I went to one of the nearly 3000 No Kings protests around the world on Saturday. Over the past few weeks as I’ve watched protesters and people just going about their lives, TBH, being assaulted and arrested by masked and armed federal thugs, the feeling that I can’t let others do this alone has built up inside me.
Also—listening to Republicans of every strip yowling about
the paid America-hating radical left extremists planning insurrection on
Saturday just frankly got up my nose.
I bought posterboard and markers from Dollar Tree, used a
graphic an artist on Bluesky made available as visual interest and cobbled
together a little homemade sign.
The local Indivisible org asked protestors to wear yellow,
and I managed to find a tee-shirt from some tech company that filled the bill.
I removed the biometrics from my mobile phone and put ID
and bail money in my pocket (Governor Fleeceweasel had announced he was calling
up the Virginia National Guard to “keep peace” at the protests) and started
walking to the nearest of four sites in the People’s Republic, about a mile
away.
Along the way, I ran into one of my neighbors, who was
carrying several signs—turns out he’s a cartoonist, and is really good at
expressing ideas visually.
As we approached the site, I was relieved to see that there
were already hundreds of people lining Reston Parkway—on both sides. (I’d been
rather worried it might be five blokes and a dog.) As time passed, protestors
spread out about half a mile. It wasn’t just the blue-haired set (as predicted
by one of the yowling Republicans), although there were plenty of us who had
experience protesting back in the 70s. One woman walked up and down the line
with a bubble generator; there were plenty of cowbells. No inflatable frogs,
but one squirrel, and my neighbor said he saw a rabbit, too.
Cars driving past honked, waved and flashed thumbs up. Some
went back and forth several times. It was a festive atmosphere.
I did not get a lot of pix, because of having to hold up my
sign. Did not get a shot of the beautiful banner proclaiming “We the People
means all of us”, or of the squirrel. But here are a couple.
BTW—the response from the White House was to post an AI-generated video of the Kleptocrat in a fighter jet (wearing a crown and with his breathing apparatus below his nose) releasing clumps of liquid shit on protestors. No, I am not making this up.
My gratitude today is for participating in just one event
of many that were held in Reston, which was one town in hundreds around the
world. More than seven million, we are told. I'm grateful for every one of those seven million, for their determination, their creativity, their joy. And no major incidents (outside of
that one woman in Fairhope, Ala., who was arrested for “lewd conduct” for
wearing an inflatable penis suit and a sign saying “No dick-tator”; it took
three local cops to wrestle her to the ground and someone on Bluesky commented,
“Four dicks.”. And there were a couple of attempts by MAGAts to stir up trouble, because fuckwits gotta fuck), despite all the federal forces standing at the ready with
fingers twitching against their weapons.
I’m grateful for the reminder that—while I am but one, one
plus one plus many more ones is power. And as a sign at one of the protests
proclaims:
Power to the people.
©2025 Bas Bleu
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