The Rude Pundit: Random Observations on a Day of Joyful Protest in a Terrible Time

[babylonsister]

The Rude Pundit
Proudly lowering the level of political discourse
10/19/2025
Random Observations on a Day of Joyful Protest in a Terrible Time


1. I had to be on Staten Island on Saturday, the Trumpy borough of New York City, where a bunch of immigrants and their descendants from Ireland, Italy, Russia, Albania, and elsewhere pretend that they are more American than the newer immigrants from the Dominican Republic, Syria, Liberia, Sri Lanka, and elsewhere, but I didn't want to miss out on the No Kings protest. So I headed over to the gathering outside the office of Representative Nicole Malliotakis, a Republican, in a nondescript building on a main drag.

About 600 people were on the sidewalk, blocking a couple of parking lots, across the street from the office. With no speakers and no real organization beyond "let's meet here," it was an organic effort, with the expected well-made signs and the expected but no less delightful people in inflatable animal costumes. Goddamn, I love the inflatable costumes. It's such a gleeful, absurd fuck-you to the raging dickscabs screeching about "hate rallies" and how the left is filled with, as Trump spokesass Karoline Leavitt snarled, "Hamas terrorists, illegal aliens, and violent criminals." Lady, we're wearing frog and unicorn outfits and dancing. Calm the fuck down. Joy and liberation are the antidotes to hate and repression.

2. I've heard and seen some complaints on the social medias along the lines of "We gathered, we made signs, we chanted. So?" Lemme see if I can explain it: Sometimes you just want to hang out with 7 million like-minded people and not feel so fucking lost and alone. Yeah, I get it. The day didn't end in a revolution. It wasn't going to. Sometimes you go to your regular bar just to have a drink with people who are like you. And sometimes you end up hooking up with some hot dude and fucking the night away. But the fact that you don't do some fucking every time you go to the bar doesn't mean you can't just like being there, drinking, talking shit, meeting old friends and new people, simply allowing yourself to say, "Okay, okay, here, right here, I feel safe and like myself and all that fucking shit going on out there, all the people who are actively trying to fuck my life up, all the assholes who make it their job to ruin everyone's day, none of it matters for the little while I'm here."

Lemme put it another way: You know how empowering it is to see that hundreds of people in Staten fuckin' Island were ready to stand outside, with the NYPD across the street, and yell at the office of a shitty member of Congress? You know how important it is in places that are even filthier with Trump-humpers, like Cookeville, Tennessee, or Gulfport, Mississippi, or Idaho Falls, Idaho (where 1200 people gathered), that anti-MAGA protesters showed up and marched or chanted? Every single time these events happen, the movement strengthens. So, yeah, it's necessary. And if you're gonna say that this was all just preaching to the choir, well, as I've said before, the choir deserves to get preached to. That's why they go to church. To be inspired and to stay inspired.


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https://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2025/10/random-observations-on-day-of-joyful.html

[alterfurz]

1. Rise like Lions after slumber / In unvanquishable number -

Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you -
Ye are many -- they are few.
Shelley / The Masque of Anarchy

(with apologies to Jackson Browne, Florence Reece & The Solidarity Sing-Along Singers)

Maybe you're an old man
With your whole life at your back
and you can hear eternity
whisperin' down the track

But you know that it's comin'
Just as surely as the dawn
The battle for the future, baby--
Which side are you on?

Across this great old nation
Tell me what you gonna do?
When there's one law for the rulers
and one law for the ruled
Which side are you on, boys?
Which side are you on?
Which side are you on, gals?
Which side are you on?

C'mon, c'mon, c'mon, if you're comin'--
The battle lines are drawn
C'mon, c'mon, c'mon, if you're comin'--
Which side...which side are you on?