I was at the Rally to Restore Sanity; though I was too far back in the crowd to hear the performances, the energy was intoxicating. It wasn’t the reverent jubilance of the inauguration, or the sneering self-pride of the Tea Party rally. It was a comfortable convergence of complex and quirky messages. I tweeted some of them.
This rally was one of the few times I have been happy for the people around me to assume I agreed with them. I loved being in the Middle East because I could not be assumed to agree, and so had a license to make my own self. But at this rally, I felt a part of a clean mob, a rooted assembly interested in a calmer way of being political.
It was also a truly nerdy place–from the xkcd sign to the stormtrooper to the Tolkein sign on truthiness.
Some of the protesters seemed to be engaged in some complex performance art–but they weren’t yelling and they got out of the way of the crowd control horses, and so were fine in my book.
I guess that’s what made this rally different: it was truly open to all perspectives. Even cartoon ones.
Inspirational Quote:
“All I know is what I read in the papers.”–Will Rogers
