Characters
From Portland’s Fearless Frog to historic characters with a message, costumes add spectacle and defray the fear-based messaging of the right.
Create a persona for your protesting activities. Make it silly or pointed — it’s dress-up time!
How to do it:
There are several approaches to using costumes and creating characters to protest. All are designed to create a visual spectacle, so expect to be photographed. Consider elements including safety, comfort and whether you want your face obscured. Here are some examples to inspire you:
costumes AT protests
At the June 14th No Kings! protest I encountered the couple pictured above. Their costumes were thematically appropriate to the protest, but also re-usable. They can stick with this message over the long-run. For professional-grade costumes, make sure your work will last. At the same protest I also encountered Lady Liberty and several giant puppets.
costumes AS protest
There are numerous examples of thematic costume-as-protest. This differs from the example above in that these are projects designed to stand alone. Examples include groups of women dressed as Handmaids, and Lee Goodman of Chicago, who stands in various places in a Concentration Camp uniform with a blue triangle (for immigrants) and explains the parallels to people who ask.
costumes to DE-ESCALATE
At volatile events, like standing protests at the ICE facility in Portland, where the regime is trying to create an image of violence and conflict, costumes can point out the absurdity of the claim. Portland is particularly good at this form of de-escalation.
