Why aren't there mass protests in the USA?

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Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨Yazer@lemmy.ca⁩ to ⁨nostupidquestions@lemmy.world⁩

I’m shocked that I haven’t seen one protest yet. Is the media suppressing them? If there aren’t any, why?

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vfsh@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
It’s being suppressed, I can’t find the graph I saw yesterday but cumulative daily protests this year have far outclassed the protests from 2017, yet there’s very little coverage of it from the major outlets.

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- Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  The revolution will not be televised.
  
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  - onyxjet@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    You picked the right time, but the wrong guy.
    
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  - vfsh@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Not when the class that controls the media is the one being revolted against.
    
    It will however be recorded and streamed and shared peer to peer.
    
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Varyk@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
I’m not sure where these questions are coming from, there are tens of thousands of people conducting dozens of protests across every single state at every level of government, and multiple stories about those protests in this feed.

there’s absolutely some media suppression since Trump is friends with the owners of some media outlets, but there is also a lot of media documenting the literally Nationwide protests.

there’s a super popular post like a few tiles up about the dozens of ongoing Tesla protests going on that are tanking the company.

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ArchmageAzor@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Because the Americans don’t know how to protest.

To a Frenchman a protest is storming and taking control of the representation of authority in the country.

To a Greek a protest is filling the streets of many cities throughout the countries with hundreds of thousands of people.

To an American a protest involves standing in a square by the few hundreds, holding signs with semi-sarcastic or passive aggressive messages written on them.

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- stickly@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Eh, I feel like every day there’s a new story of Tesla’s being torched. That’s a pretty directed and forceful form of protest that gets no credit.
  
  Also, it’s not like America never has large scale protests. Hundreds of thousands of people fill the National Mall pretty regularly, skimming Wikipedia I counted 14+ since 1950 of over 200,000.
  
  Just 5 years ago 15m-26m people participated in some especially roudy protests across all 50 states, but no credit for that either.
  
  Large protests that get even slightly out of line in the USA usually end with:
  
  well armed, paramilitary police violently dispersing everyone
  
  the CIA assassinating protest leaders
  
  and/or the 6 media conglomerates suppressing coverage at the behest of the ~15 people that own them
  
  If you’re criticizing Americans for anything, it should be for their response to that and not their ability to organize and orchestrate protests.
  
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- PieMePlenty@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  
  protest is storming and taking control of the representation of authority in the country.
  
  Jan 6. 2021… just the other side protesting though.
  
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  - spooky2092@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Yeah, insurrection is a form of protest, I guess.
    
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  - ArchmageAzor@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Yeah, I hope every American here realizes that the lunatics behind Jan 6 are more effective protesters than they are.
    
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- some_designer_dude@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Image
  
  Such ferocity.
  
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randombullet@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Just remember, the media is owned by the rich.

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- socialjusticewizard@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  These days i get quite a lot of US news off Lemmy, and aside from Tesla torchings (great start) I mostly just hear about people going to rallies. Are there actually americans out there obstructing something? If so, why aren’t they sharing their own news for solidarity and motivation of masses? How is capitalist media causing fediverse content to be censored?
  
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it_depends_man@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
There are protests, they are just way too small.

Trump hast at least 40% of the population behind him, and a good 20-30% don’t care. Still.

You can’t organize “mass protests” with 20-30% of the population.

I mean, you can, but they are literally a loud minority.

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- JimmyMcGill@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  That’s just wrong
  
  Put 20/30% of the population of any city or county out on the streets and it will make headlines
  
  It’s technically a loud minority but a very loud and significant minority
  
  The problem is that of those 20/30% only 10% will actually get out on the streets so you are left with around 2% of the general population. And that ain’t much
  
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  - it_depends_man@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    
    The problem is that of those 20/30% only 10% will actually get out on the streets so you are left with around 2% of the general population. And that ain’t much
    
    So you do agree?
    
    Getting mass protests organized is a tremendous effort. If you have 80-90% support for something, getting 30-40% on the street is a huge accomplishment. If only 30% support the idea in the first place, there is no chance.
    
    The “mass protest” has to be at a scale, where it’s basically a general strike where society shuts down because people are protesting.
    
    That doesn’t mean stop trying, but also
    
    but a very loud and significant minority
    
    This is meaningless in a country that chooses to ignore public voices. Authoritarian regimes can stay stable with 10-15% support of the population, ignoring protests and complaints.
    
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captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
What would “a protest” accomplish? What have they accomplished in my lifetime?

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- DrDickHandler@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Actual protests work.
  
