Our Hands Off experience in Nashville

We had no idea what to expect at the Nashville Hands Off protest. No one we knew was planning on attending or had even heard about it so we were prepared to be disappointed. We hoped to be there 30 minutes early because there is not a lot of parking at or near Centennial Park. We arrived at noon, the posted protest start time, and drove by the protest site on the way to the parking area. We were relieved to see a few hundred people there. As we drove through the park there were LOTS of protesters heading to the protest. We made up our own parking space in the opposite corner of the park and Craig began attracting attention as soon as we started our 20 minute walk to the protest. By the time we got there there were well over a thousand and the crowd kept growing. There were a lot of creative signs and the crowd was ready to be engaged.

The crowd was organized in a circle around the speakers/organizers with megaphones so it was hard to hear. There were chants but overall it did not appear to be well-organized, unfortunately. A woman told me she came at 1130 and there were about 30 people, mostly older and she was expecting the worst.

Come to find out, the organizers sent out a cancellation notice at 1040 AM after a site visit revealed soggy ground and “ponding”. That, combined with predictions of severe weather and tornado warning during the protest hours led to the cancellation. At that time we were well into final preparations and did not check email. Even if we had seen the notice, I suspect we would have gone anyway because the forecast had been updated to show the rain was not due to start until after the protest ended at 3 PM. Hopefully the organizers had a plan for a better PA system and a longer program had there not been the aborted cancellation.

Craig and his sign attracted a LOT of attention. He even made the Tennessean photo gallery – although his sign didn’t – presumably because of the word Asshole on it.

We had the best quality signs and they will serve us well for many protests to come. After a LOT of people started approaching Craig to thank him for his service and his sign, I started hanging back so he could be more approachable and I could get some pics.

After the speeches ended about 130ish, some crowd members kept the chants going for a while and then many gathered along adjacent West End Avenue. There was more honking of support than dissent but to be fair, many of those honking were protesters on their way home. We stayed on the street until 3 PM. By that time most of the protesters had dispersed.

It was a GREAT day and we look forward to the next country wide protest on April 19.