bartstationbard (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bartstationbard) wrote2021-01-07 10:20 am
bartstationbard) wrote2021-01-07 10:20 am
(no subject)
The coup failed. In the process, I think a lot of things became crystal clear. We'll see if they stay that way. I'm ashamed of us, and at the same time hopeful. I'm afraid of what the next two weeks will bring, as it looks like the people who have the power to remove our aspiring dictator will not use it.
We don't get to say "not my President." The occupant of the Oval Office is, in fact, our President. This was one of the things I refused to chant in the protests I was part of pre-COVID. My partner and I, as a matter of fact, would start counter chants when it came up. To hear the insurrectionists appropriating those chants is a useful mirror. E Pluribus Unum. We don't get to disown each other because we don't agree. We don't get to break things because we're mad. When we go out into the streets we have a responsibility to make things better, not worse.
So yesterday was instructive. White and armed was treated quite differently than Brown with a paint roller. Once they got inside, they didn't even know what they wanted. There's a vast difference between a protest and a tantrum. These people trashed the Capitol. Just as they did at the Malheur Refuge. When I protest, I take everything I brought with me back with me, unless it actually goes into a trash can. If I leave a sign behind, it is in the hand of another person. I don't break things. I don't trespass. I've climbed on a statue or two near City Hall, to get a picture. Nothing more. We're on display and on the news when we have our say. Are our feelings, or our message the thing we want remembered? These people made history, but what they left behind isn't limited to the trashed offices and the littered Mall.
If I go to Washington ever again, I don't expect to be able to go into the Capitol without some serious security barriers. As a kid, I used to just walk into the Federal Building in San Francisco. There was a GPO bookstore in there that is now long gone. Now it's metal detectors and there's nothing in there except offices. As a uniformed government employee I have to think before I go and leave things like my knife (sailors need to carry one) and my backpack at work. It just isn't worth the hassle. I made two visits, a couple of years apart, to the British Museum in London. The first time I just walked in. The second, there was an ugly tent and a bag search.
Peace begins with me. I have no control over other people, nor should I. I get the wish for freedom, and I think it's a fundamental right too, but it is not unlimited. When we insist that it is, we create yet more limitation. These insurrectionists have barred us all from easy access to our Capitol by insisting on their right to "our house."
We don't get to say "not my President." The occupant of the Oval Office is, in fact, our President. This was one of the things I refused to chant in the protests I was part of pre-COVID. My partner and I, as a matter of fact, would start counter chants when it came up. To hear the insurrectionists appropriating those chants is a useful mirror. E Pluribus Unum. We don't get to disown each other because we don't agree. We don't get to break things because we're mad. When we go out into the streets we have a responsibility to make things better, not worse.
So yesterday was instructive. White and armed was treated quite differently than Brown with a paint roller. Once they got inside, they didn't even know what they wanted. There's a vast difference between a protest and a tantrum. These people trashed the Capitol. Just as they did at the Malheur Refuge. When I protest, I take everything I brought with me back with me, unless it actually goes into a trash can. If I leave a sign behind, it is in the hand of another person. I don't break things. I don't trespass. I've climbed on a statue or two near City Hall, to get a picture. Nothing more. We're on display and on the news when we have our say. Are our feelings, or our message the thing we want remembered? These people made history, but what they left behind isn't limited to the trashed offices and the littered Mall.
If I go to Washington ever again, I don't expect to be able to go into the Capitol without some serious security barriers. As a kid, I used to just walk into the Federal Building in San Francisco. There was a GPO bookstore in there that is now long gone. Now it's metal detectors and there's nothing in there except offices. As a uniformed government employee I have to think before I go and leave things like my knife (sailors need to carry one) and my backpack at work. It just isn't worth the hassle. I made two visits, a couple of years apart, to the British Museum in London. The first time I just walked in. The second, there was an ugly tent and a bag search.
Peace begins with me. I have no control over other people, nor should I. I get the wish for freedom, and I think it's a fundamental right too, but it is not unlimited. When we insist that it is, we create yet more limitation. These insurrectionists have barred us all from easy access to our Capitol by insisting on their right to "our house."