad enough yet.
Who watches the news these days?
No one.
The retired and thats about it
The revolution will not be brought to you by xerox without commercial interruption, the revolution will not go better with coke, the revolution will not fight germs that may cause bad breath, the revolution will put you in the driver’s seat
I'm not sure where these questions are coming from, there are tens of thousands of people conducting dozens of protests across every single state at every level of government, and multiple stories about those protests in this feed.
there's absolutely some media suppression since Trump is friends with the owners of some media outlets, but there is also a lot of media documenting the literally Nationwide protests.
there's a super popular post like a few tiles up about the dozens of ongoing Tesla protests going on that are tanking the company.
@[email protected] there is also the 50501 group organizing protests in all 50 states April 5.
As others have commented, there haven't been protests this large and often in the US since the Vietnam War. Organizing this takes time. Organizing without using billionaire owned services with questionable privacy policies takes even longer... but it is happening.
Americans are too dumd down, pacified, apathetic and fatalistic.
Europe or other places would be on fire.
In the US taking a group walk with some signs and shouting is already too much to ask.
Let the downvotes rain for the uncomfortable truth.what are you protesting?
A lot of people said they weren't going to protest this time. People voted for the guy 3 times. A lot of people said, "fuck it! If this is what you really want, let's learn this shit the hard way." Right after the election and right after inauguration I saw this sentiment all over. In practice, a lot of people have taken to hoarding cash and have adopted a seige mentality. There is no help coming this time.
It sucks that protest is the only lever we have
There's lot of ways to protest. Already refused to help my Trump voting family members with $. They wanted this lesson. I'm gonna make damn sure they learn it.
Just remember, the media is owned by the rich.
These days i get quite a lot of US news off Lemmy, and aside from Tesla torchings (great start) I mostly just hear about people going to rallies. Are there actually americans out there obstructing something? If so, why aren't they sharing their own news for solidarity and motivation of masses? How is capitalist media causing fediverse content to be censored?
Getting sick of Europeans falling for the blatant suppression and propaganda that our corporate-elite overlords are spoon-feeding them and using that to act superior.
Europeans are so smug about this shit. It's not a personal virtue that all of you can just hop on a train or a bike or whatever and be at your nation's capital in an hour or two for between zero and fifty euros. Some of us are literally thousands of miles from DC. We are still protesting where we are, but it's purely symbolic and also no one cares.
Why shouldn't they be? Americans have long had a superiority complex, always confidently mocking the problems of others around the world as if they were immune to them. It may feel bad for you now but the schadenfreude the rest of the world feels is completely justified. Frankly, the way some of you are suddenly crying about the rest of the world being mean to you is only further contributing to this image of Americans thinking they are above everyone else.
That being said, if you have a hard time getting the word out on your protests, then the suppression is working.
Publicizing your actions is part of the protest.
Especially since far-right groups have been falling for Musk's same bullshit in Europe.
There's been reports that Germany's AFD party fell out of favor after their news got to see how Trump played out. I seriously hope that ends up being true in their next election.
Maybe you just aren't where it's happening?
"Protesters in Philadelphia and at state capitols in California, Minnesota, Michigan, Texas, Wisconsin, Indiana and beyond waved signs denouncing President Donald Trump; billionaire Elon Musk, the leader of Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency; and Project 2025, a hard-right playbook for American government and society."
I guess I'm just shocked that they only waved signs. In France, the guillotine would have been out. Here in Canada we entirely shut down our capital for months, and both for way less. When will the real protests start?
I’m not a historian, but my guess is that we have lived too many generations without major political incident; the kind you’re supposed to make heads roll over.
We’ve been indoctrinated since birth to blindly love our country, to mind what we say; we have seen other countries and their political unrest, and we ignorantly convinced ourselves that it will never be like that here.
And despite the cop out response of “we vOtEd fOr it”, otherwise good, hardworking Americans were lied to by their friends, family, church, and beloved government for so long that they can’t know any better.
Make no mistake, we fucked up and let our hubris get the better of us. I hope we can see the error of our ways and fight back before it really is too late.
if you haven't seeb the news, some protestors and professors have been taken captive by ICE in the US and that's had a chilling effect. however, that also builds some tension - as soon as some major property destruction breaks out and it becomes obvious that ICE can't disappear them all, people will be bringing police precincts and declaring autonomous zones again like they did in the BLM protests (did your news sources report those?)
Americans are notoriously terrible at protesting. I was in high school in the '00s and our American history textbook had a sidebar about the 1999 Seattle WTO protests. The bit that stuck with me: a French dignitary interviewed on the scene was unconcerned about the protesters. He pointed to an untouched BMW (or similar luxury car, I forget the exact make). "In Paris," he said, "That car would be burning."
