#j25

Over 60% of the Country is protesting in Solidarity with Portland.

PNW Youth Liberation Front@PNWYLF

Portland July 25 Action: Alberta Park at 8:00 PM. Mask up, wear black, bring a friend, and be water

ROLL CALL 

Rockford, IL

Oakland, CA

Baltimore, MD

Minneapolis, MN

Flagstaff, AZ

Denver/Aurora

Los Angeles, CA

Oakland, CA

Richmond, VA

Salem, OR

Kansas City, MO

Philadelphia, PA

Seattle, WA

Las Vegas, NV

Eugene, OR

Washington DC

Olympia, WA

Tacoma, WA

South Gate, CA

Providence, RI

NY, NY

There is definitely one trumpet to go along with the drums in Portland. 

Actually, we went to another protest organized several miles away, as part of the “solidarity with portland” 25 thing, which was going on all over the country. 

Anyway.  After a bit of standing around, wondering what the deal was going to be, they announced that the deal was going to be marching to the Justice Center.   Which, as I said, is several miles away. 

I distinctly heard someone off to my left say, “Are you fucking kidding me?”  

I kind of agreed - it wasn’t what I’d expected. 

But hey.  There we were.  So we went. 

We saw signs like this along the way.  Cute!  We also saw one that said “A Witch's Place is in the Resistance”, which I also liked. 

It was a long walk - something like 4.5 miles (I guess 7.24km).  

Somewhere along the way, I heard some “booooooo” and other jeering-type vocalizations.  Guess who!

We saw them a few more times, but no interaction other than the cheering crowds.

I was really impressed by how well-orchestrated this all was - there were people on motorcycles and mopeds at all of the intersections, keeping traffic from being dicks.  I’ve heard that the march stopped for red lights, but it was hard to tell, where we were. 

It was full dark when we passed the Rose Garden - oops, I mean Moda Center.  Fuckers. 

I didn’t fully appreciate how many of us there were until we got to crossing the Steel Bridge.  You can kind of see up to the left where it winds around in an S almost. 

Ok so Steel Bridge is just a hop skip jump to the Justice Center.  It wasn’t long before it was impossible to tell where the new group was - we just schmoozed right in.

We started at 3rd and Salmon, but my Riot Buddy was hungry, so we decided to head to Riot Ribs and see what the haps was there.   It was a bit of a line, but not so much we felt like it was a bad idea.  I mean, no one was going anywhere, right?  So we got hotdog and Damn, Riot Ribs has more condiments than...well, a lot of things. 

We sat on a curb and ate our food, spun some Poke-Stops, then got kitted back up and started going towards the...I guess the center.  It felt stupid to come and join it like a street bbq.  More bodies in the front, you know?  

Passed this sign.

Things were starting to feel a little more real now - I mean, I’m not in any way an expert, this is my first *real* protest.  But the mood was changing.  It might have been the whiffs of tear gas that tipped me off.

We were around the block from the Justice Center, near 4th & Salmon.  

I have more pictures/videos of this, but there are too many identifiable people/vehicles that would be hard to obscure.  So just take my word for it.   I mean, you can see the gas cloud up the street there.

Let me tell you, I knew about the leaf blowers, but y’all, they had box fans and a generator.   Think about that for a second.  They went to the trouble of rigging up box fans with a generator, because that’s how it is now.  Also, they were QUICK.  Sumbitch they were quick.  and smooth.

At one point, there was a lovely cool breeze that pushed the gas right back into the faces of the gassers.  I feel like it was a sign that the weather deities were freaking tired of this shit.

Every time we were pushed back, there was a chant of “Stay together, stay tight! We do this every night!” usually with drum accompaniment, which was actually pretty comforting.  

By the end of our time there, there had been maybe the three or four times* where we went forward, pulled back. There had been at least one more “GO GO GO THEY’RE RUSHING”, which was kinda terrifying yeah.  My friend there has a video they took over their head, showing the line of cops directly behind them.  They were absorbed by the line of shielders pretty quickly, but that video is terrifying.  

Also, I keep wanting to call the line of shield-holders “shield-maidens” but I’m pretty sure the genders in that group where pretty varied.

Anyway.  This is the last picture I feel ok sharing.  It’s after a big rush by the cops, followed by their vehicles.  We were trying to see which direction to go, and saw that the blocks to one side seemed clear, but the other was having the same thing happen. 

We decided at this point it was a night, for us.  It was about 2am, I think. We peeked-bolted-peeked-bolted, then found a little alcove to un-kit and turn into pedestrians.  

We checked the bus schedule, and technically a few were still running, but it was really less complicated and in one case, faster, to just walk back to the car. But then something happened - my friend says it was definitely fae.  In any case, we didn’t have to walk back, and got some good advice as well. 

I don’t know that we’ll be going back down there, I’m old and decrepit, and I feel like I won’t be doing much good if I’m the one who ends up needing help.

So instead, I’m going to pretend that I have thousands of fans anxiously awaiting my posts about the protests, which I get from following a bunch of independent journalists on twitter.  They are some amazing people, as are all of those who have been down there for the last two months.