Good morning! I read Democracy in Retrograde and I've been building local community as a result...I'm also going to speak at a local rally soon. I'm scared of public speaking, but that video from Iowa pushed me to use my voice while I can 💪🏼 any encouragement is appreciated!
Hello! After reading Democracy in Retrograde I started a Civic Pod we call Bake and Bitch. Once a month, everyone brings a baked good, we vent (bitch) for the first 15 minutes together, then move on to what each person is doing to take action, what they want others to be aware of coming up, or sharing resources. So far several members have gotten involved in their neighborhood boards or gone to town halls, we’ve all called representatives and senators, donated to mutual aid and legal funds, signed up for volunteer work in our community, etc! We are holding each other accountable each month and have compiled tons of resources about a huge range of issues. And we of course have been sharing all our delicious baking recipes :)
I think it could be good if it can continue. I've stopped shopping at Target this year and today I normally would have swung by Starbucks to treat myself to a latte as a Friday treat after school drop off, but I won't be. My son's birthday is on Sunday, so I adjusted any last minute shopping for a card and cake ingredients to yesterday. If we can make this more long term, then I think we'll see something much bigger.
I disagree with the Necefer's point that "The assumption behind this type of boycott is that withholding consumer spending for a single day will send a financial shockwave through the economy." No organizer or participant I know assumed that. However the idea started, it quickly took on a life of its own and IMO was practice for people like me who live in a upper middle class bubble to practice taking collective action. My anecdotal experience is that my local stores were QUIET yesterday. I drove through the Target and Costco parking lots and was shocked - Fridays at suburban big box stores are usually hopping. My friends and I met for dinner at a locally owned restaurant and everyone showed up with cash. I think proving to ourselves that we can think critically and change our habits for a day can become a week and soon we will be able to do things that *actually* move the needle. If we learn from organizers of the past and work in a unified way (as a white woman, I am the first to say this is not our strong suit).
I think anything that people are willing to start is a good thing. Sometimes it takes baby steps. I did a little closets cleanup this week and reorganization of mine at my house. Ended up with one paper grocery bag to give away free of clothes/shoes on FBM. As I looked at my tidied closets, I was pretty disgusted by how much I have.
I still have less than many and more than many. But it felt gross, period. Every little thing I need and want I buy.
It also felt timely that I did this now, connected to my commitment to a low spend year and this particular day today. We need to cut back. I need to cut back. It’s keeping us so unfocused and distracted. There’s so much more to life that’s free and fresh and fun and healthy. May we start building more of that.
I have mixed feelings. I think it will be hard for us to see the impact of a single day, and consistent voting with our dollars is more impactful. It feels a bit like "donate $10 NOW to the campaign and it will fix everything!!" I heard late last night to avoid social media as well, so as to not give them ad dollars and that has honestly been the most eye opening for me.
I'm using today to make small switches where I can (i.e. transferring data to Storygraph instead of Goodreads, finally setting up my Signal account and inviting my family members) and only reading substacks from authors I trust. In the end, it's one day, so why not join in even if I'm not buying into the hype.
I didn't intend on participating in the boycott, but my gas tank is full and my house is stocked with all my essentials, so here we are. That said, I did have to post in support/defense of it as my brother posted that this boycott amounts to wanting America to fail.
I read Jill’s piece and it really echoes my complex feelings about this. Trump voters aren’t some abstract concept to me, they are literally my neighbors. I have the only rainbow flag in my entire town on my house.
And while I grieve and have *significant* anger toward them, I also know many of them to be good people. I also know that I was able to convince many of them to vote for state and local Dems, even if they couldn’t let go of their idolization of Trump. I know these split ticket voters well.
Good people can be scammed by a scammer. Our information ecosystem is royally fucked, propaganda is powerful, and as much as we want to pat ourselves on the back for making a better choice- we did not all “have access to the same information” or the capacity to identify what’s real and what’s an AI deepfake.
