OK, I now have a gmail account. My gmail address is rpwolff750@gmail.com
Next baby step: How do I create a list of people who express an interest in being part of a network of activists? Eventually, I want their contact info, including zip codes, so that [if this ever gets off the ground] I can sort them by area, and try to get all the people in a geographic area in touch with one another, not just through me, so that they can as a group decide how and what they want to do.
If this thing does get going, I can function as the central fund raiser, maybe using PayPal [despite its questionable origins]. I have in mind trying to get people to commit to a small donation, five or ten dollars a month, the money to be used for whatever we decide we want to do.
In theory this should be easy, right? In practice it will no doubt turn out to be hard.
But for now, I just want to take little baby steps.
Bob, Philip here! You can create a group on Gmail so that you can send one message to multiple destinees. As for addresses and post codes etc, you will have to create a database on Excel . Once you have a larger group, you can divide it up into smaller ones, groupin people by city or State. We can't be very active activists but I hope thi will help you take the next baby step
ReplyDeletePerhaps a Facebook private group would be most efficient for what you want to do.
ReplyDeleteWhich brings up something you mentioned a day or two ago. You said that you just don't know why people voted for T***p. But if you want to know, it's simple: Go on Facebook.
Now I'm guessing that very few of the people in your social circle are T***p voters. However, the good thing about Facebook is that you're basically forced to eavesdrop on others' conversations. So if a friend of yours writes a anti-T***p post, oftentimes *their* friends will respond with pro-T***p comments. Others join in, and it inevitably devolves into a melange of insults and hurt feelings. Is this anecdotal? Sure. But you can only watch the same scenario unfold so many dozens of times before you begin to suspect a larger trend.
Let me share with you one exchange that has stuck in my mind. I have a friend, I'll call him Robert, who is a Syrian immigrant (came here as a young child). He wrote up an angry post in reaction to the results the election, saying something about how he was ashamed in the country. In response, one of his "friends" chimed in and said that he should really refrain from criticizing this country "since it has been so good to you and your family." Another friend of Robert's then interjected to note the subtle racism in this remark: it said, in effect, "Not only are you an immigrant, but worse, you're Middle-Eastern." Attempting to explain herself, this "friend" of Robert then said that she voted for Mr. DT because of Obamacare. Specifically, Obamacare was too expensive for her and her children, and so she had to resort to state-sponsored insurance, "which sucks." And her solution was to vote for the Republican! Oy!
Excel can be unwieldy and dangerous. I speak as someone who used it for organizing and unwittingly deleted a large amount of data while trying to manipulate it.
ReplyDeleteMy wife, who is formerly a political organizer and currently a development officer, says CiviCRM is the way to go. Viewable here: https://civicrm.org/ Apparently it takes a little bit of tech savviness, but not expertise. I a, not sure how much that is.
Prof., I'll email you. Everyone, what's the status of Bernie's org? I've seen several recent media appearances, but he either talked about his book or offered analysis of Trump's victory, not talked about his org.
ReplyDelete