civic diary

Civic Diary 6-10-2016

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com, www.SeventhSanctum.com, and Steve’s Tumblr)

Well the California Primaries are over, my Twitter feed and news feed are filled with politics, and I’m of course thoughtful.

So I haven’t always followed up on primaries in the past, but as I’ve become more aware of politics and civic engagement, I see their importance.  It’s not just the presidential Primaries, but its the local voting as well – local politics has an influence on people’s lives, change minds, and build future political careers.  Those local bills and policies change a lot.  You’ll want to pay attention to.

Since that political meeting I wanted to go to was cancelled, I scheduled two more this month, figuring A) I can make at least one, and B) No one is going to cancel both of them.  I pretty much decided I want to find out how to do get out the vote work as a start to real civic engagement.

There are also local political clubs I found and joined one.  I figure it can’t hurt to check one out if I have time.

And speaking of time, I’m feeling the time crunch from work, social obligations, my projects, and more.  It really takes effort to make time for civic engagement, especially NEW civic engagement.  I’m having to rethink my plans and schedules.  That’s good, but man, it’s a bit of a pain.

Which brings in another realization – being civicly engaged is a long-term commitment.  yes, I knew this and understood it, yes some of my civic work has been long term, especially my more local and geek stuff.  Yes, I usually think long term.

But then I realized a good chunk of what influenced me was the 2016 election and the realization people could be better engaged in politics.  But still a apart of me had stopped thinking about anything past November.  I’m realizing that’s (obviously) short-sighted.

So yeah, I want to get more involved politically and see if there’s anything I can do for this election.  But I’m trying to shift my mind to long-term engagement beyond my flirting wit the idea of being on a city board – and I’m kind of drawing a blank right now as to what that is.

I mean I have my civic engagement in the form of social groups and museum work and speaking at cons and the like.  But it doesn’t quite feel like its got a lot of long-term planning in it – or even the long-term planning of doing “yeah, that’s good enough.”

However, I have come to realize about 70-80% of what I do outside of politics is pretty satisfying civicly.  I may need a bit more thought of what I’m doing, a few changes there, but I feel like my whole elder geek/geek job guru/social integrator thing works pretty good.

So that’s it for my Civic Diary.  How are you doing?

– Steve

Civic Diary 6/3/2016

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve’s Tumblr)

Hello everyone, it’s the latest Civic Diary. As noted I figured I’d post this late or not at all considering the weekend, and I figured I’d just do one this week. Not exatly what I’d want to do, but I do acknowledge my limits.

So this weekend I attended Fanime 2016. I do a lot of conventions where I speak – but this time it was just recreational, cosplay, and hanging out with friends in a mini-reunion. This got me thinking.

Lately my usual work at a museum doing accessioning has been on hold due to remodeling. I just had my first event I haven’t spoken at in years. So having a sudden spate of not doing “my community thing” was insightful. I felt like something was missing, a visceral sensation.

That sensation is a guide to Civic Engagement that trully is something from “you.”

There is something we humans crave in engagement, the desire for meaningful activity that ties us together. Having a rare moment where I did not have my museum work, did not have speaking, made me aware of that lack.

It led me to rethink – and appreciate – my various forms of community involvement. What was important? What mattered? Why did I do it? What more can I do. I’m going to be re-evaluting my civic engagements in the weeks to come now that I have this “gut feel” about what’s important.

I think I need to sort of write up my “system” for civic engagement if that makes sense. This is, of course, part of it.

What else is up?

