In the homes of many liberals, we roll our eyes, yell at the television, some of us even throw things when we hear certain GOP presidential hopefuls spew their political bullshit promises. This election cycle is particularly aggravating with the candidates the GOP brought in on their clown car. Is this really all they have to offer? As I am at home, watching the circus unfold on TV, there are brave and persistent souls with their placards and bullhorns at GOP campaign events shouting the things I want to say.
Johari Osayi Idusuyi is one of these brave souls, but instead of a placard, she was holding a book; instead of a bullhorn, she silently read. Her book of choice was Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric, a critically acclaimed book recounting “the mounting racial aggression in ongoing encounters in twenty-first-century daily life and in the media.“
Her actions were single-handedly louder than any protester that was thrown out of the events at a Donald Trump rally on Monday, November 9. Ironically, her silence was the result of her anger towards the treatment of some loud protesters.
Johari went to the event with an open mind. Because hey were minorities, and “there weren’t a lot of minorities there,” they found themselves in the VIP section, sitting right behind Donald Trump.
Johari sat there, with optimism that Trump would somehow redeem himself for all the inhumane comments he has made. (Oh, to be young!)
Though Johari went with an open mind, she quickly became troubled. In the middle of Trump’s speech, some anti-Trump protesters began shouting “Dump Trump!” Johari was excited to see these people demonstrating their free speech. However, her “joy was quickly taken away by the nastiness of [Trump’s] supporters.” Johari witnessed a man snatch a hat off one of the protesters as she was being led away by security.
Johari was shocked, but in that moment recalled other incidents she heard about including “protesters violently dragged out of a rally” in Florida. She began to fill sick. She quickly became disinterested in the rally. And that is when she opened her book. She began reading to get lost in the words of Claudia Rankine, rather than listen to the words of a man who constantly disrespects and dehumanizes so many, including the protesters that day.
What won the hearts of so many, what made her a reluctant hero, was not only her audacity to read at the event, but her response to some Trump supporters who interrupted her:
In that instance, Johari thought, “Me, too.” She turned back to the book with her defiance, and in that moment she knew her reading became a protest.
Johari did not want Trump or his supporters to disrespect or dehumanize her, or others, anymore. She felt she went with an open heart, but the events that ensued lost any empathy she was willing to share.
It was difficult for her to stay. But she stayed. And her defiance made her a hero. Her supporters wanted to know who this woman was. In the days that followed, Johari wrote her story in a Facebook post and retold her story to a writer for The Slot at Jezebel.com.
Since Monday, there have been suggestions that Johari’s silent protest should be a start of a movement, a movement of silent readers. After all, as Claire Fallon of the Huffington Post remarks, “Reading a book is deliberate…. It’s a very conscious choice to devote your attention to something other than the events around you.”
It would be an incredible sight to see at any of the GOP contenders’ events to have all those in the VIP section just open their books and read during the candidates speech. This would be more powerful than any shouting or screaming or placards combined.
Feature Image by Elvert Barnes available under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 License
