E-Sign of the Times

The problem with petitions

I am done with petitions. I am sick of being harangued to sign petitions on Twitter. I am sick of seeing links to petitions in Instagram bios, which should be reserved for thinkpieces about why Quibi is pro-slut. I am sick of receiving emails from Change.org just because I signed something in 2015 demanding the death penalty for Subway Jared.

The word “petition,” like many beautiful women who’ve hurt me, is Latin in origin. It comes from the word “petitio,” meaning blow or thrust. (🚨HORNY ALERT 🚨) Sharp readers will note that “petitio” shares a root with “fellatio.” The alternate prefix changes the meaning from “sucking off the fellas” to “sucking off your pets.”

The past six weeks have been hot for petitions. Google Trends shows a massive spike in searches for petitons corresponding with the murder of George Floyd. Alongside donating to GoFundMes and reposting infographics, petitions seemed like a solid way to demand justice, particularly if you were apprehensive about going to a protest because of COVID-19. There was a ten day period where social media felt like walking near Union Square, with countless people in vests trying to sign you up for a charity (or sell you a mixtape). And that’s good. For certain causes related to Black Lives Matter, petitions seem like they could work. Policing is largely controlled at the municipal level and a petition can create outsized pressure for a local politician. If 10 million people sign a petition demanding action from the mayor of a city of 200,000, that’s a level of public scrutiny which could get results.

Google Trends for “petition”

But it doesn’t seem like that happened. The Google interest in petitions is back to normal. The pot, which once looked precipitously close to boiling over when those petitions were created, is now reduced to a low simmer. Some petitions might have worked, like those demanding George Floyd’s killers face charges. But I’d bet the smoldering police station is a better explanation for that. Very few other petitions seem to have worked, such as those demanding justice for Breonna Taylor, Elijah McClain, Sandra Bland, and so heartbreakingly many more. Good, tireless people continue to ask for signatures for those causes. But why? To call attention? To raise awareness? Those capable of punishing her murderers are, I promise you, well aware of those injustices. They showed us already that mass protest and direct action are the only way to get what you want. They hear you. They see you. And they’re ignoring you. 

Now, spurred on by this uptick in petitions, comes a new wave that’s even more sadly futile. Tell the EU to protect LGBTQ people in Poland! Close the Uighur concentration camps! Stop the war in Yemen! These are things which no petition can solve. No amount of signatures or pissed off posts will help the oppressed in any of those places. Calling attention is good, I suppose, because it is better for people to know about injustice than to live in ignorance. But the statesmen at the EU and UN and NATO and NAMBLA know well and good what’s going on around the world. 

Petitions bum me out because they are symptomatic of powerlessness. To me, they represent the pervasive feeling that we are feckless and impotent. The sense that power is beyond our reach, and even if we could grab it with one of those claw grabber things, we would be unable to wield it to get what we want. This, to me, seems the defining feature of our age: the world is too complex, the mechanisms of power too obscure, its wielders too hidden, to imagine anything different. Just as the Deists saw the world as a clock, wound up and started, we seem to live in a world where intervention is impossible. We careen forward, like captive passengers on a malfunctioning roller-coaster.  Entering our name on Change.org feels just proactive enough to soothe ourselves as we screech toward oblivion. We petition landlords not to evict people during a pandemic, instead of curbstomping them. If riots are the language of the unheard, petitions are the language of those screaming into a void.

Petition culture is charmingly Obama era. In 2013, the Obama administration launched We The People, the official White House petition platform. If your petition got 100,000 signatures, the White House would be required to respond in 60 days. One petition demanded the government construct a real life Death Star. It got enough signatures to merit a silly little response from someone in the administration with cute jokes about how it would raise the deficit. Reddit Gold for all involved, le epic sirs. 

This is laughable now. The idea that the President, whether it was the smart, cool war criminal or the fat, dumb war criminal, would even read a petition is absurd. But on a deeper level, We The People operated on a sense of trust and nonchalance, faith that the federal government was ultimately competent. We The People relies on a cordial relationship between government and citizen. It requires a sense that the social contract is robust enough that you can crack jokes with your rulers. You only pull pranks on friends who can take it. Maybe this worked in the Obama era because we did not feel that the government was actively endangering our lives, so long as we were not innocent Afghanis going to a wedding or hospital. 

I know my anger is misplaced. (As I’ve said time and time again, I am not responsible for my words nor my actions.) Petitions are not the enemy; the people being petitioned are. But we must continue to look beyond the simplest, quickest ways to feel like we’re making a difference and actually find ways to make one. It feels like shit to know we can’t do much about Poland or China or Yemen. But there are things we can do, which can also make you feel less shitty. Put money on someone’s books at a local jail. Buy groceries for an old neighbor. Let someone who’s been evicted crash on your couch. Then curbstomp the landlord.