VivirLatino

Notes from the NYC Union Square May Day Pro-Immigrant Rally

08:06 H | Topics: New York City

After the Beyond Borders screening, it was time to head to Union Square Park. At 12:15 pm, the park was pretty empty, save the police and set up people. At 2:30 , it still was pretty empty. On the side of the park where the rally was not happening, the rest of NYC seemed to be oblivious or not care what was going on, as organizers led a practice round of bilingual chants (which were way too long!)

Hitting the playground with my kids as we waited for the official rally to start, immigrant women of color nannies watched their white charges. One said that she knew of the rally but had to work, she then called her friend to let her know about the rally.

Read more about what went down (including how a racist woman got in my kid's face) after the jump.

Logistically, the rally was a mess, but unless you're a rally organizer, you wouldn't have noticed how poor internal security was, for example. The setup was not really in the interest of public safety, with people pretty much trapped in the park by metal barricades, and I saw no organizers clearly marked/available. Thankfully nothing went down. There were a few minutemen type protesting the rally but they were kept away from us and since I had the girls, I didn't go check them out myself.

The only arguing I saw, was among all the WWL - Wacky White Left organizations, like the SWP, WWP, and ISO, who occasionally clashed over whose paper was the more legitimate voice of the worker (sorry- none of the above). No offense if anyone reading belongs to any of those groups but here in NYC, they pimp POC movements to sell their papers.

The rally included poets, musicians, and activists. The crowd was diverse but fairly low-key. There weren't too many families.

Their was a negative experience when I left the march to go home. A white woman got in my older daughter's face as we approached the Astor Place subway station. La Mapu, my daughter, was holding a sign she got at the march that read stop the raids in English and Spanish. The lady got in La Mapu's face and yelled "what does that bullshit say?" I stepped in between and asked the lady to stop cursing and get out of my daughter's face.
"Oh I'm sorry," she says sarcastically.
"Don't fuck with my kids or you're gonna fuck with me, " I told her. She began to walk away yelling "shut up, shut up" .
My daughter was pretty shaken up and didn't want to hold her sign until we were in "safe" territory, meaning on the 7 train after & 74th street.

Share your May Day experiences.

I'll be uploading video all day taken by my daughter.

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