greenmountainboy’s Recent Comments

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  Wait a minute...

  I agree with the comments that Ascendancy and rh made and think they effectively made the argument that most of the negative responses to Nathan's piece largely missed his point.

  Two of which I want to respond to...

  Sam writes

  "If knocking on your fellow citizens doors and asking them to make a financial commitment to an issue isn't important work- I don't know what is.
  Money is important.  Money shows that people care. And, money pays for students to spend their summers organizing. Raising money is organizing."

  Wrong. Raising money can support organizing but it certainly isn't a very substantive form of organizing in and of itself. Organizing, grassroots organizing, was best defined by Saul Alinsky who listed its three principles as
  

  1. Win real, immediate, and tangible improvements in people's lives
     
  2. Re-align power relationships by building a strong and effective organization
     
  3. Empower people to become active and effective in the political process, and in their communities

  Nathan's piece does not suggest that raising money person to person is bad or that we shouldn't do it. It suggests that there are better ways to do it that won't disenfranchise people who have more to give. By canvassing solely for the sake of fundraising we are putting many of our best and brightest to work at something that only partially gets at the second principle. Nathan is suggesting that students and all other canvassers should be prepared with a broader ask that can work at the first and third of Alinsky's principles as well.

  2) The worst response of the bunch however came from Democratic Courage who said "It's understandable that Mr. Wyeth is so inexperienced and lacks any kind of broad perspective when it comes to organizing, but please don't impose it on the rest of us"

  As someone who has been doing community, campus, and political organizing since high school I am continually frustrated by the supposed "wisdom" of people like this who are so quick to dismiss brilliant minds like Nathan because he is young. Further, as someone who has organized and run campaigns with Nathan for over six years I can attest that he is anything but inexperienced.

  More generally, all of the respondents who tried to hold their age over Nathan as some sort of rebuttal in and of itself need to check themselves and realize that youth have much to add much to these debates, not because of their youth but simply because they are smart people, period. That's right, we have more to give than simply "energy" or "creativity." Oftentimes the most talented and successful organizers and thinkers out there are youth who don't get the chance to show it because people like Democratic Courage see us through the lens of age and not the quality of our ideas and talents.

  Further, arguing that we need to continue the traditional model of canvassing because we don't want to rely on corporations of big foundations is a false dilemma that again misses Nathan's point. There is a third way that Nathan hints at - using the canvass to cover all three of Alinsky's principles by giving the people behind those doors more than just an option to donate- say for instance an option to attend a Meetup or a Sierra Club and Beer event - the kind of organizing many Building Environmental Community organizers with the Sierra Club are doing. When I reference my experience on the Dean campaign later, you'll see why this sort of engagement can lead to greater fundraising.

  When Nathan wrote "when people are asked to do more, to take action and express outrage commensurate with the problems we all see in our world, even the busiest respond enthusiastically." I can see why some adults dismissed this as pure idealism- their rich friends probably don't want to give more than their money. However, in the student organizing world, Nathan's description is fairly apt and most students are quick to volunteer their time- we're the most service oriented generation that has ever been mapped. The hook to our service? We don't want to feel that we're being used for something that doesn't honor our commitment or vision and we only want to join a community that genuinely values and respects what we have to offer.

  Two related but distinct personal stories of my own might help illustrate the difference I think Nathan is trying to highlight - a difference that goes beyond canvassing methods and applies to how organizers in the progressive movement engage people at all levels.

  In 2000 I volunteered for the Democratic Party in Lebanon, NH, mostly working on Jeanne Shaheen's Senate campaign. I spent my summer registering students to vote and contacting students who were back from college to make sure they were registered to get their absentee ballots. One idea that I and other students had was to make a "top-ten list" of reasons students should register to vote. It had reasons like "Because Mr. Kelly (the Civics teacher everyone from our city knew) says that if you don't vote you can't complain" and "It's our future that politicians are deciding- we deserve a voice." After finishing the list we sent it off to the Manchester campaign headquarters for approval. We got it back the next day and our list was unrecognizable. The list was no longer the "top ten reasons to vote" it was the "top-ten reasons to vote for Jeanne Shaheen." It included ludicrous and patronizing suggestions like, "because her name rhymes."

  Fast forward to the summer of 2003 when I worked for Howard Dean out of his national headquarters in Burlington. When students - or anyone else for that matter - had an idea for how to organize locally, they did it through a meet-up or suggested it on the blog. They were part of a real community that was empowered to get engaged in substantive ways beyond just giving money. Furthermore, I can guarantee you that the people who were giving all those small donations were doing so in large part because they felt personally invested in the campaign - through Meetups and the blog etc. Essentially they were giving money because they were being asked to do more than give money. And they believed in it. That's what students and youth want and need- community where their ideas are shared and respected and can be utilized to organize for REAL change, not just quotas.
  On Why green-group canvassing operations need an overhaul posted 3 years, 6 months ago 28 Responses