This is Not a Protest

June 14^th 2025: The sky is overcast and rain drizzles down in pockets that wander across Rutherford, New Jersey. As I approach Lincoln Park, the small plaza across the street from the post office, I hear drumming and the chatter of people. A loose crowd fills roughly a third of the park. They are here for one of the thousands of “No Kings” protests taking place across the country to demonstrate against the overreach of the Trump administration.

As I step off the curb to head into the oasis, a motorcyclist roars down the street. Affixed to the luggage rack on the rear fender of his Harley is a large, tall flag waving in the wind. It reads “Trump 2024 – Take America Back”.

Inside the park, the sentiment is diametrically opposed. Grey ponytails are almost as prominent as the whimsical signs carried by nearly half the participants. One sign reads “No Kings, Just Clowns”. Another says “No Dick Tater” and displays a cartoon drawing of Donald Trump as a potato with a penis shaped nose. The young people hold Palestinian, Mexican and Pride flags.

A woman in a gazebo shouts into a bullhorn but her voice only carries over a roughly 15-foot radius. In my area of the park, we can only make out every third or fourth word. Regardless, we dutifully applaud when every else does. Her companion on guitar has a little more luck. Singing “Imagine” and “Blowin’ in the Wind” she’s able to get a few people to clap and sing along. The crowd is wet, cold and enthusiastic. When the woman with the bullhorn marches into the crowd she chants “Hey, hey, ho, ho, Donald Trump has got to go” and gathers a little more support.

During a lull a young spectator fills the hush: “This is the only president who is a felon! This is president is not a king! He is a wannabe dictator!” Without a prepared speech she searches for a way to conclude her statements. “That’s all I have,” she mutters. “Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.”

As the hour comes to a close, more and more participants head to the edges and out of the park, presumably for a late lunch or possibly drinks at a local pub on the East Rutherford side of the train tracks. I make my exit about fifteen minutes after the hour when roughly half the crowd has left.

I suppose we all feel like we did something today. What that is, is hard to say.

In the beginning of March 2025, President Trump called on universities to expel anyone participating in “illegal protests” or else face an end to federal funding. This threat never came to fruition. Today, there are marines and members of the National Guard in Los Angeles under Trump’s orders, sent there to quell the destruction caused by rioters. In both cases, escalation had the potential to radicalize liberals in America. Perhaps that’s why Trump retreats as these confrontations approach their boiling points. Instead we have a peaceful, if damp, day at the park.

Today’s protest feels like a masquerade. Everyone is aware of the role they’re meant to play and what their motivation is but less so about their lines. We gather in a group, make cute signs and shout catchy slogans. We chant, we sing and we get a bit angry. Maybe. But an hour later we continue with our day and all the histrionics amount to very little.

I participate because I know there is value in numbers. One more protester at one more rally in one more town adds to the sum that reflects the mood of the people back on itself. But in the end, these protests all have the probability of going the way of Occupy Wall Street: sound and fury, signifying nothing.

The downfall of today’s political uprisings is the lack of direction. Without a list of demands, and consequences if those demands are not met, what changes? Today’s activists are sailing on a rudderless ship, in need of a navigator.

During the Civil Rights Movement, students would sit at “whites only” chairs and get arrested to denounce unfair laws, filling jails if necessary. When Rosa Parks was arrested for occupying the wrong seat on a bus, the people of Montgomery boycotted the use of buses for over a year until the unjust practiced was ended. Injustice was met with specific repercussions.

This is not a protest. This is not yet a revolution. This is a cry for help and a shout in the dark for a reply.

In 1969, John Lennon sang, in the Beatles song “Revolution”, ‘You say you got a real solution, well, you know, we'd all love to see the plan.’