Proud Boys act meek in local marches

World Cup soccer is great; let's not spoil it with politics

A couple of weeks ago, 30 or so men put on masks and marched through the streets of several communities in Saratoga County while waving American flags.

It was a brief spectacle. The men were followed by a yellow pickup truck, its bed full of flags on poles. 

The marchers were members of a regional chapter of the Proud Boys, which has become infamous for its role in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Four of its top members — Enrique Tarrio, Joe Biggs, Zachary Rehl and Ethan Nordean — have been convicted of seditious conspiracy for plotting and leading that attack. The Justice Department is asking they each be sentenced to more than 25 years in prison.

The event in Saratoga Springs was a far cry from the riot on Jan. 6. The video I watched showed the men scampering along the side of the road, hiding their faces as if they were ashamed of themselves.

But the angry response from local communities is understandable. The distance between pathetic and destructive can be short, as we saw on Jan. 6, when men in silly costumes took part in beating police officers and vandalizing our national seat of government.

Calling for the ticketing of participants in Saratoga Springs or the passing of laws to prevent more such marches, however, is an overreaction.

In Ballston Spa, Mayor Frank Rossi said he wants the town to pass a permitting requirement, so marches the community finds offensive can be met with a response. In Saratoga Springs, Mayor Ron Kim demanded a written report from Public Safety Commissioner James Montagnino that explains what his department knew about the march and how to prevent similar ones from taking place.

Kim criticized Montagnino for calling the march a “non-event.” But it lasted just a few minutes and drew few onlookers.

The Justice Department’s prosecution of hundreds of rioters and the long prison sentences some of them will serve is a proportional response to the savagery they showed on Jan. 6.

A shrug would be a proportional response to the Proud Boys’ pop-up marches in Ballston Spa and Saratoga Springs.

A couple of guys who live nearby sometimes race past my house in a pickup truck decorated with American and Trump flags. I don’t call the police and demand something be done.

We fly our own flag — a Black Lives Matter flag — next to our front door.  I express myself on politics and culture and anything else whenever I feel the urge. I do not need or want to stop other people, even those who are irretrievably wrong, from doing the same.

Our flag flies in front of our front door.

Permitting protests is tricky, since they can be spontaneous responses to daily events. The right to demonstrate in public should be expansively interpreted, and, apparently, it has been in Saratoga Springs. Groups other than the Proud Boys have been allowed to gather without permits, Montagnino said.

Let them march. That way, masks or no masks, we can see them.

Soccer

The Women’s World Cup is wrapping up this weekend. It has been spectacular, despite the disappointing early exit by the U.S. team. I’m writing this before Sunday morning’s final, and I’m predicting Spain will win. I don’t want to underestimate England’s burly defensive play, although I’m not a fan of their “let’s kick the ball around the backfield until the other team falls asleep” style. But I believe Spain’s poise and clever attacks will triumph. 

On another note, it’s disappointing to see people who disagree with the political views of some members of the U.S. team use their loss as an opportunity to jeer. Apparently, a connection is being made between their liberal politics and their early (for them) exit from the World Cup. This is nonsense, because U.S. team members have been expressing liberal political views for many years and the team has been during that time the most successful national men’s or women’s soccer team in the world. And it’s nonsense because players’ political views have no more to do with their success on the soccer field than which movies they like or books they read. What is great to see in soccer and other sports, is that, despite the tremendous diversity of the players, it’s the way they play that matters, nothing else.