Tag: activism

activism, Uncategorized

Action 3: Out Your Lunch Box

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tupperware

Remember when water bottles and travel mugs were weird anomalies?  When you had  to clip your cup to your rucksack with a carabiner and then ask for special permission to fill it from the soda fountain?

Now even briefcases come with mesh pockets for portable hydration. Monday through Friday in every office in America, a rainbow of screw-top coffee mugs and metal-glass-plastic reusable water bottles clutters every working surface.

Far better than cluttering landfills, yes?

So what’s stopping us from doing the same with our food containers?

Continue reading “Action 3: Out Your Lunch Box” →

activism, Take Action

Action 2: Pick up the Phone

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vintage-phone

It’s old school.  It’s unsexy.

It takes under five minutes.

And it’s effective.

Use this call sheet as a script to make a call to your representatives on issues of concern.  Adapt it as you see fit.

Notice that the call sheet has tabs across the top.  In addition to scripts, you’ll see lists of representatives and other tips.  This sheet is merely a template created in the first week after the election.  As events unfold, the language and issues will change.

I’m embarrassed to admit that for all decades of armchair commentary — indeed, I still consider myself “radical” despite my unexceptional suburban existence — I haven’t actually picked up the phone to talk to my senators or representatives in a lifetime and a half.

Yesterday, I made the calls.   The action was straightforward and very simple.  It took no more time a walk down the hall to fill up my water bottle, and arguably went much further to quench my thirst.

 

 

 

activism, Take Action

Action 1: Who are your Representatives?

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congress-photo

Find out who represents you in the US Senate and House of Representatives as well as in your state legislature.  It’s easy to look them up with the Find your Elected Officials tool created by Common Cause and the Sunlight Foundation.

Make note of who your representatives are.  Take a few moments to find out how they have voted on immigration, education, reproductive rights, environmental policy, health care, protection of marginalized groups, and other critical issues.

Most importantly, make note of their addresses and phone numbers.  Bookmark them in your browser and program them into your phone.  The only way they’ll be responsive to us is if we start putting our concerns in front of them.

 Image: Library of Congress

activism, Take Action

Act Now

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vivir-sin-fronteras-colordsgfix.jpg

Here is a small selection of things that don’t work:

  • Wearing black
  • Fretting
  • Posting “Joe Biden: White House Troublemaker” memes (although a giggle is good medicine)
  • Wearing a safety pin
  • Returning to safe, familiar, more-or-less neutral patterns of work and social life
  • Conflating the expression of feelings with action
  • Rehashing outrage and fear in casual conversations with friends and family who agree with us
  • Repeatedly checking social media to watch horrors as they unfold
  • Waiting to see what else he does before doing anything ourselves

Here is what does work:

  • Asking the next question: What action will we take today — this very day — in the service of justice and our common future on this planet?

Continue reading “Act Now” →

activism, Determination

The Power you Have

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procession

Are you willing to use the power you have in the service of what you say you believe?

-Audre Lorde

We’d scheduled a White House tour for the morning after the election.  My 10-year-old son was already excused from school for the day. Through the night, the red stain bleeding across the map tangled me into a knot of sleepless apprehension.  It drew tighter every time I reached for the phone to pull up CNN.  As the unreality of our new president crystallized into fact, fear of what will happen to our nation, to my neighbors and our shared home — and the uncertainty about how to be a mother through it all — metastasized from compulsion to obsession.

Continue reading “The Power you Have” →

activism, Change, Purpose

White Privilege at a Racial Justice Action

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SURJ note

In February 2015, Natasha McKenna, a 37-year old neighbor and mother, called 911.  The help she expected was not what showed up.  Instead, she was herself arrested on an outstanding warrant.  In custody, she suffered a mental health crisis.  She was restrained while naked and put into leg shackles and handcuffs.  Six Fairfax County police officers in hazmat suits put a bag over her face and tazed her four times.  She stopped breathing.  Natasha McKenna died a few days later.  The deputies responsible for her death faced no charges and continue to work in law enforcement.

