Microblog Memes

Cool.

I've been doing such things, going to protests, volunteering for various advocacy/aid groups, helping to organize them, switched my entire career path etc., for nearly two decades...

...and what it looks like to me is... 80 to 90% of people treat what I do as an annoying ad they skip, as if me actually doing this in the real world, is indistinguishable from meaningless virtue signalling, and 10% of people are like you, coming in here and making a comment like that... for two decades.

I've been radicalized since getting simultaneous degrees in Econ and Poli Sci during the 07/08 financial crash, and since, have been doing everything I can to avert/mitigate this entirely predictable future we have now arrived at.

When was the last time you did something that actually had a positive effect on society?

At this point, I agree with Sergio Leone:

When I was young, I believed in three things: Marxism, the redemptive power of cinema, and dynamite.

Now I just believe in dynamite.

Luigi did it. (jk of course, how could he, he was helping me with my yard work that day)

"There are no heroes left in man"

Doing something may be worse than morning if it drains the resources and sates the fervour of those who should be doing something real

Often that's only if those in power worry there will be consequences for the protests being ignored. It could be as simply as worry about being kicked out of office, damage to property, or damage to them or their family (such as Republicans staying in line with Trump because of worries about stochastic terrorism).

Refusing to participate on the grounds that it isn’t the perfect solution is short-sighted.

Less an issue of "refusing to participate" and more a question of "what am I participating in?"

People who are enthusiastic about participating in a bigger organizing project still have a limited amount of resources - time, money, physical energy - to expend. Part of any organizational campaign is to connect with people and channel their efforts efficiently. Another part is highlighting your accomplishments such that participants feel rewarded and are enthusiastic about the next effort.

What did the Feb 28th "No Buy Day" accomplish? Who participated? Who benefited? What is there to brag about? Why would I want to participate again in the future? Who am I even coordinating with in the future?

I'll raise a counterpoint. Was at a pro-choice march in my home town years back. I got to meet other activists. I got to spend time with friends. I got to see how many people in my town were enthusiastic supporters of women's rights. All of that was productive and affirming, even (perhaps especially) in the face of Roe's repeal and the Trump electoral win. I got to meet other people and talk to them and plan out future volunteer efforts.

I didn't get any of that out of this movement. I didn't see people picketing outside retail stores or championing any explicit cause. I didn't see any efforts to confront protesters or any concessions made by business. I only knew one person, personally, who was actively participating and even she conceded she was just going with the flow and didn't have any expectations or know anyone else who was doing this.

This isn't an issue of perfection, its an issue of community and effort building. If there's a large cohort of activists who got in on this and are stronger for it, great! But I didn't see it anywhere in my neighborhood.

Oh I didn't refuse to participate, and I still encourage any effort we can manage, but these "don't buy anything on X days" concepts are themselves just deeply flawed. Don't buy anything for a week? Alright so either I just don't eat for a week, or I'm only offsetting purchases to before and after. It still doesn't make a dent. If your protest doesn't hurt the corpos, they don't care. Showing we can organize is great, but iterating on this format can't be the end goal.

By reducing our labor spend on these spend nothing days and not increasing our labor spends on these days surrounding them, we’ve increased our profits!

People actually eat fast food daily? No wonder Americans are so fat