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Anyone else go to a No Kings rally today?
We had more people at our local/suburb protest than in June. I think organizers still underestimated attendance as we never even made it to the route of the march. The crowd was trying to funnel through some tight spaces so eventually people just stood on the side of the busy streets and collected horn honks. Atmosphere was great. Everything relaxed. Many choice signs.
Yep I went I saw I marched
Fav sign is a toss up between “you cant take my rights, Im using them” and “If I was paid to be here Id have a better sign”
Nothing so far today has been more amusing than the international branding of No Tyrants instead of No Kings.
https://www.ctvnews.ca/vancouver/article/vancouver-protesters-join-global-no-tyrants-rallies/
I guess it still hits a little better than “Some Kings” or “No Kings Except Ones Who Are Essentially Ceremonial Without Executive Authority” or “No Kings Except His Majesty Ruma X Of Thailand May He Reign Forever Don’t Imprison Me Please”.
We're allowed one.
I did enjoy the "No Tyrants" rebrand quite a bit. Oh Canada, we're so fun and silly.
In Sweden it seems to be called "no dictators".
And while I would like to get rid of our monarchy as well, I think they are right to not conflate the two. (Funny fact, if you are against the monarchy in Sweden you'd typically call yourself a republican, in fact, the only goal of the Swedish republican association is to get rid of the monarchy).
I'd settle for abolishing the monarchy of the Netherlands too though, even if they're just overpaid stick figures. No, scratch that, especially because they're overpaid stick figures with their name being the sole selling point. Receiving tax payer money for just being called king is oppression in another jacket. No Kings rings fine to me.
But.. in the spirit of the march I think tyrants fits better.
It still sounds so weird to me when I'm reminded that Canada technically has a king.
I wanted to, but I'm a shut-in in terms of social interaction. Felt bad about not attending, but I figured even if I'm not there in person I could find some way to contribute, so I donated to Kat Abugazaleh's campaign as she is very much aligned with the kind of congress I want to see, even if I'm not in Illinois.
We were on the road today for about 5 hours and saw a whole two people in what I imagine was a very conservative town. Mr. Alpaca honked for them and they immediately threw their hands in the air. I hope they're safe and warm because it had started raining not too long before. Otherwise, we really didn't see anybody, which surprised me. But I imagine they were all out in the more populated areas than where we were at.
I had a lovely time getting rained on with about 8,000 others at my local event. Smaller than the summer protest but better organized, and with great speakers. I got to make paperclip chains at a booth spreading the Paperclip Resistance Movement.
Our state representative used the word "anti-fascist" multiple times, to great cheering from the crowd. 100% peaceful, zero counterprotesters. Lots of families with children, including newborns in arms.
The state and local police were in attendance to direct traffic, smiling and clapping at the best signs and costumes. Less thrilling was a Flock camera installation in the park.
I'm hoping the inflatable suit remains a hallmark of these protests - there's so damned little joy for so many people right now. I was happier than I've been in a long while to march along behind a dragon, a unicorn, and a Pikachu, trailed by a couple of sad clowns with American flags.
I went! It was a smaller local rally so just standing on sidewalks instead of a big city march. We still got lots of honks and only a few naysayers in comparison :) I gotta get me an inflatable suit for protests also - we had people in raccoon, pikachu, narwhal, and spooky bone dinosaur suits, and they were fantastic.
So, I've had this hilariously insulting and inappropriate mental image for an inflatable costume to give the middle finger to trump.
Start off with the mental image of a My Little Pony character. Or perhaps Pikachu given the animated ICE commercial using that character. (poor Pikachu) Now imagine the Furry subculture version of that character. Now imagine a large... manhood attached. Taller than the rest of the character itself. Then you put an inflatable of dear leader holding on to the top of it with his mouth, and march down the street with said abomination.
If you wanted to be slightly less inappropriate you could have the organ in question produced with a grainy pixelation pattern to signify it being blurred out.
Possibly the Pikachu version would be more appropriate specifically for ICE facility protests.