By Lily Abromeit
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a sea of pink hats with small points on each side bobbed a red baseball cap worn backward that read, “Make America Great Again.”
The hat’s owner, Cale, was from Philadelphia and in town for the inauguration of President Donald J. Trump Friday. He headed out with his suitcase Saturday morning, placing his hat on his head without even thinking about what he might walk into — the Women’s March on Washington.
“People were yelling stuff at me all morning,” he said. “I’m probably going to get spit on.”
Cale, who didn’t want to give his last name because “people are really quick to judge,” said he felt stupid wearing the hat because he isn’t against the idea of the march.
“I mean, I love women,” he said. “I even consider myself a feminist … They name [Trump] as all these –ists … What has he said to be that way?”
Not everyone in the streets of Washington D.C. agreed with these sentiments. In fact, most openly disagreed.
Although the Women’s March on Washington was not supposed to be anti-Trump, many signs and chants seemed to express otherwise.
The idea for the national march formed the day after the election and was originally referred to as the million women march. According to a press release from the Women’s March on Washington official website, it was created to address perceived divisions being created in the country and to have a collective place for people to raise their voices.
Hundreds of thousands of women, often joined by men and children, flocked to the streets of D.C., surrounding the nation’s capitol, the national mall, and every corner in between with pink knit hats and homemade signs.
One read, “She The People.” Another, “This is what democracy looks like.”
“Show me what democracy looks like.” “This is what democracy looks like.” This has been one of the most popular chants today. pic.twitter.com/ZijLkkhJSx
— The Daily Iowan (@TheDailyIowan) January 21, 2017
According to the Associated Press, transportation officials said Saturday was the fifth busiest day in the metro’s history and predicted that it would make it to the number one spot by the end of the night.
Because of the sheer numbers of the crowd, the original march route wasn’t possible and marchers had to find alternative ways to get through the city. A rally took place in the morning and early afternoon to kick off the march but many marchers weren’t able to get close enough to hear the speakers.
Some in the crowd cited solidarity as a reason for making the long trip to join so many others.
“I’m representing Kentucky women in a state that voted overwhelmingly for Trump,” said Rachel Carrigan, a resident of Louisville, Kentucky. “I think we made so much social progress in the last eight years, I don’t want to see any regression.”
For many, there was no one reason to join forces, but because of the whole picture.
“I can’t name one specific reason, I just know that it [would] be wrong not to,” said Lottie Gidal, a 16-year-old sophomore from City High School in Iowa City.
The idea of marching for dozens of reasons at once seems silly to Debbie Marty, a Trump supporter who was in town over the weekend for the inauguration.
“It is their right, I just don’t understand [because] they’re here for one million issues,” she said. “I don’t agree with those issues.”
A large number of the chants throughout the day were anti-Trump, something else Marty said she doesn’t understand. She said the “Love trumps hate,” message doesn’t make sense because, from her perspective, many of the marchers express hate toward Trump and his supporters.
“Just because I don’t understand their opinion, I’m a bad guy,” she said. “I don’t understand that … we should all be able to have a difference of opinion.”
While there weren’t many Trump supports around the march route, a few that were expressed irritation with the whole event.
Marty’s friend, Karen Daparma, was one such person.
“They’re entitled to it as an American but I think putting kids in shirts that say “pussy” is disgusting,” she said. “And I think everyone has a cause lately.”
Daparma added that she doesn’t think people should be offended by Trump saying inappropriate comments because he said them in private and it just happened to be recorded. However, she said she was personally offended by the number of signs Saturday that displayed cuss words and genitalia because marching them through the streets is exposing her children to those things in public.
“America lost its morals,” she said.
But for teens like Lottie, all of the emotions surrounding the march made her feel just the opposite.
“Now I can’t wait for the next 20-hour bus ride to the next awesome event,” she said.
The number of people who attended the event far exceeded what the organizers were predicting, and Freda Stelzer, from Iowa City, thought it surpassed in success, too.
“I think it was more successful than people had hoped,” she said. “I don’t know what it means … What I hope it means is that people who are progressive will have woken up and understand that we have to make our views known and better communicate our views better than we have in the past.”
Throughout the day, people were chanting “What is America?” “This is America.”
“And it is,” Stelzer said simply.
*Check back with The Daily Iowan for updates to this story as well as stories from the Des Moines women’s march*
