Share your activism stories!

[cattygurl]

Have you joined an organization? Went protestin'? What issues are important to you, and what have you done/are interested in doing about it? Share your experiences, good and bad.

I think it's a good place to share out inner activists.

Me first...

My first activism was for environment protection. My friend's father was a ranger and used to help the local Uni's botany dep't by collecting seeds of native plants from the local arboretum and parks. My friend and I would follow him and help him collect specimen, along with the professor and college students (I was still in grade school). I learned about the importance of preservation here first. This led to my first protest/gathering, where a whole bunch of us wandered Walden Pond handing out leaflets to save Walden from real estate encroachment (yes, Thoreau's walden- some ass wanted to build bunch of crap all around it).

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1374/is_n1_v57/ai_19016005

I spent time after school handing out leaflets in front of grocery stores and putting up posters with some of my classmates in Concord, MA. I even baked my first batch of muffins to take to activists that were handing out leaflets that day...

That was the very first step in my life as a part-time activist (unfortunately, not a full-timer).

[Scowl]

I joined a revolutionary political organization in college; I've had mixed results with them. The people I met seemed to genuinely care, but I always felt like I was being groomed to be a "soldier of the revolution."

I was particularly jaded by the infighting I'd seen between all the different activist groups, and especially the apathy of the vast majority of the people we were trying to reach out to.

[blockthebox]

I started out by working at a women's shelter, but the screaming kids really got to me. Then I moved on to working with inmates, but the marriage proposals really got to me.

After that, I've mostly been helping people in the Asian community get papers and money and some semblance of justice. It's good but depressing as hell. I also like sitting with old people and listening to their stories.

[xian]

When I was 18, I worked for the AFL-CIO organizing in inner-city Chi. My roommate was a kid from the same projects that we were doing a lot of the outreach, so he really whipped me into shape in terms of empathizing and understanding what was going on.

We were supposed to be doing pro-union stuff, but it kind of turned into general social justice stuff. I mean, the union was a vital part of a better life for the people we were talking to, but we couldn't turn them down when they asked us to help them contact their alderman, or information on public health clinics, etc.

We worked 16 hour days and then went out to dance at night. I had a crappy fake ID that I'm sure wouldn't have worked if one of the kids in the program hadn't been pretty well connected in the club scene.

It was the first time that I really understood that we can live and breathe social justice and it keeps you going even without enough sleep or food or whatever. It was also when I realized how much I like going place where I know no one and getting to know people from the beginning.

[KeJia Sista]

Tong On Girls :shock:
Meli Trail of Tears Longhouse
December 12th Coalition
Chinese Progressive Association
David Wong Support Committee
Yu Kikamura Support Committee
Captain James Yee Support Committee
Oct. 22 Coalition Against Police Brutality
Leonard Peltier Support Committee
Organization of Chinese Americans

Demos for Mumia, protests against various police brutality cases against unarmed Asians, Blacks and Latinos murdered by NYPD.

Theres more. I hesitated to even put these for some reason.

Even when not in activist situations, I try to inject an element of activism or progressive politics into the atmosphere.

Ke Jia

[Minh]

Youth issues. :idea:


My younger brother participating in one of the East Timor programs having been assisted by Youth off the Streets.
http://public.fotki.com/Mintii/ :D

[Le Sheng Liu]

Well, this is a refreshing thread to read since few of the Asians I grew up with are involved in any causes as far as I can tell. Most of my volunteer/outreach/activism work has been around drug education & policy reform such as www.dancesafe.org and www.ssdp.org

I got info and pix on my website below.

[cattygurl]

^^Ah, you're involved in dancesafe!

I knew several ppl that were involved in dancesafe back in the day. I also know of several ppl that were involed in harm reduction activities.

I think drug policy/reform is long overdue, but there are too many political factors that keep drugs illegal. On a theoretical level, they make sense. On a practical level, the current drug laws are downright criminal and a socioeconomic travesty.

[Le Sheng Liu]

You said it right Cattygurl :wink: I've always felt like I should branch out to other causes besides drugs. But it's what I'm most familiar with and the drug war has so many problems attached to it (police corruption, prison overcrowding, racism, civil rights violations, foreign military policy, etc) that I practically am involved in all different causes.