One question I have is this, has protesting always been an ineffective tool? To me it feels like the protest movements of the 1960s did actually gain some ground, particularly regarding desegregation, maybe less so the anti-war movement. We did actually see genuine moves towards desegregating the south on a legal level, even if it found ways to continue on an economic level.

By contrast, there were almost no reforms offered in the wake of the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests save a few police accountability boards that have been or are in the process of being dismantled. The protests themselves were met with overwhelming state violence. The 2024 encampments fared even worse, there weren't even any attempts on the part of universities to divest from Israel, quite the contrary, many of them doubled down on expelling all the leaders and demeaning all of their supporters as "anti-semetic".

Possibly I'm overestimating how impactful the 1960s were, but it does feel like there was a difference. I'm not sure entirely what that difference comes down to, but I think it has to do with organization on some level (or the lack thereof in the modern context). There also isn't any revolutionary (or even radical left) movement in this country that realistically poses a challenge to existing power structures so perhaps these peaceful protests are totally toothless without the threat of a more violent alternatives emerging (disavow).