Activism

Everyone can do something to change the world. The people who actually do something are called activists.

Activism Is Powerful

Activism elects presidents, topples corporations and saves lives.

Activism Is For Everyone

Activism is an activity that anyone can engage in. Most activists are volunteers campaigning for the sake of making a difference while making a living in another career. Unlike workers competing for scarce positions in elite government and corporate organizations, activists are basically ‘self-employed’ and can achieve a great deal with few barriers to entry. Becoming a successful brain surgeon or CEO is an undertaking of many years, but becoming an impactful activist can be realistically accomplished in your spare time. Business is a zero sum game in which every winner succeeds by making someone a loser, whereas activism is a cooperative game where winners seek to help others win. It is within the realm of possibility that one day most everyone will become activists.

Eagle Scout training process

http://www.eaglescout.org/

OFFICES

Setting Up An Office

Empowered offices should be comfortable, productive, efficient and effective. Desks, Bookshelves are a must-have. Fans for cooling during hot days and heat for cold days.

Outreach

Outreach is an essential activity to inform the public of your events and campaigns.

Maintaining An Outreach Activity Schedule

Keep a list of all upcoming events available online and on paper to inform people of upcoming opportunities to participate and make a difference spreading the word about the issues. Call your contact list to publicize upcoming events. Contacting our friends and family is more important than contacting new strangers because we have more connections to each other to base our ideas on.

Contact List Calling

Divide the list up amongst the members.

Autosolidarity

Groups should be able to freeassociation their

The Free Association

Resolutionary

Organized Communications Strategies

Coordinated groups of activists simultaneously communicating a shared message are more effective than individuals speaking in isolation.

Doocracy

"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."

—Theodore Roosevelt, "Citizenship in a Republic," Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, 1910

"The man who really counts in the world is the doer, not the mere critic-the man who actually does the work, even if roughly and imperfectly, not the man who only talks or writes about how it ought to be done."

—Theodore Roosevelt

"Criticism is necessary and useful; it is often indispensable; but it can never take the place of action, or be even a poor substitute for it. The function of the mere critic is of very subordinate usefulness. It is the doer of deeds who actually counts in the battle for life, and not the man who looks on and says how the fight ought to be fought, without himself sharing the stress and the danger."

—Theodore Roosevelt

http://www.theodore-roosevelt.com/trsorbonnespeech.html

http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/life/quotes.htm

Becoming an Activist

http://www.infidels.org/activist/making.html

• Talk with those who agree with your viewpoint and offer a sounding-board for each other, reinforcing and strengthening your viewpoints.
• Talk to others who may not be aware of your viewpoint. Let them know of your viewpoint and of others who share it, what they're doing.
• Talk to others who you know disagree with your viewpoint. Engage in persuasive (but not confrontational) conversation to test your and their *views against the other. See how well your viewpoint stands against theirs.
• Read/Listen to the media on a regular basis to learn about recent developments regarding the causes you support.
• Do research to discover organizations which support your viewpoint or cause, using the public library, an Internet Browser, or following up on *authors and media sources who have written articles which support your viewpoint. Educate yourself by learning what these organizations know *and have done about your cause.
• Provide a one-time contribution to any of these organizations which advocate your viewpoint.
• Prepare a database / card file of all organizations you discover that support your cause, including contact person, address and phone numbers, *and any other related information such as clippings of their advocacy efforts. Use such acquired information to strengthen your viewpoint.
• Prepare a database / card file of all organizations you discover that oppose your cause, including contact person, address and phone numbers, *and any other related information such as clippings of their advocacy efforts. Use such acquired information to test your viewpoint.
• Read/Listen to the media on a regular basis to study its presentation of the causes you support. Write a response to any articles or shows which *seem to disagree with your viewpoint. Set a periodic personal goal to reach, say, two letters/month.
• Listen to talk shows which touch on issues of concern to you. Participate on a call-in basis to share your viewpoint. Set a periodic personal goal *to reach, say, two call-in shows/month.
• Regularly support organizations which advocate your viewpoint. Become a member if you can afford it; or contribute money, time, or other *resources you may have to offer.
• Pay attention to local political efforts that appear opposed to your viewpoint. Make your opposing viewpoint known in these efforts to any/all *government officials privy to these efforts through a letter, a phone call, or personal appearance.
• Purchase 'Gift' memberships to the organizations that you support for local libraries and/or government officials so that they are kept apprised *of the efforts and information being promulgated by the organizations you support.
• Participate regularly in local discussion groups that support your viewpoint. Contribute your ideas and opinions to these groups as often as you *can.
• Support political candidates who strongly identify with your viewpoint, through money, time, or other resources.
• Write an article advocating your cause and submit it to a publication which supports that cause.
• Write an article advocating your cause and submit it to a publication which is neutral to that cause.
• Make a public commitment to regularly contribute in some way to an organization which supports your cause.
• Propose a project which you believe will further your cause and present it to others who may support your project.
• Take an advisory role in one of the organizations that supports your cause.
• Recruit another to join and support one of the organizations that supports your cause.
• Participate in a project sponsored by another.
• Offer to lead your (or someone else's) project to bring it to fruition.
• Find a friendly public forum which is interested in and supportive of your viewpoint. Speak on behalf of your cause in this forum.
• Find a neutral public forum which will allow you to voice your viewpoint. Speak on behalf of your cause in this forum.
• Lobby/campaign for money and/or resources for an organization that supports your viewpoint.
• Take a leadership role in one of the organizations that supports your cause.