In the US, protests are largely performative. People want to make a show of it do they can say "Look, I did something!" even if they're doing nothing. They'll break their own arms patting themselves on the back.
I live in Portland which is protest central. We had 100 days of Black Lives Matter protests which meant and did nothing as the city largely agreed with the sentiment.
You want a protest that matters? You take it where the action is happening. In the case of Trump, you can set EVERY Tesla dealer on fire, it means nothing.
Take that shit to D.C. and shut that city down for 100 days? Assuming the Feds don't kill everyone, that's a protest that would matter.
Are we really comparing the French Revolution and the annoying-ass, snowflake trucker protest?
We don't have the level of social safety nets that France does to allow people the freedom to pretest without starving or becoming homeless. It is by design. They keep everyone just on the verge of poverty so nobody can afford to be disruptive.
There have been but i suspect they may have slowed down.
I feel like one reason why trump has crashed the economy is to hurt people so they are too busy working and struggling to be able to protest his fascist policies.
It's hard to help your neighbor when you are drowning yourself
Heh … massive unemployment is going to be like Covid all over again. The crazy shit is coming for sure.
I think this is a factor of your media echo chamber. I've personally attended protests nearly every week since January. I'm going to one tomorrow. They are all over my news feeds.
Because the Americans don't know how to protest.
To a Frenchman a protest is storming and taking control of the representation of authority in the country.
To a Greek a protest is filling the streets of many cities throughout the country with hundreds of thousands of people.
To an American a protest involves standing in a square by the few hundreds, holding signs with semi-sarcastic or passive aggressive messages written on them.
Eh, I feel like every day there's a new story of Tesla's being torched. That's a pretty directed and forceful form of protest that gets no credit.
Also, it's not like America never has large scale protests. Hundreds of thousands of people fill the National Mall pretty regularly, skimming Wikipedia I counted 14+ since 1950 of over 200,000.
Just 5 years ago 15m-26m people participated in some especially roudy protests across all 50 states, but no credit for that either.
Large protests that get even slightly out of line in the USA usually end with:
- well armed, paramilitary police violently dispersing everyone
- the CIA assassinating protest leaders
- and/or the 6 media conglomerates suppressing coverage at the behest of the ~15 people that own them
If you're criticizing Americans for anything, it should be for their response to that and not their ability to organize and orchestrate protests.
Such ferocity.
protest is storming and taking control of the representation of authority in the country.
Jan 6. 2021... just the other side protesting though.
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Because the people protesting represent in the single digit percentages of the voter base of America. An extremely vocal minority, but still a minority of Americans.
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Boy who cried wolf situation. Protesting every single thing endlessly for years on end has made the average person stop caring about whatever you're protesting about. Not saying it's right but that is how many people view continual protesting.
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The far left protests lost most of their corporate backing this time around. As soon as the bean counters up top realized that pandering to the social stuff on the left wasn't going to net them record profits they all dropped supporting the issues like a bad habit. They saw the popular vote change and they all dropped their masks immediately. Remember this in 10 years when the balance swings back again and you see target suddenly pretending to give a shit about gay right again or whatever it is at that time. They only ever cared about money.
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Lack of unified direction of protests. There are tons of local and small group protests as many people have linked in the comments, but outside of these small tight-knit online communities planning these things the general public has absolutely no clue any of them are happening. There isn't a single unifying "thing" to rally around like the BLM protests had with George Floyd. When the angry mob can't direct their anger all in the same direction it loses power.
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Since modern media runs on outrage (clicks) and they have seen that most people don't care anymore they have moved onto other things in order to generate the clicks they want to make the money for the big guy.
I think you are missing the point. Media is controlling the narrative and purposely ignoring the protests. We have twice as many people protesting right now compared to the peak of the defund the police movement.
They could get a shit ton of clicks by covering protests. This isn't about random event not being cohesive enough or algorithms ignoring events. It is purposeful manipulation by are newly minted ruling class under Donald Cuck.
What far left protests have ever had corporate backing?
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Lol wut? There are. Where do you get your news?!?
They may happening, but they don't really make the news. You are still far below the MLK threshold.
Yes, its all over the news. You must be using shitty sites that aren't real news sites.
Why do kids, who mainly get their news from Tik Tok, not get mad?
Maybe look at who controls the algorithms
Half of the Americans are in favor of this clown, and the other half either are too drained from the whole thing, can't afford to miss work, or just don't know how to protest.
There are, they are being reported. I couldn’t speculate as to why you are missing them.
Can you provide 3 links to different protests?
Not being snarky. Just haven't seen any reporting on it.
Ahh… THAT is the difference.
In the US, most of the media is complicit in what’s being protested. And online social media coverage is being contained to small bubbles.
