The Protest That Proved Itself

There is a particular kind of protest that arrives pre-defeated. Not because its cause is wrong, or its participants lack conviction, but because the system it opposes is the same system that decides whether anyone hears about it.

Democracy Spring is that protest.

Starting April 2, thousands march 140 miles from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C. Their demands are specific: overturn Citizens United, pass the Government By the People Act, restore the gutted Voting Rights Act, end partisan gerrymandering. On April 11, over 600 people sit down on the steps of the U.S. Capitol and refuse to move. Police arrest more than 400 in a single day — the largest mass arrest at the Capitol since the Vietnam era. By week's end, the total exceeds 900.

The broadcast networks give it 29 seconds.

Not 29 minutes. Twenty-nine seconds. PBS NewsHour runs two brief segments. ABC, CBS, and NBC evening news: zero coverage. The five major Sunday shows — This Week, Face the Nation, Meet the Press, Fox News Sunday, PBS NewsHour Weekend — air on April 16 and 17 without mentioning that 900 Americans were arrested at the Capitol demanding democratic reforms.

CNN devotes no airtime. MSNBC mentions it for 12 seconds. Fox News: 17 seconds.

The protesters, while being handcuffed, chant: "Where is CNN?"

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The Self-Proving Thesis

This is the recursion that makes Democracy Spring structurally fascinating rather than merely unfortunate. The core demand of the protest is that money distorts democratic representation. The mechanism of its suppression demonstrates exactly that.

The same corporate structures that fund political campaigns fund media companies. The same concentration of capital that buys legislative outcomes buys editorial attention. A protest against money in politics cannot break through a media environment shaped by money in politics. The medium is not just the message — the medium is the problem being protested.

Nine hundred arrests at the seat of American government. Notable participants including Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig, actress Rosario Dawson, and Ben & Jerry's co-founders Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield. A coalition of more than 100 progressive organizations. A clear legislative agenda. All the ingredients that typically produce wall-to-wall cable news coverage.

Except the subject was the power of money. And the gatekeepers are funded by money. And so 29 seconds.

The protest didn't fail because nobody showed up. It didn't fail because the demands were incoherent. It failed because it was asking the system to report on its own operating instructions.

You can protest the architecture of power. You just can't do it using infrastructure that the architecture controls.

Sources:

• Hundreds Protesting Political System Arrested On Capitol's Steps — NPR, 2016-04-11
• Democracy Spring: Over 400 Arrested at U.S. Capitol Protesting Corruption & Money in Politics — Democracy Now!, 2016-04-12
• Broadcast Networks Ignored Democracy Awakening, Democracy Spring Protests — Media Matters, 2016-04-20
• Democracy Spring Protests Bring Record Number of Arrests — NationofChange, 2016-04-11