Hi Booiacs,
I’ve been a bit busy lately, so have not been able to post or comment much. Well, that and I’m a natural lurker. I even lurk on my own blog! But anyway, things are a bit freed up now, and I have a proposal for a collaborative project. And connecting the dots.
As some of you know, I’ve published a small, international magazine online for a number of years. It has waxed and waned through the years, as time and finances allowed… as it’s been an all volunteer operation, focused on opening up communication and on promoting a world without borders, and has not be for the purpose of making money, it has gotten put aside from time to time when circumstances required.
Anyway, over the past few months, a few things have converged for me, that have not only allowed me to focus on building up the magazine again, but also to think about the direction — a brief window of time where I am in a position to devote time and energy to it, the election of 2004, and the certainty that what we need is a new international progressive movement renaissance, in the small spaces as well as the large. More than that, I think that we must hang together and stick up for one another, regardless of our personal pet interests.
What does any of this have to do with you, you may be asking?
Follow me over the flip and I’ll tell you.
First, not all that many people read blogs, comparatively. Yet. Some don’t know what they are, and others have a mental image of some loser sitting around in their basement typing out their opinions on everything. That is slowly changing. I have an older Democrat friend who will only visit “mainstream” blogs… Josh Marshall, Tapped, and so on. When Markos appeared on C-SPAN, all of a sudden he too was in the “approved” section (one good argument for bloggers not disdaining offered air time).
Anyway, I’ve been thinking for a time on how to build bridges… bloggers, writers, wonks, thinkers, doers, readers and so on. And also various interests.. feminism, environmentalism, labor, etc. I don’t have any software or programming skills, so that was out. I’ve published a couple of pieces from the kos site, but regardless of what the site says, I don’t feel comfortable not working directly with the authors – which I am actually doing with a few now, but even that doesn’t accomplish what I think is needed. I could start my own blog, but didn’t quite see where that would get me. I did have a glimmer of an idea for one organization, which I still think is viable, but I did it backwards so it needs more work. So, I decided to fall back on that old adage.. “go with what you know”.
I’d like to put out a special issue of the magazine that is the collaborative effort of Human Beams and the Booman Tribune writers. Others as well, if they are interested. Actually, I’d like to do a number of such special issues over the next few months, as I have a specific purpose in mind… not only funneling people through the magazine to the blog(s), but also into effective action and involvement. More on that later.
The theme for the first special issue would be women. Why women? Well, at the moment, women’s rights are under assault, sometimes way under the radar, all over the place. And this affects different people in a variety of ways. While poor or middle class women in the US are humiliated and inconvenienced by nutty religious scolds masquerading as pharmacists, poor women in other parts of the world are dying from lack of needed medication or information, that they have been prevented from accessing due to yet another group of nutty religious scolds. While people are busy trying to shove lesbians back into the closet and bring back full discrimination, in other countries they are not even acknowledged to exist, and some risk very bad stuff if it’s found out they do.
Anyway, what I was thinking is not so much a bunch of disparate articles about women (although those are nice too) but collaborative research and writing, addressing the core subject from specific directions and connecting the dots. Women and environment, labor, education, human rights, and so on, worldwide. Not any sort of anti male thing, in fact I hope men also join in the project. And not a US centric thing, although I do think if women in “the most powerful country in the world” are unable to secure their rights, we have little chance of helping others do so.
A later theme would address all the topics from the point of view of environmentalists, again connecting all the dots. Or human rights, or any of the other subjects. We are all in this together, and we must all stand up for one another, especially these days. Separating out into individual interests, without clear acknowledgement of the interconnections, reminds me of the ‘divide and conquer’ strategy, which right wingers have certainly taken advantage of.
If it turns out like I think it could, there could be a pdf or e-book thingy of each special issue, available for printing out, which is another way of funneling people who are not online into online communities, and also into online/offline involvement in a progressive movement. I am working simultaneously on the action/involvement areas… such as drawing a line in the sand for those pharmacists and other things (anyone interested in helping with that is more than welcome as well).
Anyway, there are of course more details, but this is getting super long. I’ll be happy to answer any questions, and if anyone is interested in this project, we can start a discussion of just what form it would take and all that.
This sounds fantastic! I’ve noticed the same problem, when you tell people you got some piece of news on a blog they roll their eyes. When you tell them it’s sourced, makes no difference. Somehow if it’s in print, that makes it more real.
The topic is a good choice too, women are losing rights incredibly fast.