Check out @[email protected] posts. They are posting pictures of grassroots protests across the country every day. Like has been said, there hasn't been THE big mass protest, but there is constant local activism and protest, just mostly ignored by media.
@[email protected] my kids didn't have school yesterday because their teachers were protesting.
In Usa, "protesters" are not allowed to do anything further than waving a few signs.
Even when they start shouting too loudly, they go to jail immediately. And then they need a president who releases them (but he releases only the right ones).
Have you noticed how many, many police and national guard troops they can afford? Massa Musk does not cut down on police, only on schools and scientists and caregivers for the sick...
Me too
And i live here
There's considerable more happening now than in 2017. They hust aren't getting media attention because the media has been folded in.
I visited family/friends in the US recently (i've lived in europe for many years).
Everyone is super upset about the current state of things, angry at Trump etc.
However, they are also generally just convinced they need to wait out these four years and then everything can return to normal.
Loads of people in this thread saying they're happening but media not covering them...
I don't think that's really what is meant by "mass protests". In the not so distant past I would have thought every american man woman and child would be weeping in the streets at the corruption and despotism.
There are protests, and maybe they're not being covered, but it's not the type of civil unrest I would have expected honestly.
Europe has roughly the same land mass as the United States and less than half the population. The population density and urbanization is even lower.
So for the USA it's actually quite a bit to have protests of hundreds in smaller towns and state capitols.
Major cities can muster the large groups, but the consistent and widespread nature of the protests should not be discounted.
Incidentally I am also not seeing counter protests or demonstrations of support.
The media is definitely covering it. If your media sites don't cover it, block that media site and follow one that does.
That's... not really what I was getting at.
There are, The media is own'd by the rich and now so is the government.
Fortunately there's tons of great independent media that is covering it. Why would you subscribe to corporate trash?
Okay, I'm going to acknowledge that there are protests, yes, but probably what OP is thinking of something more like the BLM protests during COVID where shit started to get real. There's a few things going on here:
First: People don't have the time off like they did during COVID. They also aren't locked up and less able to ignore the news.
Third: Resignation. I think this is the bigger of the three parts. I know for my part, I consider this a complete loss of the federal government. Even if we somehow avoid a dictatorship and get control of the government back, the damage that's been done is so deep and complete that we'll likely never fully recover from it, we'll just have to move on with things as they are. My efforts are now focused on organizing balkanization. If Texas wants to be a fucking stupid theocracy with prosperity gospel televangelists and the antichrist at the top, who am I to get between them and a good time? Maybe without having to hear about what Daniel the terminally addicted Fox News viewer thinks about Critical Race Theory, we can get some shit done, fix healthcare, get some fucking trains and bike lanes put up.
Second: Lack of organization. The federal government has spent the last 100 years stomping any serious leftist movements both here and abroad. There is almost no living memory of what a real leftist movement looks like, or how to get one going, so we're all having to roll them from scratch, and there's still a lot of the old high-roading instincts that were implanted in us over the decades. It's just going to take time.
You won't see much about protests until we're closer to the next election.
What next election?
They had that protest in every state did they not? But when I couldn't find much on it in the Canadian media, I went searching CNN and other American sites and found very little also, which was surprising to me. Here on lemmy, there were all sorts photos being posted from various cities, and it looked like a pretty big deal?
There have been multiple protests like that one. And many more at Tesla dealerships, national parks, etc as well.
50501 is hard at work! Also check out https://www.mobilize.us/
They exist, if it gets to the point like with the Floyd protests you can bet Donnie won't hesitate to point the military at the citizens, then things would get very interesting.
Chicago has had a few. In particular at the protest for science there was a dude in a trump in diapers blow up costume.
Because over half the people voted for him and are convinced of everything he says and does. My f'ing BIL thinks Trump can't do anything wrong. Just go question him on other social media, especially a state subreddit, and people will say things like "so you are in favor or waste and fraud!?" like it is case closed.
Because over half the people voted for him
No they didn't. Only like 60% of eligible voters actually voted in this past election. Which means only about 30% of eligible voters voted for Trump. About 80% of the country's population are eligible voters, and since only 30% voted for Trump, 80% x 30% = 24% of the population voted for him. Roughly a quarter of people voted for him, not half.
And for anyone who's wondering, "why did only 60% of eligible voters vote?" The answer is mostly voter suppression in various forms.
Politicians should be responsible for the people to vote.
An election with 63% of the voters should not allow a full mandate. Of course politicians will never agree to that on either sides, but it's how it should be imo.
Queue the Democrats that have done the same thing for their own party members.
Can't mass protest if you don't have a way to get people in one location. United States car infra prevents that.
