What did the Inaguration protests and the Women's March protests accomplish?

Not much, that's why I think 99% of the protests are wasted efforts.

 

There's a big thread on this already where most conservative voices, and some moderate ones, etc, are already asking this question.

Did the original "tax" march of the tea party in washington (smaller than these marches, by far) accomplish anything? Did we know, two days later? In order: yes, they accomplished a lot (unfortunately), and no, we had no idea on Monday afterwards.

I've answered this question to the best of my ability in the main thread, at any rate. I marched with my wife; I didn't want to go at first b/c it was raining, but she rarely asks me for things like this. I've explained what has happened to her in the other thread and why a p***y grabber is particularly difficult for her as the most powerful person in the country, including the message that sends to other men who might behave badly towards women.

People seem to want a piece of legislation. Movements and solidarity are often different than that. A whoooole lot of people saw they have good company if they need to get active to support their beliefs. A lot of women saw that a whooooole lot of their fellow citizens don't approve of retrograde issues on women.

The messages were NOT, in my experience: about the election, or about delegitimizing Trump. It was more, "you're in power, Trump and Ryan and Hellspawn Soulless Turtle but we're watching your every move and we aren't going anywhere either."

You can say that's all useless, and that's fine, for you. I found it inspiring, due to how overwhelmingly peaceful and good-humored it was. (I last marched, against the stupid and sad Iraq war, and it was much more angry and confused, in terms of what united people.) The only negative thing I witnessed was a Trump supporter coming unglued and trying to bully a woman who was walking by herself -- real classy. I'm sure there are many classy Trump supporters who weren't there, but it was a striking image to take in. I talked to the dude in a calm voice and told him what I'll tell you, "if it's useless, as you suggest, why are you man, bro?" ...not that you are mad, Falcons Talon. I hope you're not, b/c there's nothing to be mad about in these marches. Your team is in complete control. Don't worry about the marches, just govern such that as many Americans as possible feel represented by your team in power.

EDIT: Finally, Falcons Talon, a lot of this think the worst case of a Trump presidency could significantly harm the structure of our democracy. He could try to be an authoritarian. (I even think he could try to put us at war and then cancel the 2020 elections, in the worst case scenario.) That may sound crazy, but he says crazy things... all the damned time. So, history shows, silence will never protect you. Every time horrible things have happened, the people who sense horrible things might happen wish they had spoken up early and often.

Cheers.

 

Both.

Like bbob mentioned, the tea party march accomplished something significant in hindsight, a crystallization for those who resent the current leader in power.

Like bbob mentioned, republicans have mostly unfettered control of all three wings of government.

Cons being angry is a waste of time and money. Y'all are wearing the big boy pants now.

Time to own it.

 

About as much as this thread.

 

quick, I need a witty "conservative" to post the meme about getting more fat women to march than blah-di-blah-herp-derp-blah.

B-Bob is on the right track with two points: First, who cares that they marched when your party is sitting on all three branches of government?
Second, and more important, we won't know the effect of the marches and what they accomplished until the mid-terms just like we did with the tea-party "movement".

 

We won't know until 2018, or perhaps even 2020.

My prediction is nothing will come from this, mostly because modern liberals are goddamned awful at focusing their message and organizing their energies into actionable change.

The 2009 tea party protests were, at least originally, inspired by the financial crisis and TARP. It was a response with a direct cause and a direct message that fermented into direct action. Ironically that action ended up putting more people in office who will drive us to another financial collapse, but regardless, it worked.

Here we just seem to have an "anti-Trump/pro-choice" demonstration. Being anti-Trump is fine, but it's a *lot* more important to be pro-putting good people into Congress. Pro-Choice is great, but unless Republicans are stupid enough to actually start going after Roe v. Wade, it won't result in any kind of electoral movement. It's a pre-emptive shot across the bow, I suppose?

I think this past weekend's events were purely about catharsis, but I'd love to be proven wrong.

 

I agree Tea party movement was successful, even though it was the worst thing to happen to the US in a generation. Let's see if this movement is one of those one in a hundred that accomplishes something.

 

I know that numerous people have set up organizations and calling rotations to keep the congressional representatives and senators aware of their belief in rights/opposition to the Sec. of Education nominee. It's possible to say it brought awareness and motivated many folks to take action on a number of the issues they cared about.

 

I think Trump now has massive awareness that he needs to stay away from the social issues on the left. It's early but so far he's done that and you'll notice he didn't complain about the marches. It's good, it's healthy (the non-rioters), and should help Trump focus on other important issues. He may be a repubtard but Trump isn't a Christian conservative and I feel like the libtards are forgetting that. This is a man who doesn't go to church and is surrounded by woman in his life. I think women will be fine, they just triggered right now and good for them on sending a reminder that he probably didn't need.

 

You're very welcome. Appreciate the honest question. Strangely, even though I am pro-march in my biased way, I think you, me, ipaman, and DonnyMost, from different angles, are all pretty close to the same page. It was probably largely a cathartic exercise at this point, but time will tell if it has legs.

One of my favorite images from the SF march. LOL.

 

They have been. So that's key. What will these groups do next? How will they organize? Will they have selected leaders or go the distributed route (both proven pretty effective over times)... it's way too early to said, but the initial # of 3+M for just the Women's march is a great start. And my suspicion is it will be maintained this time around because of Trump.

The next one up is 4/15 - Trump, release your tax.

 

This is Library!

dude is a hero

 

It accomplished making Madonna a topic of conversation at the water cooler today at work. Specifically, her plans to blow up the White House. Violence.

 

It's a rhetorical question, and willfully obtuse about the complexity and duration of social and political movements at all points on the ideological spectrum.

 

It made very upset people who were recently overruled by the rest of the country in an election which came as a massive shock to them due to a large percentage of them living in echo chambers of like minded individuals feel like they are still in control, if only for a day.

 

No way to know today. We should hopefully see some results towards the end of this year. If the left isn't more organized with a coherent message by the end of this year, it either won't have had an effect or it will be 2020 before we know. They need to get their s*** together quickly if they want to affect the mid-terms next year. Candidates need to be in place and running before 2018 starts.