A “White Lives Matter” rally in Huntington Beach, California, turned out to be the embarrassing failure it was always destined to be after attendees were outnumbered by counterprotestors and police ultimately shut the whole thing down.
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Orange County has been the site of all sorts of rightwing protests over the past year, and has had a reputation for racism long before that, so it isn’t much of a surprise that when white supremacists began organizing their rallies across the country for this weekend, it became one of the focus sites.
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But anti-racists and Black Lives Matter organizers countered by taking to the streets even before the White Lives Matter people showed up. And when they did, their pro-Trump, anti-mask, Christian supremacy signs were met with shouts to “go home Nazis.”
According to the LA Times, there were nearly 500 people gathered in total, with the majority of them being counterprotestors.
After the White Lives Matter folks arrived, things got heated on more than one occasion — several fights broke out and 12 people were arrested throughout the day — but there was no major catastrophe.
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By 2:30pm, the gathering had been deemed “unlawful” by police and the crowd was dispersed.
The Huntington Beach rally was one of dozens that happened throughout the country on Sunday, organized via social media by Nazis and far right extremists. But time and time again, these “White Lives Matter” marches underwhelmed, showing for the nth time that the “silent majority” is only quiet because their numbers are nowhere near as strong as they keep trying to shout at the world.
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NBC News reports rallies in Albuquerque, Philadelphia, Raleigh, and Forth Worth, to start. They sound disorganized and chaotic, in addition to being underwhelming in terms of attendance.
But that didn’t stop counterprotestors from showing up and driving home the point that their small numbers would not be left unchallenged. Any blatant displays of racism or white supremacy are not welcome in these cities, was the message they intended to get across. And it was one the world heard much more loudly than anything the hate groups tried to squeak out before having to fade back into the shadows once again.
*First Published: April 12, 2021, 5:52 am
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