If Silent Sentinels met a Flâneur…
Romantic as it first sounded to me, I quickly realized browsing without intention was simply just not within my capacity as a person. Whatever has been recently occupying my mind seems to find it’s way to the surface of every pot, be it the internet or the water I boiled mac n’ cheese in earlier as I contemplated how gendered ideas contribute to my hatred of cooking.
That being said, I must say before I go any further that I find the idea of simply walking through the streets, whether digital or physical, without any intention but the mere pleasure of observing and watching, is kind of absurd to me, to Jessie Darling, and I think to anyone who cannot walk freely down the street without being whistled at, stared at, or thrown disapproving looks.
I really did try to keep this idea at bay in giving the dérive a fair shot. I started on the Wikipedia home page, clicking from one link to the next until I ended up on a page about the Silent Sentinels. This was a suffragist group founded by a woman named Alice Paul and associated with the National Woman’s Party. The Silent Sentinels protested in front of the White House during Woodrow Wilson’s presidency in 1917, two years before the 19th amendment finally passed through both houses of Congress.
The Sentinel’s were given their name because of the means of their protests — they would stand silently, allowing banners and signs to speak for them. Wikipedia states that, “ nearly 2,000 women[3] who picketed were harassed, arrested, and unjustly treated by local and US authorities, including the torture and abuse inflicted on them before and during the November 14, 1917 Night of Terror.”
Which, obviously, lead me to inquire about this “ Night of Terror.” Many women associated with this movement were wrongfully charged with minor crimes and given an option of bail or a few months jail time; the women chose jail time as another means of protest. The prison they were confined sounds like it contained many rings of hell. Most infuriating of all, however, was that the prison warden instructed the prison guards (all men, duh) to “rough up” the Sentinel’s within the prison in some attempt to truly “silence” them.
The leader of the movement, Lucy Burns, had her hands shackled to the top of her jail cell and was forced to sleep standing up all night. Other women were beaten or had their heads bashed against their iron bed frames.
This all keeps bringing me back to this same guilt and responsibility I often find myself working through lately — why have we been taught to be complacent? Why was I not taught all of this information in AP US History? Why do I not know the name of the first female member of Congress? Why can I not recall the name of the first female governor?
I could continue to travel from one Wiki page to the next, trying to cram all of these anecdote’s about women’s history I so regret having never been taught. But at some point I feel like my boundless Wiki traveling will lose it’s value; it’s an information overload. And I’d rather spend that energy sharing and spreading even these smaller snippets of information I have now discovered.
You see, the Flâneur is the man who writes about the Silent Sentinels from his distant position on the opposite side of the street. He’s got nothing better to do. He’s got nothing better to stand for or work on. But I don’t have time to waste, and I thank the platforms and search engines that allow me to explore and learn with intention.
