Organizing Tips, #6: Organizing Solidarity: Part 1 of 4

 

Introduction:

The goal of organized solidarity is cost the other side more than they are willing to pay. The first rule of solidarity is to be persistent. The second rule is to use your imagination.

It is common for many people to think that what ever you write or say most people will remember most of it. Though there will be a few who remember more, in general, at best, people will remember about 10% of what they read or hear. That does not mean that the other 90% is wasted. In communicating a message to people you want to first give them enough information so that as they are reading or hearing you they agree mentally. Then if you want them to do something about that agreement you need to touch them emotionally, in other words you need them to care about what they are reading or hearing. So what you write or say needs to be clear, understood and well put together.

You can do somethings that will help determine the 10% people remember. One way is to add emotion to facts and then repeat the facts in a form of a question. This way you touch both their intellect, their emotions and you draw them in personally by a question. Here is an example of something I use sometimes with Leonard Peltier stuff: "The people of Pine Ridge live in very harsh conditions. The unemployment rate at the time of the reign of terror was about 96%. Can you imagine living in a community with an unemployment rate of about 96%?" Either by writing this or speaking this (when speaking it you pause after the question to give them time to think about an answer) you are drawing people in. In other words you must highlight what you want people to remember.

One comment that seems to come up on some e-mail lists, is, someone will say to keep things short and to the point. True, things to e-mail lists should not be too long, but what these people fail to realize is that they are talking about what their personal dislike is, rather than realizing that they already have information, they already care about it and so on. As Janet McCloud, a Native Elder and activist, use to say to me most every time I talked to her, "don't just preach to the converted." If you already know the information realize that others don't or you will just be talking to yourselves.

GIVE YOURSELF TIME IF POSSIBLE!!! There are two types of organizers. The first type is like a sprinter, though they get off fast they don't get very far before they burnout. This type of organizer likes to wait to the last moment and tries to get everything done quickly and often burns out. The other type of organizer is like a jogger, may not be fast but keeps going long after the spinter burns out and they get farther down the road. And this is important in most organizing like organizing solidarity because most things take time to win and you must last longer than the other side is willing to last.

Doing support work and follow-up effectively is a continuuous effort. The thing that burns out organizers more than anything else is what they give up in their normal life. In other words to do the organizing work you push something else to the sidelines of your life. That maybe your other interests, your relationships, and what not. In time those other parts of what was your normal life create stress for you and in time you burnout. If you are going to be anything more than a short time organizer you need to make your organizing a part of your normal life, continuously, not just once in a while, while at the same time give time to those other things that are important. This means as an organizer you need to not only organize others but you need to organize yourself and that means organizing your time.

A. Foundation:

Every group or organization should try to have as much of their foundation for solidarity work as possoble done before they need it. When the time of need comes about you don't want to waste time organizing yourself and your resources, rather you want to be abl;e to go to work directly on solidarity. I have seen groups that spend more time trying to organize themselves after the time of need comes about than they do organizing what they came together to do, and sometimes that can be the difference between success and failure.

In organizing your support for something you start off with your base of support. With IWW struggles our base of support is our membership. That is why I have for a number of years tried to get an IWW Solidarity list of most of our members, but some members who know much more than I do keep trashing the idea. After you reach your base of support go after your supporters who are non-members. Then go after people who are labor radicals. Then people who are just radicals and then the general public. The more you get away from your base of support the less responce you will get, but it is still important to try to get all the support you can get.

I would suggest that each branch start up a support notebook where they list all resources that could help them. Things like reporters names that you deal with, e-mail lists, news web sites, and so on.

B. Writing an appeal and/or article:

1. If a branch or group is sending this out by mail use your masthead.

2. Start off saying "Please Post Widely" or something like that. There are two reasons for that: First to plant the idea in people's minds to pass it on. And so that people who want to pass it on don't have to ask you if they can.

3. For e-mail and news web sites where you can't use your masthead state next who the appeal or article is from. It does make a difference with some people when they read something to know who the statement is from while they are reading it.

4. Don't start off with a bunch of facts a figures. You need to get the readers attention first. You may use what some call a hook, that is something that will pull the reader in.

