Seven Greenpeace activists climbed to the top of a crane north of the White House and hung a large banner reading “RESIST” on Wednesday morning. Given the timing, one would think the word might allude to President Trump’s orders to revive the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines. Greenpeace is an environmental organization. It sorts the initiatives it promotes into “saving the Arctic,” “protecting forests,” “fighting global warming,” “protecting our oceans,” “living toxic-free,” “promoting sustainable food,” and “defending democracy,” the latter because “[d]emocracy should be the best tool we have to protect the environment,” Greenpeace says.
But we can now add a few more categories to the group’s activism. It described Wednesday’s demonstration as “[delivering] a message of love and progress to counter Trump’s hate and ignorance at the White House.” Its Facebook page asked users to share live streams of the stunt with the message, “Greenpeace activists are displaying a massive banner above the White House in resistance to Trump’s climate denial, racism, misogyny, homophobia, and bigotry.” Its chairwoman, Karen Topakian, did not mention a single environmental cause in her statement about the protest. “While Trump’s disdain and disrespect for our democratic institutions scare me, I am so inspired by the multigenerational movement of progress that is growing in every state,” she said.
One of the individuals who ascended the crane and broadcast footage to the Internet, a woman from San Francisco named Nancy, said the “RESIST” banner was “a hand-painted love letter to you … the people.” She continued, using the word “environmental” only once in this flourish:
So they were out there to advocate the abolition or reform of the Electoral College? Is that an addition to Greenpeace’s definition of “defending democracy”?
Nancy also decried Fannie Mae, which will eventually have some offices on the construction site once the crane frees up. It’s a corporation responsible for attempts “to evict the communities across this country that are deeply rooted in the places where they live,” she said. Eight minutes into one of her video streams, she did mention contaminated drinking water, clean air, and fuel pipelines. The Standing Rock Sioux must be relieved not to have been forgotten.
This all-encompassing manner of defiance is an early trait of what it means to “resist” the new administration. Alice Lloyd, who attended the Women’s March on Washington last weekend, observed this about an “anti-racist” contingent of people who participated:
A Greenpeace demonstration was more about progressivism than the environment. A women’s march was at least as much about progressivism as it was feminism and women’s rights. Single-issue rebels are becoming ambassadors for an ideology. Watch the trend continue.
Given the many moderate beliefs of Donald Trump—he and Kamala Harris really must get together to talk human rights some time—he has become, ironically, a serious crisis for progressives. They don’t seem willing to let it go to waste.
