Building anintergenerational

progressive movement

Separate oil and state

Education, activism andcommunity buildingOUR SELVES

The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives

V. 20 N.3 (#103) Spring 2011 $15.00ISSN 0840-7339

OUR SCHOOLSOur Schools/Our Selves is a quarterly journal on educationpublished by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA).

To subscribe to Our Schools/Our Selves, contact:Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA)205-75 Albert St., Ottawa, ON K1P 5E7Tel: 613.563.1341 Fax: 613.233.1458ccpa@policyalternatives.cawww.policyalternatives.ca

CRITICAL MASSA primer for social change

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OURSCHOOLS/OURSELVES•V.20N.3(#103)Spring2011

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Our Schools/Our Selves is published four times a year bythe Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, 205-75 AlbertSt., Ottawa, ON K1P 5E7. This is Volume 20, Number 3,Issue #103 of the journal (Spring 2011). Our Schools/OurSelves is a member of the Canadian Magazine PublishersAssociation. It is indexed in the Canadian Magazine Indexand the Alternative Press Index.

EDITORIAL BOARDKeren Brathwaite, Michael Corbett, Denise Doherty-Delorme, Bernie Froese-Germain, Larry Kuehn, Doug Little, George Martell, Patricia McAdie, MaritaMoll, Satu Repo, Heather-jane Robertson, Erika Shaker

ADVISORY BOARDLynn Carlile, Kari Dehli, Sarah Dopp, Ed Finn, David Flower, Karin Jordan,Clare Keating, Kirsten Kozolanka, David Livingstone, Mike Luff, DianeMeaghan, Janice Newson, Aleda O’Connor, Claire Polster, Anne Rodrigue,David Robinson, Mark Rosenfeld, Harry Smaller, Jennifer Sumner, Jim Turk,Sofia Vuorinen, Robert Whiteley

EXECUTIVE EDITORErika Shaker

EDITOR EMERITUSSatu Repo

ASSOCIATE EDITORLarry Kuehn

ISSUE EDITORErika Shaker

EDITORIAL OFFICESuite 205, 75 Albert Street, Ottawa, ON, K1P 5E7

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Cover Artwork: Nancy Reid (www.nrgrafix.com)Cover Design: Nancy Reid (www.nrgrafix.com)First Page: Nancy Reid (www.nrgrafix.com)

The opinions expressed in Our Schools/Our Selves are those of the authors,and do not necessarily reflect the views of the CCPA.

ContentsVOLUME 20, NUMBER 3 (#103) SPR ING 2011

9 Education RoundupLARRY KUEHN

15 Editorial NotesWork in Progress

ER IKA SHAKER

25 Viewpoints25 A Grandmother’s Wish

TAM GOOSSEN

31 “It’s Not My Job to Educate You”How anti-oppression activists are failing tobuild a movement

ASHLEY BURCZAK

45 Where Do We Go From Here?Building an intergenerational progressivemovement

KEVIN MILLS IP

57 Painting a Freak ShowEducation, activism and community building

SPENCER J . HARR ISON

71 Won’t Somebody PLEASE Think of theChildren?Promoting student-centred sexual healtheducation

SARAH A. BRYANT

81 The Alternative Federal BudgetBridging the gap between theory and practice

SHELLIE B IRD

91 Separate Oil & StateUsing the media for a critical eco-pedagogy inthe classroom

PAUL ORLOWSKI

121 Our City, Our FutureA case study in community engagement andpopular education

RYAN McGREAL

133 Politics and PedagogyDisrupting the criminalization of HIV

TIM McCASKELL

157 Where’s the Magic?Women and political change — insight intoCAWI’s Civic Participation Campaign

JENAALE INEE DAVARAJAH AND VALERIE STAM

171 A Case of PrioritiesPrimary education or mining profits

LARRY KUEHN

177 Democracy Re-inventedLessons learned from the global youthmovement

HENRY A. G IROUX

197 From Other Media197 I Don’t Get Twitter

GEORGE STEPHENSON

201 Bottled Water In ... School Teachers OutB ILL McCLELLAN

205 International205 ‘If There Is No Struggle…’

Teaching a people’s history of theabolitionB ILL B IGELOW

221 University Front221 The Tides are Turning

The backlash against the bottled waterindustry in CanadaELLY ADELAND

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A fter 20+ years working in andwith social justice organiza-

tions in various different capaci-ties, it suddenly occurred to methat I was no longer able to claimto be part of or represent the“younger generation.” And after Irecovered from the shock, I beganto think about what happensnext.What do progressive people do

