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I am reading the book Blueprint for Revolution that advocates non-violent activism. In fact, non-violence has to be a core value of your group and you have to a

by enaaem 5y ago

I am reading the book Blueprint for Revolution that advocates non-violent activism. In fact, non-violence has to be a core value of your group and you have to actively enforce it among your members. It's often said that violent protest are needed because change happens too slow. The book argues that violence is counterproductive and will only slow down whatever you want to achieve. Often times, authoritarian regimes actively provoke a violent response or plant infiltrators. Instead of being seen as a reasonable group of people with a just cause, you will be painted as rioters, thieves, and terrorists who are stealing for your own benefit or are bribed by foreign forces.

Izkata 5y ago
> The book argues that violence is counterproductive and will only slow down whatever you want to achieve. Example - BLM and the riots in 2020: https://civiqs.com/results/black_lives_matter https://civiqs.com/results/black_lives_matter A lot of people immediately switched from in-between to oppose, and they steadily kept losing support for almost a year and a half, the decline only stopping around this past October. Net support is back to where it was in mid-2018.
- enaaem 5y ago
  BLM and "Defund the Police" are interesting examples of really ineffective activism. First of all, the demands are too vague. You want to be as concrete as possible with your demands. Get small victories and take baby steps towards your goal. Secondly, you have to paint a better vision of the future. Just campaigning "Down with the dictator!" doesn't work. Most people have a job and a family to feed. Even if life sucks it's kinda stable and they don't want a civil war and chaos. You need to give a plan or vision of how everything can be 10 times better. That's why campaigning Defund the Police doesn't work, because then what? What's the plan? Chaos? All the riots in the background don't help either. An example of a better campaign could be to demand longer police training. US police trains for 6 months, while their European counterparts train for 3 years. I think most people don't even know the extend of how undertrained US police is. It's a campaign everyone can stand behind. Left and right. Who doesn't want better police? Even the police want better police. It's not even explicit anti-racist, but it would save many black lives. It's an easy victory you can take towards a bigger goal.

by enaaem 5y ago

Izkata 5y ago

> The book argues that violence is counterproductive and will only slow down whatever you want to achieve. Example - BLM and the riots in 2020: https://civiqs.com/results/black_lives_matter https://civiqs.com/results/black_lives_matter A lot of people immediately switched from in-between to oppose, and they steadily kept losing support for almost a year and a half, the decline only stopping around this past October. Net support is back to where it was in mid-2018.

enaaem 5y ago
BLM and "Defund the Police" are interesting examples of really ineffective activism. First of all, the demands are too vague. You want to be as concrete as possible with your demands. Get small victories and take baby steps towards your goal. Secondly, you have to paint a better vision of the future. Just campaigning "Down with the dictator!" doesn't work. Most people have a job and a family to feed. Even if life sucks it's kinda stable and they don't want a civil war and chaos. You need to give a plan or vision of how everything can be 10 times better. That's why campaigning Defund the Police doesn't work, because then what? What's the plan? Chaos? All the riots in the background don't help either. An example of a better campaign could be to demand longer police training. US police trains for 6 months, while their European counterparts train for 3 years. I think most people don't even know the extend of how undertrained US police is. It's a campaign everyone can stand behind. Left and right. Who doesn't want better police? Even the police want better police. It's not even explicit anti-racist, but it would save many black lives. It's an easy victory you can take towards a bigger goal.