A science rally!

I was in St. Paul, or transiting to and from St. Paul, all day yesterday for the grand #StandUpForScience rally. As you might expect for an event organized by science nerds, it was flawlessly executed: it started exactly at 3pm, had about 10 speakers, and finished precisely at 5pm. The speakers were all brief and to the point. We had several state legislators talk about the importance of science education and the contributions of science to our state’s economy, and several people with direct experience of the impact of Trump’s chaos — one young woman had just finished a post-doc and got a job with a state agency (the forest service, I think) the week after the election, and walked into a demoralized office where no one knew what was going to happen to them. She found out: she was fired 3 weeks after starting, with 2 hours notice.

Some people talked about social and economic justice, in particular, the Hennepin Energy Recovery Center (HERC), which I knew nothing about until yesterday. It’s a big incinerator which converts trash to energy, which is nice, but somehow it got located to the center of a district filled with low-income and minority residents. Funny how that happens.

Science and DEI are intertwined — so many first generation scientists were reliant on DEI initiatives to get their careers started. One speaker suggested a good question to ask critics of DEI: What, specifically, are they opposed to? Is it diversity, do they dislike people of color working in science and engineering? Is it equity, the idea of equal pay for equal work, do they think brown people should get less support? Or is it inclusion, the idea that minorities should be able to work shoulder to shoulder with existing, dominant groups? There’s no good answer to those kinds of questions, and they’re all just hiding behind an acronym, afraid to spell out what they actually want.

Another theme of speakers and participants was the raging inequality in this country. Mention the word “corporations” and you heard a chorus of “boos”. A lot of the signs people were waving targeted the wealthy and unfair tax laws, that the Trump regime was robbing science to make the rich richer. Everyone in this crowd hated billionaires in general and Elon Musk in particular. That guy is so desperate for attention and respect and popularity, and he has made himself the #1 enemy and object of contempt by scientists & engineers & teachers & health experts. Chalk that up to yet another tremendous failure by Musk the Incompetent.

It seems the greed of the wealthy in this country has inspired a lot of people to look favorably on communism and wealth redistribution and the social safety net and mutual aid. That’s going to backfire spectacularly on the upper class. This event sounded like a communist rally at times, good for them.

Also, I got to meet many fellow angry supporters of science, including commenter foolishleader who does have a spectacular octopus hat.

I’m looking forward to more Stand Up for Science events!