when they realize that there arevictories we can no longer takefor granted, particularly when wesee some of those hard-foughtvictories being eroded? What dowe do when we find ourselveshaving oh-so-familiar argumentsin defense of the basic tenants ofa just society... but this time withpeople much younger rather thanthe grey-haired monied set weused to butt heads with?What do

we do when we realize that whatwe’re doing now — what we didin the past — to secure victoriesand move a progressive agendaforward may no longer be enough(if it ever was)?Periodically I hear criticism

from some of the establishedprogressive community abouthow today’s young activists havean unwarranted sense of entitle-ment (see, for example, some ofthe debates raging in feminism).But it makes me wonder: afterall the struggles of the past, andwith all the struggles of today,isn’t entitlement precisely thepoint? Isn’t the reason we con-tinue to toil for a better worldand a better future precisely soour children will be entitled to amore just, more equitable, fairerworld than the one we inherited?

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EDITORIAL NOTES

Work inProgressBY E R I K A S HAKE R

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Isn’t that what progress isabout?I’m not arguing that we should

forget the sacrifices that weremade— the backbreakingmentaland physical labour, the toll takenon families and personal relation-ships, the weeks spent on picketlines, the incarcerations, thedeaths — but I don’t see how wecan justify our claim that we’remaking these sacrifices so thatour children won’t have to worryabout equality or racism or child

care or pharmacare or safe work-places or a living wage or cleandrinking water or student debt ora million other things….and thencomplain that they don’t worryabout them.We want them to feelentitled to all these human rights;rights are things we should all beentitled to — rather than, say,optional perks like granite count-er tops or ipads.That said, we also need to do a

much better job at telling our sto-ries and making the strugglesthat have brought us to where weare today an integral part of oursocial fabric. We — all of us, andespecially our youngest — needto learn about what’s been won,and what’s been lost. We need todevelop a network of support thatprovides our struggles with his-torical context as well as one thatallows us to build on and learnfrom each other’s work in the

present and ultimately thefuture. And we need to figure outways to do that — to work withour debates and our differencesand our conflicts and our debates,not let them tear us apart.Because I think that those differ-ences will make our movement(s)stronger, more responsive, moreinclusive and, ultimately, moreresilient in the face of neoliberaloppression and opposition. Andon these things I think we need todo much better.The theme of this issue ofOur

Schools/Our Selves — “CriticalMass: A primer for socialchange” coalesced — as many ofthe themes of this journal do —over time, and as a result of anumber of conversations that cul-minated in a call for a discussionthat addresses this particularpoint in our social justice evolu-tion. And it tries to get at a fewkey questions: given social media,generational shifts, identity poli-tics, financial challenges and anincreasingly organized and well-funded conservative opposition,do we need to change how we “do”activism? Who are our teachersnow — and who will they be inthe next few decades? What canwe learn from those breakingnew ground? And how do webuild a movement that will con-tinue to further our social justicegoals, ensuring our continuedprogress towards a more just andequitable society for all of us?Ashley Burczak tackles some

of these questions in a verythoughtful, compassionate way

We need to learn about what’sbeen won, and what’s been lost.

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— a way that provides an infor-mal frame for much of this issueof OS/OS. She identifies the dif-ficulty many progressives have inbuilding a sense of communityand a network of support to resist(better funded and better organ-ized) anti-oppression agendas.

[M]ovements can only beeffective if they grow. Thatgrowth happens in twoways — by further involv-ing the people who alreadyagree with you, and byconvincing new people ofyour perspective. In thecase of the first group, theeffort required to build aconfident, effective newleader is fairly straightfor-ward. However, it requirestime, persistence, openconfrontation of oppressivedynamics within yourmovement, and a willing-ness to give up some cred-it, along with some controlover the shape of yourwork — efforts too many ofus are unwilling to make.

In the case of the secondgroup, the hard truth isthat we only have twooptions: we can destroyour oppressors, or we cantransform them. Even ifthe first option were possi-ble — and I don’t believe itreally is — I would ratherbe oppressed myself thanspend my days trying todestroy people.

Kevin Millsip’s contribution isdirectly connected to Ashley’s callfor comprehensive mentorship.Next Up is a BC-based projectdesigned to provide mentorshipin social justice work to youngpeople:

In general, the field of pro-gressive social changework does not have anintegrated approach toboth welcoming andgrounding young people.There is a particular dis-connect between theory,skills development, men-torship and action, andreflection opportuni-ties….This is when NextUp was created, with thegoal of to putting intopractice the understandingthat in order to have moreleaders, we need to investin leadership development.

