A crowd of hundreds blocking a bridge is. People blocking entrances to government buildings is. People surrounding bases is. People flooding the capitol or disrupting the discourse of policy is. The reason they use the military and ICE is because they are terrified that people will remember that even 1% of the US doing this far outnumbers them.

The absolute whining from people when they are moderately inconvenienced is depressing. "Sure, death camps are bad but did they have to block the bridge? I'm going to be late for my brunch!" Well, the person in a camp is going to be late for stuff, too.

There's a reason why Marsha P. Johnson is remembered.

For throwing the first fucking brick.

Non violent protests work if the alternative is violence. Otherwise they just keep sending in violent bullies to dismantle the protests.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deacons_for_Defense_and_Justice

So basically what the climate protesters are doing.

We learned the hippies were ineffectual drug addicts that believed in super weird stuff. Then HIV happened and free love was over. Then Manson family killed a bunch of people and became a scape goat. The hippies lost their appeal. Computers blew up and we never went back to that place to try and figure out how to do it right.

People (especially white) frequently forget about Martin Luther King Jr. He and his team worked extremely hard to keep it nonviolent and effective. He was ready to die for what he believed in but it was wise enough to realize violence was not the answer. For those curious, I would recommend that you read some of his works.

I also think that for civil disobedience to work you need purpose and a clear direction. Just blocking a bridge is just going to annoy people and get you labeled as a public nuance.

With the civil rights movement, it was very well organized and people directly disobeyed laws they wanted changed. Sitting at a white only table is very different than blocking a bridge for something less concrete.