Source: seen mass protests, seen "US protests". Night and day difference
I don't have an answer but I have wondered the same. Serbia, Georgia and Türkiye have currently some very large pro-democracy demonstrations, but the USA hasn't. What there is seems to be pretty small scale.
Maybe pro-democrat Americans don't feel like their actions matter? Perhaps the opposition just isn't that popular? Maybe the USA just didn't have all that strong traditions of civil action to to begin with. At least when compared to countries lile Georgia or Serbia.
Because it turns out they were just little afraid bitches the whole time. Russians in waiting. Little goblins waiting for an overlord.
Protest for what? Not sure if you are referring to something in particular, or just in general.
The majority of people were tired of the democrats, and like what the republicans are doing. Under Biden for the past 4 years, I saw way more people who were democrat become republican, than I saw republicans become democrat.
I've seen one protest where I live, and there were maybe 30 people there.
Because protests don't do shit. There were mass protests over police brutality in 2020. Didn't do shit and the right wing media reaction arguably helped kill off police reform legislation that was in progress before the protests.
The reason protests from the left don't do shit is because the most popular media is controlled by Maga. The top social media network for news, the top podcast, and the top cable TV news are all outright maga propaganda. A narrative can arise without them, but they will determine what happens to it. So last time, the protests arose due to George Floyd, but the right wing media turned it into a narrative about lawless riots, using exaggeration and fake images.
See also Palestine protests.
Basically, the left is fucked in the US until something changes in the media so there's no point in trying.
This is not true, protests have a measurable impact and the defeatist nonsense of "there’s no point in trying" is exactly what enemies of democracy want.
Because protests don’t do shit. There were mass protests over police brutality in 2020.
I get why you feel that way, but it's just not true.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_police_reforms_related_to_the_George_Floyd_protests
Because protests don't do shit.
Occupy Wall Street had an impact.
Sadly, this is the correct answer. Protests really only look effective on paper, (or social media) however, gathering in protest is only ever going to work if those they protesting against, actually care to listen with an open mind.
There is no way the current administration has any plans to listen to anyone that disagrees with their attempts to personally own America.
I think the nice thing about a protest is that it's a show of power, strength, and unity. It sends a message to those on the outside that there is a number of people who believe in a common goal. And really, the message is one all Americans can pretty much agree on and that's trickle down isn't trickling and corporate profits are soaring.
The longer the protests, the worse taxes become from tariffs, the more cuts they make to social services, the more people could snowball this into a movement.
The power of protests are People.
protests represent the threat of violence. the threat went away and the rulers stopped listening.
Quite simply, most americans aren't that mad at Trump. He's poking at foreign nations, while the foreign media gets more n more shrill and hysterical. You're in Canada, dude, he's trying to piss you off right now.
I personally believe he's doing so to try and get better USMCA trade agreements, but I believe it's just going to backfire, which could also just as well be the goal.
I don't think he cares if it backfires. Canada has about as much raw power as about 3 midwestern states, with the military and populace to match. It was capable of projecting world power in a world a fuck sight less populated than today, the worlds second largest country but the population of some European country you can drive across in 4 hours.
We had an election and Trump won fair and square. All you can do is regroup and get prepared for the next election.
There are protests, they are just way too small.
Trump hast at least 40% of the population behind him, and a good 20-30% don't care. Still.
You can't organize "mass protests" with 20-30% of the population.
I mean, you can, but they are literally a loud minority.
That’s just wrong
Put 20/30% of the population of any city or county out on the streets and it will make headlines
It’s technically a loud minority but a very loud and significant minority
The problem is that of those 20/30% only 10% will actually get out on the streets so you are left with around 2% of the general population. And that ain’t much
The problem is that of those 20/30% only 10% will actually get out on the streets so you are left with around 2% of the general population. And that ain’t much
So you do agree?
Getting mass protests organized is a tremendous effort. If you have 80-90% support for something, getting 30-40% on the street is a huge accomplishment. If only 30% support the idea in the first place, there is no chance.
The "mass protest" has to be at a scale, where it's basically a general strike where society shuts down because people are protesting.
That it doesn't work right now doesn't mean they should stop trying.
but a very loud and significant minority
This is meaningless in a country that chooses to ignore public voices. Authoritarian regimes can stay stable with 10-15% support of the population, ignoring protests and complaints.
Did you forget the BLM marches already or are you talking about a specific issue?
Damn, I wish I lived under the rock you apparently do.
What would "a protest" accomplish? What have they accomplished in my lifetime?
https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/peace-protests-dallas-response/
Some may not have been in your lifetime but peaceful protests do get results. Outside of revolution all our civil rights around the world have been won through protest.
Downvotes, but no answers.
What good has ever come from people standing in a street waving a cardboard sign?
Because Americans are by and large complete cowards.
Your mom's a coward!
