Watching the various Tea Party groups ramp up their rhetoric in preparation for their April 15th rallies (subtitled “Help Us Build a New Revolution”) reminds me of my own youthful protesting against the war in Southeast Asia. It got me wondering how this year’s protesters were so different from those I remember joining with.
Protesting has been part of the American political scene since the Boston Tea Party (or even before). We were founded by dissenters, and populated by men and women of courage who would rather leave their homelands than abandon their faith and beliefs, serve in the military, or face starvation.
So if political protest is something I agree with, something I have done personally with commitment and enthusiasm, why does the Tea Party movement feel “wrong” to me? This needed some research and considered thought, which I will share.
First, every attempt at dialog I have made with folks involved in the movement has failed. When I was outside the Expo Center in Portland, I tried talking to the protesters. I asked them what cuts in federal and state spending they felt should be made to lower taxes (no suggestions), whether they would like to cut spending by withdrawing our military from foreign wars as Ron Paul suggested (no takers), and what alternative to federal health care legislation they would have preferred (no suggestion, just repeal, but nobody happy with the status quo either).
The folks I talked to (and I’ll admit I didn’t talk to each and every one, just about a dozen at random) felt just as strongly about their position as I did about mine. What I felt was missing was a way to move forward.
If you’re protesting a war, explaining your solution is easy: negotiation leading to a peace agreement. When it comes to legislation, things get knottier, I guess. But the other thing, the thing that really set my teeth on edge, was the anger at government itself, the feeling that absolutely nothing emanating from a central authority would be acceptable, the threatening, confrontational manner (getting closer and closer to those waiting to see the president, until they were mere inches away).
When I protested war, even to the point of civil disobedience, it was non-confrontational. We took a stand against the taking of life, but there was no sense of impending doom, no hate-filled signs. What I saw in the protesters in Portland was quite the opposite. The tea party supporters, by their own words, believe that this nation is under attack and that they need to defend it. They believe that:
Many are in fear of the demise of our Great nation. The fear is legitimate. There is only one entity that will turn things around and save our constitution and our country as we once knew it. “We the People”.
They believe that:
The Tea Party dream includes all who possess a strong belief in the foundational Judaic/Christian values embedded in our great founding documents.
Please judge for yourself. I would never dream of telling you what to believe or how you should define your political beliefs or actions, and I completely respect your right to believe and act as you think you should After all, we are a faith that believes in personal responsibility. Thing is, I don’t understand how a movement that claims to defend the Constitution can violate its First Amendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…
Maybe that’s nit-picking (I don’t believe it is), but it goes deeper than that.
I can’t understand the failure to believe that we, as a people, are resilient, have been through challenging times and been strengthened by them; have the will to join together as Americans, whatever our beliefs; have the common sense to elect leaders we believe in, and to elect someone else if we don’t like the result. We don’t need anger; we need dialog, and I just don’t see that in the Tea Party.
I was already an adult at the time of those protests of the ’60s and ’70s, and I remember them well. What was different then was the hope that one could persuade those who thought differently to change their minds, whether by facts, by reasoned discussion or by moral example.
I taught college students from 1967 until my retirement a few years ago. One striking change that I noticed in the ’90s was an ever-growing conviction among undergraduates that people just didn’t really change their minds about anything — that “facts” (so-called) had no reality or power — that arguments could never actually be valid, but were always just con-games to trick the people with whom one was arguing — and that everyone always had the basest possible hidden motives, no matter how worthy of emulation they might appear to be.
There were exceptions, of course, but by about 2005 this conviction was probably held by a small majority or a large minority of undergraduates whom I taught at my university.
This always puzzled me, since I daily saw these same students do good, change their minds, and reason their own way to new conclusions. They just didn’t seem to notice how their own lives provided counter-examples to this conviction that they voiced. Or maybe they noticed, but didn’t feel confident enough to challenge the received wisdom of their peers.
In a climate such as I have just described, the only reality seems to be, who can force whom to yield or die, and the only point a protest can ever have is to display a potential threat and thereby to increase one’s own power. Maybe this is what you perceive, Rita.
I’ve encountered the mindset you describe, and it seems to still be fashionable. The backup attitude is that anyone who believes any differently is merely unable to face the truth, and is telling themselves whatever it takes to avoid dealing with how the world really is. There’s no productive discussion with a diehard believer, though I could probably put up with them better if they didn’t seem so smugly happy about everything being crap.