Tim McCaskell examines thesteps involved in building an effec-tive social movement with theintent of bringing about positivesocial change — in this case, amulti-faceted campaign targetingthe criminalization of individualswith HIV-AIDS. He lays out therequired steps including populareducation, media work and mobi-lization — vital not just for thiscampaign but for others aswell. Inaddition to providing a thoughtfuland salient analysis of how tobuild social movements, his articleoutlines a case study in effectivepublic campaigning as well.

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The role of popular education insuccessful community campaignsis further developed in other arti-cles in this issue of OS/OS.Ryan McGreal and JenaaleineeDavarajah and Valerie Stam pro-vide potentially new templates(and lessons learned) addressingissues of community involvement,public empowerment, and engage-ment with the political process atthe local level. McGreal explores agrassroots municipal campaignfocused on issues of inner-citydevelopment and public financing,and provides readers with keystrategies that proved to be quitesuccessful in the face of a verywell-funded and politically-con-nected opposition. Davarajah andStam describe the Ottawa-basedCity for All Women Initiative(CAWI):

Learning goes well beyondthe classroom setting; real-izing this, the women ofCAWI have made it theirgoal to educate andencourage women fromdiverse backgrounds tobecome more involvedwithin their communityand city. Using the founda-tions of popular education,CAWI provides womenwith the appropriateknowledge and skill sets toactively challenge andinfluence city politics. Bydoing so, the organizationhas created a space wherewomen, especially thosefrom marginalized commu-

nities, can collectivelyidentify with the inequali-ties they face within thecity. Through theircollective efforts, thewomen of CAWI are ableto challenge the neoliberalstructuring within urbancentres that often polarizesuch groups, both sociallyand spatially.

Shellie Bird, a long-timeactivist, describes how she usedthe Alternative Federal Budget(AFB) as an entry point to exam-ine the relationship between the-ory and practice. Interestingly,she was able to address some ofher own misreadings of the rea-sons for the gap between policyand grassroots mobilization:

the work...is much morenuanced than I hadthought. I came tounderstand that it is oftenconstrained not so muchby political or ideologicaldifferences but by thevery practical realities oflimited time, resourcesand over-stretchedorganizations.

But what also became clear toher was the need for consistentand rigorous review of whatorganizations are doing to ensurethey continue to move towardstheir goals:

the more people’sorganizations take time

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for non-judgmental butrigorous review of theirestablished norms,practices and the assump-tions about how to carryout the work. the bettertheir chances of creatingthe necessary socialchange needed to win theprogressive policies theyadvance!

Community activism and edu-cation come together in other arti-cles in this issue: Tam Goossendescribes her experience as aToronto school trustee in adiverse community where therelationship between the commu-nity and the school was para-mount. She maintains that, 10years after amalgamation, weneed to reinvent our neighbour-hoods with the public school atthe centre, because:

I would much rather mygranddaughter attended aschool with a heart than aschool that emphasizesonly the academic aspectof learning. It is my wishthat her school will try itsbest to welcome andinclude all students andtheir families. It is mywish that her school willwork with the larger com-munity to make sure itsmost vulnerable studentsand their families get thenecessary help to improvetheir quality of life andaccess to a good education.

It is my wish that mygranddaughter will havefriends not just at theschool, but also at after-school activity programs atthe community centre, andthat as she gets older, shewill join a youth group co-organized by the schooland the community centre,and that, in time, she willbe a mentor to otheryouth. And the circle willturn.

As Tam explains, because of itsunique relationship with the sur-rounding community, the school isoften the most appropriate andeffective place to work for positivesocial change: this is the subject ofa number of OS/OS articles.Spencer Harrison describes hisrole as artist-in-residence atGeorges-Vanier Secondary Schoolin Toronto as providing a safespace to confront gender oppres-sion and homophobia, and theway in which art is used to dothis. Sarah Bryant examines sexeducation as a way to engage kidsin what and how they learn abouta topic with powerful and person-al ramifications. Bill Bigelowfrom Rethinking Schools talksabout his curriculum based on apeople’s history of the abolition.He explains:

I wanted students to seethat history is a series ofchoice-points and there isnothing inevitable aboutthe direction of society,

OUR SCHOOLS/OUR SELVE S

that where things movedepends on how we ana-lyze the world and how weact on that analysis.People like them — notonly famous leaders —make history.

