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| My youngest daughter at a march last time he was in office. |
We won't stop.
We march, we vote, we write.
We do have limitations. Physical. Financial. We can't get to Washington. We struggle to keep food on the table, donations to important causes and candidates are slim. And we don't have some of the resources (personal skills or talents) to engage the same way some others do. We all have our own gifts, we use them as we can.
I prefer education. I am a volunteer educator with museums, parks, whoever. I often teach about zoology and ecology. I believe that it's important to remind people that we are part of our ecosystem: that we are not independent, isolated, or different from the other creatures and habitats of this planet, or from other people on this planet.
We march, we vote, we write.
We do have limitations. Physical. Financial. We can't get to Washington. We struggle to keep food on the table, donations to important causes and candidates are slim. And we don't have some of the resources (personal skills or talents) to engage the same way some others do. We all have our own gifts, we use them as we can.
I prefer education. I am a volunteer educator with museums, parks, whoever. I often teach about zoology and ecology. I believe that it's important to remind people that we are part of our ecosystem: that we are not independent, isolated, or different from the other creatures and habitats of this planet, or from other people on this planet.
I also teach some elements of history. It's important to know how we got here. The past builds on itself until it becomes the present. We have committed the same mistakes over and over, and sometimes found the same remedies over and over. I often talk about injustice and inequity, but in the context of the historic skills I'm teaching, usually sheep to shawl programs, or occasionally bread baking.
I've taken a bit of a break from some of that to support a more local effort in my community that organizes activities and weekly meals for members of my senior community. Now my role in that organization has been passed down, which lessens some of my responsibilities there, and allows me more time to get back to my other volunteer work, which is so important to me.
I'm writing this because all acts of resistance do not look like a march, or a letter writing campaign, or standing in the halls of Congress. They can be little acts that are part of our daily lives or our personal interests. In teaching Spanish/Mexican colonial era wool preparation, I can talk about women's historical roles, how they differed between different areas of colonization and why. The social interaction and power imbalance with the indigenous populations, and how traditional views of age, gender roles, and ethnicity compare with some of today's beliefs.
Sometimes it's easier for people to understand these issues in a different historical framework, something that doesn't carry the defensiveness of the present. In education, we talk about scaffolding: building on something already known, and we talk about framing: the context we place the information in. I've learned that people are much more willing to have these discussions framed in the terms of the past (and, I've found, often science fiction media) and then build the realization that the things that they find bad in the past (or in sci fi) are also bad in the here and now... and the same is true of the good.
So, yes, I'm continuing to go to all the places I went to before this happened. I'm going to learn. I'm going to teach. I'm going to experience and share the experiences. That is subversive. Those are my acts of resistance at a time when really, I just want to curl up and cry.
And yes, I will march. And yes, I will make my voice heard. But I will not underate the little acts of defiance and resistance that each and every one of us take part in every day, whether it's a social media post, or shopping small and/or minority owned businesses, or explaining how our lifestyles have impacted the planet, and the fallout from that (like the L.A. fires.)
I've taken a bit of a break from some of that to support a more local effort in my community that organizes activities and weekly meals for members of my senior community. Now my role in that organization has been passed down, which lessens some of my responsibilities there, and allows me more time to get back to my other volunteer work, which is so important to me.
I'm writing this because all acts of resistance do not look like a march, or a letter writing campaign, or standing in the halls of Congress. They can be little acts that are part of our daily lives or our personal interests. In teaching Spanish/Mexican colonial era wool preparation, I can talk about women's historical roles, how they differed between different areas of colonization and why. The social interaction and power imbalance with the indigenous populations, and how traditional views of age, gender roles, and ethnicity compare with some of today's beliefs.
Sometimes it's easier for people to understand these issues in a different historical framework, something that doesn't carry the defensiveness of the present. In education, we talk about scaffolding: building on something already known, and we talk about framing: the context we place the information in. I've learned that people are much more willing to have these discussions framed in the terms of the past (and, I've found, often science fiction media) and then build the realization that the things that they find bad in the past (or in sci fi) are also bad in the here and now... and the same is true of the good.
So, yes, I'm continuing to go to all the places I went to before this happened. I'm going to learn. I'm going to teach. I'm going to experience and share the experiences. That is subversive. Those are my acts of resistance at a time when really, I just want to curl up and cry.
And yes, I will march. And yes, I will make my voice heard. But I will not underate the little acts of defiance and resistance that each and every one of us take part in every day, whether it's a social media post, or shopping small and/or minority owned businesses, or explaining how our lifestyles have impacted the planet, and the fallout from that (like the L.A. fires.)
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