Photos: HUGE Immigration Rally in Somerville
As part of my duties at work yesterday I was lucky enough to be able to attend the amazing rally at Foss Park in Somerville, organized to coincide with the national Day Without Immigrants action. While it seems like actions around the region were well attended, I was blown away by the success of the Somerville rally. It was most definitely the single largest group I have ever seen assembled in one place in Somerville. I guessed somewhere around 600 people were in attendance, but my co-worker who was one of the main organizers and up in front of the crowd said it seemed more like 1000. Whatever the number, the even clearly demonstrated the impact that immigrants have in Somerville, not only in sheer numbers but in political legitimacy as well. Even Mayor Joe Curtatone went in front of the crowd to reaffirm the City's commitment to being a safe-haven for immigrants.
Besides the huge turnout, one thing that struck me about the rally was the number of U.S. flags waved in the audience. While the crowd did wave a number of Brazilian, El Salvadoran and other flags, the U.S. flag clearly outnumbered others. Perhaps problematically, as a "veteran" of the anti-Iraq war movement I guess I'm not used to, and in fact am quote uncomfortable, with such overt shows of patriotism. But I know that a lot of the criticism of the last two pro-immigrant action days was that while people were rallying for rights in the U.S., they seemed to only to wave banners from their homelands. Whether that criticism is valid or not, clearly they understood and acted accordingly, at least in the case of Somerville. The classic racist argument that immigrants do not care about the U.S. could not apply to this rally yesterday.
I also took a ton of photographs at the event and posted them on Flickr. Be sure to check those out, but here's a sneak peak:
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