Anti-cop protests in New York and across the country Friday night drew small and mostly peaceful crowds, despite rumors of mass demonstrations.
The Department of Defense were among those spooked by an online rumor about a national “Day of Rage,” warning personnel on Thursday about travel to 37 cities named by anonymous posters on the internet.
Demonstrators in NYC turned up at the Stonewall Inn to protest police violence, but the lackluster event drew just 30 people, cops said. They marched from there to the LGBT community center on 13th Street — less than half a mile.
“They didn’t do anything wrong,” said Johnny Dasthi, 50, who owns a store nearby. “Parties were gentle, the cops didn’t do anything aggressive, and the people were just peaceful. They just went away and then the traffic started going away.”
Elsewhere in the country protestors gathered in small numbers in Oakland and briefly blocked traffic in Phoenix, while a planned demonstration in LA’s Leimert Park completely failed to materialize.
The myth-busting site Snopes.com, dedicated to debunking urban legends, reported that the “Day of Rage” rumor was “virtually identical to one that was circulated two years earlier after the shooting of teenager Mike Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.”
