Watershed, a Journey In 3 Parts

The political awakening. A leftist’s watershed moment, that person, place, or thing that jolted them awake, after which their world—and the way they rise to meet it—is never the same. It's propelled by all sorts of circumstances—illness, death, loans, bills, identity, inequity, poverty. Mine was a protest chant.

Part I: Showing Up

There’s a lot of evil, conniving shit that goes down in New York City. There’s also a lot of brave, furious pushback from its inhabitants. While the efficacy of said pushback is dubious at best (counterproductive at worst ☹), attend any NYC protest and you’re bound to be met with an overwhelming feeling of solidarity, a shared electric hum of determination and rage. You’ll know you're not alone in your feelings.

The first demonstration I ever attended was in October of 2011 inside of Zuccotti Park in the Financial District. Thousands of others like myself had come to protest, share, listen, and learn about America's economic inequality and corporate greed. I remember the organizers had been barred from using microphones and megaphones—anything that amplified voices. So to deliver messages from one end of the park to the other, the crowd became a human microphone. Whomever was speaking would say a line or two, which was repeated loudly by the innermost circle, then repeated again by those just within hearing range, then again and again, until it reached the outskirts of the crowd.

It was a slow but effective process. I had never seen or heard anything like it, and was deeply moved by the care and coordination. I managed to drop by Zuccotti Park a second time before the Occupy Wall Street camp was forcibly removed just a few weeks later.

Outside Zuccotti Park 📸 October 2011

Showing up at Occupy Wall Street wasn’t comfortable. I was incredibly anxious to be around so many knowledgeable, politically active people. Plus the swaths of cops didn’t help. I wanted to participate, but was too timid. The truth is, the two times I made it to Zuccotti Park, I stayed silent. I could only watch.

February of 2012 saw the murder of Trayvon Martin. Despite the cold, thousands showed up. Again NYC took to the streets following the murders of Michael Brown and Eric Garner in 2014, coalesced under the newly formed Black Lives Matter movement. Vigils, rallies, and marches sprang up in cities across the US and around the world. I mustered the courage to use my voice, finally joining the call-and-response chants.

Two years later, Donald Trump was elected as the 45th President of the United States. The protest scene ballooned, and with it, my rage, concerns, and confidence.

Part II: Being Bold

Before the rise of Donald Trump, if you attended a demonstration, it was likely prompted by war, the 1%, or police brutality. After he won, it could have been literally anything. Democracy was at stake. The world collectively bucked and reared and freaked the fuck out, myself included.

Days after Trump was elected, I made my very first protest sign. Silver paint marker on black cardboard, it read “This Is What Democracy Looks Like”. It was dinky on purpose—I felt self-conscious carrying a sign, but knew that I wanted to. Holding the sign felt good. Holding the sign while chanting at the top of my lungs felt even better. The last of my fears, any remaining uncertainty for what to do or how to be at demonstrations, dissolved.

📸 November 2016

Following the election I bought a train ticket to Washington DC for inauguration weekend. Nothing had been planned yet, but I knew I wanted to participate. Inauguration Day slithered in, and I found myself at the anti-inauguration protest on Saturday and then the Women’s March on Sunday.

Had I not attended that Saturday protest—which saw extremely confrontational and violent cops making sweeping, unwarranted arrests—it’s possible that the Women’s March wouldn’t have seemed so goddamn Shangri-La. But I'm not so sure. Everyone on that overcast Sunday just stood around packed like sardines smiling in their pink hats. There were no cops to be found anywhere.

The Women’s March was harmless to a fault. It wasn’t any kind of political act; it was coopted milquetoast, an open-air human rights expo. Tired of feeling baffled, frustrated, and claustrophobic, I abandoned the march and went to help with jail support down the street. All of that momentum and energy, only for Donald Trump to be reelected as the 47th President of the United States eight years later.

Part III: Disillusionment

In August 2020, following the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, I was three months into “doing the work”, aka attending near-daily demonstrations with my tried and true homemade “NYPD Suck My Dick” sign, calling my representatives, reading, listening, engaging in conversations. I was exhausted, but it felt important to keep participating.

One evening after work, I joined a march through Brooklyn in the rain with a group of 30 or so people. By this point in the year, the movement had noticeably thinned out. Black Lives Matter demonstrations were rapidly losing steam as election season ramped up. Liberals’ attention had been diverted, believing all would be righted once Biden was elected. No matter than Trayvon, Michael, and Eric had all been murdered while Obama and Biden were in office.

📸 June 2020

Leading the rainy after-work march were two young Black men. At some point, they began chanting “Fuck Donald Trump” to the tune of “FDT”, YG’s velvety crowd-pleaser and protest song from 2016. It was the anthem we all needed—cathartic, rude, and candid.

Fuck Donald Trump
Fuck Donald Trump
Yeah, nigga, fuck Donald Trump
Yeah, yeah, fuck Donald Trump
Yeah, fuck Donald Trump
Yeah, fuck Donald Trump
Yeah, nigga, fuck Donald Trump
Yeah, yeah, fuck Donald Trump, yeah

Us marchers gleefully returned the call-and-response, chanting exuberantly. Then the leaders tweaked it: “Fuck Joe Biden” they declared.

And to my astonishment, every fucking North Brooklyn bitch around me booed and yelled “That’s going too far!!!”. The chanting ceased immediately. The mood changed. Hell, I changed. My watershed moment—my realization that no liberal is ever going to do the fucking “work”, because deep down they believe they don't have to. Since the system works just fine for them, deep down they believe that hardship and misfortune is a moral failing, not a material one. That it's not a constituent’s place to criticize, question, or challenge their leaders. That civil behavior means respecting and championing the lesser of two evils at the expense of the continued suffering of millions.

My fellow marchers, literally protesting police brutality in August, told two Black men that Biden—Biden, who during his 2020 campaign doubled down on his admiration for cops and priority to increase their budgets across the board if elected—was not to be mocked like Trump, effectively silencing them in the name of decorum. Arrogant, privileged cowards.

That was the last demonstration I attended for a long time (over three years, until the week after October 7, 2023). I was exhausted, my participation felt futile. The energy I had poured in had gone nowhere. Disillusioned, I stopped everything to reexamine my relationship to protests and their efficacy, the people I marched with—physically and online—my beliefs, my politics. Thinking back to the first sign I’d made, “This Is What Democracy Looks Like”, made me cringe. Democracy for who, exactly? I’d been living in a bubble. “Fuck Joe Biden” popped it.