5. Persent your information as a story. Most people find it easy to follow a story because that is how they get most of their information.

6. Don't put all your facts and figures together. Break them up a bit of a time in your story.

7. Be clear in what you write.

8. End your story with a clear conclusion.

9. State clearly what you want people to do with the information.

10. Have good and clear contact information and since this is the IWW it would be useful to always include iww.org.

11. Our struggles cost money so always request donations and make it clear and easy how to donate. Yes, I guess things like paypal are good but not everyone can use it. So make sure that to have also a mailing address. Even if you are just doing something by e-mail you should have this because someone may print the statement out and hand it to someone who does not have a computer.

12. Follow-up statements. These are needed for a number of reasons:

a. So that people can follow the story.

b. to keep support letters and what not going and donations coming in. I am not sure of the reason behind this but I have found in most everything I have been a part of that it is your second or third appeal that brings in the most support and donations.

c. If it is an up-coming event that you are building for, I normally send out three or more statements. The first one as soon as possible, the second one about two weeks before and then one a few days before the event.

Each statement should have up-dated information. And each should have a short part with background information to both remind people of what is going on and in case someone is reading the information for the first time.

13. It is good to have a longer piece of information for those that want more information.

14. It is best to have your information on white paper or very light colored paper that can be copied.

15. Photos and artwork are good but remember everytime a photo is copied it gets darker and less clear. And artwork can become lighter everytime it is copied. What I often will do is copy artwork or a photos a few generations to see what it will look like. Color photos and artwork look nice but most people cannot afford to make many copies of an appeal with color This is true on web sites. You could have your nice looking piece with color but also have a it without color so that it can be used.

16. Sign your statements and articles. Unsigned statements don't get reprinted much and have a far less impact. If you have a long term struggle you are doing publicity for it is a good idea to have a press person who signs the statement. One of the first things you need to create is creditablity. When people get use to seeing articles by someone on a struggle they tend to believe what is said. Having worked on a number of publications let me tell you that most publications don't like to print unsigned appeals. There is a myth that not signing things gives people more security, the fact of reality is the opposite.

17. Have people read over what you write to proofread and one thing I do when I can is to find someone who is unconnected to the situation and the group to read it over to see if they understand what is writen and don't take anything the wrong way. Groups, organizations, struggles and movements sometimes have their own way of speaking and terms have their own meanings and we sometimes write or say things that we are use to that others outside of our groups would not ubderstand correctly.

18. Don't write as if you are writing down or dumbing down to people. If the reader things you think you are smarter than they are you will lose them. Rather write and speak in as much of common language as possible.

C.. Fliers, posters and postering and handing out (flying squads):

1. Fliers and posters should state things clearly and be easy to read. If it is to be posted then it needs to be seen and a few main words should catch the eye and draw people into reading it.

2. Artwork or photos should make sense to the purpose of the flier or poster.

3. Make your fliers and posters in such a way so that they are easy to copy.You want people to make their own copies. Matter of fact you can come to depend upon that. In our local organizing for Peltier marches as much as half of the fliers and posters that get out are copied by supporters. So that means using white paper or light colored paper, don't use color photos or artwok or different color lettering. And remember each generation of copying photos will get darker and less clear and each generation of artwork tends to get lighter.

4. Posters and flier have an additional purpose beyond just telling about an event or an appeal for something. They also promote your cause or group. For example: In promoting the yearly Tacoma Peltier marches we are not just promoting an event with our fliers, posters, and mailing. We are getting Leonard's name and some of his story out in the public as much as possible. With IWW stuff you are planting Wobbly seeds in people's minds.

5. Have your contact information complete. I can't tell you how often I see fliers and posters without clear contract information. Sometimes people can't make your event but would like to help or donate money. Sometimes they want more information. Some groups like to just put phone numbers on fliers and posters. First off many people don't like calling people they don't know. I never put phone numbers on things because most calls I have gotten are really just people who want to talk to someone and I don't have time for that. If someone wants more information or has a question I would rather that they send me an e-mail or letter. That way I can send them something they can keep, I have an address for them and I can reply in my own time rather than just when someone calls. And phone numbers can be seen by those that you don't want to have your phone number. Same with mailing addresses. I would suggest never using a home address.

