Self-Defense Networks from the Grassroots

Submitted to It’s Going Down

Do you think that it might be possible to invent new and collective ways to keep the most vulnerable within our communities safe from harm in these hard times?

Suppose we prepare ourselves with education and training to intervene when hate crimes occur.  Imagine neighbors and friends joining together to study and understand the widest variety of helping tactics while making plans to help each other out.

An individual in trouble – or someone observing an attack – would immediately inform and activate their own network friends via cell phone. Nearby friends could come running or walking or driving.  If it was needed other nearby networks could be activated.

Most importantly would be our human resolve and careful popular education.

Locally we would start small with plans to take concrete action against the hate growing within our midst. Eventually we could try to expand everywhere in the country. These networks could be national and include lots of different kinds of people and lots of different racial, national, gender, economic, and religious backgrounds. We would come together to explore our kindness and humanity and power in the face of hatred and intolerance.

We’d all have to agree to keep ourselves informed and involved and protected.

We would occasionally be inconvenienced and some level of risk is inevitable.  But perhaps this work could help open of our minds and hearts. We might find ways to rethink our prejudges and privileges; we could even abandon some of our individualism in order to take collective action.

Certainly we could network our cell phones and computers for emergency responses to harassment of immigrants and people of color – perhaps even ICE raids and Muslim baiting and LBGT hate crimes would eventually be resisted!

Certainly today there are many technological resources which could support this effort.  Someone(s) could build Apps that offer automated group texts, location finding GPS, and synced face/twitter notifications. Probably there would be many more tweaks to the technology side – and probably even a tweet or two to help get it all started.

Could you get together this week with a few friends to discuss organizing your own self-defense network? Let’s keep in touch and figure out together how to share ideas about this.

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