For me, my philosophy and survival strategy is “everyone I can reach is worth reaching.” That means everyone, including people I blame and may never forgive for how much my family is suffering right now. There are unreachable people, but I won’t give up on a single neighbor that I can reach. Frankly, my survival depends on it.
Totally relate to that feeling. ❤️🩹 It’s honestly so painful to know that my neighbors and loved ones chose this. I carry the weight of that grief every day.
Sometimes people make bad choices (and that includes choices that cause horrific harm) even if they aren’t inherently bad or irredeemable people. It’s so hard to reconcile that. What helped me move forward is realizing that I don’t have to forgive them to keep reaching or keep the door open.
If we are ever going to survive this and build a better world, I don’t see how it’s possible to do that without every person we can get on our side. And if we completely shun people we otherwise could have reached, they may have no one to turn to if/when they start questioning if they’ve been manipulated and scammed.
Thanks for the roundup! In my community a friend and I are staring a monthly womens community night at our community center. We’re starting with a book swap where you bring three books and then get to take 3 new ones home. Found sometimes this is an an alternative to a book club is everyone trying to find time to read the book is a challenge. Still brings people together in conversation! We did it with just people we knew a few months ago and are opening it up to a wider community in a few weeks. Very excited!
Book swap is a great idea! Another one I’ve been thinking about starting is BYOBook club where there’s no set book and everyone brings what they’re currently reading to chat about.
Love that! We had talked about a book pitch where you basically do that with one of your fav books and pitch it to everyone on why they should read it.
I looooove the Friday round up. This is organized in a way that doesn’t wreck my nervous system, makes me feel smarter, and wraps up with a little delight! 🫶
Trying to figure out how to be more involved with my neurodivergent self... Saw the Protect your Parks nationwide call to protest on Saturday and decided to help out! I created promotional graphics and distributed them to local groups/on social media. Hope we have a good turn out! But I need to relisten to Democracy in Retrograde to get more ideas.
PS anyone near Williamsport, MD, join me at the C&O Canal Cushwa Basin at Noon 3/1!
My takeaway from Carrie Bradshaw's wedding dress is this: You will never, EVER be better off for having worn a bird on your head. Not at your wedding, not ever. Never let anyone convince you that it's a good idea. This advice works in every aspect of life -- millions of people believed a lot of lies and empty promises and decided they'd be better off with a bloviating orange bird stuck to their heads, so here we are. There aren't even any eggs.
Hi! Loved the Friday round up! Thanks Emily! I attended my first town hall last night! Ruben Gallego (AZ) hosted a tele-town hall, which was cool cause I wouldn’t have been able to participate last night if I had to go in person. I had a question about the Save act, Emily you shared an article about it today, but I thought you had previously mentioned in your stories that wasn’t a high level of concern for you, has that changed? Should we be calling our reps about it? Thanks!
I am a health care professional and educator. I found Share My Lesson through the AFT and joined one of their book clubs. For fun, I will be celebrating Paczki Day, going to a park with my daughter, and maybe a Paczki Day party. I started volunteering in my local community with my extended family and we are loving it.
Just plugging library bookclubs. I joined one in my community and it's been so nice. Are most of the women my mom's age, yes. Is it one of my favorite things, also yes. Am I potentially the most liberal and passionate perspective sometimes... probably based on our discussion of Wandering Stars by Tommy Orange.
I think libraries are often open to allowing bookclubs to be run in their meeting spaces not organized by them, as well.
I've also had great experiences with bookclubs run through local bookstores if you have one in your area.
Lastly, I just created a new bookclub with the parents from my child's school on fable with option to meet/discuss in person as well. It's just a small group of parents but I'm hopeful maybe it will bind us in a more community active way.
The nice thing about Fable or Story graph bookclubs, is you can have micro conversations chapter by chapter without spoiling later segments. I actually just did a buddy read of Brave New World with a friend on there and it was so delightful to be able to dig into a text with someone else.
Thank you so much for all you do! After reading your book and subscribing to your content, I’ve made a conscious effort to get involved in my local legislative Dem group. They are pretty active but mostly retirees so I volunteered to help them with their social media to get more involved!
