Honestly don't talk about this much because I don't expect to get heard...

Almost no protest happening right now in the US is doing anything more than defusing protests that can actually work.

I'm not saying protests don't work, I'm not saying nonviolent protests don't work... I'm saying current protest tactics accomplish nothing toward the ends they're pursuing.

Protests work in one of two ways:
* They draw attention to an issue people are unaware of
* They are a threat that if things don't change they'll get worse

All we do is the first, and it doesn't work because everybody already knows. They either have heard the message and can't do anything or they don't care, alternatively they thing it's all made up/blown out of proportion/etc and there's no way to show them proof of that by showing up to a protest.

The largest protests of our time made for symbolic, but ultimately fruitless victories. They got so big that they accidentally crossed into threat territory and they sent in the cops to shut it down... and because they were met entirely with passive non-violence, the threat disappeared as soon as they had a symbolic victory. They threw a few token scraps and made a show of enacting changes that they gradually rolled back within a year or two.

The second option also doesn't mean we go out there throwing molotovs right now...

It means we go out there saying "stop what you're doing or we'll give you a real problem to deal with". And it doesn't just mean violence against people, it can absolutely be violence against objects and institutions. It means burning down cop cars, it means sabotaging ICE vehicles, it means smashing the windows of businesses that donate to or provide support to cops and crooked politicians.

And more important than the actual violence and harm is the simple threat... "Fix this, or we escalate".

I'll leave it there because I know I'll already get so many people preaching the propaganda that violence never solves anything, that all we have to do is politely ask loud enough and they'll turn from their evil ways like life is some saturday morning cartoon.