alt Hacker NewsThere is Mesh(core|tastic) around. Both use LoRa.
With tiny solar repeater that placed on a strategic hill you can cover lots of kilometers. Being sensitive down to -145dBm opens a lot of doors.
I was able to build energy harvester nodes that fit into 5cm x 5cm x 4cm boxes that roughly cost around 20€. Without energy harvesting capability with a normal TI BQ wide range charge controllers (that stuff costs $1.5-2.5@pcs and eats every power source up to 18V! With pseudo-MPPT!) you can bring the entire thing down to <<15€. That's mass producable throw-away stuff.
Currently available LoRa-gear is either USB-power optimized (looking at you Heltec) or just awfully overpriced as soon as a solar panel is attached to it.
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I guess if you're protesting against the government, you don't have to comply with regulations and can use more power and basically the entire spectrum :)
Meshtastic citywide nets use a single frequency. Jamming it is trivial.
LoRa locally is often installed/managed by municipal governments.
You also make yourself a bright shining beacon to anybody looking for a resistance network because Lora operates on very specific frequencies. It would be easy to spot you with an RF scanner.