I love this so much! Have they been receptive? If you can help individual candidates, that's an area where a lot of help is needed from people who understand how the platforms work.
Loving your regular Substacks, Emily! I know you’ve been through so much (and still are managing so much) and I’m so glad you feel up to doing these again. They are filled with important info for us to expand in the fight.
Also…the woman selling the Carrie dress to fund her divorce. The way I love women. So many SNAPS!
My civic act for the weekend is that I signed up for the first Women’s Self Defense seminar put on by my local police department. It was today and it was SO good. I’m not sure what other police depts would have the budget to do this, but it was amazing for community engagement and felt extremely useful.
It feels like the SAVE act had everyone in my feed riled up at first, then it became, "this will never pass, and if it does things will have gotten to a point where we are all f***ed anyway." Now it seems like folks are taking it seriously again. How likely is it that this continues to move forward to becoming the law?
The only way it becomes law is if Senate Republicans get rid of the fillibuster, otherwise it would require 7 dems. I think that it's super important people know what the republicans can do but that the outrage bait tiktok accounts who were claiming that it was imminent was too much
Good morning! I read Democracy in Retrograde and I've been building local community as a result...I'm also going to speak at a local rally soon. I'm scared of public speaking, but that video from Iowa pushed me to use my voice while I can 💪🏼 any encouragement is appreciated!
wow!! GO YOU!
Thank you 🫡
Yes 🙌 that’s amazing and honestly I don’t even know you but I feel less alone and hopeless just knowing that there are people being brave.
Courage is contagious. Who knows who else you will inspire? 💜
"Courage is contagious" I had never thought of that before, but it is so true! Thank you 😊
Hello! After reading Democracy in Retrograde I started a Civic Pod we call Bake and Bitch. Once a month, everyone brings a baked good, we vent (bitch) for the first 15 minutes together, then move on to what each person is doing to take action, what they want others to be aware of coming up, or sharing resources. So far several members have gotten involved in their neighborhood boards or gone to town halls, we’ve all called representatives and senators, donated to mutual aid and legal funds, signed up for volunteer work in our community, etc! We are holding each other accountable each month and have compiled tons of resources about a huge range of issues. And we of course have been sharing all our delicious baking recipes :)
Love this idea! 🫶 Such a good way to get *on a roll* with civic engagement.
Love this idea! I’ve been thinking about starting a civic pod. Baked good addition is 🤌
I love this!!
I'm curious how people feel about the economic boycott today?
Personally, I found this substack to be compelling and put to words some feelings I've been having about it: https://drlennecefer.substack.com/p/boycotts-echo-chambers-and-the-illusion?r=1lqx0a&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true
Thank you for sharing this. I felt like it sort of validated my feelings with actual facts.
I think it could be good if it can continue. I've stopped shopping at Target this year and today I normally would have swung by Starbucks to treat myself to a latte as a Friday treat after school drop off, but I won't be. My son's birthday is on Sunday, so I adjusted any last minute shopping for a card and cake ingredients to yesterday. If we can make this more long term, then I think we'll see something much bigger.
I disagree with the Necefer's point that "The assumption behind this type of boycott is that withholding consumer spending for a single day will send a financial shockwave through the economy." No organizer or participant I know assumed that. However the idea started, it quickly took on a life of its own and IMO was practice for people like me who live in a upper middle class bubble to practice taking collective action. My anecdotal experience is that my local stores were QUIET yesterday. I drove through the Target and Costco parking lots and was shocked - Fridays at suburban big box stores are usually hopping. My friends and I met for dinner at a locally owned restaurant and everyone showed up with cash. I think proving to ourselves that we can think critically and change our habits for a day can become a week and soon we will be able to do things that *actually* move the needle. If we learn from organizers of the past and work in a unified way (as a white woman, I am the first to say this is not our strong suit).
I think anything that people are willing to start is a good thing. Sometimes it takes baby steps. I did a little closets cleanup this week and reorganization of mine at my house. Ended up with one paper grocery bag to give away free of clothes/shoes on FBM. As I looked at my tidied closets, I was pretty disgusted by how much I have.
