Do you protest? Armchair or street and does any of it matter?

[Goosebump]

Looking at this article primarily: https://thesciencesurvey.com/editorial/2...redefined/ but there are numerous other examples. 

Do you think activism, out in the streets or from your keyboard, is effective today? Are protests lacking the focus and specificity of the past? What is the point of protest if they don't result in anything, let alone meaningful?

Just questions. I have no answers.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I have gone to the streets against the invasion of Iraq. Didn't change much of anything. I protest from my keyboard. Still don't feel like the dial's moving.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Looking at this article primarily: https://thesciencesurvey.com/editorial/2...redefined/ but there are numerous other examples. 

Do you think activism, out in the streets or from your keyboard, is effective today? Are protests lacking the focus and specificity of the past? What is the point of protest if they don't result in anything, let alone meaningful?

Just questions. I have no answers.

In my younger days, I was a frequent street protestor. It had a positive outcome (eventually). I think the diminishing power of the protest is largely due to the fact that the powers-that-be don't care about waving signs and shouting slogans - riots and destruction of property are much more effective.

I'm sorry that you have no answers, so I'll give you some:

-Herodotus

-Potassium

-The Taming of the Shrew

-D

-The Ural Mountains

Boru

[brewer]

Looking at this article primarily: https://thesciencesurvey.com/editorial/2...redefined/ but there are numerous other examples. 

Do you think activism, out in the streets or from your keyboard, is effective today? Are protests lacking the focus and specificity of the past? What is the point of protest if they don't result in anything, let alone meaningful?

Just questions. I have no answers.

May not result in immediate actions but I think they do change minds. At the very least start a conversation.

[arewethereyet]

A couple elections ago, I really pushed my daughter and her husband into voting. Neither had prior to that. I did have some help from their daughter who is paying quite a bit of attention to politics now.

I'm old and unwell so marching at a rally isn't really in the cards for me. But I vote and after tRump was elected again, I took down the flag from my house. Once he is gone, if he's not replaced by someone as bad or worse, I will display it again.

This past election is the first time I threw money at the DNC.

None of what I have done is earth-shattering but I am hoping that a lot of people doing little things will eventually add up to enough.

[Angrboda]

I have mixed feelings about all the political contributions I made. But having Trump only win by 1.5%, that keeps the conversation alive, and I think will matter down the line, even if it didn't matter in the way we hoped.

[Jackalope]

I don't live in the US any more, but in 2020 and prior I lived in Portland and participated in the protests against the adminIstration and the BLM protests. I would be doing so again today if I still lived there, and I will when we visit later this year.

The needle moves slowly if at all.

I'm in agreement with Boru - waving signs and shouting slogans is far less effective than mass civil disobedience and property destruction. Sometimes breaking the state monopoly on violence is required to effect change.

[Mister Agenda]

I'm a bit old for it and my SO is a bit unsteady for it...but one of the most activist people I know has no arms and one leg; so my excuses ring kind of hollow. I donated money to Indivisible through her instead of showing up tomorrow. Maybe I can get out of the house and honk support driving by.

[The Grand Nudger]

Weird position for me. Professionally, I'm all activist all the time. Personally, it's an on again off again relationship with multiple waves of disillusionment and nihilism. Very often, at least in my little ao....the things we would need to do to satisfy my fellow activists moral sensibilities are exactly the things they won't do. So they'll protest, or volunteer, or sign petitions - but they won't do the actual thing...and premising your business...even if its a thing based business, on just the thing, is a recipe for failure.

A concrete example. Waaaaay back in ye olden times in florida, we structured our business around and explicitly marketed to the activist demo. We tanked. It was when we realized we were getting their proto-trumpist parents...partly, I think, as an olive branch to those kids, that it started to work. "See honey, I am doing something, I'm doing that thing you were always talking about, bring the grandkids over and I'll babysit this weekend, they do kids movies and free u-pick berries on fridays so you guys can go out. It's ratatoulle this weekend!".

The armchair stuff, don't even get me started. When someone tells me that antinatalism is the only way, and that so many of our problems would be solved if there were fewer of us, my eyes roll all the way up in the back of my head. I'll add another dimension. Regulation activism. Wherein we make it legally impossible to do the thing we say we must if we're to save the earth. May as well light the fire myself, at that point. It's often a combo position. "We have to do x to fix y, but since I've just made it legally impossible to do x, you need to pack or die instead...only ethical option!"

[Alan V]

With the reelection of Donald Trump, I have given up on the idea that the majority of people are honest enough to deal with our many problems realistically.

I see this as due to our evolved, opportunistic human nature. And because of my distrust of human nature itself, I also avoid crowds of any kind.