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Resist
skippydumptruck
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I'm feeling pretty upset about the Trump regime and the direction my country is headed. Reading the news makes me sad and mad, and makes me feel ineffectual. I decided to make a list of things I could do to resist, and thought it might have more impact if I shared that information with all of you.
Credit to Ann Friedman, whose email newsletter I subscribe to , for prompting me to take action with her recent article in the New York Magazine.
1. If you are not yet registered to vote, register. And then vote.
TurboVote is a free website that will guide you through the process of registering to vote, help you vote by mail, and send you reminders so you never forget to vote.
2. Find out who your representatives are, and contact them to tell them what you care about.
You can input your address to find out who your Senators and Representative are here in one step. You can also look up your governor, state legislators, the mayor of your city, and other local officials here.
Countable keeps track of votes coming before Congress so you can let your representatives know how you'd like them to vote, and 5 Calls will provide you contacts and scripts if you'd like
Here are some tips for calling your members of Congress
3. Decide which issues you will fight for, and then fight.
Below I've compiled organizations that you can connect with to fight for issues you think are important. You can donate your time or you can donate money or both. Some may organize protests or events in which you can participate. Please don't feel overwhelmed because there are so many areas where you can help -- start with one that speaks to you.
==Women's Rights==
The Women's March is sustaining its momentum through 100 days of collective action. Every 10 days, you can join with others to take action.
Planned Parenthood provides reproductive health care for women. 7 things you can do to help planned parenthood
Center for Reproductive Rights uses the law to advance reproductive freedom as a fundamental human right
==Racism==
The Southern Poverty Law Center fights hate and bigotry and keeps tabs on hate groups
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund is a legal organization fighting for racial justice
Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund is a Latino legal civil rights organization
Showing Up for Racial Justice is organizing white people for racial justice
Color of Change is working to end the injustices Black people face
==LGBTQ Rights==
Human Rights Campaign stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer equality. What now?
Transgender Law Center works for change so that all people can live safely, authentically, and free from discrimination regardless of their gender identity or expression
The Trevor Project provides crisis intervention/suicide prevention for LGBTQ youth
==Immigration and Refugees==
Kaputa is organizing to protest the muslim ban
The International Rescue Committee helps people whose lives are shattered by conflict and disaster
The International Refugee Assistance Project mobilizes direct legal aid and systemic policy advocacy for refugees
Council on American-Islamic Relations works to enhance understanding of Islam and empower American Muslims
The National Iranian American Council works to promote greater understanding between the American and Iranian people
==Health Care==
Healthcare-NOW is advocating for a national single-payer healthcare system
National Disability Rights Network advocates for individuals with disabilities
==Our Environment==
National Resources Defense Council works to protect the environment, primarily through legal action
Greenpeace is a worldwide environmental campaigning organization
==Intersectional Organizations==
(of course, most of the organizations listed above care about more than a single issue)
ACLU defends civil liberties through legal action
4. Encourage others to resist.
Share information with your friends about the causes you care about. Encourage them to learn more about the causes they care about. Encourage them to vote, to contact their representatives, to volunteer and donate, to march and protest, to run for office themselves if so inclined.
5. This thread.
I'm not familiar with all the issues and who to recommend checking out. If you have additional stuff for this OP that might be helpful for others looking to resist, please PM me or @ me in this thread with the information and I'll add it.
Do something.
Credit to Ann Friedman, whose email newsletter I subscribe to , for prompting me to take action with her recent article in the New York Magazine.
1. If you are not yet registered to vote, register. And then vote.
TurboVote is a free website that will guide you through the process of registering to vote, help you vote by mail, and send you reminders so you never forget to vote.
2. Find out who your representatives are, and contact them to tell them what you care about.
You can input your address to find out who your Senators and Representative are here in one step. You can also look up your governor, state legislators, the mayor of your city, and other local officials here.
Countable keeps track of votes coming before Congress so you can let your representatives know how you'd like them to vote, and 5 Calls will provide you contacts and scripts if you'd like
Here are some tips for calling your members of Congress
3. Decide which issues you will fight for, and then fight.
Below I've compiled organizations that you can connect with to fight for issues you think are important. You can donate your time or you can donate money or both. Some may organize protests or events in which you can participate. Please don't feel overwhelmed because there are so many areas where you can help -- start with one that speaks to you.
Ann Friedman wrote:Pick at least one issue that does not affect you directly — if you’re white, police violence and criminal-justice reform is a great one — and commit to educating yourself about and taking action on it.
==Women's Rights==
The Women's March is sustaining its momentum through 100 days of collective action. Every 10 days, you can join with others to take action.
