Make Protests Fun

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Mark Sommer is sick of protests. Last fall, he took part in a San Francisco rally against the Bush administration?s Iraq policy. The vibrant, energetic crowd exhilarated Sommer, a veteran activist and director of the Mainstream Media Project, a nonprofit educational organization based in Arcata, California. Not only was the number of people who gathered impressive, but nearly half of them were under the age of 25; Sommer, 57, noted the refreshing energy they brought to a movement that had its last major infusion of youth in the seventies.

But then the speakers began harsh rants against current policy, and the feeling of deflation in the crowd was hard to miss. Sommer realized something that many of those attending large protests in the Bay Area, Washington, D.C., and other cities would later comment on: Yelling wasn?t working anymore, and the anger that seemed necessary to fuel the movement felt misplaced. So he went home and devised a new strategy: the Global Village Gathering.

?To be driven by fear and anger more than hope and determination is to catch the very illness we seek to combat,? he writes in an essay outlining his plans. Sommer?s proposed new form of protest is an attempt to get back to the very definition of demonstration with carnival-cum-conference events that don?t directly protest anything, but actually demonstrate the kind of world that he, and like-minded collaborators, seek to create. They would be, in his words, ?part Renaissance fair, part music festival, part farmer?s market, part networking conference . . . demonstration projects for a sustainable society.? These ?veritable marketplaces of practical ideas and initiatives? would take place outdoors, ideally, over the course of one or two full days, providing ample time for people to get together to see working versions of alternative technology and culture and to talk, plan, and bring about change themselves.

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