> perhaps, but what public activity isn't activism?

Buying eggs at the grocery store.

You might be too familiar with "activism" as a perjurative but it needn't be one. Gaining visibility to your case by the media reporting on an arrest is sometimes seen as a plus (ex. Rosa Parks).

I'm not personally much of that mindset because the media didn't de-segregate the buses. It was black people literally just never taking them until it de-segregated that did.