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- WhatThaFudge@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  globalcitizen.org/…/peace-protests-dallas-respons…
  
  Some may not have been in your lifetime but peaceful protests do get results. Outside of revolution all our civil rights around the world have been won through protest.
  
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- captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Downvotes, but no answers.
  
  What good has ever come from people standing in a street waving a cardboard sign?
  
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jagged_circle@feddit.nl ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Lol wut? There are. Where do you get your news?!?

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- Treczoks@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  They may happening, but they don’t really make the news. You are still far below the MLK threshold.
  
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  - jagged_circle@feddit.nl ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Yes, its all over the news. You must be using shitty sites that aren’t real news sites.
    
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bluegreenwookie@bookwormstory.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
There have been but i suspect they may have slowed down.

I feel like one reason why trump has crashed the economy is to hurt people so they are too busy working and struggling to be able to protest his fascist policies.

It’s hard to help your neighbor when you are drowning yourself

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- unconsciousvoidling@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Heh … massive unemployment is going to be like Covid all over again. The crazy shit is coming for sure.
  
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- Kecessa@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  French Revolution happened while people were starving…
  
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  - bluegreenwookie@bookwormstory.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    But people aren’t starving, they are struggling. That’s the difference.
    
    They want us exhausted so we can’t protest. But they don’t want us so desperate we bring out the guillotines.
    
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jeffw@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Why do kids, who mainly get their news from Tik Tok, not get mad?

Maybe look at who controls the algorithms

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NeoNachtwaechter@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
In Usa, “protesters” are not allowed to do anything further than waving a few signs.

Even when they start shouting too loudly, they go to jail immediately. And then they need a president who releases them (but he releases only the right ones).

Have you noticed how many, many police and national guard troops they can afford? Massa Musk does not cut down on police, only on schools and scientists and caregivers for the sick…

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jontree255@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Yes, the media is suppressing news of protests because most of the media companies are owned by billionaires who’ve kissed the ring.

The protests that are happening are also smaller and somewhat decentralized. The media likes a big show and these protests don’t get clicks or eyeballs on screens.

There are many smaller protests happening such as the ones outside Tesla dealerships literally everywhere. This is having an effect on Teslas stock but TBD if it’ll have a lasting effect.

People are also attending town halls with their congresspeople and getting confrontational. This has led to many representatives cancelling town halls or screening for only Republicans like fucking cowards. Chuck Schumer just canceled his book tour because he knows he’ll get run out of every city he shows up in after his capitulation.

Pro Palestine protests continue on campuses.

There’s a lot to dig into on why there isn’t a large mass protest like 2020 but my simple answer is that things aren’t bad enough yet.

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- Wooki@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Who watches the news these days?
  
  No one.
  
  The retired and thats about it
  
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- bestagon@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  The revolution will not be brought to you by xerox without commercial interruption, the revolution will not go better with coke, the revolution will not fight germs that may cause bad breath, the revolution will put you in the driver’s seat
  
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tunetardis@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
They had that protest in every state did they not? But when I couldn’t find much on it in the Canadian media, I went searching CNN and other American sites and found very little also, which was surprising to me. Here on lemmy, there were all sorts photos being posted from various cities, and it looked like a pretty big deal?

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Fubarberry@sopuli.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
You won’t see much about protests until we’re closer to the next election.

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- actionjbone@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  What next election?
  
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Montagge@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Because Americans are by and large complete cowards.

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- Nay@feddit.nl ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Your mom’s a coward!
  
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conditional_soup@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Okay, I’m going to acknowledge that there are protests, yes, but probably what OP is thinking of something more like the BLM protests during COVID where shit started to get real. There’s a few things going on here:

People don’t have the time off like they did during COVID. They also aren’t locked up and less able to ignore the news.

Resignation. I think this is the bigger of the three parts. I know for my part, I consider this a complete loss of the federal government. Even if we somehow avoid a dictatorship and get control of the government back, the damage that’s been done is so deep and complete that we’ll likely never fully recover from it, we’ll just have to move on with things as they are. My efforts are now focused on organizing balkanization. If Texas wants to be a fucking stupid theocracy with prosperity gospel televangelists and the antichrist at the top, who am I to get between them and a good time? Maybe without having to hear about what Daniel the terminally addicted Fox News viewer thinks about Critical Race Theory, we can get some shit done, fix healthcare, get some fucking trains and bike lanes put up.

Lack of organization. The federal government has spent the last 100 years stomping any serious leftist movements both here and abroad. There is almost no living memory of what a real leftist movement looks like, or how to get one going, so we’re all having to roll them from scratch, and there’s still a lot of the old high-roading instincts that were implanted in us over the decades. It’s just going to take time.
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null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Loads of people in this thread saying they’re happening but media not covering them…

I don’t think that’s really what is meant by “mass protests”. In the not so distant past I would have thought every american man woman and child would be weeping in the streets at the corruption and despotism.

