“The People United Will Never Be Defeated”
Project Overview: A qualitative eyewitness account of protest culture in NYC, including photos, videos, and write-ups on three different protests throughout the month of April. Because of the timing of when I conducted my research (and, perhaps, because of the vested interest in the issue that so many New Yorkers have), two of these three protests are related to civil rights and police brutality–topical subjects in the past year especially. The first, #ShutDownA14, was brought to my attention by a flyer when I visited “RESPOND,” a #BlackLivesMatter exhibition at Smack Mellon in DUMBO, this past winter. I found out about the second, NYC Rise Up and #ShutItDown with Baltimore, via a Facebook event page. The final protest that I attended, the CCNY Day of Action and the accompanying #Fightfor15, was brought to my attention by a friend and classmate. This primarily addressed economic injustice in NYC and beyond, but other CCNY-specific issues–including the shutdown of the campus childcare center, tuition hikes, and various social issues on campus–were spoken out against as well.
Protest Write-Ups:
CCNY Day of Action and #Fightfor15
NYC Rise Up and #ShutItDown with Baltimore
Findings: Most attendees of all of the above protests were students, who tended to display diversity in race, gender, and more. Demonstrators of other ages were also present, with older people and children showing up for protests but not necessarily staying for marches. The NYPD always seemed to be present at scheduled protests–at least when the attendance was a hundred people or more. From what I observed, they were usually fairly passive, either watching the goings-on silently, talking amongst themselves in mutters, or looking on in amusement and making jokes. However, they sometimes made apparently arbitrary arrests, as their reasoning–that a demonstrator was marching in the street–did not extend to all protesters, but to those whom they cherry-picked from the crowd (except in cases of obvious belligerence). As is to be expected, the tone of each protest was left-leaning–farther left than Democratic liberalism–and the atmosphere was often charged with a strange mixture of exhilarated anger and a deep, almost comforting bond of solidarity between protesters. For example, sometimes, in the middle of a speech or chant that had attendees shouting outraged agreement, a speaker would stumble over their words, and those listening would give an encouraging, good-humored laugh. Overall, the people at these protests, by and large, did not seem the type to shy away from the possibility of violence or arrest, but this seemed to derive from compassion for their oppressed compatriots and a firm conviction that the fight for justice is worth compromising civic order.
About the Author: Samantha Dauer is a freshman at CCNY, pursuing an English major (creative writing), a psychology major (BA), and a sociology minor. She is an aspiring writer with a passion for social issues, button-down shirts, cats, and cartoons. In her free time, she enjoys reading, gallery-hopping, blogging, and going to protests that she doesn’t tell her conservative Westchester-based parents about.