I Protest

There is a book filled with wisdom called “the Bible.” Inside that book there is — and I realize this is a little confusing — a book called Proverbs. (There are 66 books in “The Book,” which is the literal meaning of the word “bible.”)

Proverbs was written mostly by King Solomon. He was not only the richest man of all time (including Elon), but also the wisest. And so it is that many today turn to Proverbs when they are searching for wisdom. That is good.

But Solomon also wrote another book called Ecclesiastes, which is much harder to say than Proverbs. The wisdom it contains is also harder, in a way, because it can be seen as skeptical, or at least negative. Who needs that? We do, as it happens, so I’m going to share some very wise words from Solomon. And a few others from me.

Nothing New

You have heard the phrase There is nothing new under the sun, but did you know it was Solomon who wrote that? Here it is in context, taken from the English Standard Version of the Bible, specifically Ecclesiastes 1.

What has been is what will be,
and what has been done is what will be done,
and there is nothing new under the sun.
Is there a thing of which it is said,
“See, this is new”?
It has been already
in the ages before us.
There is no remembrance of former things,
nor will there be any remembrance
of later things yet to be
among those who come after.

That is still true today. Specific areas I’m thinking about from our not-so-modern world are political unrest and, primarily, “uncivil” disobedience. A common word for how that is carried out today is “protests.”

I’m not lumping all protests into one gigantic hay stack, but the protests that make the news are often more violent, more “uncivil,” and often littered with disobedience. That kind of protest is not — as many have pointed out — a constitutional right.

What the constitution generally protects, especially under the First Amendment’s rights of speech, assembly, and petition, are peaceful, nonviolent protests about public issues. In order to enjoy the protection of the Constitution, the protests must be peaceable, with no violence or property destruction (Where’s the fun in that? they ask.) or serious danger to others. Civil disobedience is different than that.

In the case of civil disobedience, people break the law on purpose so they can appeal to the public conscience in order to effect policy change or raise awareness of some wrong. It is called “civil” for two reasons. One of those is that it is carried out by civilians, not military personnel, and the second is that those who are disobeying are nonviolent, and though they are protesting some particular policy or law, they are still accountable to the overall law and are willing to be arrested and pay the price for breaking the law.

None of that is new in 2026. Or even in this century. Or even in this millennium. People have been protesting and disobeying both with and without civility for thousands of years.

Protests in America

Throughout recorded history there have been protests of almost every stripe, and not just in America. Of course the history of protests in America is unique among many countries, because of the First Amendment. It makes perfectly good sense that the founding fathers would include that, because they themselves had been protesters, both in thought and in action.

The first protest that many remember is the Boston Tea Party. It was initially known as The Destruction of the Tea, but Boston Tea Party became more popular. The event took place in Boston on December 16, 1773. It was protest at its finest, but it wasn’t the first or the last protest against England that took place in the Colonies.

Here’s a list of some of the more famous protests in America over about a 200 year period:

• Boston Massacre protest (1770) – Crowd confrontation with British troops in Boston that became a rallying point against British rule.
• Boston Tea Party (1773) – Colonists dumped British tea into Boston Harbor to protest the Tea Act and taxation without representation.
• Abolitionist meetings and petitions (early–mid 1800s) – Organized campaigns, rallies, and publications calling for the end of slavery.
• Women’s suffrage marches and pickets (late 1800s–1920) – Including large parades in Washington, D.C.
• Montgomery Bus Boycott (1955–1956) – Year‑long boycott of segregated buses in Alabama following Rosa Parks’ arrest.
• Freedom Rides (1961) – Interracial groups rode interstate buses into the segregated South to challenge non‑enforcement of desegregation rulings.
• March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (1963) – Mass rally in Washington, D.C., where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered “I Have a Dream.”

And now

There are many more, but I edited that list to end with Dr. King, whose birth we celebrated recently. His protests were nonviolent, like Mahatma Gandhi’s protests in India. Many of the protests we are experiencing today, and many over the past several years, have included a great deal of violence.

Of course the news outlets love the violence because “if it bleeds it leads” is axiomatic in the news business. (Journalists spell it “ledes,” and I’d like to protest that.) But even violence can only hold the news cycle for so long. What we should be thinking about is not the violence, but the reason for the protest. Unfortunately that gets lost in our lust for bad news as violence takes the spotlight.

So allow me to protest not protests, but the unnecessary violence that has been part of protests since the heyday of BLM. It is time for us to return to the methods of King and Gandhi and the Women’s March on Washington. Let the reason for the protest be heard, and let it be heard without distraction.

Protests can certainly help bring more good into the world, but violence as a means does not justify the end.

Do good, even when you protest. It’s in you.