A March for the Marchers

The mood at the Familes Belong Together Marches this weekend was effervescent and ebullient. Subjected to a sordid panorama of pain at the border, white liberal America vented its frustrations in a spectacle of its own. There were children here, too, many riding along in strollers that cost as much as a down payment on a small car. Their parents sweated; it was hot all across the country, lending marching a sanctimonious halo, the luminosity of selfless sacrifice. The babies at the border must not be snatched, many of the signs and placards declared. The pathos of imagining their own cozily ensconced, sun-screened progeny pumped the volume of chants. Others demanded the abolishment of ICE. “Its 95 degrees: Let's Melt ICE,” said one sign, the weak joke exposing the privilege of the person carrying it.