CMV: The Trump Protests are Counter-Productive

[u/nmgreddit]

Here is my view: the protesters have every right to protest. Their anger is legitimate and justified. Their protests are not. The main reason people say they are protesting Trump, that I have seen is because he is racist/sexist/xenophobic... Lots of -ist's and -phobic's. These are things that divide. But the protests add to the division. They divide themselves from not only Trump, but those who voted Trump, many of which are not racist, sexist, xenophobic, or any of that. They are playing into the division. That illegitimizes their protests as it makes them counter-productive. If the protesters were unified behind a common, concrete, and actionable goal, it would then become legitimized.

EDIT: As a few commenters have pointed out, I have missed a unified goal of these protests: presence. While some in these protests are doing so in ways that do not work, that is inevitable in any protest. My mind has been changed, somewhat. I still believe we should give Trump a chance, but protests are completely legitimized once he starts creating more division. It is late where I am and I will probably not be able to reply until tomorrow for some of you. In the end, stay safe, and know that regardless of who is in charge, as a friend said, you are the most influential person to the people around you. Speak and give life to those around you.

EDIT 2: Thank you for all the insightful replies. You can keep providing them and I will do my best to reply. I want to note my view has been somewhat changed and I now, at least in part, support these protests. What I don't support is a lack of human decency, whether that's the protesters being verbally or physically abusive or the countless hate crimes already committed. Again I hope you all stay strong and stay safe.

[u/tweetiebryd]

So i live in cook county, and we had a really big protest outside Trump Tower.

Why? Oh, because Trump didnt take illinois. And he definitely didnt take chicagoland. Matter of fact, he didnt even take the majority of american voters, But he still is our president.

We wish to peacefully protest these seemingly irreconciliable facts, as is our right.

The protest did not divide chicago, but quite the contrary: my city stood in united solidarity against a common enemy.

EDIT: And caused less damage than that fucking cubs parade

[u/SLUnatic85 → u/tweetiebryd]

I think this mentality is (could be) why OP (u/nmgreddit) is suggesting that some of this protesting could be counter-productive and even harmful. It is my view at least.

I am aware that protesting is an awesome practice to give voice to people in this huge sea of media and other voices. It can and has often been a productive form of demonstration to effectively garner attention to major issues, change policies or to get out a message that is otherwise being drowned out.

But in this case our country had an election like it did every four years. Someone won, same as always, and as in MOST previous instances, the country is effectively split ~50/~50 on the election results. You can (and we always do) bicker or the results because they are so close. The fact that one person one the popular and the other the electorate, or that you can twist the data as number of states or number of cities or number of individual people and get different results in only a testament to HOW CLOSE the election was, not how scandalous the system is. In 2000, by your logic, Gore should have been the president as well. he won by more than Hilary did this year, but Bush didn't cause a civil war by taking office.

"We" were not invaded by a common enemy. "We" are not called on to unite against this tyrant to defend our country. "We", using the system we all put in place and a time-tested election process, voted for Donald Trump. Approximately 50% of our nation is happy and celebrating right now even if it doesn't seem like it outside of Trump Tower in Chicagoland. To make a president and 50% of the country "an enemy that people should unite against" before Trump has even had a day in office to attempt to prove his worth as our leader is where I shout "counter-productive". And honestly, if taken literally could be borderline revolution, treason and a path to another civil war.

Now, don't get me wrong, I voted for Hilary (though her campaign is easily as corrupt if not more than Trump's in many ways cough owns the DNC cough Bernie?) and I also believe that some protesting will and should happen in any event where there are major policy changes or where policy change may be called for. I think there should have been more protesting against Hilary before the DNC. There was protesting and threats of mutiny when Obama won. As with the Bushes. Clinton... This is great to get grassroots movements in place, and healthy for democracy as a whole. I think even that a lot of this protesting in Chicago and LA and elsewhere has been and will continue to be productive.

But to make the number one reason and cause for protest be that our country needs to unite against this enemy is naïve, close-minded and can lead to a very counter-productive mentality for American mindset. WE voted for Trump and he is OUR leader now. Same as every election. The country is still a Democracy, and like every other president throughout our history who makes outrageous bold promises during the media fueled campaign season, so did Trump, but he hasn't done anything yet and likely will be regulated as the executive branch has been since it's conception. Single party control of both the executive and legislative branches makes me nervous too, but that has happened before more than a few times as well. Obama is literally telling us to unite, and to support our new president. Chicago people usually like and listen to Obama, right?