Paul Orlowski deconstructsthe de-politicized way in whichenvironmental education is oftentaught, using his background inmedia criticism. He summarizes:

The goal of the criticaleducator is to ask animportant question. Thequestion I asked here wasthis:Why can’t we dosomething to stop the seri-ous threat to our natural

world caused by the oilindustry? ... Perhaps if weare serious about dealingwith climate change andother oil-related catastro-phes, an informed publicwill elect people into officewho are just as concernedabout the fate of the plan-et as they are.

George Stephenson humor-ously questions the role thatsocial media can play in record-ing political and social uprising— a new twist on the mediumbeing the message. Can the revo-lution really be tweeted? “Even ifthose involved in momentousevents manage to send outTwitter messages, they are given

Elly Adeland

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21

status because of the method ofdelivery rather than their con-tent. If someone left a phone mes-sage of 140 characters, the mediawouldn’t quote it endlessly.”Finally, Elly Adeland of thePolaris Institute takes this analy-sis of research and politicalactivism into the post-secondarycontext and examines the bot-tled-water-free campaigns takingplace on campuses across thecountry. She describes some ofthe particularly effective cam-paign techniques that, combinedwith hard research, were instru-mental in confronting the bot-tled-water industry and settingup an effective resistance.It’s no secret that the inherent-

ly political aspect of education andthe role of educators has comeunder fire recently (Wisconsincomes to mind — see “BottledWater In... School Teachers Out”in this issue). These implicationsare often international: LarryKuehn provides an overview ofCIDA’s decision to cut fundingto the Canadian Teachers’Federation’s international pro-grams. And where is CIDA’smoney now going?

Funding is being redirect-ed into “Corporate SocialResponsibility projects” ofbig mining companies suchas Barrick Gold and RioTinto….So there you haveit. The priorities of the cur-rent government are clear:no professional develop-ment for teachers in devel-

oping countries; instead,add to the profits ofCanadian mining compa-nies by providing govern-ment subsidies to theirinternational investments.

Henry Giroux examines therole youth are playing in recentinternational demonstrations,and suggests reasons why thiskeen awareness and action is notbeing reflected in American coun-terparts.

European students live insocieties where it becomes moredifficult to collapse public lifeinto largely private considera-tions. Students in these coun-tries have access to a widerrange of critical public spheres;politics in many of these coun-tries has not collapsed entirelyinto the spectacle ofcelebrity/commodity culture; left-oriented political parties stillexist; and labor unions havemore political and ideologicalclout than they do in the UnitedStates…. American youth must“understand their rights andknow how to demand them” andrealize “their own power” justlike their counterparts in Egypt,Libya, Tunisia, Serbia, and allthose other countries coming outof the darkness, heralded by theright to freedom, justice andequality.

The theme of this issue is afairly complex and multi-facetedone: obviously none of this is easy,

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and these aren’t minor discussionpoints. We’re talking about con-stant re-examination of who weare and how we “do” socialchange, how we work and moveforward together, how we healwounds, and all within a globalcontext where the money and thepower structure often appears tobe insurmountably one-sided.But the stakes are far too high topretend that where we are is any-where close to good enough. Andwe’re at far too critical a point in

time to just leave this banner tobe taken up by the “next” genera-tion because, as Ashley Burczakexplains, “if we don’t find a way todo those things — to mentor newleaders, build community, andpersuade those who disagreewith us, we will lose. We’ll leavethe world worse. And to be hon-est, I’m not sure how much morethe world can stand.”And debates on the left

notwithstanding, on that I thinkwe can all agree.

* * *

Erika Shaker is the Executive Editor of Our School/Our Selves.

Recently, I was talking to a friend who has quite a bit of expe-rience with the conservative movement in America, specifi-

cally with the activists within that movement who focus onbuilding new conservative leadership. She’s writing her disser-tation about their work, which has meant spending hours at lib-ertarian conferences, anti-choice leadership trainings, and semi-nars for the Glenn Becks of tomorrow. How my friend has main-tained her admirable sanity is an open question, but she haslearned a great deal.One thing she has learned has come very much a surprise to

her: the mentorship, nurturing, and overall kindness — in otherwords, the sense of community—within the conservative move-ment far outweighs what she has found in years of feminist andother progressive activism. In the course of her research, she hasreceived more help from people who know she does not agreewith them than she ever has from the elders who are supposed-ly “on her side”. Ironically, she has found that some of the mostrabid individualists — people who, for example, want to turn theprovision of water into a corporate venture— are better at build-ing connections and unity than we progressives are, even withall our lip service to the villages it takes to raise children.