  • That local political meetup?  Got cancelled.  So I need to find out where the next one is.  I’m annoyed, but thats the way it goes.
  • With all the eventful activities I got behind on “The Little Book Of Revolution” – I’ll try to finish that soon. Its kind of a heavy read to be blunt – plus right now I’m not in the mood to learn to Change People’s Minds.
  • I’ve been thinking over my idea of Strong and Weak links in Civic Engagement -and I hate the terms. I’m thinking of them more as Strong and Diffuse links – do we build specific powerful structures or more of a networked system. Voter registration via a political party is a Strong form of Civic Engagement. Charity work to distribute food to the needy is more diffuse. Running an anime convention is Strong, running a general writer meetup is Diffuse.
  • People really, really should appreciate the power of their fannish groups, game clubs, and more. Those connections provide a lot of support and social structure – as my own experiences at Fanime reminded me.
  • I’ve gotten behind on writing my representatives – though I wonder I’ve overfocused – since usually as of late I write them on trans rights. Do I keep mailing on the same thing or try to keep discussing different important items? For instance, this time I wrote them on voting rights.
  • I keep forgetting my state reps. I really need to remember them.
  • I’ve seen a county political party encourage letter writing to the media. Does that work? I admit the media is a pretty giant mess but I wonder if, much like me writing my reps, it at least has a chance to work?

Thats it for now. More next week!

– Steve

Civic Diary 5/20/2016

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve’s Tumblr)

Hello everyone, welcome to my weekly look at my attempts to be more civicly engaged.

And . . . not a lot has happened.

One job ended last week, a new job began this week, and I’ve got some vacation coming up. I’ve had a lot on my mind obviously.

Which is probably a good lesson in this entire quest to be more civicly engaged – it’s not a simple, linear process. You will get interrupted. You will need to take a break. You will have Other Stuff To Do.

I confess to some pangs of guilt as I’m busy working on this, and it’s opened up a whole new world to me – but also I realize that’s the way it is. The desire to do this is real, and it won’t go away just because I’m spending a week getting a new job.  Or anything else.

I think that’s one of the most important things of being civcly engaged is that it has to come from a “real” place. A desire for change. A desire to connect. A desire to find out what you should and can do. But you can’t fake it or do it out of guilt, it’ll be false and exhausting.

A lot of really civicly active people I see are passionate. They’re for real. This is part of what they live and breathe – and when you try to do this as well that’s what you’re evolving towards.

However I do have a few findings.

  • Still planning to attend a local political meeting in June to understand how I can get involved in GOTV. That’s gonna be a big step for me.
  • I like the place I live, and I figure next year I’ll give a look at being on a city board. I’m being realistic here as I have a lot on my plate – three books and then some. I also want to learn more about it, but the idea calls to me.
  • By following the news more I’m realizing how much does not get said. Did you realize the guy’s behind Ben and Jerry’s have been involved in protests supporting better voting rights?  They’re part of Democracy Awakening. That they got a arrested at a protest? That they’re releasing an ice cream in celebration of it? Exactly, you didn’t hear about it.  The news is not always what you think.
  • I’ve become far more aware of how ideas, often insane ones, spread throughout political consciousness. If you told me a few months ago people would be freaking out about transsexuals in bathrooms, I’d figure it’d be confined to some religious group or a single state.
  • That guide to activism I’m reading, The Little Book of Revolution, is very helpful, and I thoroughly recommend it – even as I’m still finishing it. I’m going to have to reread it a second time to develop more of a plan, but it’s fantastic.
  • By now my reviews of political news and activism ideas is pretty regular. That always keeps “tweaking” me to move forward – it’s building structure on top of the passion.
  • As people continue to rail against the political establishment – mostly Trump supporters but also some Sanders supporters – it’s clear a lot of people don’t get that an establishment gets things done. Organization is how things happen, and if you don’t like the establishment your choices are to influence, take over, or replace.
  • As much as I support protest, that’s only part of it. Protest can inspire, it can disrupt, it can influence, it can get people to organize. But it seems people value protest for protest’s sake (mostly angry screaming) and that’s even counterproductive.

I suspect I’m not going to be having a lot of deep civil insights the next week or two. But I’m going to keep posting these.

I think I like this as I’m doing this publicly to hold myself accountable. If I screw up, I screw up in front of the world (well, on a blog and anywhere from 30-150 readers). It’s nicely sobering.

Besides, the choices I make do affect the world.

– Steve