One aspect of protests deserves a mention here.
It’s the element of disruption they cause to those of us who happen to get caught in the middle of them.
Donald J. Trump’s executive order banning refugees from certain Muslim-majority countries has prompted protests at airports and other transportation terminals around the nation.
I have just returned home from a five-day trip to the Pacific Northwest to wish my beloved uncle a happy 90th birthday.
While I was there the president issued that ridiculous, paranoid order banning refugees. What happened, then, at Portland International Airport? Protesters clogged the place. They carried signs. They yelled at security officials. They made nuisances of themselves!
Other protests broke out all across the country. People marched in the streets.
When I left PDX this morning en route to Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, I didn’t encounter any protesters at my point of departure. I thought there might be a horde of ’em at DFW. There weren’t. Good deal.
I got to my next connection to Amarillo and arrived quietly at the terminal.
My point, though, is that protests are fine. We are a country founded by protesters, people who didn’t like taking orders from monarchs. Those good folks then set about to build a government in The New World that guarantees people the right to assemble peaceably to “see redress of grievances” from the government.
It didn’t necessarily suggest they could disrupt the flow of life’s activities for the rest of us who choose to keep our protesting to ourselves.
Just so you know, I detest what the president has done. It’s in-American. For all I know it might even be unconstitutional. I’ll let the legal scholars of the world decide that one.
As for marching at airports, train stations and ship terminals … well, I’ll leave that for others.
Just stay out of my way. Please.