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ASHLEY BURCZAK

“It’sNotMy Job toEducateYou”How anti-oppression activists arefailing to build a movement

The second thing my friend has noticed in right-wing activistshas been an impressive openness. Despite the rigidity of theirideology, these activists are willing to work with people who dis-agree with them: to engage them with the goal of eventuallymoving them toward a more conservative worldview. In contrast,

when the young conserva-tive activists she meetstell her about theirencounters with progres-sives, they reliablydescribe our behavior asverging on outright cruel-ty. They are called names,say they are humiliatedin class by professors who

supposedly abhor the use of authority to harm others, and gen-erally forced out of any dialogue that might change their ideas.I’ve been worrying a lot about these two observations, and try-

ing to make sense of them because it’s not hard to see that, iftrue, the implications for anti-oppression organizing are notgood. If we are failing to build community among those who doagree with us AND shutting out anyone who doesn’t alreadyagree with us, there isn’t much of anywhere for our “movement”to go.There are several reasons the Right is so effective at ensuring

the world is currently speeding toward dystopia like a steamtrain,many of which have nothing to do with our actions.A smallgroup of rich corporate types regularly throws hundreds of mil-lions of dollars toward financing mentorship of new right-wingactivists, academics, “journalists,” and media figures. We justdon’t have that kind of money. They also have another edge: it isalso much easier to protect oppression than it is to oppose it.Anti-oppression activists are faced with the difficult task of con-vincing people that the basic models they live by need to be rad-ically changed, without access to much in the way of institution-al power or media voice. On the other hand, the narrative sup-porting oppression is already fully formed in the public mind,and it is reinforced daily: pretty much every commercial on TVis a commercial for white-supremacist capitalist patriarchy.Each time we begin a public discussion about creating an anti-

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Anti-oppression activists are facedwith the difficult task of convincingpeople that the basic models theylive by need to be radically changed,without access to much in the way ofinstitutional power or media voice.

oppression narrative, we start from scratch. The basic fabric ofour culture supports the work of activists working to maintainoppression, while working against alternative visions.These are very real challenges which we do need to respond

to in our organizing strategies. But there are also areas whereanti-oppression activists create our own problems. Most notably,we’re falling down on efforts at building new leadership, evenwhen we do have access to resources.In 2001 I, along with a group of other young activists, started

Students Active For Ending Rape (SAFER), an organizationdevoted to providing college students in the U.S. with the train-ing and mentorship they need to become effective anti-violenceactivists. The response from many established social justice fun-ders was less than enthusiastic. While SAFER did manage tofind funding and survive, the majority of our budget was raisedthrough grassroots efforts, pieced together bit by bit. Unlike theorganizations opposing us, who operate with large multi-yeargrants provided by a few funders and are therefore able to spendmost of their energy on programmatic work, SAFER has beenforced to focus a tremendous amount of energy on fundraising—a fact that has no doubt slowed the organization’s efforts.There are a variety of reasons for the funding disparity

between SAFER and its opponents. As I’ve mentioned, right-wing causes have much greater access to institutional resources,especially corporate money.And, as is unfortunately common,wewere dismissed by many funders due to our focus on so-called“women’s issues” — considered unimportant by many male pro-gressives. However, it was not merely sexism or corporate influ-ence that limited our efforts. Quite simply, social justice organiz-ers of the baby boom generation did not recognize the impor-tance of building young leaders in the same way those on theRight do.Before it was a national nonprofit organization, SAFER began

as a grassroots effort by students at Columbia University toimprove the school’s sexual assault prevention and response pol-icy. SAFER built a genuinely powerful grassroots movementfrom the ground up. We secured 1,800 signatures on a petitionsupporting our work, organized several protests involving hun-dreds of students, had a mailing list of over 150 students, andhad an active leadership of dozens. Only about five students

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were actively involved in opposing our work; however, those fivestudents found their voices greatly amplified by the support pro-vided to them by a larger right-wing infrastructure. In contrastto our experience of spending weeks unsuccessfully searching fora single organization that could provide us with support or men-torship when we faced a blitz of media attacks coordinated by anational right-wing organization, the most involved studentopposing SAFER’s work was provided with a $4,000 fellowshipfrom the right-wing Phillips Foundation to write articles in theschool paper. He was given the opportunity to network with mul-tiple conservative organizations and leaders, even finding him-self on a private yachting trip with conservative icon William F.Buckley. He was invited to write an opinion piece about theColumbia Policy for the New York Post, and mentored by conser-vative journalists from various outlets. The student went on to asuccessful career in the conservative movement, where he con-tinues to work today.The contrast between our experience as young feminist

activists and that of our conservative counterparts could not bemore stark. But this represents a much larger trend.