I still have less than many and more than many. But it felt gross, period. Every little thing I need and want I buy.
It also felt timely that I did this now, connected to my commitment to a low spend year and this particular day today. We need to cut back. I need to cut back. It’s keeping us so unfocused and distracted. There’s so much more to life that’s free and fresh and fun and healthy. May we start building more of that.
I have mixed feelings. I think it will be hard for us to see the impact of a single day, and consistent voting with our dollars is more impactful. It feels a bit like "donate $10 NOW to the campaign and it will fix everything!!" I heard late last night to avoid social media as well, so as to not give them ad dollars and that has honestly been the most eye opening for me.
I'm using today to make small switches where I can (i.e. transferring data to Storygraph instead of Goodreads, finally setting up my Signal account and inviting my family members) and only reading substacks from authors I trust. In the end, it's one day, so why not join in even if I'm not buying into the hype.
I don’t think one day matters. 🤷♀️ quit spending dollars with shitty people long term, sure. But one day, meh.
I appreciated this take: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DGqUY_uRaS3/?igsh=b3k5ZzJlcGEwb3Y1
I didn't intend on participating in the boycott, but my gas tank is full and my house is stocked with all my essentials, so here we are. That said, I did have to post in support/defense of it as my brother posted that this boycott amounts to wanting America to fail.
I read Jill’s piece and it really echoes my complex feelings about this. Trump voters aren’t some abstract concept to me, they are literally my neighbors. I have the only rainbow flag in my entire town on my house.
And while I grieve and have *significant* anger toward them, I also know many of them to be good people. I also know that I was able to convince many of them to vote for state and local Dems, even if they couldn’t let go of their idolization of Trump. I know these split ticket voters well.
Good people can be scammed by a scammer. Our information ecosystem is royally fucked, propaganda is powerful, and as much as we want to pat ourselves on the back for making a better choice- we did not all “have access to the same information” or the capacity to identify what’s real and what’s an AI deepfake.
For me, my philosophy and survival strategy is “everyone I can reach is worth reaching.” That means everyone, including people I blame and may never forgive for how much my family is suffering right now. There are unreachable people, but I won’t give up on a single neighbor that I can reach. Frankly, my survival depends on it.
You said this so well. I’ve been struggling with the whole “how can I think these Trump voters that have been in my life are good people?”
Totally relate to that feeling. ❤️🩹 It’s honestly so painful to know that my neighbors and loved ones chose this. I carry the weight of that grief every day.
Sometimes people make bad choices (and that includes choices that cause horrific harm) even if they aren’t inherently bad or irredeemable people. It’s so hard to reconcile that. What helped me move forward is realizing that I don’t have to forgive them to keep reaching or keep the door open.
If we are ever going to survive this and build a better world, I don’t see how it’s possible to do that without every person we can get on our side. And if we completely shun people we otherwise could have reached, they may have no one to turn to if/when they start questioning if they’ve been manipulated and scammed.
Everyone I can reach is worth reaching. 💜
Love this viewpoint. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for the roundup! In my community a friend and I are staring a monthly womens community night at our community center. We’re starting with a book swap where you bring three books and then get to take 3 new ones home. Found sometimes this is an an alternative to a book club is everyone trying to find time to read the book is a challenge. Still brings people together in conversation! We did it with just people we knew a few months ago and are opening it up to a wider community in a few weeks. Very excited!
This is a great idea! I have also done an “article club” where it’s not just news articles but long form stuff
Book swap is a great idea! Another one I’ve been thinking about starting is BYOBook club where there’s no set book and everyone brings what they’re currently reading to chat about.
Love that! We had talked about a book pitch where you basically do that with one of your fav books and pitch it to everyone on why they should read it.
I looooove the Friday round up. This is organized in a way that doesn’t wreck my nervous system, makes me feel smarter, and wraps up with a little delight! 🫶
Yes! I had the same thought. Can’t wait to try the banana bread :-)
Trying to figure out how to be more involved with my neurodivergent self... Saw the Protect your Parks nationwide call to protest on Saturday and decided to help out! I created promotional graphics and distributed them to local groups/on social media. Hope we have a good turn out! But I need to relisten to Democracy in Retrograde to get more ideas.