Yep, I get the eye-roll too (even virtually!). I am not sure why blogs seem so foreign to people… possibly because the word itself is so unappealing, or something. Anwyay, I think introducing people to blogs in a different way might work, and also combining the energies of bloggers and non bloggers and activists.
As for women’s rights, they certainly are under attack. Ductapefatwa pointed out, in one of his postings, something about the oppression or diminishing of women being necessary to bring about anti populace agendas. I’ll have to find the direct quote, it explains it well.
The SCUM (So Called Unbiased Media) have managed to deprecate blogs in many people’s minds. We are not controlled by the big 6 and therefore need to be demolished.
Bring back the fairness in broadcasting rule!
btw, my first post here! Cool userid I got. Should I call my diary The 700 Club?
Fillmore East: Fillmore West
Virginia Beach: San Francisco
or something like that.
Hi Mark, welcome to the site.
The media seems to deliberately misunderstand what blogs are, and the difference between a personal “what I did last night” blog and ones with political or social purpose. It’s in their best interests to denigrate blogs (although some of them are realizing they’d better get in on the act as well).
I think that is changing a bit, but they still don’t seem to like them much.
I am certainly willing to help in anything that will advance women’s rights. I am not sure just what you are proposing, could you make it a little clearer as to what part you want us to play in this.
I know I am bad at explaining things… takes me ten words to say what someone else can say in two.
The part the boo folks would play… basically, collaborative research, and writing. I would publish the articles online (under the chosen bylines of the authors… nicks or real names, with links to individual or group blogs) with the billing that it’s a combined effort of the BooTrib and Human Beams. Also, a pdf or other method of printing out the issue (we are not a print publication yet).
Women’s rights is just one small part of the proposal though, for the special issue relating to women. It’s more of a thing of connecting the dots… how issues affecting women throughout the world have ramifications in other areas. And how other issues, such as environmental, medical, educational, and so on affect women around the world. So, a thing connecting the dots with urban women, rural, all races, all economic backgrounds, all areas of the world… we all are in this together, and no man (or woman) is an island type thing.
I really can’t believe that many of the women you see with their jowls quivering with pleasure at the thought of denying basic health and reproductive information to a poor woman across the world really understand the results of some of these policies. So, connecting the dots in that way as well. Only I think that the positive aspect of what can be done and is being done in many areas should be at the forefront.
Jowls quivering what a visual. Ok I think I am tracking you now.
I am still struggling a bit with end object and mechanism.
What is the end object to be, disemminating info that’s been researched, etc. or seeking, finding and making an action plan that can be inplemented.
If the end result is to be action, then I would suggest developing ideas and research into petitions generated from an action committee type, that could also encompass other issues as well, design and produce petitions and developing a plan to deploy the petitions.
Research area, action planning area, disemination area.
Well I shall think more on it and see how this diary fleshes out and add more later.
In any case I am happy to see new ideas, new directions and most of all action.
We need a cause!!!!that we can sink our teeth into.!!!!I’m ready.
Yes, that’s it exactly… the hoped for end result is to be action. Various ones, as you say… and depending on what area of the country or world you are in. And that is the other side of the planning… the correlating action items whether it’s petitions or boycotts or whatever, but using the power we have but don’t use… mostly as consumers, or pointing to people already doing that very thing, etc.
It’s possible I may be giving a few wrong impressions however, with the initial focus on women, that the end result is to be a sort of women’s thing or women’s movement or whatever. It’s not, though.
set up a recurring themed diary on the subject of women’s rights, and create research areas. I will also be interested in looking into adding features to the site for archiving subjects and categorizing them for later access.
I do need to increase the membership/traffic of the site to keep it a viable enterprise. Anyone way you can help me do that will be greatly appreciated.
Sounds like a great project to me!
Oh, thats a great idea! The separate subject diaries would keep things categorized and also help people better understand where things are headed.
I think it would help to increase both membership and traffic, as non blog type persons read something and think… ‘wow, i’d like to see more work by that person’ or ‘i’d like to get involved’, and they follow the links. It’s a small thing, but every little bit helps ;).
In this diary for reference and such. There is something to fit most everyone’s area of interest, I think, so project participants can choose from which direction they would like to approach the issue.
I forgot to address this. Individuals who contribute hold the copyright to their own work. That’s how we’ve always operated and it seems to work fine.
So, once something is written, it belongs to the writer… I would prefer that if it is written as a contribution to the special issue, that it not be published elsewhere first, so as not to lessen the overall impact, but that is completely up to the individual author.
This also goes for photos, etc.