Today, SURJ Northern Virginia gathered at the Fairfax County courthouse in front of the detention center where Natasha McKenna was held and brutalized.  The protest found its way to Route 123, a narrow and busy corridor through downtown Fairfax.  At 9:00am right during rush hour, we stepped out into the street and stopped traffic.  Coverage of the story is here and here and here.

Continue reading “White Privilege at a Racial Justice Action” →

community, Determination

Show Up

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People are getting live-killed on Facebook, y’all.  If we aren’t showing up now, then when?  It’s time to get out there.

SURJ Organizer, 7/10/2016

Over 70 folks came out for the SURJ (Showing Up for Racial Justice) meeting.  They had to bring in more chairs.  After last week in America, despair and outrage have combusted into something that refuses to stay contained.

The meeting was two hours of focused, efficient movement.  We engaged in small group discussions about concrete things we’ve seen white allies do to disrupt racism and cultivate justice in our communities.  We heard from the organizers about activities that have gained traction in the first year of this young organization’s life: immigration reform, police accountability, renaming buildings that celebrate the Confederacy, and coordinating a region-wide canvas in majority white neighborhoods in the run-up to the presidential election.  We then split into breakout sessions for a deep dive into each of these areas.  Finally, we learned about the next public action planned for this coming week.

Around the country, ally organizations are stepping up to make a stand for Black Lives.  The focus is on police departments, sheriff’s offices, and Fraternal Orders of Police.  Affiliated organizations led by People of Color have put out the call to SURJ and other white allies to take bolder action on issues of police brutality.  Facing our white privilege means more than talking about it on social media.

It means showing up.

It’s time to take our horror at what happened to Philando Castile and turn it into a movement.

And what happened to Alton Sterling.

And Natasha McKenna.

And Freddie Gray.  And Trayvon Martin.  And Michael Brown.  And Eric Garner.  And Tanisha Anderson.  And Tamir Rice.  And Zamiel Crawford.  And Dominick Wise.  And Frank Shephard.  And Vincent Valenzuela III.  And the 5 Dallas police officers, some of whom had stood with the protestors before the shooting began.

And so many more, each a story.  Each a neighbor.  Each a life blown short by a force whose call to protect has gone haywire.

The organizers asked who would be there for the coming action.

At a public protest, my skin and income lower the risk of abuse to negligible.  This fact does not make me proud.

It makes me raise my hand.

It’s time to show up.

 

Determination, Purpose

Bleached Bones and Jumbled Residues

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We are now faced with the fact, my friends, that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with a lost opportunity. The tide in the affairs of men does not remain at flood — it ebbs. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is adamant to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residues of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words, “Too late.”

– Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., “Beyond Vietnam, A Time to Break Silence,” delivered April 4, 1967, Riverside Church, New York City

Change, Purpose

The Myth of Colorblindness

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We tell ourselves the story that we have triumphed over the (official) racism of the land. We say, “It was awful then.” Then we twist ourselves into logical contortions to explain or ignore mass incarceration of Black men, the economic marginalization of communities of color, and a whole continuum of institutional racism.

In the post-civil rights era, newer forms of racism present formidable obstacles because they recruit and rely on our belief system about racial equality and egalitarianism. They hold that we exist in a meritocracy, and any consideration of race in policy or access is itself indicted as racism.  The new forms are more insidious than the public expressions of white supremacy so easily identified and vilified as racist.  Our shared narrative is a public expression of racial equality.  Continue reading “The Myth of Colorblindness” →

community, Growing Up, Purpose

Resonate

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umbrella house

It was easier when the heroes were prophets. They stood just far enough forward that we had to keep moving to keep up. We had to lean in to hear. That was when tyrants wore names like uniforms. Good and evil faced off across chasms and we knew better than to tumble between. We stood firm on our side. Myth grew us a chorus of muses. They sang in every shade of green.

Over across the way, it was hard to make out anything but ruin. Rumor had it someone had salted the earth. The restoration was a long way off. We knew we could only build a bridge after the villains had been vanquished. Even if we could arrive sooner to begin the purge and planting, would our comrades welcome us? Would they even recognize us? Continue reading “Resonate” →