The Boycott and the Skeptics

Let people try stuff.

Image: by Excel23, CC

Last Friday, many people participated in a retail boycott of a list of MAGA friendly outlets, from Walmart to Amazon to Target. The boycott was suggested by a meditation facilitator named John Schwartz, who has never been involved in activism previously. His video proposing the boycott, was viewed 8.5 million times. It was touted by Stephen King, Mark Ruffalo, and Bette Midler; the economic blackout was covered in USA Today, CNN, NPR, and numerous other outlets.

On social media, some people enthusiastically encouraged their followers and friends to participate in the boycott. Others were more skeptical. They pointed out that the economic blackout didn’t have clear goals. They noted that one day is too short a time to do much economic harm to retailers; people likely just moved their purchasers to the day before or the day after. They argued that ill-conceived actions like this distract people from more useful resistance and are therefore actively harmful.

I share some of the doubts about whether a one-day boycott is likely to change the behavior of businesses, much less of Trump or Musk. But I don’t think the effort is harmful. On the contrary, I think there’s value in people trying different actions—not least because (contra the skeptics) rather than being a distraction, resistance (of whatever form) often builds more resistance.

To be clear, if all direct action is ineffectual, that’s obviously bad. Just doing something for the sake of doing something doesn’t always lead to change, and the most effective actions—like demonstrations during the Civil Rights Movement, for example—are often carefully planned and calibrated. Fighting fascism is important, and you want the fight to be effective. In that vein, the Tesla takedown demonstrations, congressional Town Hall protests, and coordinated call-in campaigns to Senators seem more promising ways to build power and put pressure on Republicans (and Democrats).

Having said that…we’re in a very difficult and in some ways unprecedented situation right now. The US—government, media, businesses, colleges, nonprofit institutions—has never turned its back on multiracial democracy and embraced fascism this enthusiastically and relentlessly since at least the end of Reconstruction.

One thing we’re missing in particular so far in the second Trump term is what might be called easy-mode resistance. In 2017, we had the Women’s March and a range of other family friendly, large-scale protests. Those protests, too, provoked a certain amount of sneering, and some grumbling about “performative activism.”

The thing about activism, though, is that it’s meant in part to be a performance. That performance can do various things; it can, for instance, be a way to force those in authority to reveal their brutality. But it can also be a way to let people know that they’re not alone in their resistance. It can remind them that they have a voice, and that they have the power to speak, especially when they speak together.

Actions aren’t just meant to push those in power. They can also be designed to rally people and get them further engaged. You draw people in, give them a sense that they can work together, and they may be ready to do more. After boycotting, they might be inspired to, for example, call their Senators, travel to a town hall, protest at a Tesla dealership—or join in whatever the next action is.

I think people often work with a model of activism that imagines there’s a limited amount of energy and personpower out there for resistance, and we have to horde it and direct it only towards the best, most confrontational, most strategic demonstrations. But I think that in reality, organizers are often desperate to get people doing something because they know that once you’re committed, once you feel like you are part of a movement, you’re more likely to do more.

It's anecdotal, but I had several people tell me that they boycott engaged people who aren’t online and don’t generally pay close attention to politics. You could say that those people were fooled, and that they felt like they were doing something when they weren’t. But part of the goal of a dictatorship is to convince people that they are powerless, and that they can do nothing. Building a sense of community and empowerment is important in itself.

Maybe the boycott helped with that. Maybe it didn’t. But in general, it’s probably best right now to err on the side of offering support to people who are trying to resist, rather than mocking them or telling them that their actions are useless. As activist and organizer Mariame Kaba (for whom I sometimes do freelance work) has pointed out on social media, no one knows for sure how best to fight this terrifying regime. So, rather than insist beforehand that something won’t work, it’s often best to extend solidarity, and see if maybe it will.