I guess you know it’s Portland when you take off on your daily walk and trip over an ICE protest right in the middle of your neighborhood. That’s old red hat around here. I followed the sound from a megaphone to a small house on a side street. It was a curious sight.

The scene had all the elements. Not a huge group, fewer than a hundred souls, and all carrying the same sign: REVOKE THE ICE PERMIT. I approached in a good mood. Clearly these were my people.

Right away, trouble. A chunky fellow in a Christian Nationalist T-shirt was trying to video the goings-on with his phone, and a skinny black-clad fellow was thwarting him with an umbrella. All right, we all had our uniforms on; the players were clear. The referee was maybe the news guy on the side with a big camera on a stick. Would there be a half-time show? I understand that’s where you get the real conflict.

The Christian Nationalist was barking at the umbrella man. I walked behind him and patted him on the shoulder like the old lady I am privileged to be. “There, there, it’ll be all right,” I said. Let the record show I was sweet as pie. Let the record further show I knew I was provoking. Our eyes met.

“Why don’t you go home and feed your cats,” he said. Ooh, burn. I had two possible retorts.

One: “Shows what you know. I already fed my cats.”

Two: “Which cat? Fluffy or Nazi-Slayer?”

We were both furious. Remarkable: zero to enraged in ten seconds. It would have been unthinkable fifteen years ago. But here we are. On yesterday’s walk, I saw a gigantic truck with a bumper sticker that read: I’M GOING TO PUT MY CARBON FOOTPRINT RIGHT UP YOUR LIBERAL ASS. Ignorant son of a bitch. I was triggered, as intended, by someone’s choice of truck decoration. We’re all wearing our team colors and insignia.

It finally occurred to me to wonder why this event was taking place in the middle of my neighborhood and not on a busy street corner. So I went up to a sign-waving young woman at the edge and asked. “Whose driveway is the woman with the megaphone standing in? Why are we here?” And she said, with some glee, “It’s Mayor Keith Wilson’s house!”

Well, shit. The megaphone wielder was now demanding that the resident come out and talk to his constituents, who were demanding that he revoke the permit for the ICE facility downtown. “If you don’t come out and talk with us, we’ll know you’re afraid of us!”

Oh, please. He might not be afraid of you. But don’t pretend that is not your intent. “We know where you live and the names of your children” is not an invitation to a bake sale.

My heart sank. Yes, I’m with you: ICE is evil. You probably think if I’m not outraged, I’m not paying attention. False. Honeys, I’ve been demonstrating in the street since your grandparents were in burlap diapers in a commune. I can be paying attention and outraged and still keep my wits about me. What do you hope to accomplish here? There is so much evil in this world. Don’t add to it by terrorizing people. You know nothing. You do not know if the mayor is home. Or if his neighbor is trying to rest after surgery. Or even, apparently, if you’ve now antagonized an innocent passerby who totally agrees with your goals. This, here, is plain stupid.

The mayor is not capable of revoking the permit for ICE headquarters with a stroke of his pen. Or, more to the point, if he does, the issue will go to the courts for, possibly, years, and he will not prevail, especially since he and the whole city council have already demonstrated animus toward ICE. And, as he has publicly explained, this is not a fight we can afford to lose.

Ain’t that great? We have a mayor who has loudly excoriated ICE as recently as last week but he is not pure enough to suit these young soldiers in his driveway who are convinced he could do more if only he wanted to. I told the young woman I agreed with her goals but not her strategy. It’s not nice, and it’s not right. It wouldn’t even be right at Stephen Miller’s house, or Kristi Noem’s, or any other of Hell’s zipcodes. Implied threats and harassment are wrong and unhelpful. Why anyone goes into public service now I will never know. And we need people.

I walked away, equally troubled by a right-wing asshole and by a group of righteous young freedom fighters. All I could think of was that someone has looked at all of us, all over the country, left and right, as a big box of fire ants. And has spent the last decade poking sticks at us and shaking up the box until we attack each other, certain that we’ve been stung by the ant next to us, and oblivious to the shakers of the box.

Focus. We can do better.