Get Up Stand Up

Feels like we’ve been marching our whole lives

On The Road Again

Looks like we are on the road again, gathering, standing, singing, marching, showing the world our outrage and serious concern. Again. How many times has it been for you? I lost count of the number of protests I’ve participated in years ago, but I’ll always show up as long as I am able, because it matters. My grandkids will too, I’m guessing; they helped make my sign more exciting, and we had a little civics lesson as they doodled. Unless they are taught otherwise, kids seem to have a natural sense of justice and fairness that makes equity fairly easy to explain in simple terms.

My whole family is fond of an old Bob Marley song, Get Up, Stand Up (and if you haven’t heard it, please give it a listen, it’s a great dancing around the house song!). It’s been running through my head lately as I’ve been reading about all the April 5 Hands Off rallies. So many people got up, showed up, stood up, yet media coverage was spotty and largely down played the huge numbers that gathered across the county, and in other countries as well (thank you Canada!!!)

A friend sent me this link to Rebecca Solnit’s Meditations In An Emergency post for April 6 (see below), and it was heartening in many ways, starting with the opening photo of thousands of people gathering in peaceful yet impassioned protest Salt Lake City, Utah. That’s one of the encouraging parts, because so many people gathered in red states and purple states as well as the usual blue places. Ironic that the regime seeking to polarize and divide us has managed to unite so many of us instead. Silver lining? We can sure use one!

https://www.meditationsinanemergency.com/

Underrated And Discounted

It was less heartening to see how little mention of these 1,300+ protest events made it to popular media, where major news outlets reported “scores” or “hundreds” of protestors nationwide when in fact there were thousands in many places and millions all together. Even here on Bainbridge Island some 1,500 people signed up with Indivisible or Hands Off to attend and it felt like there were even more filling the streets and overflowing into Waterfront Park. All ages, from teens to grandparents, finding comfort in seeing so many people standing up.

One offs are great for morale, but if we want to see change, we need to have conversations. Not patronizing lectures, not furious rants, but actual conversations with people who may not think as you do. Conversation are exchanges of views with all participants practicing deep, respectful listening to each other. The most lastingly effective way to change is personal, working one on one, finding common ground, whether in our right to receive Social Security, our need for Medicare and Medicaid, for more support for education, not less, whatever. Pick a topic you care strongly about, ask some open questions, and be curious about why someone might disagree. Once we aren’t butting heads, we can find points of agreement, and that’s where change begins to flow.

Write, Call, Listen

It’s also important to keep calling and writing to our elected officials, including those who don’t vote the way we would prefer them to. Call, write, and make your voice heard. Here’s a very easy way to do that: 5calls.org

Put in your zip code, choose a topic and you’ll find the right people to contact and the best ways to do that. You can call every day, about as many things as you want. They don’t care if you cry and there are handy scripts you can use if you have a hard time staying on track (so easy to get off on related tangents, right? Because there are SO MANY OTHER THINGS to work on). Take them one at a time, but please call. Again. And again. Focus on the midterms and call. Onward, right?