An on-going list of political and social action items to keep you aware in these rage-inducing times.
-Wow, fuck off: Mike Moon introduced a Missouri bill that would define any attempt to terminate a pregnancy into murder and require police to enforce it.
-Walking in two worlds: Canada’s ‘two-spirit’ doctor guiding trans teenagers.
-Predicted outcome of forcing abortion centers to close: DIY abortion attempts three times as prevalent in Texas as other states, study finds.
–Resistance in the Library: digital access, privacy, surveillance, ICE, and more. Thought provoking read!
-AILA will host a National Day of Action on March 5 in Washington, D.C. to advocate for USCIS accountability, immigration court reform, and due process for aspiring Americans.
-The Puentes Libres project connects people seeking asylum who have been forced to wait in Mexico with lawyers in the U.S. via teleconferencing.
– Fiona Apple will donate two years‘ worth of royalties from her hit song “Criminal” to immigration rights group While They Wait. Add it to your playlist!
Still useful stuff:
–100 Ways to Support—Not Appropriate From—Native People
-Help voters register before the 2020 primaries by donating to Spread the Vote’s Project ID initiative.
-The #HomeIsHere campaign provides resources for individuals receiving DACA protections.
– Resources for teachers, education volunteers, and students on empowering students to vote. Curriculae, planning a registration drive (4-week action plan), start a club (sample club constitution), and more!
–Four Ways to Destigmatize Abortion in Everyday Conversations
-What You Can Do to Help Women in States With Extreme Abortion Bans via the Cut.
-Use the Americans of Conscience worksheets to make and Action Plan and Self Care plan for 2019.
-Complete Guide to 2019 Artist Grants & Opportunities
– Check out Jen Hoffman’s new year activism challenge with her activism plan worksheet and a bonus self care worksheet. Sign up for her weekly newsletter which is so ridiculously more thorough than ours!
– Join the Handmaid’s Resistance! Get updates about events, resources, organizing your own event and more.
– fire up that cellular device and oppose the rollback of birth control coverage, defend childhood immigrants and DREAMers, denounce Trump’s ban on transgender troops, tell DeVos to maintain title IX protections for campus assault victims. Or pick any other five issues from 5 Calls, there are 31 active issues! Bonus points: follow up with emails and faxes through an app (see below) or good ole snail mail.
– Try the Stance app. Record a voice message and will send it directly to your representative’s phone.
– Head to the House of Representatives website to find your rep in congress and contact them! Emails are great, phone calls are better, but do something. Contact them until the poor, unpaid interns who have to answer the phones all day know you by name. Contact them until everyone cries because you will not stop until your rep knows exactly where you stand on all the issues.
– Follow your congress(wo)man on Twitter or periodically check-in (if clouding your social media feed with their trash is too repulsive), representatives will often tweet about upcoming town halls. Attend town halls.
– If you are in a time crunch and want to contact your senators or representatives but can’t get to a town hall, check out this genius texting bot called Resistbot. You will have to come up with a short message, but the bot will fax your legislators DAILY if you so desire. Resistbot is now available on Facebook Messenger, with even more features than ever. If you are not using this, it is simply the fastest, best way to contact your state and federal representatives.
– The Women’s March is a goldmine of resources and suggested actions to combat the growing voice of racism, bigotry, and sexism. Follow them on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram as well!
– Check out The American Civil Liberties Union’s (ACLU) handy-dandy doc Know Your Rights for when you’re out there on the street peacefully protesting and expressing your motherfuckin’ right to civil disobedience. In fact, while you’re at it, donate some cash monies if you can. Here in ‘Merica we vote with our dollars.
– **NEW!!** Indivisible has released a brand new version of the Indivisible Guide. New congress, new rules of engagement. Check it out!!
-If you are a Texas resident, you can go to the Texas Legislature Online and sign-up for an account, allowing you to view legislative content and add bills to an alert list. Whenever a bill you’ve put on your list is updated, you’ll receive an alert. Also, feel free to check out our list of Texas legislative bills that we are monitoring and updating. Stay woke, witches.
-Check out Planned Parenthood Texas Vote‘s guide on attending legislative committee hearings where the public is given the opportunity to provide input and feedback on proposed laws.
– Don’t over extend yourself! Yes, we’d all like to fix all the problems right the fuck now, but that’s not practical. You will burn yourself out if you try to keep up with everything in this country (and world for that matter) that needs fixing, so we recommend you come up with a short list of the most important social issues to you. This does not mean you don’t care about everything! We know you do! But we can’t all be doing everything all the time.
My ritual is to make a small offering. Usually it is a small teacup of tea, wine, sake, milk, or honey. Often if I am brewing tea in the morning I pour out the first sip and set it aside as the offering. Other times I offer flowers or lit incense.