There are protests, and maybe they’re not being covered, but it’s not the type of civil unrest I would have expected honestly.

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- ZombiFrancis@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Europe has roughly the same land mass as the United States and less than half the population. The population density and urbanization is even lower.
  
  So for the USA it’s actually quite a bit to have protests of hundreds in smaller towns and state capitols.
  
  Major cities can muster the large groups, but the consistent and widespread nature of the protests should not be discounted.
  
  Incidentally I am also not seeing counter protests or demonstrations of support.
  
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- jagged_circle@feddit.nl ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  The media is definitely covering it. If your media sites don’t cover it, block that media site and follow one that does.
  
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  - null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    That’s… not really what I was getting at.
    
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ABetterTomorrow@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
50501 is hard at work! Also check out www.mobilize.us

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Buske@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
There are, The media is own’d by the rich and now so is the government.

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- jagged_circle@feddit.nl ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Fortunately there’s tons of great independent media that is covering it. Why would you subscribe to corporate trash?
  
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jjjalljs@ttrpg.network ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
I’m going to guess

poor media coverage

media is explicitly hostile to protests and pro trump/right-wing-extremism

many people are living paycheck to paycheck + we have minimal labor protection

years of left-wing organizations being kneecapped (eg: the murder of fred hampton)

A lot of people are angry but there’s not really much organization. As much as I would love someone to take 50,000 of their closest friends, march down to DC, and shoot every republican in the head, without years of organizing that’s just a fantasy. Unfortunately, the right wing has been doing years of organizing and it’s now bearing fruit for them.
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- HasturInYellow@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  In Luigi we trust.
  
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  - unconsciousvoidling@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    I’m glad we have the freedom to say this shit here.
    
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- factotumus@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Wholly agree. Vast majority of US Americans cannot afford to lose what little is left. We are two to three paychecks away from homelessness. Economic subjugation has been in the works across political parties.
  
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- mke_geek@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  There’s no leader. Most people are followers.
  
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  - AtHeartEngineer@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    I think the reason more people haven’t started to openly organize is mostly concerns about self preservation. This govt obviously doesn’t care about civil liberties and are openly calling anyone not with them “the enemy”. It becomes much harder to publicly and civily organize if there is a substantial chance you’ll be branded a terrorist organization. That’s obviously just my take from my perspective.
    
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Sorolainen@sopuli.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
I don’t have an answer but I have wondered the same. Serbia, Georgia and Türkiye have currently some very large pro-democracy demonstrations, but the USA hasn’t. What there is seems to be pretty small scale.

Maybe pro-democrat Americans don’t feel like their actions matter? Perhaps the opposition just isn’t that popular? Maybe the USA just didn’t have all that strong traditions of civil action to to begin with. At least when compared to countries lile Georgia or Serbia.

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jordanlund@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Maybe you just aren’t where it’s happening?

apnews.com/…/50501-protests-project-2025-trump-st…

“Protesters in Philadelphia and at state capitols in California, Minnesota, Michigan, Texas, Wisconsin, Indiana and beyond waved signs denouncing President Donald Trump; billionaire Elon Musk, the leader of Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency; and Project 2025, a hard-right playbook for American government and society.”

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- Bz1sen@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Sorry but there are like 100 people at each protest. There should be a million marching through Washington… What are we talking about here
  
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  - jordanlund@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Getting a million people to Washington D.C. is a tall order when places like CA, OR, WA are 3,000 miles away, plus people have to, you know, work and stuff.
    
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- Yazer@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  I guess I’m just shocked that they only waved signs. In France, the guillotine would have been out. Here in Canada we entirely shut down our capital for months, and both for way less. When will the real protests start?
  
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  - match@pawb.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    if you haven’t seeb the news, some protestors and professors have been taken captive by ICE in the US and that’s had a chilling effect. however, that also builds some tension - as soon as some major property destruction breaks out and it becomes obvious that ICE can’t disappear them all, people will be bringing police precincts and declaring autonomous zones again like they did in the BLM protests (did your news sources report those?)
    
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  - Tyfud@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    We met have the level of social safety nets that France does to allow people the freedom to pretest without starving or becoming homeless. It is by design. They keep everyone just on the verge of poverty so nobody can afford to be disruptive.
    
