The Enduring Power and Risk of Nonviolent Protest

 The Enduring Power and Risk of Nonviolent Protest

By Rebecca Kay Bright

Lede
They came in peace. They sat, they sang, they prayed. And for that, they were beaten, hosed, jailed, and shot. America's most transformative protests have often been peaceful, from lunch counters in Greensboro to forest encampments in Atlanta. However, the myth that nonviolence ensures safety has been shattered time and time again. The truth is far more brutal. In America, even peace is a provocation.

A Counter, a Catalyst
On February 1, 1960, four Black college students, Ezell Blair Jr., David Richmond, Franklin McCain, and Joseph McNeil, walked into a Woolworth’s in Greensboro, North Carolina, and sat at a "whites only" lunch counter. They asked for coffee. They were denied. They stayed.

Over the days that followed, white patrons cursed, shoved, spat, and dumped food on the young men. Police stood by. Newspapers mocked them. But the students sat quietly, refusing to move. "It wasn’t about the food," McCain later said. "It was about the right to sit. The right to be treated as human."

Their act of resistance sparked a movement. Sit-ins spread across the South. Thousands joined. Many were arrested, suspended from school, or expelled. Some were beaten on sidewalks. Some were jailed for weeks. Yet the dignity of their silence exposed the raw cruelty of segregation more powerfully than any speech could.

The sit-ins became a moral lens. America was forced to look.

The Price of Peace
What few textbooks explain is that nonviolence did not protect these protestors. In Jackson, Mississippi, activists at a lunch counter were drenched in condiments, cigarettes extinguished on their necks. In Rock Hill, South Carolina, students were dragged from their stools and kicked unconscious. No one was spared. Not girls in dresses. Not ministers in collars. Not teenagers who had only wanted the right to order a sandwich.

By 1964, the Civil Rights Act was signed into law after years of sit-ins, marches, boycotts, and bus rides. Segregation in public spaces was made illegal. But for many of the movement’s foot soldiers, the bruises, trauma, and stigma of their protest lives never faded.

In the Woods, Another Front
Decades later, a new generation of nonviolent activists found themselves in harm’s way—this time in the old-growth forests of the Pacific Northwest. In the 1980s and 90s, environmental groups like Earth First! and Cascadia Forest Defenders began using direct-action tactics to halt the clear-cutting of endangered trees. Protestors chained themselves to logging equipment. They perched in “tree-sits” for weeks. They blockaded roads with their bodies.

“We were trying to protect the lungs of the planet,” said Sarah Halvorsen, who was just 22 when she was arrested near the Willamette National Forest. “We weren’t violent. We didn’t yell. We were polite. But the police came in like we were criminals.” Halvorsen was dragged by her hair through gravel. Another activist, Jason Grove, was hit with a baton hard enough to fracture his wrist. “We thought peace would protect us,” Grove said. “It didn’t. It made us easier targets.”

Despite their treatment, the protests helped push forward legislation on sustainable logging and land preservation. But the message was clear: when you disrupt profit, even without violence, you will be punished.

Water and Fire: Standing Rock
2016, that lesson echoed again, this time along the Missouri River. At Standing Rock, thousands of Indigenous people and their allies camped for months to protest the Dakota Access Pipeline, which threatened sacred land and drinking water for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

The camps were centered on prayer and ceremony. Youth runners carried petitions across state lines. Grandmothers cooked communal meals, and Tribal Elders led sunrise blessings each morning.

Then came the response.

Militarized police surrounded the camps. Armored vehicles rumbled across open plains. Protestors, who called themselves Water Protectors, were met with tear gas, rubber bullets, flashbang grenades, and water cannons in subzero temperatures.

“I was praying with a feather when they shot me with a rubber bullet,” said Waniya Locke, a teacher and tribal member. “I had bruises for weeks. But I was lucky. Others lost their eyes. Some nearly died.”

Over 800 people were arrested. Journalists were targeted. Medics were detained. And yet, the movement refused to retaliate.

“They wanted us to fight back. That’s how they justify their violence,” said Faith Spotted Eagle, a respected elder. “But our strength was in standing still.”

The pipeline was eventually completed. But Standing Rock changed the conversation. It inspired a global wave of Indigenous-led climate action and revealed just how militarized protest policing had become in America.

Atlanta’s Forest, and a Funeral
In 2022, protestors gathered in the South River Forest outside Atlanta, Georgia, to oppose the construction of "Cop City," a $90 million police training facility planned on public land. Activists argued it would destroy one of the city’s last green spaces and further militarize law enforcement. The protest was peaceful. It involved art, teach-ins, music, and environmental studies. Activists meditated beneath the trees and built gardens in the soil.

Police labeled them "domestic terrorists."

In January 2023, during a raid on the protest encampment, officers shot and killed Tortuguita, a 26-year-old nonbinary environmental activist. Law enforcement claimed Tortuguita fired first, but independent autopsy findings contradicted that narrative. They were shot 14 times, with bullet wounds in their hands, suggesting they were trying to shield themselves.

“I sat in vigil by their tent,” said Jules Terrell, a fellow protester. “They were always smiling. They shared granola and poetry. The idea that they were violent is obscene.”