• The Leadership Institute, which trains thousands ofAmerican college students to be effective right-wingactivists, was formed in 1979 and has since expandedto include a budget of $9.1 million. The Institute hasformed hundreds of independent campus conservativegroups, to which it provides strategic, networking andfinancial support as needed.1

• The annual budget of the Intercollegiate StudiesInstitute, the leading right-wing organization focusingon American college campuses, increased from $1 millionto $6 million, in the years between 1989 and 2001.2

• Conservative foundations have begun a campaign tocreate academic centres devoted to conservativethought, providing funding for colleges and universitiesto hire right-wing faculty. According to the NationalAssociation of Scholars, 37 of these programs exist.Twenty were created in the last three years.3

• Evidencing intense recruiting efforts on campuses,60% of registrants at the 2010 Conservative Political

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Action Conference (CPAC), a major annual gatheringof conservative activists, were college students.4

The Right has prioritized efforts to build young leaders. Theyhave spent tremendous time and money developing structuresenabling new activists to enter their communities, educatingthose activists on the core tenets of the movement, and provid-ing them with the skills they need to lead. Many older anti-oppression activists, on the other hand, have often focused onmaintaining their ownpower within stagnant oreven dying organizations.Somehow we seem to haveadopted a movement-widesense of what amounts tosocial justice Calvinism —the idea that there are afew perfect individualswho have it “right,” whileeveryone else is hopelessand not worth talking to.Instead of nurturing youngactivists, we reject them for failing to have a fully formed analy-sis of kyriarchy5 at an age when this would be nearly impossi-ble, or worse, for having innovative ideas that challenge us, orfor calling us out on our own replication of oppressive systems.Instead of building coalitions around specific changes thatwould improve people’s lives, we insist that everyone accept ourentire philosophy. Instead of making a clear argument in favorof concrete institutional change, we engage in name-calling andattempts at shaming anyone who disagrees with us. We forgetour ideals and become cynical, rigid ideologues.By failing to reach out, and neglecting to mentor new leaders,

we are clearly acting in ways that are destructive to an anti-oppression movement. And, while I’m sure the people my friendstudies would disagree, I don’t think that anti-oppressionactivists are doing this out of selfishness or meanness. I don’tthink we lack empathy or open-mindedness. I think we’re in pain.Most of the people working to end oppression are working to

end our own oppression. That means that, unlike conservative

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The Right has prioritized efforts tobuild young leaders. They have spenttremendous time and money develop-ing structures enabling new activiststo enter their communities, educatingthose activists on the core tenets ofthe movement, and providing themwith the skills they need to lead.

activists, we never get a break from the hostility. Unlike conser-vative activists, we’re not just trying to increase the power wealready have, we’re fighting for our lives. We can never just gohome and watch TV, or just go to community centres or places of

worship or contemplationand revive ourselves, or justgo to a party and have fun.Even assuming we have theresources, we never knowwhen the next blow willcome, or where it will comefrom. We’ve learned fromhard experience that anyinteraction with anotherperson— even those we love

most, even those who claim to be our allies — can become a gut-wrenching fight to assert our humanity. The vigilance isexhausting.Anti-oppression activists aren’t falling down on the organiz-

ing job because we’re hypocrites.We have big, real, deep reasonsfor failing to build community, and failing to reach out. We real-ly do. I have all the empathy in the world for everyone who hasever felt too damn tired to explain one more damn time to some-one dripping with privileged smugness that oppression does, infact, exist, or too overwhelmed to provide the kind of hardcorementorship necessary to build a strong new leader.But.If we don’t find a way to do those things — to mentor new

leaders, build community, and persuade those who disagree withus,we will lose.We’ll leave the world worse.And to be honest, I’mnot sure how much more the world can stand.If we’re going be effective in building a movement, I believe

some personal transformation is in order.Most urgently, we haveto find ways to process our pain constructively, whatever thatmeans for us. I don’t know the best way to live with the fact thata lot of people won’t ever see us as fully human. I can’t tell any-one how to handle the daily humiliations and dangers. I certain-ly don’t have any advice on the “right” way to wrap your mindaround things like mass rape or the torture of children.Ultimately, I think we will all have slightly different ways of cop-