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  - ryven@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Americans are notoriously terrible at protesting. I was in high school in the '00s and our textbook had a sidebar about the 1999 Seattle WTO protests. The bit that stuck with me: a French dignitary interviewed on the scene was unconcerned about the protesters. He pointed to an untouched BMW. “In Paris,” he said, “That car would be burning.”
    
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  - jordanlund@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    In the US, protests are largely performative. People want to make a show of it do they can say “Look, I did something!” even if they’re doing nothing. They’ll break their own arms patting themselves on the back.
    
    I live in Portland which is protest central. We had 100 days of Black Lives Matter protests which meant and did nothing as the city largely agreed with the sentiment.
    
    You want a protest that matters? You take it where the action is happening. In the case of Trump, you can set EVERY Tesla dealer on fire, it means nothing.
    
    Take that shit to D.C. and shut that city down for 100 days? Assuming the Feds don’t kill everyone, that’s a protest that would matter.
    
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  - Tm12@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Are we really comparing the French Revolution and the annoying-ass, snowflake trucker protest?
    
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  - dohpaz42@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    I’m not a historian, but my guess is that we have lived too many generations without major political incident; the kind you’re supposed to make heads roll over.
    
    We’ve been indoctrinated since birth to blindly love our country, to mind what we say; we have seen other countries and their political unrest, and we ignorantly convinced ourselves that it will never be like that here.
    
    And despite the cop out response of “we vOtEd fOr it”, otherwise good, hardworking Americans were lied to by their friends, family, church, and beloved government for so long that they can’t know any better.
    
    Make no mistake, we fucked up and let our hubris get the better of us. I hope we can see the error of our ways and fight back before it really is too late.
    
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  - Iampossiblyatwork@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    You gotta remember. The majority of voters wanted this. Trump won the popular vote. He still has almost a 50% approval. Half of Americans are good with what’s happening. Let that sink in.
    
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HowAbt2morrow@futurology.today ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Fluoride. Domesticated mfer. They’ll put yellow ribbons on a tree for some bullshit.

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OsrsNeedsF2P@lemmy.ml ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
Can’t mass protest if you don’t have a way to get people in one location. United States car infra prevents that.

Source: seen mass protests, seen “US protests”. Night and day difference

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TheFeatureCreature@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
There are. Heaps of them.

The US is just a big place and very spread out. And the ruling government and its media conglomerates are trying to keep them out of the media.

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- whodrankarnoldpalmer@startrek.website ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  There absolutely are not. There are anemic little marches scattered here and there.
  
  Americans were protesting George Bush in 2004 more forcefully and in vastly larger numbers than they are protesting now.
  
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  - steal_your_face@lemmy.ml ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    wagingnonviolence.org/…/resistance-alive-well-us/
    
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  - finitebanjo@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Apparently there were about 375,000 people protesting the Iraq War in New York in 2003 compared to about a million people marching for women’s safety in 2004 in DC
    
    In the years since there have been about 5 protests the same or much larger than that. In 2017 2.3 Million people protested the Trump inauguration, and protestors also showed up for Trump’s 2025 inauguration which was held indoors for reasons including harsh snow. The exact number estimates for the 2025 inauguration protest and the 50501 protests are unknown at the moment, but it is occurring in all 50 states which is comparable to the George Floyd protests.
    
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ohulancutash@feddit.uk ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
There are, they are being reported. I couldn’t speculate as to why you are missing them.

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- andrewta@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
  Can you provide 3 links to different protests?
  
  Not being snarky. Just haven’t seen any reporting on it.
  
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  - jagged_circle@feddit.nl ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    commondreams.org/…/trump-department-of-education
    
    dropsitenews.com/…/dhs-detains-columbia-universit…
    
    democracynow.org/…/hundreds_rally_in_houston_agai…
    
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  - los_chill@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Check out @usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml posts. They are posting pictures of grassroots protests across the country every day. Like has been said, there hasn’t been THE big mass protest, but there is constant local activism and protest, just mostly ignored by media.
    
    lemmy.ml/u/usernamesAreTricky
    
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  - Habahnow@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    los angeles map of other protests
    
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  - keinBloudsinn@lemmings.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    old.reddit.com/…/us_guys_reddit_has_removed_the_p…
    
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  - keinBloudsinn@lemmings.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    old.reddit.com/…/in_front_of_the_stock_exchange_n…
    
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  - keinBloudsinn@lemmings.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    m.youtube.com/watch?v=A69GtWE5OU4
    
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  - keinBloudsinn@lemmings.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    50501
    
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  - adespoton@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago
    Ahh… THAT is the difference.
    
    In the US, most of the media is complicit in what’s being protested. And online social media coverage is being contained to small bubbles.
    
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