A reflection of the triumphs and obstacles that arise in activism as well as the impacts that collective chanting has on social change.
By: Ryann Frolik
I was 12 years old when I first felt called to action. With tears welling in my eyes, I was prepared to make a difference in the world by taking a stand against the meat industry.
I had just watched the film “Cowspiracy” and urgently needed to share what I had learned. I took out my iPhone 4 and opened Instagram. I posted a long, strongly worded devotion proclaiming my veganism and an itemized list of all I had learned from the film.
My fellow seventh-graders were unimpressed. Jokes started to circulate that didn’t make sense to me, but I did understand how belittled I felt when groups of prepubescent boys laughed in my face about something I cared about.
From there, parts of myself were slowly diminished and the things I cared about became less important. This led to a path of self-resentment and destructive tendencies when my peers still didn’t find me socially acceptable. In eighth-grade, I was the first to start experimenting with drugs and talking to guys grades older than me for some sort of validation.
High school was littered with the same circumstances. I became a person on autopilot living my life through how others perceived me. I needed other options, and online school seemed like a saving grace.
That lasted four months. I overdosed on Feb. 9, 2017, after taking enough ibuprofen to cure a headache for the next nine months. My mom’s birthday the next day was spent exchanging tears and figuring out what to do next.
After tours at charter schools and neighboring high schools, I ended up in the parking lot of Ivan Sand Community High School. It was the only ALC — alternative learning center, or what my classmates from my former school trademarked “assholes’ last chance” — for miles.
The parking lot littered with potholes and chipped green paint on the 12-room building held a sense of acceptance. It was rough on the outside, but a feeling of community and optimism filled the hallways. I found a home at Ivan Sand. I wish I could say I took a positive trajectory from then on, but that wasn’t the case.
The companionship I found at the ALC included filling our voids with alcohol and drugs. Using substances to feel better and fit in with my peers became my main focus. Continuous self-destructive behavior eventually led to getting a minor consumption in school — the same day as conferences.
What did break the pattern was the resurgence of my old friend, activism.
During the pandemic, I learned how to think outside of myself again. My older sister’s friend Calista sent me an Instagram message about an activist organizing a local event for the 2020 climate strike.
I went. It was a beautiful day, the kind that isn’t just yet cold while the sun still warms your skin when you stand still beneath it. I remember painting an Earth on cutouts of cardboard I had dug out from my sister’s freshly unpacked boxes. With big black chunky stickers, I had finished my artistry with a sign that said boldly: OUR EARTH MATTERS. I felt empowered looking at the finished product.
But as I walked alone to the Hennepin County Government Center with a slab of cardboard tucked under my armpit, I suddenly lost my sense of empowerment and felt once again like that small, mocked seventh-grader. My masterpiece suddenly felt as if it weighed a million pounds. I desperately wanted to get away from it.
In the distance, I could hear faint chanting coming from a collection of tiny voices. A wave of relief showered over me as I turned the corner to the final building and saw a small group of people with signs like mine. I could feel myself move faster, eager to no longer be alone with my sign.
As I approached, people turned to me and smiled through their masks, their eyes squinting a little. Even with the warm embrace of feet shuffling around to make room for me the first couple minutes I was only whispering the chants with my sign hung around my knees.
“We are unstoppable, a better world is possible.” “We are unstoppable, a better world is possible.” As the chant repeated over and over, I felt the words move through me. I felt inspired when my voice joined everyone else’s. I felt a shift in how I was internalizing the setting. I was no longer worried if my sign looked stupid. I wasn’t thinking any of the trivial thoughts I had thought walking up to the crowd.
The collective voices repeating a message lifted me and my sign higher.
The connection I felt was what researchers call the “muscular bonding” of protest chants. This occurs through people keeping time together, moving muscles in their body in a rhythmic pattern and chanting collectively.
The chanting is much like music because of its ability to move people in profound ways. Expressing messages that are amplified through the unity of strangers has a real impact on systemic change.
I’ve found friendship and solidarity with other students through collective action and caring about something bigger than myself. I’ve found healing in my past and growth for what I can become through activism.