Planned Parenthood provides reproductive health care for women. 7 things you can do to help planned parenthood
Center for Reproductive Rights uses the law to advance reproductive freedom as a fundamental human right
==Racism==
The Southern Poverty Law Center fights hate and bigotry and keeps tabs on hate groups
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund is a legal organization fighting for racial justice
Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund is a Latino legal civil rights organization
Showing Up for Racial Justice is organizing white people for racial justice
Color of Change is working to end the injustices Black people face
==LGBTQ Rights==
Human Rights Campaign stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer equality. What now?
Transgender Law Center works for change so that all people can live safely, authentically, and free from discrimination regardless of their gender identity or expression
The Trevor Project provides crisis intervention/suicide prevention for LGBTQ youth
==Immigration and Refugees==
Kaputa is organizing to protest the muslim ban
The International Rescue Committee helps people whose lives are shattered by conflict and disaster
The International Refugee Assistance Project mobilizes direct legal aid and systemic policy advocacy for refugees
Council on American-Islamic Relations works to enhance understanding of Islam and empower American Muslims
The National Iranian American Council works to promote greater understanding between the American and Iranian people
==Health Care==
Healthcare-NOW is advocating for a national single-payer healthcare system
National Disability Rights Network advocates for individuals with disabilities
==Our Environment==
National Resources Defense Council works to protect the environment, primarily through legal action
Greenpeace is a worldwide environmental campaigning organization
==Intersectional Organizations==
(of course, most of the organizations listed above care about more than a single issue)
ACLU defends civil liberties through legal action
4. Encourage others to resist.
Share information with your friends about the causes you care about. Encourage them to learn more about the causes they care about. Encourage them to vote, to contact their representatives, to volunteer and donate, to march and protest, to run for office themselves if so inclined.
5. This thread.
I'm not familiar with all the issues and who to recommend checking out. If you have additional stuff for this OP that might be helpful for others looking to resist, please PM me or @ me in this thread with the information and I'll add it.
Do something.
skippydumptruck on
+47
This discussion has been closed.
Posts
This can be a great resource to bookmark, and to reference whenever we need to do something, or to get others involved.
PSN: ShinyRedKnight Xbox Live: ShinyRedKnight
http://www.altnps.org/
A MESSAGE FOR
PRESIDENT TRUMP
You can shut down the use of our social media accounts, but you cannot shut down the internet or take control of what we do with our personal time! We only wish to protect and preserve the environment for future generations to come.
- Arches, Shenandoah, Yosemite, Badlands, Yellowstone, Grand Canyon, Blue Ridge Parkway, Everglades, and Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
ah, it finally makes sense why Besty DeVos thinks schools need to protect themselves from bears.
maybe i'm streaming terrible dj right now if i am its here
Refugee/Immigration
* refugeerights.org (International Refugee Assistance Project)
Racism
* www.naacpldf.org (NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund)
* www.maldef.org (Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund)
Women's Rights
* www.reproductiverights.org (Center for Reproductive Rights)
LGBTQ
* thetrevorproject.org (Crisis Intervention/Suicide Prevention for LGBTQ Youth)
maybe i'm streaming terrible dj right now if i am its here
The reality is, the speed at which Trump's regime is moving in terms of Executive Orders and other policy decisions is making their goals and timeline of actions very apparent. It's making people very afraid, and it's making other people (like myself) realize that certain scenarios that we envisioned may very much be realistic and things we have to be prepared for.
In the past few days, I've gotten a lot of questions sent to me, largely over PM, over how people should just be safe. The kind of things they should acquire, do, learn, and be ready for to just survive and be okay in the coming weeks and months. I've been answering those questions on a case by case basis, but I think this thread is a good opportunity to kind of database those answers for people so they can just have them as needed.
Why were people coming to me, of all people about this stuff? Bit of background about myself, for people who don't know me. This isn't super duper relevant to what I'm talking about, it's not like it's absolutely necessary to know this stuff, so I'm gonna spoiler tag it and you can go ahead and skip it if you don't care.
As a result, he considered it good, reasonable parenting to raise his children to be prepared for worst case scenarios. Government collapse. Nuclear war. Hostile foreign invasion. Oppressive fascist or communist regimes. These were scenarios my father trained my brother and I for from like, the age we were able to walk. I was raised by a goofball doomsday prepper. It kinda sucked! Fortunately, my parents were divorced so I spent half my childhood with my mom who wasn't like that so I didn't turn out totally fuckin' warped.