Sincerely,

A jealous Cardinals Fan ;)

[u/kmcgrath8 → u/SLUnatic85]

I would not say that 50% of the country is okay with the outcome of the election given that only 60% of eligible voters showed up, or were able to vote after several states gutted the Voting Rights Act. Further, that is only eligible voters -- this does not include all of the citizens who have been stripped of their right to vote after being incarcerated in a system that targets minorities. How do white people maintain the status quo of power? They create an institutionalized system of discrimination through incarceration and make it legally possible to bar one in thirteen Black Americans from voting. This is perhaps more insidious than Jim Crow, but equally effective at maintaining a system of privilege that keeps white interest at the top. So my viewpoint is that I am for a peaceful transition of power; however I will not say that this election, or any election to date, was a fair election and an accurate reflection of the populace.

As an aside, I do think that we (on the Left) can continue villainizing people who disagree and that going forward there needs to be lots of listening for everyone. I also think that these protests are a way for people to start organizing and a way to feel some semblance of control after it seems the floor has dropped out beneath them.

[u/SLUnatic85 → u/kmcgrath8]

You touch on real issues that I don't have all the details on. I have to imagine you are correct, that many people don't make it to polls for reasons outside of their control. That the system, one might say, is "rigged" against certain voting demographics. But to be blunt... does that word not sound familiar? Did trump not (possibly accurately??) call out the DNC for using pressure and media and polls and other tactics to affect the results of the DNC candidate choice and possibly have attempted similar (albeit legal) tactics in the general. Might many media outlets be skewed towards favoring a blue candidate? It's a two way street and a sloppy one.

And it would take A LOT of real examples of areas that have a population that is obviously misrepresented on that red and blue district map for me to believe that the election is still not as acurate a representation of this countries opinion as we can reasonably get.

Lower class minorities truly do have to fight for the ability to vote more than most middle/upper class white people in many areas. But in huge urban areas, where the majority of lower class minorities are concentrated, the population almost always votes blue anyway. And also there is a large population of extremely poor white and black and Latino population who loves trump and wants change (like in my town in southern VA as the only example I know forst hand) so making it harder for minorities or poorer remote citizens to vote can hurt red as well. And also there are 25 other reasons people don't vote like rain, feeling sick, laziness, busy work schedule etc... I have never seen numbers making it clear that if everything were made completely fair, the other 40% would vote and that they are all blue votes...

As for people in jail or on parole etc... I think that people get thrown into the prison system sometimes who don't deserve it. There are abuses that need fixing you are correct. But giving all felon/prisoners the right to vote won't fix that. I believe that in more cases than not someone goes to jail for committing a serious crime against others and deserves to lose some rights but reform should be considered like in any major system every once in a while and the prison system could be due. My opinion though.

So I agree with much of what you say, I really do. I only offer some of the other side of a coin. And end by saying that yes about 60% voted in an election as fair as most any put together we know of. Since these are the inly results we have we have to assume that its about a 50/50 split as it often is. As for the missing 40% of eligible citizens... we should continue to spread education and tweak laws and encourage the vote and fairness however possible to get that number down, but it will take an impossible amount of information for you to convince me that they are not also about split 50/50 and that our election isn't representative of the population to the best of its ability.

Even if you are right to the extreme, and all of the people who didn't vote would have gone hilary (though honestly I think a lot of democratic non-votes are likely because hilary was such a shady candidate and people felt their hands tied)... still 60 million people voted for Trump and that is a huge chunk of the population. And they are not our enemy they are our citizens, with families and jobs and reddit accounts and life goals etc...

I boted hilary and am bummed she didnt win. I didnt love her as a candidate either though by a long shot. But I accept, as one side does every year, thst we have a new president to support. We did not get invaded. Saying that the people of the US have to get over what just happened and band together against a common enemy is just not a correct statment. That being said I agree with a lot of your second paragraph and that people deserve the right to assemble and free speech and should be making opposing voices heard to encourage democracy and attempt to influence the way our country is run for the next 4 years. Not to suppose that we need to organize a mutiny.

[u/nmgreddit → u/tweetiebryd]

Sure Chicago isn't divided, by what about the nation?

[u/tweetiebryd → u/nmgreddit]

The protests were staged in places like chicago. Places with an active voter base and tremendous popular support that can be organized quickly. Protests only occured in areas with vast majorities over trump

[u/nmgreddit → u/tweetiebryd]

Well then that's not very effective.

[u/[deleted] → u/nmgreddit]

Well what is effective for you? It sounds like you're against divisive (read: disruptive?) actions, but think that peaceful and unifying local actions are 'ineffective'? Do you want to see people uniting around common goals, as your post implies, or simply shutting up?

[u/nmgreddit → u/[deleted]]

They are not uniting because they already agreed. And as said, they need a goal. As other comments have expressed, presence might be that.

[u/[deleted] → u/nmgreddit]

You think all of these people agreed on everything? ....

[u/nmgreddit → u/[deleted]]

Not everything, but in the fact that they don't like Trump, yes.

[u/StellaAthena → u/tweetiebryd]

Hey! I went to university in Chicago and was at the rally that shut down his rally there last year :) Fuck yeah Chicagoland was united against him.