According to psychologydictionary.org, cognitive dissonance is “a state of conflict occurring when beliefs or assumptions are contradicted by new information … the conflict produces feelings of discomfort, which the individual seeks to relieve by reconciling the differences, by convincing himself they do not exist, or by adopting some other type of defensive maneuver.”
The SLO Women’s March organizers had women (via the San Luis Obispo Police Department) removed wearing “Believe Mothers” shirts and holding signs advocating informed consent, parental rights, and vaccine safety from their “open to the public” rally.
Why were these women unwelcome at an event whose mission is: “to protect women’s rights, human rights, our safety, our health, and our planet”? Are mothers’ rights not women’s rights? What of children who’ve experienced adverse vaccine reactions? Are their rights—to education, to health—not protest-worthy? Why were signs objecting to glyphosate in vaccines unwelcome? Protesting pesticides in our food or parks is acceptable, but not in vaccines?
Clearly their messages made the organizers uncomfortable. Information that challenges one’s belief is disconcerting, and they reacted with defensive maneuvering. They sought relief in convincing themselves that those women didn’t exist. A revealing reversal of roles.
Perhaps it is time for the organizers to re-evaluate their guidelines: “Your signs are your personal expression of values you are fighting for … signs address your truth, and why.”
Sara Semmes
Atascadero
This article appears in Jan 30 – Feb 9, 2020.
I attended the Women’s March last weekend as I have the last three consecutive years and was there from start to finish and walked the entire route. As I have always done at public protests and as a social justice activist with 40 years of experience, I’m careful to walk throughout the entire gathering, paying close attention to the vibe and potential for outside disruption or agent provocateurs.
I don’t know how to break it to the writers at the New Times who falsely reported this story, the author of this letter and anyone else who believes that the group of anti-vaccine women were banned, excluded or prevented from attending or marching, but it simply isn’t true. I’m highly respectful of women and don’t typically take photographs of individuals without consent, so I don’t have photographic proof of my claims, but these women were there, were afforded street space among and side by side with the march at large and they walked the entire length right behind my spouse and I. I didn’t see anyone accost, deny them of anything and they appeared to be quite comfortable in their space.
At one point I was tempted to try and converse with a few of the women to see if they had read about the release of a major contradictory finding from a vaccination study of 650,000 Danish children, but felt I’d be argued with and that the march wasn’t the appropriate venue for that.
Tim Bauman
Atascadero, CA
Hi Tim! Thank you for your comment. We’re sorry you didn’t approach us as we all love a good, peaceful dialogue. Yes, we did march with the parade around downtown SLO after we confirmed with the SLO police officer that there was nothing that could prevent us from doing so. This was AFTER we were told by the same police officer to leave the pre-march rally in the permitted space of Mitchell Park, at the request of the SLO Women’s March committee. As we did not want any trouble, we stood with our signs across the street in front of Grace Church which afforded us great visibility but was outside the rally premises as they requested. Our frustration with the WM committee is that our signs did not violate their policy which reads: “Your signs are your personal expression of values you are fighting for. ” We were disheartened that our group of 10 mothers and several children would be segregated from the group during the rally when our messages such as “My Child. My Choice,” and “Vaccine Mandates Violate Women’s Choice” seem to align perfectly with the Women’s March values. Aren’t we all fighting for women’s rights? Current CA laws SB276 and SB714 force mothers to stay home and homeschool in order to protect their medically fragile children from further vaccine side-effects. Our question is: How is this consistent with women’s liberation?