Listen To This Story

This week has made it clear that the fate of American democracy hangs in the balance. As our own bunker-busting bombs hit Iran, without Congressional approval, we’ve seen an escalation of executive power from the already dangerous overreach we protested just a few weeks ago. This doesn’t mean we give up hope. It means we keep our eyes and arms and homes open, and we fight even harder. Here are some things you can do.

       1.   Make sure the press sees your events

The week of the No Kings Day protest, I received an itinerary for our local event to my work email. It was just a list of events, booths, and speakers, with no context and no easy media messaging for overloaded newsrooms. I contacted the person who sent it to me and asked if they had a press release. They did not, so I fashioned one for them. I emphasized the size of the rally (thousands), and the fact that all of our local, on-the-ground activist groups had come together to put it on. (That’s important because it makes the event unique. It’s rare to get all these groups, with their disparate aims, to work together.) I used the original sender’s information, sent it back to them, and continued on with my day.

The lesson here is: Use your skills to help get your group more visibility. If activism is invisible to the public, its impact is severely impacted.

       2.   Understand the terrain of your local activism groups.

A day after I sent the press release I’d written to the organizer, I got a message from a leader of another group asking if I had received a press release. I informed him that I had actually written it, and he was relieved but also perturbed. Apparently, he had also written several drafts of a release and was waiting on approval. My press release, sent by the other organizer, came as a surprise to them.

In addition, there is some friction between the groups here, as there will always be when people try to come together around a common cause. Everyone wants to be identified correctly and to have their efforts suitably highlighted; given my sparse knowledge of the organization of the event, I had unwittingly not done this clearly enough.

After I learned of my mistake, I received many frantic phone calls from organizers trying to fix the error and smooth out details… and soothe tempers.

I ended up making my own calls to various leaders, explaining that the fault was mine, and trying to mend the precarious bridges they had built to one another. It took a lot of back-and-forthing, but because I am now fairly well-known in these circles and they knew I truly meant to do a good thing, they gave it all the benefit of the doubt, and everyone could move forward.

The moral of the story is: Even if you are helping, make sure you have all the information on hand before dashing off what you think is “help.”

       3.   If you fail or make a mistake, keep going.

No one’s activism is going to be perfect. Many mistakes are going to be made along the way. One important thing, especially for white people, is to listen and learn with an open heart and an absent ego. As human beings, it is hard to face a mistake. It is true that my intentions were good, but I also needed to learn from this experience. My voice, even as a ghostwriter, shouldn’t be the loudest in the room.

If we take these moments and learn from them, we can work together with those we have accidentally wronged and do better. If we get stuck in feelings of embarrassment or inadequacy or we are defensive and disinclined to put ourselves back out there, we end up hindering the movement’s progress. Remember, it’s a joint fight for our democracy, and we need all hands on deck.

In this case, after my phone calls, I kept my offer to write the press release for them on the table. One of the leaders tried to combine my press release with another, and sent me the results. She’s an excellent leader, but writing is its own skill set. I rewrote the release to include her varied events and keep it short and punchy. She was grateful and used that release before the protest. In the end, what’s important is to work together to advance this vital cause.

       4.   Take comfort in the wins. 

More than 2,000 people showed up at the protest in Gainesville, FL. The rally included booths for various groups, a mutual-aid table, a speaker list, and music. Folks brought folding chairs and picnic blankets and listened to activist leaders talk about what steps are needed to continue to fight for progress. Another faction of the group stood on the nearby road and waved signs and shouted at oncoming traffic, most of which honked emphatically in return.

Importantly to me, the press did show up. Both television and print media took photos and interviewed participants. Why is coverage so important? Because other people see it. It shows those on the fence that the movement continues to strengthen and grow. It shows those who are feeling helpless a way forward where they will be surrounded by people who share their goals for a better world. It makes the steps into activism less daunting to take. It makes people feel less alone.

       5.   Follow up to do better next time.

The best way forward is through… and then back. After the successful protest, I coordinated with the woman I had inadvertently erased in my original press release. We sat down for coffee and I asked her to tell me her story. Her experience is important.

“You want the whole dramatic thing?” she asked.

I did.

But I didn’t take notes, I didn’t report. I didn’t want to hear her story to publicize it or make any kind of statement about it. I wanted to hear her story to gain a better understanding of how she, as a woman of color, has been treated in this space since 2016, and how I could help other white people amplify voices like hers, voices of those who are the most affected and disenfranchised. I wanted to hear her story because she has a right to tell it, loudly and clearly, and to be taken seriously when she speaks. 

I listened so in the future I could do better for her and the cause we shared. And I will.

       6.   Do the detail work to integrate yourself into operating systems.

In addition to newer activism groups that formed since Trump first took office, like 50501 and Indivisible, I’ve been integrating myself into older, more established groups that at first glance might seem to just be plodding along. Yet these older groups can be just as effective as the newer ones, if not more so. Yes, they move more slowly. Yes, they are not as flashy. But what they lack in alacrity, they make up in structural continuity and experience. No one likes to read a rulebook. No one likes detailed, legalese-y policies and procedures. No one likes the red tape of officers and boards and oversight. But in the long-haul battle against this administration, the very detail-oriented approach that may at first appear to tie hands can actually make the needed actions more effective.

With this mind, I volunteered to help the League of Women Voters with their communications. I was assigned to tone up their website. My first reaction was blech! I don’t usually consider comms to be updating webpages, but if that is what they need, that is what I’ll do.

So, I familiarized myself with the backend of their operations, got myself access permissions and a username, and now I can edit the site. And the League of Women Voters site is important — it gives people action items and the tools to get them done. If they tell you to call your congresspeople, they give the names and numbers, along with a suggested phone script that is tailored to your area. If they hold an event or are tabling somewhere, they ask well in advance for volunteers and provide contact information, location, and time details. They are a well-oiled machine, and it’s because they’ve been doing this important work for so long.

       7.   Call Congress about the bombing of Iran.

As we watched Trump sign his tax bill into law — which will cut Medicaid and food assistance for millions and which will require massive protests to try to overturn — it can be easy to forget the threat to our entire way of life posed by his reckless military moves abroad. Now that the fanfare about Iran is dying down, and we are stuck in this ‘did we win, did they win, did every country win, did nobody win, does anyone care anymore’ loop, call your congresspeople to complain about HOW it was done. He willfully chose to coordinate bombing another country without congressional approval. 

What we are seeing is nothing less than an attempt to dismantle our constitutional form of government. And the best way to combat this fascist-style takeover is by standing up for the structural guardrails built into the United States Constitution. We can start by telling our senators and representatives that the president cannot be allowed to bomb any country without Congressional approval.

Note that this goes beyond rallying against a military confrontation with a specific adversary, like Iran. While that’s important, the most important — and I believe most winnable — battle is to protect the structural components the Founders put in our Constitution of checks and balances. 

So, yes, calling and saying not to bomb Iran is good, but calling and saying not to bomb any country without going through the proper constitutional procedure is better. It’s better because at least some congresspeople will be open to a call to defend their own legislative rights and privileges, to fight back against a would-be dictator who would strip them of their lawfully ordained powers and reduce them to lickspittle lackeys of an out-of-control White House.

The time for action is now, and any action you can take, large or small, will do something to push the needle a little more toward liberty for all. Celebrate the victories, however limited, that you achieve. Do not allow the dark clouds of repression to steal our will to stand up and fight. We are strong enough. We can do this. See you next week.

Past weeks of “One Small Thing” can be found here.