Lunch-Counter Liberalism

The American struggle for civil rights continues!🇺🇸

As Americans grapple with the trials and tribulations of the second Trump term, millions have taken to the streets in peaceful protests in pursuit of a better world.¹

Thus, as the collective American conscience is once again awakened from its slumber, we ought to remember how we’ve made it through times like these in the past.²

Let us consider where we’ve gone wrong in recent years and how we can do better in the coming ones.

Lawn-Sign Liberalism

Coined by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson in their book Abundance, lawn-sign liberalism is a brand of liberal politics whereby individuals signal, often via lawn-sign, their progressivism.³ It is, therefore, the performance of a commitment to a particular set of liberal values where the practice of those values is conspicuously absent.

Lawn-sign liberals hang signs that say “Black Lives Matter” but then don’t show up to BLM protests. Lawn-sign liberals demand homeless people be called “unhoused” while fighting to keep low-income people out of their neighborhoods, a la the NIMBY movement.⁴

In essence, lawn-sign liberalism talks the talk but doesn’t walk the walk.⁵ Much can be said of its ills but for now, allow me to suggest it is as inevitable an outcome in our modern age as it was in the past. It is the twenty-first-century equivalent of the Jeffersonian self-contradiction of writing a declaration that “all men are created equal” while owning men as slaves.

I care not to shame anyone who has engaged in lawn-sign liberalism— indeed, I’m guilty of it, too; we all are if we’ve ever posted anything political online, for instance. Rather, my purpose is to call on us all to do better.

It’s nice to say all men are equal; it’s infinitely better to act on that principle.

Lunch-Counter Liberalism

Enter: lunch-counter liberalism, the cure to the failed lawn-sign liberalism of the past decade.

In the 1950s and ‘60s, millions of Americans stood up and spoke up in support of civil rights for African Americans and an end to racial segregation.⁶ Led by prominent African American preachers and activists, people took to the streets, the ballot boxes, administrative offices, buses, and lunch counters to advocate for civil rights.

During the Civil Rights Movement, activists participated in sit-ins, boycotts, like the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and marches, like the famous March on Washington led by MLK Jr. Notably, these protests were non-violent, despite often being met with grotesque violence.

This matters because it offered a clear, provocative juxtaposition of African Americans calmly asking to be served at a lunch counter as pro-segregation white Americans, in law enforcement and otherwise, often lashed out in violence. These images challenged America to be better— to not uphold such an unequal, unjust system; they did so because people were actually doing things.

Also of note is that the Civil Rights Movement spanned decades. It took years for real progress to be made through public policy and culture shift, which is to say nothing of the century or more it took for America to abolish slavery a century prior to the Civil Rights Movement.⁷ In other words, real, lasting progress takes time and real, prolonged effort. That’s as true today as it was then, though we’re perhaps more impatient today.

Long Live Our Liberal Project

As is the case everywhere in the world, in America, democracy is never guaranteed. When we take it for granted or sacrifice it for short-term gains, comforts, or for the sake of risk aversion, then we risk losing it.

This is a problem because democracy is what matters. Our democratic values are what ensure our civil rights and civil liberties; these values promote justice and equality and are worth fighting for on their own terms.

Obligatory Disclaimer: all views expressed here are my own personal views and do not represent the views of my employer nor those of the U.S. government.

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Sidenotes, Endnotes, & Tangents

Audio with footnotes:

1. Obligatory clarification: the protests that have been occurring have been overwhelmingly peaceful. To the extent any have been violent, there’s reason to believe the rioters were intentionally aiming to subvert the purpose of the protest. Seeing as this is not the main point of this piece and is, indeed, a distraction in general, I shall not go into it further here.

2. One could say this slumber was brought to us courtesy of Sleepy Joe Biden and other moderate Dems who’d rather align themselves with the Cheneys than with the more progressive wing of the Party. However! I understand that saying this may upset the sensibilities of some folks, so I will instead just say I wish Biden well!

Editor’s note: If this comment rubs you the wrong way, allow me to explain why it’s here. When I write drafts of posts, I usually go through a process (typically in drafts 2-4) of removing the dismissive, sarcastic, or unproductive turns of phrase that I may write down as an initial draft. Then, by the final rough draft I choose to publish, I’ll usually have weeded out much of this language. Does that make sense? Anyway, my point/request is this: I have come to believe it’s best to remove irony and spite to the greatest extent possible. What do you think? Do you agree or disagree? Do you think this footnote is a good example or a bad one and why? I’d love to know your thoughts!

p.s. If you think I’m overthinking it, I agree, but alas, here we are.

3. Note: to my knowledge and memory, the Abundance authors coined the term, though I should maybe look into this to be sure. Additionally, the definition I’ve provided here is from memory as well and is based on my own personal beliefs on the subject, and therefore shouldn’t be taken as an official definition per se.

4. where NIMBY = “Not In My Back Yard” and refers to people who support affordable housing, as long as it isn’t located too close to their houses. Klein and Thompson discuss the lack of affordable housing in America and what they see as the solution to this issue at length in their book. In essence, they say we need to build more houses, and I agree!

Editor’s Note: Read my initial review of Abundance here:

5. I plan to delve more deeply into this subject of lawn-sign liberalism in a future post.

6. in addition to the anti-war movement and other social movements of the time.

7. How long Americans engaged in slavery depends on where one starts the clock, but we’ll put the particulars of that debate aside for the time being since the point still stands even with the most conservative of calculations.