I’m afraid I’m going to have to disagree and question you on a point or two (I’m sure you’re surprised!).
While I’m not always happy with Tea Party rhetoric, I do realize it is not a single monolithic movement (any more than Pagans are). There are as many Tea Party platforms as there are Tea Party organizations.
Your quote of “They believe that: The Tea Party dream “ is, at best, out of context and, at worst, misleading. It is not the stated platform of any Tea Party I’ve found (it’s not even the stated platform of the group whose web site you took the quote off of). Your citation leads to personal commentary by the founder of one Tea Party organization where he makes the statement you quoted buried rather deep down on the page. Nor does the statement he makes require everyone in the Tea Party believe such or makes such a belief necessary for membership in the Tea Party; only that people who do believe such should be in the Tea Party.
Yet on the front page of the same organization’s web site they have a very clear ‘core beliefs’ statement which you chose to ignore:
Although I don’t agree with all these points, either, note none of these statements is religious-oriented (‘Traditional Family Values Are Encouraged.’ could possibly be argued but it is not prima facie religious).
Another Tea Party site (Boston Tea Party) makes the following statement:
A suggested general Tea Party platform is:
And finally the comments:
Platform #1.
-it shall be a violation to bring Peppermint tea, to a Tea Party event, for Peppermint tea..is not really tea.
For more possible details on how such a platform might be implemented, see Blueprint of a Tea-Party Platform (I haven’t had time to run down the document yet; anyone who does, please post a citation).
I have to repeat myself and toss out a previous observation here – TPers, like any nationwide group, seem to vary widely from region to region. You may not experience the same stated policies/goals/rhetoric I hear, and what I hear I can’t ally myself with.
Most of what we have locally thus far take Protestantism as a given, and there are plenty of them who have no idea of anything in government or politics, they’re only on board because “it’s called the White House for a reason, dammit!” and they want Obama out of it. Similar to Rita’s experience, none who IDed as TPers that I’ve spoken with has been able to articulate any concrete details for a plan or suggestion for improvement, or even state a clearly defined position as you’ve done above. All I’ve heard, from people who took me as a blank and from people who knew I’m “a symptom of what’s wrong with the country”, is a lot of catchphrases, full of soundbytes and fury, signifying nothing. One local chapter schedules all it’s meetings to begin with watching Glenn Beck’s show for a reason, and saying you don’t endorse Palin is a good way to start someone yelling at you that “if you don’t like what this country stands for then leave”.
Maybe we could timeshare groups, and ours might pick up the MO of yours?
Sorry, should be “have been able”.
Rita –
And now for something completely different
Doonesbury ran a great series on Tea Parties a few weeks ago. The official Doonesbury site doesn’t seem to offer archives, so here’s a few grabbed off political commentary sites:
Link here
Link here
Link here
Enjoy!
And today the news carried a picture from a Massachusetts Tea Party event, with one sign that read “Throw Sarah Palin into Boston Harbor”
Now that I’m finding somebody to pass it along to, I really wish I had thought to bookmark the page it was on this morning.
During the first “contract on america” during the Newt Gingrich Circus years, one example of what they did to cut the budget was to cut 3 Million dollars from the department that released formerly classified government documents. This department revealed, as one example, people that were exposed to nuclear materials. So it was like “honk, honk–toot toot–streamers descending on crowd!” we cut the size of government, Go Newt! They tried to cut a million here or there, usually department such as Master Gardeners who have a couple of paid employees that organize many volunteers. Go Newt!
But at the time they never the discussed the 26 billion dollar secret budget of the CIA and if that could be reduced. They weren’t ready to discuss the 50 billion we were spending to defend Europe. The Aid to Dependent Farmers program and its 12 billion to fatcat Agribiz executives was also off limits. Cutting millions when there was billions to cut.
Personally I feel the government is a coral colony that just keeps growing and growing and needs to reduced, but to teabaggers it seems more important to be angry than to point out what could be done logically.
These somewhat vague notions of Judeo christian values is inconsistent with the values and virtues that became the code of our country. What are their historical values? Cotton Mather and his war on Satans wilderness is more akin to what they believe (even today-demons in washington comment -remember?) than the freedom of thought, speech, expression and association we ended up with in Thomas Jeffersons America. Jefferson believed in a loving ‘God of Nature’, a sharp contrast to the christian god and His steaming pressure cookers of rage.
