In Which I Almost Get Shot for Exercising My Constitutional Rights

I've had to explain to multiple conservatives this week that, contrary to their very confident assertions, everyone within the borders of the United States is entitled to constitutional rights regardless of their citizenship status. That's how the Constitution is worded, and that's what courts have upheld since 1903. I've also had to explain the very simple and obvious fact that if people who enter the country illegally aren't entitled to due process, the government can deport anyone it accuses of entering the country illegally whether they actually did or not. I also had to explain to one of them what due process actually is. He thought it was amnesty for people who enter the country illegally. JFC, these people vote. Of course, now that the protests against their cult leader have grown too large and numerous for them to laugh off, some conservatives are admitting that they don't think citizens who disagree with them should have constitutional rights either.

I went to a last-minute protest against the Gestapo on Thursday, and then the big one on Saturday. And on both occasions, for the first time, I encountered part of my local friend group. These are people I met in Logan who moved down to the city, and they factored into my decision to move down here as well. I haven't seen them nearly as often as I hoped. Despite not being in school or having kids, they're all insanely busy with some kind of responsible adult crap. None of them like Trump. Two of them were seriously looking at options for leaving the country after his reelection. I broached the subject of protesting, but they felt like it was futile. I see they've changed their minds. I can't tell you how much it warmed my heart. Protesting will be so much more fun now. One friend told me this is totally out of character for him, but he's so mad, and it's lit a fire in him, and he wants to go to every protest, and when he's there, he doesn't want them to end. Glorious.

Here are some pictures from the beginning of the rally on Saturday. I wanted some kind of record even though I never get good pictures that convey the scope of these events.

And one from the march. I don't take a lot of pictures.

At the end of the march, I was with the bulk of the crowd by the federal building when someone shot someone. The details are still coming out, but at least two people had assault weapons, and one person was shot in the head and died today. I heard two of the three gunshots reported in the media, didn't know what they were, heard people yelling about a shooter, and saw the victim lying in the street about twenty feet away from me. Now, I don't exactly expect things like this to happen, but I know in the back of my mind that it's a risk every time I go out in public because I live in the United States of America, where gun rights are more sacred than human life. And every time I march in a protest, I'm aware that a Trump supporter might plow his pickup truck into me. So despite the stress of the situation, my predominating thought as I ran for my life was This was bound to happen to me sooner or later.

I haven't often felt like I was about to die. There were a couple of times when I almost got hit by an idiot Utah driver while using a crosswalk, and a few times when I was high and felt like I would slip out of my body, perhaps permanently, if I relaxed all the way. I didn't really think I would die in this situation either. I knew that with the size of the crowd, the odds were in my favor. But it was possible, and in that moment, I had to draw on the preparation and coming to terms with my mortality that I've done over the last few years, and I had to focus on what was most important and what I wanted to leave behind.

For a minute or two, I crouched behind a concrete wall with some other people, and we noticed a guy filming us from his apartment balcony, and we thought he was a sniper, and we pointed and yelled, "HE'S ON THE BALCONY!" That was the worst part. He couldn't have gotten me if I stayed crouched, but I didn't want him to get someone else because I didn't yell as loud as I could have. We realized he wasn't a sniper because he took too freaking long to aim. So I just made the chaos worse, but I did my best. My friend later said one of the guys with an assault weapon ran toward the wall I was hiding behind before he changed directions and ran into a parking garage. Also, I had a moment of heroism when someone fell out of their wheelchair in the rush to escape. Several people helped them up, and I decided without hesitation to shield them with my body. This is my blog, and I can brag about being a good person if I want to.

The police did good. They swarmed the area in less than a minute and shouted directions. I later found out from viewing the footage that protesters held one of the gunmen for them. I got off that block and just kept walking with other protesters. Near me, a woman was having a panic attack while her friend tried to comfort her, and I wanted to tell her everything would be okay, but that would have been a lie because I didn't know that it would be. I walked until I figured out that we weren't going anywhere in particular, just away, so then I got on a train to go home, but it was delayed by thirty to sixty minutes and just sat at the stop, so I called one of my friends and regrouped with them back at the park where we'd started. Several people were still there, along with a much larger police presence than before. I was glad that we hadn't all been scared off. My friends and I were unanimous that we wouldn't be scared off and wouldn't stop protesting because of this. I hope others felt the same. And I would say that maybe the people who brought their kids shouldn't do that next time, but then again, in the United States of America, you expose your kids to a risk of gun violence any time you bring them out in public at all.

As the sun went down, my friends and I stood by the road with our signs, getting honked at a lot and occasionally fipped off. A woman took pictures of our signs, then asked if we'd heard about the shooting. And I've tried to analyze my motivation in this moment to figure out if I'm an asshole. Maybe I was callously seeking attention when I made sure she knew that I didn't just hear about it, I was there, and I saw the guy lying in the street twenty feet away. I certainly felt like an asshole when she said, "I was there, too," and broke down crying. She sobbed, "What are we doing here? What is this country?" I didn't know how to respond to that, partly because I had nothing positive to say, and partly because, as noted, this sudden disillusionment was very much at odds with my own resigned cynicism toward American gun violence. I reached out and put my hand on her shoulder. That was a very big deal for me. I've never been able to read social cues or know when it's appropriate to touch people. The sexual misconduct prevention training I took in college said to never touch anyone without permission, which is obviously not how neurotypical people live their lives - no less a personage than the freaking university president later touched me without permission - but is the safest advice for me. Still, in this moment I knew it was the right thing to do.

She hugged me and cried on my shoulder for several seconds. I'm very much not accustomed to anyone needing or wanting that kind of support from me. The only thing people ever ask me for is money. Again, I had nothing to say, so all I could do was hold her. Then she got into her car, which was parked right by the curb where we were, and I ran after her yelling, "Do you need anything?" I had to yell it five times because of the noise from protesters and traffic. She said, "I need another hug," and she got out and held me again. I didn't want her to leave and be alone in that state. I said she could just hang out with us for a while if she wanted. She said, "I'm going to, I just want to park somewhere else." Then she didn't come back, and eventually we left. I hope she's okay. I hope she hasn't been scared into silence. I really wish she had hung out with us.

This same day, of course, a MAGAt tried to assassinate two Democratic lawmakers in Minnesota and their spouses, and succeeded in one case. It's weird that the people who have wet dreams about shooting home intruders are so violent. Overall, though, it was a great day for democracy, with some of the largest protests in American history, and Trump's birthday parade turning out so comically pathetic that it looked like satire. (Come to think of it, I had two tickets reserved, and I forgot to go. Whoopsie.) The harder Tangerine Palpatine tries to be a dictator, the more he makes an ass of himself and pisses people off. I'm much more optimistic about the future than I was in November. This country, for all its faults, is not going to put up with his bullshit. And once his cult dies with him and everything he stands for has been rendered unacceptable in polite society, maybe it will finally become a country I can be proud of, a country I would want my little nieces to grow up in.