The Frog Wars

Inflatable Resistance:

When Protest Learns to Laugh

In a time when every protest is instantly labeled “hate America” or “foreign-funded terrorism,” the inflatable resistance offers a stroke of pure genius. In Portland and other creative corners of the country, people are showing up not with Molotovs, but with giant balloon ducks, inflatable liberty bells, and ten-foot smiley faces. It’s civil disobedience through helium gas.

The power of the inflatable is that it changes the emotional chemistry of protest. Rage gets all the headlines, but humor gets all the hearts. The moment you see a crowd carrying a ten-foot dragon made of vinyl, it’s impossible to buy the narrative that these are paid terrorists. They’re clearly artists, clowns, citizens — people who still care enough to laugh.

And now they’ve taken it a step further — the inflatables are on roller skates. Whole troupes of costumed figures glide down the streets, bouncing and spinning, moving in time to live music or portable speakers. It’s a carnival of resistance — part street theater, part rolling parade, part dance party.

You can tear gas a clearly harmless dancer in an inflatable costume, but you won’t get away with it for long. You can’t intimidate a melody or crush a laugh, and meanness and cruelty have a price to pay.

The sound of laughter and the sight of very funny inflatable frogs and other bodies dancing through the quiet street has a strange power. It short-circuits fear. It disarms authority. Even the angriest onlooker can’t help but grin when a roller-skating Statue of Liberty twirls by to the beat of a catchy little drumbeat.

Inflatables are non-threatening, yet impossible to ignore. They occupy space, literally and symbolically. They say, we’re here, and we’re not going away, but they do it with a wink. They deflate fascism by being… well, inflatable.

And that’s the deeper beauty. Laughter, absurdity and joy are unbeatable forces. You can outlaw assembly, you can militarize the streets, but you can’t ban delight and laughter. The inflatable resistance doesn’t just protest policy — it protests despair itself.

If protest is a mirror of the nation’s soul, then the Inflatable Resistance is America reminding itself to lighten up — to remember that dissent doesn’t have to be grim to be powerful. When protest loses its smile, it loses its power.

Will they beat up inflatables and drag them off to prison? If they do play dirty pool, the optics are gonna be lousy — history will not be kind.

The whole thing could get ugly real fast. The short answer: yes, it can happen here, but you’ll only believe that when it’s actually happening here. The government has in the past used force against non-violent protestors and street performers — and when that happens the visuals are terrible for the authorities, but alas, history tends to remember the brutal picture, not the polite funny stuff.

Here’s the useful part: bad optics cuts both ways. If inflatables get roughed up, the footage of cops dragging balloons and skating libertas lying on the pavement will probably look ridiculous and cruel — and that can quickly turn public opinion against whoever did the roughing-up, so organizers of these events should treat the inflatables as high-value story assets to be protected and documented, not as disposable props.

Practical plan (quick & usable):

legal & media prep: recruit legal observers and a social-media team before the action. get phone numbers, hashtags, and a “share this if we get hit” plan.
document everything: give several people phones/cameras and assign fixed-shot and roaming shooters. bodycams (or helmet cams on skaters) are gold.
de-escalation marshals: place calm, trained marshals (neon vests) around the inflatables to keep people back, negotiate with police, and record IDs. practice calm scripts for marshals (“we are peaceful, please do not use brute force”).
choreography = defense: use human chains, slow rolling formations, and clear escape routes so inflatables are never isolated. moving theater is harder to grab.
medical & safety team: have medics and water on hand; visible care reduces escalation and shows you’re responsible.
rapid narrative drop: the moment anything goes wrong, push a one-sentence narrative + video to all channels — e.g. “Portland: peaceful parade attacked — inflatable Liberty and volunteers hurt. Share widely.” Short, emotional, and repeatable.

messaging notes to flip the optics if attacked:

emphasize nonviolence + play: “They beat a balloon and a clown — what does that say?”
humanize the participants: names, ages, why they came.
show the music: post the soundtrack people were dancing to — contrast the joy vs. the force used.
call for accountability: request release of bodycam/van footage and give a deadline; pressure local reporters with the best clips.

final thought — keep safety first. if there’s a real risk of violent suppression, consider moving to a safer format (parade route with permits, flash-mob style dispersal points, or a staged performance in a public plaza where cameras are guaranteed).

Like I said in my book “Trump is a Four-Letter Word”, humor is his weak spot. He can’t understand it, doesn’t tolerate it, and never forgets or forgives a humiliation.

He ran for President because of a slur from Obama. How sad is that???

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My Work Going Forward!

Thirty-five years ago, I made a decision that would shape everything that followed. I instructed the Cloister to take on all of my responsibilities — every role, every function, every subtle aspect of the Work — so that they could learn by doing, make mistakes, correct them, and in the process, truly own the knowledge.

It wasn’t about succession; it was about continuity. The purpose was to ensure that nothing — not even my passing — would interrupt the service. The Work was never meant to be dependent on one individual, not even its founder. It was meant to live, breathe, and evolve through the hands and hearts of those who practice it as a living, thriving collective community of Work.

Over the decades, I’ve watched that seed grow into a totally functional, self-sustaining organism. The Cloister has learned to handle every challenge of a certified nonprofit organization, from teaching, and healing, to art, music, publishing, business and community management — and they’ve done it with grace, humor, and relentless dedication. They’ve made their share of mistakes, as intended, and those very errors became the teachers that no person could ever replace.

Now, my work going forward is not about holding the center alone — it’s about supporting the circle that already knows how to hold it and run it on a daily basis. It’s about refining, clarifying, and creating new tools for a generation that’s already fully functional in the Work of running the Institute, and is already quite fluent in the language of the Work.

When I look ahead, I don’t see an ending. I see a relay — a passing of a flame that never goes out, because it was never kept in one pair of hands to begin with.

— E.J. Gold

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Hoo-hah! Here’s the Bardo bus! Hop on board, while you still can!

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