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We’ve learned from hard experiencethat any interaction with anotherperson — even those we love most,even those who claim to be ourallies — can become a gut-wrench-ing fight to assert our humanity. Thevigilance is exhausting.

ing. For some it will take the form of communities specificallydevoted to healing, or friendships with others who share theirbeliefs. Others will find peace in spiritual practice, which, at itsbest, can give us the ability to balance radical patience with rad-ical urgency. Regardless of what we find for ourselves, acknowl-edging how hard it is to take these issues on, and making aneffort to work with our feelings, is as important as any otheraspect of anti-oppression work. It may be a cliché, but it is acliché for a reason: if we can’t find personal peace, I don’t believewe’re ever going to have the skills or energy necessary to build amore peaceful world.Just as we have to find a way to process our pain and exhaus-

tion in order that we have the energy to invite someone new tojoin our work, we have to find a way to communicate with peo-ple who disagree with us constructively. An anti-oppressionmovement that doesn’t take the time to build new leaders orreach new communities starts to look pretty much like acade-mia-feminism today: a few exhausted activists who eventuallybecome women’s studies or ethnic studies or sociology professorswho mostly avoid anyone who disagrees with them, and whooften rarely engage in meaningful social change efforts outsideof academia. Add a handful of overworked lawyers locked in animpossible effort to hold back the tide of fascism, and stir.It’s a basic fact of grassroots organizing that movements can

only be effective if they grow. That growth happens in two ways— by further involving the people who already agree with you,and by convincing new people of your perspective. In the case ofthe first group, the effort required to build a confident, effectivenew leader is fairly straightforward. However, it requires time,persistence, open confrontation of oppressive dynamics withinyour movement, and a willingness to give up some credit, alongwith some control over the shape of your work — efforts toomany of us are unwilling to make.In the case of the second group, the hard truth is that we only

have two options: we can destroy our oppressors, or we cantransform them. Even if the first option were possible — and Idon’t believe it really is — I would rather be oppressed myselfthan spend my days trying to destroy people.We all know that most opposition to our work comes from

those who benefit from our oppression. And here’s the thing: the

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beneficiaries of oppression have more power in all sorts of situa-tions. White people end up running corporations. Men end upleading places of worship or running media outlets or becomingCEOs and making hiring decisions. Rich people decide whichnonprofit organizations get to exist, and which ones never makeit off the ground. Not to mention, pretty much everyone listensto people with privilege more intently, and with more respect.In other words, privileged people are usually the people with

the ability to change how the world works. And this means theycan be useful for our movements. Oppressed people don’t havenearly as much power to make the kind of institutional changesthat could lead to widespread revolution in people’s attitudesand behaviors (which is part of that whole “oppression” situa-

tion). Social change is com-plicated, and there are a lotof different elements to it.But one thing is certain: ifwe want to change society,we have to change the peo-ple who have power. If, as isoften the case, we don’t havethe ability to get them out of

power, that means changing them internally. I’m not saying thatwe shouldn’t work within our own oppressed communities aswell, or that we don’t need to organize and nurture ourselves asoppressed people — that work is essential. The leading edge ofanti-oppression thought will always be with the oppressed. Butwe do need to make a meaningful effort to change the minds ofthose in positions of power, too. We need to recognize that aneffective anti-oppression movement has a place for everyone —a way to be meaningfully involved, and a place in our vision of abetter world.We have every reason to resent the fact that the burden of

educating people about our oppression falls on us. It is not fair,and it is painful every time we engage in these conversations.When people say we shouldn’t be responsible for ending our ownoppression, I agree. We shouldn’t be. But we are. It is a simplefact that is hard to accept, but people don’t know what they don’tknow. Without outside interference, it is highly unlikely that aperson who is exposed only to CNN (or, worse, Fox) and Eminem

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We have every reason to resent thefact that the burden of educatingpeople about our oppression fallson us. It is not fair, and it is painfulevery time we engage in theseconversations.