6. Postering. In some groups I have been involved with we list every place we find that we can put posters up at: coffee shops and houses, campus, union halls, libraries, bookstores, recond stores, video stories, communitiy centers and what ever. We then divide up the city into parts and make a list of places in each part and members of the group take a part of the city to poster. As we find new places we add them to our list. Sometimes we use "flying squads" to hit a whole town or part of a town. You can hit a lot of places with someone driving and then folks jump out and poster and then get picked up. Don't have to deal with parking that way.

7. Leaving fliers: Most cities have free newspapers that are found in different places. I will leave a stack of fliers next to them where I find them. People are use to picking up those free papers and some will pick up your flier also. Another good place is laudromats. Some of them will have places to post community notices. I will often leave a small stack of fliers in them. People have time to kill and will pick up things to read. Most people who use laudromats tend to be working class.

8. Flyering: In some groups I have been in we will look at movement Calendars and people will sign-up to flier different events. Sometimes we will use flying squads to flier major bus stops. Sometimes we will flier movies and concerts that draw working class people. It is best to flier them as people are leaving. Flyering big companies at quiting time is good also.

9. The idea of postering and fliering is that you have all ready dealt with your base of support and those who are active in other things, (those two will give you the greatest responce) then you go after the general public (the working class part of it) as much as you can, and though you will not get the same responce as your other work, you will get some responce

10. In your statements ask for help in getting out fliers and posters. Request an address to drop them off at or mail them to. Put a copy of you flier as an attactment and offer to send it to people.

D. Mailings and mailing lists

1, Mailing lists: Computer mailing programs allow you to have many lists rather than just one list. How complex your mailing lists are depends upon your needs. To give you an idea of how complex it could be I'll give you an example. For ten years I was the co-coordinator of the Northwest Leonard Peltier Support Network and we organized or helped to organize events in two states (63 Peltier marches). The following is how I had our mailing list divided up: Each section was sub-divided up by the first three zip code numbers so that we could direct mailings to different parts of the region for local events without having to print out the whole list and so that we could look up things easy. Also, if we were doing a regional event we would have an order of how the mailing would go out. Publications that may pick up an article or plug and event would go out first. Then our key contacts who would help get the word out by making copies. And then the farther away folks are would get the mailing before those closer to the event because they would have to make plans to come.

a. The key contact list. This list was of all of our key contacts and group members.

b. Organizations and groups: Having this list meant we could look up organizations and groups easy and sometime we did mailings to look for endorcements.

c. Tribal list: This was tribes and native organizations and some times we wanted to mail directly to them. For the IWW this could be a list of unions and labor groups.

d. Mass Media: to mail out press statements

e. alteranative/radical media

f. Radio: many cities will have college radio and alteranative radio which we would send them PSAs.

g. Our large mass list: At every event we did we passed around sign-up sheets and all those addresses and addresses of those that sent us letters and other people we ran across when on this list. Our large list was subdivded by the first three zip code numbers.

2. The make up of a mailing:

a. You want a flier that people can save and copy to get out on their own.

b. An article/statement that can be reprinted. Though you would send this out to publications hoping to get it printed, but some people could be involved in some publications like organization newsletters or what not and they would have the article/statement to use.

c. Cover letter: I will sometimes use a cover letter to request help and suggest ways to help, like: coping fliers, getting articles in publications and list some needs like video taping, photos and what not.

d. Mailer: I will often use a mailer sheet. That is most mailings are of things 8 1/2 by 11 sheets of paper folded in half. The mailer would also be 8 1/2 by 11 folded in half. One have would have the return address. The other half would be something with artwork or information. One piece of advise save your ranting and raving for the inside of your mailing and keep the outside toned way down. Yes mail can disappear for political reasons.

3. Like your fliers and posters, mailing should also have the additional purpose of planting seeds so include good information on how folks can get more information. On almost everything I put out on the IWW will have www.iww.orgon it somewhere.

4. Every letter you get from anyone worth while add their address to your mailing list.

5. For events I will often mail out packs of fliers and posters to people who I think may get them out.