It might be the thesis, but it definitely raises discussions on why some protests work and others don't. It's true that a one and done protest is easy to ignore. That doesn't mean all protests are ineffective.

Historically, protests were effective when they were the signal that people were unhappy, and that if something didn't change, people would take further action.

So I'm order for protests to be more effective:

• they need better organization and consolidation instead of being distributed
• they need a clear set of actionable demands, so that protestors know when they need to ratchet up to the next level of escalation
• they need to have agreed upon levels of escalation that will be followed by those attending the protest. That could include general strikes, focussed boycotts, focussed civil disobedience, etc.

Simplifying it down to "🔫 or nothing" is just as silly as the octopus protest, in that people need to find the right set of actions for each situation.

As for the US specifically, I don't see what an immediate armed revolution would accomplish.