Fave graph: "I see the same phenomenon with the anti-racist organizing trainings that I run for (mostly) Left-leaning White people. The students in my cohorts often come with an extremely sophisticated understanding of contemporary anti-oppression discourse, but many struggle when it comes time to identify current local issues where equity and justice are on the table. We have all learned— on the right and left— that political involvement lives in our ability to properly react to the controversy of the day. We’ve aren’t used to digging up the dirt about who is being sold up the river by our local zoning board, which mega-corporations are fleecing our city through TIFs or defrauding our state through crooked mineral rights leasings. We don’t know what our school board is actually debating in the 90% of meetings where the TV cameras don’t show up and nobody is yelling about CRT." YES, this is the heart of it. What does it look like to develop a political/spiritual practice of noticing, asking, redistributing, showing up again and again?
It's a reminder I need a lot too! Just in the last couple weeks, there've been multiple times that I've asked myself, when I find my mind distracted by some internet controversy or another, "why do I have time to be aware of this and yet I tell myself I'm too busy to find out what the city council is debating this week?"
Oh my gosh this is my struggle *every day*! It is so hard to draw the attention down to the local, which makes advising others to do the same extra difficult!
It's a reminder I need a lot too! Just in the last couple weeks, there've been multiple times that I've asked myself, when I find my mind distracted by some internet controversy or another, "why do I have time to be aware of this and yet I tell myself I'm too busy to find out what the city council is debating this week?"
That "love life" quote is so perfect! And this whole piece. Perfect. It reminded me of a local climate change gathering a few years ago that had presentations from Olympic medalist skiers and fishing guides, and then a wonderful dance party with a local band and it crossed my mind that showing and sharing this kind of joy in life was how we could win.
I'm sure this will be a topic in your book, but one thing I've been stuck on a lot over the past few years is how hard it can be to find common ground (or whatever equivalent) when one person is trying to engage conversation on a local issue, and the other is responding, for example, to something they've been hyped up about on Fox or equivalent. One of the barriers is often not knowing what people are arguing against (an example being CRT, which I had to scramble to learn about when it came up in our school board election because I, like most people, had never heard of it).
Ooh, happy to talk more about this any time because it's such a huge barrier-- all of our muscles are just so tweaked towards elevating up to the big national fight, that what you're describing is super common. Two quick thoughts: First, I make clear that I'm actually just not that interested in that issue-- if they want to talk about it, what I'm always curious about is how they see the power dynamics at play-- who has power, how are they exercising it, who is being screwed. But then, I just re-state the specific invitation: "what I want to work on is ______ local issue, if that's of interest to you, great, let's talk more... if that's not the case, let's talk if that ever changes."
Fave graph: "I see the same phenomenon with the anti-racist organizing trainings that I run for (mostly) Left-leaning White people. The students in my cohorts often come with an extremely sophisticated understanding of contemporary anti-oppression discourse, but many struggle when it comes time to identify current local issues where equity and justice are on the table. We have all learned— on the right and left— that political involvement lives in our ability to properly react to the controversy of the day. We’ve aren’t used to digging up the dirt about who is being sold up the river by our local zoning board, which mega-corporations are fleecing our city through TIFs or defrauding our state through crooked mineral rights leasings. We don’t know what our school board is actually debating in the 90% of meetings where the TV cameras don’t show up and nobody is yelling about CRT." YES, this is the heart of it. What does it look like to develop a political/spiritual practice of noticing, asking, redistributing, showing up again and again?
It's a reminder I need a lot too! Just in the last couple weeks, there've been multiple times that I've asked myself, when I find my mind distracted by some internet controversy or another, "why do I have time to be aware of this and yet I tell myself I'm too busy to find out what the city council is debating this week?"
Oh my gosh this is my struggle *every day*! It is so hard to draw the attention down to the local, which makes advising others to do the same extra difficult!
It's a reminder I need a lot too! Just in the last couple weeks, there've been multiple times that I've asked myself, when I find my mind distracted by some internet controversy or another, "why do I have time to be aware of this and yet I tell myself I'm too busy to find out what the city council is debating this week?"
That "love life" quote is so perfect! And this whole piece. Perfect. It reminded me of a local climate change gathering a few years ago that had presentations from Olympic medalist skiers and fishing guides, and then a wonderful dance party with a local band and it crossed my mind that showing and sharing this kind of joy in life was how we could win.
I'm sure this will be a topic in your book, but one thing I've been stuck on a lot over the past few years is how hard it can be to find common ground (or whatever equivalent) when one person is trying to engage conversation on a local issue, and the other is responding, for example, to something they've been hyped up about on Fox or equivalent. One of the barriers is often not knowing what people are arguing against (an example being CRT, which I had to scramble to learn about when it came up in our school board election because I, like most people, had never heard of it).
Ooh, happy to talk more about this any time because it's such a huge barrier-- all of our muscles are just so tweaked towards elevating up to the big national fight, that what you're describing is super common. Two quick thoughts: First, I make clear that I'm actually just not that interested in that issue-- if they want to talk about it, what I'm always curious about is how they see the power dynamics at play-- who has power, how are they exercising it, who is being screwed. But then, I just re-state the specific invitation: "what I want to work on is ______ local issue, if that's of interest to you, great, let's talk more... if that's not the case, let's talk if that ever changes."
That is a wonderful and very useful framing!