Approximately 7 million people in more than 2,700 protests in the United States participated to call for the defense of Constitutional rights in President Donald Trump’s current administration.

My sister and I were discussing the No Kings rallies, as well as other protests we have known. We are Boomers, after all; we have been witness to many protests over the years. Andy Sacks, an old friend of ours from our college days, came up in the conversation.

A skilled and talented student photographer, as a student Andy documented the times for the “Michigan Daily” from 1965 through 1969. He photographed political figures, musicians, student demonstrations, the 1968 riot at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago and appearances of many celebrities as well as a meeting of the Ku Klux Klan in Dearborn, Michigan.

After talking with Sissy, I found a website for Andy’s work — Saxpix. I was moved by his now historic black and white still photographs of 1969 Ann Arbor Street demonstrations.

Those anti-Vietnam War protests were grimmer than what I’ve witnessed in the No Kings rallies. No hilarious inflatable costumes, not a lot of humor in the signage. I would never call No Kings protesters unserious; it’s just that these are different times. In 1969 many students were protesting the Vietnam War. By the end of the war, 58,220 U.S. service members had died “in-theater.” The draft, which lasted into 1973, was, to put it mildly, extremely unhealthy for people in our age group.

My friend Cerise and I drove to Potsdam last Saturday for the No Kings rally. My sign read “ICE ICE,” which I don’t think people could make heads or tails of; Cheryl’s simply spelled out “UGH,” which pretty much said it all. My favorite sign read “MAKE ORWELL FICTION AGAIN.” Later I learned that organizers estimated 1,000 people participated.

Although, to be fair, every age group was represented at the rally, including some babies in strollers and even a few dogs, I noticed that we Boomers made up an inordinate proportion of the protesters. As one man remarked to me in Ives Park, on the banks of the Raquette River, “I wish I could see some people in the crowd who didn’t have gray hair.”

It was true! As I looked around I saw, aside from a few bald heads, mostly shades of gray. After all, I told Cerise, this is a college town! Where are all the students?

As the crowd filed out to the street, more and more younger people joined the rally, but many still resembled an anonymous wit’s description of the typical No King’s protester: a grandmother carrying a sign and clutching an NPR tote bag. (This description was meant to offset and poke fun at some politicians’ descriptions of No Kings protesters as terrorists.) I was thinking about leaders, and the way people follow them. Some people are truly charismatic. Some examples are Pres. John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Mick Jagger and Hollywood stars, politicians, religious leaders and conmen — too many to count. Some use their charisma for good and others for their own selfish ends. I’d like to be able to say that I have never been unduly influenced by charismatic people, but that would be untrue, even in my personal life. Looking back, I find this embarrassing and unaccountable.

I have often written in this column about various insects and arachnids, including ants, locusts and also spiders found in caves in Scotland and in County Down, Ireland, who become zombified by cordyceps or massosora fungus. The fungus infects them and then manipulates their behavior, causing them to act in ways that are bizarrely against their nature and against their own well-being.

Certain charismatic people affect their followers the way cordyceps zombie fungus affects ants. Under their influence, even reasonable and predictable people find themselves doing self-destructive things they would never have considered previously. This is the only way I can account for the political views of some of my friends and family. Of course they would indignantly disagree.

Looking at the photographs of the young student demonstrators from 1969, it occurs to me to wonder how many of them were, like Cerise and me, attending No Kings rallies, looking different now, with their NPR tote bags. Power to the people!

Have a good week.

(Martha Allen, of Keene Valley, has been writing for the News since 1996.)