These teabaggers are being led down a path that will lead to Theocratic Corporatism(Imagine Mussolini and Pat Robertson arm in arm). No matter how much government is reduced, corporations will only increase the chewing and sucking of our lifeblood and these protestors need to realize this. Protest the transfer of wealth from the giant american middle class to the usurious bankers(mortgage lenders and credit card pirates), then eventually something can be truly accomplished.
My two general observations –
I think you have a romantized memory of the Viet Nam protests. While I believe you when you say that you did not ever shout an anti-government slogan in anger (rightous or otherwise) or engage in acts of violence – your fellow protesters cannot make that claim.
Two – based on my experience being in and talking to people in all kinds of demonstrations – most of them have no clue what they are actually protesting for or against. Whole lotta emotion, very little logic. They feel passionately, but cannot articulate anything past a few phrases. Mixed in, are a few people who are both passionate and knowledgeable. In this, I expect Tea Party members to be no different. People are people.
I think you have a romantized memory of the Viet Nam protests.
I would have to agree. Doesn’t coincide with what I remember.
Sterling Hall bombing, SDS, Weather Underground, 1968 Democratic National Convention (at which I assign 50% of the blame to Mayor Dealy and 50% to the protesters), the Days of Rage, bombings at the Pentagon, Department of State, and Capitol building. Riots in the streets. That’s the coverage I remember.
I’m sure that I, too, have a somewhat jaundiced PoV but there is sufficient evidence that not all the anti-war protests were peaceful love-ins.
Rita, I too am a “veteran” of the anti-war movement of the Sixties, and the Tea Party parallels fascinate me. The outstanding one is having no use for either major party. The big difference is that the GOP has tried to put its collar on the Tea Party (without much success) and the Democrats made no such effort with the anti-Vitenam-war movement.
I don’t recall the anti-war movement as purely dialectic as you do but iirc we didn’t have the hilarious cognitive dissonance of a Tea Partier carrying a “No Government Health Care” sign in his hands and a Medicare card in his wallet.
“When I protested war, even to the point of civil disobedience, it was non-confrontational. We took a stand against the taking of life, but there was no sense of impending doom, no hate-filled signs.”
Maybe where you were. I have a deeply burned memory of a pretty young girl spitting on a returning soldier at the airport, and her fellow “peaceful” protesters screaming “baby killer”. The TP protests are against the government, your war protests were very personal.
TP protests aren’t “Personal?” Are you freaking kidding me?
So, none of the absolute hatred spewed at people like Pelosi, Obama, Frank, etc.,…is “personal?” Gods…the lulz on this site are sometimes unbearable. Yeah, you guys are all a bunch of happy-go-lucky optimists.
The difference, I think, is that the elected officials are “The Man” while a returning GI was a pawn, so to speak, who was doing his duty rather than take off for Canada. Here, in Kansas, I haven’t seen the personalization of the Tea Party frustration, more against bigger govt. in general. I still haven’t attended one, just what I see on the local news. I don’t think I would characterize them as optimists by any means, but from what I’ve seen here they are at least well behaved. Obviously different in each part of the country
Yeah, these guys seem totally rational.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJ3bNhSYG6Q
Yeah, these guys seem totally rational.
Actually, yes, they do. They are practicing Freedom of Speech (see my latest post) and yelling “Kill the Bill” seems like a perfectly rational protest to me.What irrational behavior are you seeing? They shouldn’t protest a bill they don’t like? They’re not allowed to yell? And peaceful. I don’t see any violent clashes with police; in fact, I don’t see any violence at all. Ghandi would have been proud.
Whether the man deliberately spit on the CongressCritter or accidentally sprayed him because they were so close is open to debate. But obviously the Capitol policeperson standing next to the CongressCritter didn’t believe it was an assault or even an issue.
And before you go on much more about supposed right-wing irrational protests, I suggest you review other left-wing protests such as:
- Violent anti-war protest in San Francisco The “Kill the police” at 0:43 is ever so much more rational than “Kill the Bill”
- US Out of Iraq Antiwar Protest
- Protest Warrior surrounded by the Left at Iraq War protest in New York City “Get off my street” is rational? Just because he disagrees with them, they want him off ‘their’ streets?