Tortuguita’s death marked a turning point. Protests erupted nationwide. The phrase “Stop Cop City” was etched in chalk on sidewalks from Atlanta to Portland. But the crackdown intensified. Surveillance increased. Dozens of protestors were indicted under sweeping RICO statutes usually reserved for organized crime.

A Deadly Pattern
The story repeats from Woolworth’s to the woods, from rivers to forest floors. Nonviolent protestors, often young and idealistic, step into public space with open hands and clear eyes. They are met with batons, tear gas, slander, and bullets.

Peace does not protect them. It never has.

Call to Action
We are taught that peace is safe, that nonviolence is the moral high ground, and that restraint will be rewarded with justice. But history tells a harder truth. Peaceful protest may change laws, shift culture, and expose injustice, but it does not shield the protester from harm.

And still, they march.

They march because silence is complicity. They kneel because standing has cost too much. They sing because it is the only way to drown out the sirens. They resist not with fists, but with presence. They remind us that dissent, even when whispered, is sacred.

It is not enough to admire their courage. We must protect it. We must remember that every right we hold was paid for in bruises, in jail time, in blood spilled by those who refused to swing back.

When history looks at this generation, let it not say they watched peace be punished and said nothing. Let it be said they stood behind the stillness. Let it be said they stood up for the ones who sat down.

Sources

AP News. 2023. “Autopsy: ‘Cop City’ Protester Had Hands Raised When Killed.” https://apnews.com/article/cop-city-protest-tortuguita-shooting-autopsy-d49cf387b9496d769ca4421f90ff530b 

Around Robin. n.d. “Greensboro Sit-In: Impact, Facts, Protest & Quotes.”
https://www.aroundrobin.com/greensboro-sit-in/ 

Civil Rights Movement Archive. n.d. “Sit-In Documents.”
https://www.crmvet.org/docs/sitdocs.htm 

History.com. 2020. “How the Greensboro Four Sit-In Sparked a Movement.”
https://www.history.com/articles/greensboro-four-sit-in-civil-rights

Human Rights Campaign. 2023. “Remembering Tortuguita, Indigenous Queer and Non-Binary Environmental Activist and Forest Defender.” https://www.hrc.org/news/remembering-tortuguita-indigenous-queer-and-non-binary-environmental-activist-and-forest-defender

MPR News. 2016. “The Protests at Standing Rock: Oil, Water, Race and Treaty Rights.”
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2016/12/20/tw-standing-rock

National Museum of the American Indian. n.d. “Standing Rock Sioux and Dakota Access Pipeline – Native Knowledge 360°.” https://americanindian.si.edu/nk360/plains-treaties/dapl

NPR. 2016. “In Their Own Words: The ‘Water Protectors’ of Standing Rock.” https://www.npr.org/2016/12/11/505147166/in-their-own-words-the-water-protectors-of-standing-rock

NPR. 2023. “Autopsy Reveals Anti-‘Cop City’ Activist’s Hands Were Raised When Shot and Killed.”  https://www.npr.org/2023/03/11/1162843992/cop-city-atlanta-activist-autopsy

Social Studies Center. n.d. “Greensboro Sit-Ins Quotes.”
https://197sscenter.weebly.com/greensboro-sit-ins.html

The Guardian. 2016. “‘We opened eyes’: At Standing Rock, My Fellow Native Americans Make History.” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/30/standing-rock-indigenous-people-history-north-dakota-access-pipeline-protest

The Guardian. 2016. “Standing Rock: Injured Protester's Father Says Police Account Is False.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/23/standing-rock-dakota-access-pipeline-sophia-wilansky-injury

The Guardian. 2023. “‘Cop City’ Protester Manuel Terán Shot at Least 13 Times by Police.” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/feb/03/cop-city-protester-manuel-teran-shot-13-times-autopsy

The Guardian. 2024. “‘Tortuguita Vive’: Campaigners Across US Hail Anti-Cop City Activist Killed by Police.” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/jan/21/atlanta-cop-city-tortuguita-anniversary

Them. 2023. “Law Enforcement Killed Cop City Protestor Tortuguita. Now Their Parents Are Suing.” https://www.them.us/story/law-enforcement-killed-cop-city-protestor-tortuguita-parents-lawsuit

WUNC. 2014. “Three of the Greensboro Four: In Their Own Words.”
https://www.wunc.org/arts-culture/2014-01-10/three-of-the-greensboro-four-in-their-own-words

AP News. 2023. “Autopsy: ‘Cop City’ Protester Had Hands Raised When Killed.” https://apnews.com/article/cop-city-protest-tortuguita-shooting-autopsy-d49cf387b9496d769ca4421f90ff530b 

The Guardian. 2024. “‘Tortuguita Vive’: Campaigners Across US Hail Anti-Cop City Activist Killed by Police.” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/jan/21/atlanta-cop-city-tortuguita-anniversary

The Guardian. 2024. “Atlanta ‘Cop City’ Activist Death Investigation Launches Human Rights Inquiry.” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/apr/08/cop-city-tortuguita-human-rights-investigation