The Frist Filibuster quickly gained campus and national media attention. On the first day, dozens of observers watched on the lawn outside Frist. Within a week, Rep. Rush Holt and Rep. Frank Pallone, Democrats from New Jersey, participated, and the Frist Filibuster was covered by CNN and The Washington Post. In the end, Sen. Frist dropped his plan. While it is unclear how much of an impact the Princeton students had, they certainly commanded a great deal of media attention.
The Frist Filibuster had great media success partly because Princeton has the best campus in the nation on which to stage a public display of support for a cause. Elite universities like ours already command the most media attention, but unlike other Ivies, Princeton is not expected to be a source of protest, making an outdoor demonstration or rally more newsworthy. Then consider that Princeton is so close to major media outlets in New York, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., and Princeton is protest paradise.
From the outside looking in at Columbia University, for instance, it seems students there have three requirements: Take the core, pass the swim test and participate in a public demonstration about some progressive cause. A protest there must have some extreme characteristics — a massive number of students involved, consistency over a long period of time, or students endangering themselves — to get attention. The threshold at Princeton is much lower, and therefore students can attract the attention of the news media with much less effort and pain.
This year, Princeton students seem to have begun to take advantage of our protest paradise’s bully pulpit. We’ve had Princeton Proposition 8 and the mock Israeli checkpoint in addition to various displays from the Princeton Animal Welfare Society.
I can’t overlook my own part, as I stood outside Frist for 17 straight days in October teaching a student playing Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) economics in the public performance “I Could be McCain’s Econ 101 Teacher.” My experience confirmed my hunch that Princeton is protest paradise. I had Holt and the mayors of Philadelphia and Edison, N.J., stop by to show their support, because they were already on campus for various speaking engagements! The Times of Trenton had a huge picture of my teaching above the fold on the first page, WNYW (the FOX television station in New York) called to interview me on camera, and The Daily Princetonian had an article and two pictures on different days. I doubt I could have gotten all of this attention for my cause at another school (though I admit that our protest paradise also makes narcissism somewhat easier).
It only required 10 days of planning and a few people to help me edit press releases or play McCain. I’m sure there are many others here who can lead something of their own.
Of course, media attention is only a tool toward the ultimate goal of achieving results by getting an overlooked issue on the agenda, a piece of legislation passed or a candidate elected. In many cases, an outdoor protest is not needed if the same goals could be achieved by writing, holding a conference or meeting with elected officials. But if those methods are insufficient, I have found it useful to have a clear, specific message that is timely, such as when the New Jersey legislature is debating a particular issue or right before an election.
Targeting the protest to the audience is another important consideration. I find Princetonians and news organizations quite receptive to quirkiness and disarming humor rather than shock value. Also, according to the student-managed polling organization Nassau Research, about 60 percent of Princetonians consider themselves moderate-conservative, moderate or moderate-liberal, meaning that messages designed for the extremes preach to a small choir.
The protest topics can seem superficially liberal or conservative and still have messages that target broad audiences. For instance, I have two plans written up for protests promoting gay marriage and increasing awareness of the huge prison population in the United States, both causes which seem quite liberal. Yet my appeals to the wellbeing of children, tradition, cost and family cohesion are relatively non-ideological, and some could even be considered conservative.
As a senior, I’ve run out of time to organize them. But anyone else who wants to run them or other protests can take advantage of our transparent Orange Bubble. Princeton is a protest paradise because the outside world is eager to cover stories of us being concerned with more than our own matters.
James Coan is a Wilson School major from Kensington, Md. He can be reached at jcoan@princeton.edu.
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