PS anyone near Williamsport, MD, join me at the C&O Canal Cushwa Basin at Noon 3/1!
That's such a useful and impactful way to help!
I love this substack so much I sent money!
My takeaway from Carrie Bradshaw's wedding dress is this: You will never, EVER be better off for having worn a bird on your head. Not at your wedding, not ever. Never let anyone convince you that it's a good idea. This advice works in every aspect of life -- millions of people believed a lot of lies and empty promises and decided they'd be better off with a bloviating orange bird stuck to their heads, so here we are. There aren't even any eggs.
hahaha
Hi! Loved the Friday round up! Thanks Emily! I attended my first town hall last night! Ruben Gallego (AZ) hosted a tele-town hall, which was cool cause I wouldn’t have been able to participate last night if I had to go in person. I had a question about the Save act, Emily you shared an article about it today, but I thought you had previously mentioned in your stories that wasn’t a high level of concern for you, has that changed? Should we be calling our reps about it? Thanks!
I think it's important to know about! However I don't think it rises to the level of calling becuase it's not active moving legislation.
Ah ok that makes sense now, thanks!!
I am a health care professional and educator. I found Share My Lesson through the AFT and joined one of their book clubs. For fun, I will be celebrating Paczki Day, going to a park with my daughter, and maybe a Paczki Day party. I started volunteering in my local community with my extended family and we are loving it.
Thank you Emily for all you do!
Just plugging library bookclubs. I joined one in my community and it's been so nice. Are most of the women my mom's age, yes. Is it one of my favorite things, also yes. Am I potentially the most liberal and passionate perspective sometimes... probably based on our discussion of Wandering Stars by Tommy Orange.
I think libraries are often open to allowing bookclubs to be run in their meeting spaces not organized by them, as well.
I've also had great experiences with bookclubs run through local bookstores if you have one in your area.
Lastly, I just created a new bookclub with the parents from my child's school on fable with option to meet/discuss in person as well. It's just a small group of parents but I'm hopeful maybe it will bind us in a more community active way.
The nice thing about Fable or Story graph bookclubs, is you can have micro conversations chapter by chapter without spoiling later segments. I actually just did a buddy read of Brave New World with a friend on there and it was so delightful to be able to dig into a text with someone else.
Thank you so much for all you do! After reading your book and subscribing to your content, I’ve made a conscious effort to get involved in my local legislative Dem group. They are pretty active but mostly retirees so I volunteered to help them with their social media to get more involved!
I love this so much! Have they been receptive? If you can help individual candidates, that's an area where a lot of help is needed from people who understand how the platforms work.
Loving your regular Substacks, Emily! I know you’ve been through so much (and still are managing so much) and I’m so glad you feel up to doing these again. They are filled with important info for us to expand in the fight.
Also…the woman selling the Carrie dress to fund her divorce. The way I love women. So many SNAPS!
Thank you for all you do!!!
This was a fun (and enlightening, my tabs are exploding) list. Thank you for putting it out in the world, Emily.
My civic act for the weekend is that I signed up for the first Women’s Self Defense seminar put on by my local police department. It was today and it was SO good. I’m not sure what other police depts would have the budget to do this, but it was amazing for community engagement and felt extremely useful.
It feels like the SAVE act had everyone in my feed riled up at first, then it became, "this will never pass, and if it does things will have gotten to a point where we are all f***ed anyway." Now it seems like folks are taking it seriously again. How likely is it that this continues to move forward to becoming the law?
The only way it becomes law is if Senate Republicans get rid of the fillibuster, otherwise it would require 7 dems. I think that it's super important people know what the republicans can do but that the outrage bait tiktok accounts who were claiming that it was imminent was too much
That’s a great point - it’s easy to get swept up with how fast things are going, but knowing how much would have to happen for this to pass is useful.