There are so many things about my life that 18-year old me would need a great deal of explaining in order to understand how they would come to be. Like, what did it take for me to end up in front of the Binghamton Court House, mumbling the words to the Star Spangled Banner along with four thousand other people furious about the theft of American democracy by autocrats and, um, getting actually teary? I mean, it's a pretty fun song to sing and you get to cheer and shout "Free" and "Brave" at the end and think about the potential of America, despite all the problems built into the country right from the start. But still, it's a long way from Dunedin, New Zealand.
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| I took this photo from the face book page of a Binghamton mayoral candidate. |
In June two thousand people stood here for a No Kings rally. Yesterday the number doubled and it made us all feel slightly hopeful, and lord knows we needed cheering up.
And, fun fact, in 1890 three thousand people stood here to protest the sentencing of picketing cigar workers to hard labor. Their sentences were later overturned as part of a successful challenge to the assumption that unions and strikes were conspiracies against business.
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