Now, the thing is, as much as my dad was kind of a nut, much of the stuff he taught me as a kid wasn't really... wrong? Like it wasn't factually incorrect. It was ludicrous in terms of its practicable value to my life, but as an adult I did a lot more research and realized that the old man wasn't really incorrect and knew what the hell he was on about, even if the disastrous scenarios he was preparing for were absurd.
I'm in my mid-30's now and I've come to realize that a lot of the training, knowledge, and preparedness that I acquired as a child (much of which I never really lost, because some of it wasn't totally ridiculous and did sort of have real-life applications that weren't insane) suddenly, very scarily, might actually be useful again. So... that's something.
To be clear, I'm not going to advocate, recommend, or provide advice for any of the following things:
- Absurd, apocalyptic, "prepper" nonsense
- Anything illegal or that would imply direct defiance of the law
- Acquiring firearms, blades, melee weapons, or other kinds of self-defense or home defense implements
- Providing martial arts recommendations or other kinds of self-defense advice
- General "internet bad-ass" horse shit
- Stockpiling any kind of dangerous or prohibited substances, or how to make bombs or other dangerous devices
- Suggesting violence or violent actions of any kind
Cool? Good. Just want everyone to be on the same page here.
What I am going to provide advice on is how to be safe.
I am going to provide advice on the things you should acquire, the knowledge you should obtain, the things you should prepare for, to keep yourself and your loved ones safe in the coming weeks and months. Some of these things are "worst case scenario" type stuff, and to be quite frank, some of these things are stuff you should just be doing anyway because it's generally just good life advice and it's good to know or have anyway.
So with all that pre-amble out of the way, here we go...
1. Get a Kit
"Prepper" type people like to use the term "bug-out bag" or "go bag". I'm not a huge fan of those terms, because A.) they're overused by shit-people, and B.) they imply this sort of abject disastrous nature, like everything is over, you must leave now, it's all done.
I prefer the generic term "kit". Your kit is just... your emergency stuff. This is because it should absolutely, in all scenarios, include a first aid kit as its foundation (I will get into first aid in a later point). Your kit is the thing you go to in an emergency. And I don't just mean "Trump's jack-booted thugs are coming for your family now!"
I mean, "The electricity has gone out, because Trump's incompetent economic policies have resulted in power grid failures", or "due to civil unrest, there's rioting and looting going on and an ambulance can't get to you", or any number of very serious situations that in the coming months may arise. Or shit, think outside the dumb Trump box, your kit should be something you have ready in case of earthquakes, fires, tornados, etc. It should be something you can wake up from, go "OH FUCK" run to your closet, grab your shoes, and get out the fucking door and you'll be more or less okay?
The foundation of your Kit should be a first aid kit, but also a whole host of emergency supplies. My best advice is emergency disaster preparedness kits supplied from agencies like the Red Cross. I'm a big fan of this one supplied by the Canadian Red Cross:
https://products.redcross.ca/product/825/canadian-red-cross-emergency-preparedness-bundle
I am uncertain of their international shipping, however they helpfully list all the products that are actually in that kit, so even if they don't ship to where you live, you can generally find something equivalent from another agency or just purchase similar items piecemeal for your own Kit.
Don't rely entirely on the nylon bag that kit comes with, since that's just to store the stuff it comes with. Get a hiking pack with a good volume that has good waterproofing, and keep it stocked with full set of clean clothes and a waterproof jacket, and something suitably warm for your climate. If possible, an extra set of shoes isn't a bad idea to store in your kit, as it enables you to not even have shoes on in an emergency to grab your kit and get out the fucking door. You would be surprised in a situation like a house fire how vital that can be. Again, depending on your own situation, keeping spare cash in there is a fantastic idea, how much depends a lot on you and what you're able to do. My advice is generally enough to afford a Greyhound or equivalent, however much that is in your area. If you are a person who has to take medication for whatever reason, if it is practical and possible to keep spare medication in your kit for yourself or loved ones, try to do so. This is difficult and not always possible, and is a luxury. If you can, try. If you can't, don't sweat it.
2. Learn First Aid
If you are physically, mentally, and emotionally capable of providing First Aid (which to be fair, not all people are and if you're not, that is okay), then you absolutely should learn to do so if you can afford to take a class. Many workplaces may even pay for you to do so because it means you can be a designated first responder for their insurance and shit. All these dumb myths TV tells you about "b-but if I learn First Aid and if I see a person choking and I don't run and kiss them full on the mouth I could get sued!" is bullshit. That's not a real thing anywhere. If you can learn First Aid, do it. If you don't believe you are able because of anxiety or disability or whatever, or if you can't afford to take the classes because of time or money or both, that's okay. But if you can, you should. It makes a huge difference in the safety of people you care about and of human beings in general.
