Last night at Bryant Park

When you walk by a bunch of people in a protest, it's easy to turn them off in your head. You are prepared for it, and you put up those ideoligical walls in your head to block it out. You feel safe, in a way, because everything is in its little box; the protesters stay in theirs, you stay in yours, and nobody's personal life is affected. "Hey, I'm just doing my job" says the Protester, "same here, have a nice day, and by the way fuck you, haha..." says the delegate. Think about it: when's the last time a bunch of abortion protesters standing in front of a clinic made you seriously think about changing your position on abortion?

But suddenly something like this happens; some random person hanging out on a street corner starts screaming shit at you, and there's no picket signs or face paint, just some kid giving you a piece of hir mind. Now, your brain is like "Random lunatic?"..."Protester?"..."Person who gets a kick out of screaming at people on the street?"..."All of the above?"... Your mind doesn't have the ability to immediately and thoutlessly label this person and tuck them away in your memory banks. Thoughts begin to take place.

When your brain cannot immediately label something, then it is forced to think about it, and forcing someone to think is the first step toward changing their mind.

Let's take this struggle out of the political arena and make it personal. Let's stop playing the game their rules and make up our own.