3. Improve Your Cardio
Forget martial arts. Forget all that shit. If you're not in good physical shape, if you don't have good cardio, work on it. Obviously, this advice has a giant asterisk next to it. Many people (including myself!) are physically disabled, or struggle with anxiety or depression or other mental illness that present very real and serious challenges to trying to get in good physical shape. Many people have practical realities of their time or financial situations that make it incredibly difficult to eke out a space in their life to exercise, and work/life balance is already a huge challenge for them. I get that. I get all of that. But if you want to ask me for real advice on safety, on how to survive what is a very scary incoming Trumpocalypse, it is absolutely remiss for me not to say "hey get in the best physical shape you are capable of getting for yourself", especially cardiovascularly.
4. Get a Bicycle
This is related to the cardio thing, in that it's not practical advice for all people. If you're physically disabled, or you can't financially afford a bike, or you live in a part of the world that's super fucking hostile to cycling, or whatever, sure okay. Don't get one. But if you can? Do it. Not just because it's good exercise, but because in a variety of scenarios when shit goes pear-shaped, cycling is a literal life-saver. Get a good quality mountain bike that has a cargo rack on it, the sort that you can attach a pack to. A trail bike. Get good at trail riding, not just city-riding, if possible. Because here's the reality: If infrastructure fails, if you have to get the fuck out of the city, if there's a gas shortage, if there's an oil embargo, if driver's licences get canceled for certain colors of people, suddenly a bike is your best friend. Cycling gets overlooked by "prepper culture" and zombie apocalypse nerds because it's... I dunno, not sufficiently masculine, I guess? And because it's not really in zombie apocalypse movies or post-apocalyptic video games because it doesn't seem "cool" or isn't super exciting to film, I guess? It's one of those boring but practical realities that those nerds don't like to think about when they'll have a 100 page thread about which katana is the best to buy.
5. Learn your local geography
Hit Google Maps. Do some urban exploring (possibly on your new bike to, y'know, build cardio). Learn footpaths and trails and ways in and out of the place you live in that are not major roads and highways. Learn how to navigate by compass (and, y'know, buy a compass for your kit if you haven't already). Like all these pieces of advice, customize it to the realities of your life and the free time you actually have to do this shit, and your levels of physical ability and capability. But the idea here is a time may come when you might find yourself unable to use major roads and highways, and knowing methods of egress that are non-standard may actually be pretty handy, and relying on Google Maps might not be a thing you can actually do, and navigating by compass and paper maps is a thing you could actually have to do. Learn how to do it.
---
This is all basic stuff. Stuff that shouldn't be even new to you if you were in like, Boy Scouts or Cadets or whatever, and if you were in the military you are probably making j/o motions while reading this post. But I wanted to stay away from true apocalypse "prepper" stuff, Chicken Little panic shit, or anything that sounds vaguely... insurgent-like. Just things that are generally good life advice, that are stuff to be quite honest all people should be doing anyway depending on their levels of physical, mental, financial, or temporal ability.
I might expand on it later, depending on the response this post gets. There you go.
EDIT: tweet deleted after goal reached. update posted below.
I am Canadian
So I am trying to write a letter to my MP and the PM about Donald Trump and how we need to oppose not only the travel ban, but most of the EO that are coming out of the White House, but I keep hitting a brick wall when it comes to what to actually do in this situation. I get through the introduction and it just devolves into "Fuck Trump".
Any ideas on how to word this letter?
update on this, target hit, and donations matched.
Double edit: Instead, I'll link this good article by The Sweethome about emergency preparedness supplies: http://thesweethome.com/reviews/emergency-preparedness/
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
1) A certified CPR/First Aid course. These are offered by the Red Cross pretty much everywhere and run about $50-100. You might be able to get your workplace to pay for it: many businesses need to have a certain number of certified first aid staff either because of explicit regulation or because it reduces the premiums on certain types of insurance.
2) Disaster first aid. These sometimes include a certificated first aid course, but usually they don't. Most first aid courses teach you how to stabilize somebody for the 20m before an ambulance arrives. Disaster first aid teaches you what to do when there isn't an ambulance coming. Red Cross also offers these courses in some areas; sometimes they're offered by city or county governments, local CERT chapters; and so forth. Here's an example from Seattle: http://www.seattle.gov/emergency-management/about-us/event-calendar#/?i=1 and if you Google your city's name plus "disaster first aid course" you can usually find one.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
another update, she actually matched $3500.