videos will come to recognize, understand, and oppose oppressionon their own. If they personally benefit from that oppression, theodds become vanishingly small. Of course if the world were fairthey would. Of course they should. But they won’t. There aremany reasons for this, perhaps the most influential of which isthe fact that knowing what we know as oppressed people hurtslike hell. That’s why it’s a privilege not to know it.Especially when it comes to incorporating incredible psychic

pain, minds don’t change all at once. People will almost univer-sally freak out the first time they are confronted with their priv-ilege or complicity with oppression. But the fact that people oftenmeet us with defensiveness and dismissiveness is not an indica-tion that our work is hopeless. It takes the mind a while toprocess an idea that is truly new to it. The people who oppose usare only human, just like us. They aren’t usually sociopaths, andthey really do want to be good people. They won’t change imme-diately, but they still can and do change. It will make us moreeffective if we can put ourselves in their shoes and relate ourexperience to theirs. Luckily, this is quite possible. We are capa-ble of coming to understand the mindset of even our most hate-ful opposition, because we’re not very different from them.An example: I come from a mixed race background, but in

most ways I seem white, and I have white privilege.When, as afeminist, I engage someone who has bought into patriarchy, andI start to feel like all I want to do is bop them in the nose (anurge which, incidentally, should remind us just how similar wecan be at times to our oppressors), I think back to my firstmeaningful discussion of racism. I was 17, fresh out of a home-town that was almost entirely white, and a total train wreck onissues of race and racism. Like most white people, I had a verylimited understanding of systemic and institutional racism, andvirtually no understanding of the ways that racism intersectswith other oppressions. I truly believed that racism had been“solved” by the civil rights movement. I am certain that thegroup of young black women I spoke with that day left the roomfeeling exasperated and hurt. It was the sort of conversationyou might walk away from saying something to the effect of,“some people are just hopeless.”I remember that the interaction confused me for months. My

entire worldview had been shaken, and aworldview isn’t the kind

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of thing a person deconstructs and reconstructs instantaneously.I had the uncomfortable sense that there was something I wasn’tunderstanding. But my attitude didn’t dramatically shift untilone day, after months of percolation, I realized with horror thatracismwas still an active force in the world— inmyworld— onethat caused just as much pain as gender oppression.I bring up this observation, which is extremely embarrass-

ing to me now in its brilliant display of privilege, because it wasmy starting point. Shallow as my new awareness was, I hadbeen emotionally transformed by connecting the experience ofwhite supremacist oppression to my own experience of oppres-sion as a woman. While I still had and have a lot of growth todo in learning how to be an effective anti-racist activist, it wasa shift that set me on a path of taking responsibility for my owneducation about racism, and a commitment to intentionallyseeking out new information. I understood why the myopia cre-ated by my white privilege was not acceptable, and I set aboutchanging myself. A deeper understanding of racism eventuallyled to a deeper understanding of transphobia, ableism, fathatred, class-based oppression, imperialism, and other oppres-sions that I benefit from. I’m no longer able to think about anyanti-oppression movement in isolation, and see them as inex-tricably linked.When I had that first conversation, my behavior was inexcus-

able. Myway of thinking was inexcusable. I should have been dif-ferent. But it is worth saying that I never would have changed onmy own, and I never would have changed without being able toconnect my own experience to the new information I had beengiven. This can’t help but humble me when a man confidentlyproclaims to me that I’m failing to remain “objective” in myunderstanding of sexual violence, or tells me that I take genderoppression too seriously as if he truly believes he is providing mewith useful new information. Everyone has to start somewhere.As individuals shift their understanding from one paradigm

to another, entirely different paradigm, it is a psychologicalnecessity to maintain some coherence in their worldview.Beyondbeing emotionally necessary, this is actually quite sensible. Afterall, it is not the case that those who adhere to kyriarchal beliefshave no valid experience of the world — it is simply that theylack the frame to accurately understand many aspects of experi-

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ence, and especially the experiences of oppressed groups they arenot part of. This is why the most effective introductions to con-cepts of oppression aimed at privileged classes almost inevitablybegin with an explanation of the ways in which that oppressionharms them. Because this approach centres the experience ofprivileged people, it is therefore ultimately incomplete and prob-lematic; however, the process of privileged people becoming will-ing to decentre their experience must begin from a point thatresonates with their life as they understand it. Most of us areworse than we’d like to be at recognizing the suffering of others,but we naturally understand our own suffering quite well. Wealso naturally seek to escape this suffering. If we can bring priv-ileged individuals to the understanding that their own sufferingis caused by the oppression of others, they will eventuallybecome our partners in struggle — not opponents or silent, apa-thetic “supporters.”To take gender oppression as an example: the damage to the

supposed beneficiaries of patriarchy is clear. The oppression ofwomen harms men by requiring them to remain within a rigidlydefined role, constantly chasing an impossible ideal of patriarchalmanhood. It terrorizes men with the threat of being associatedwith anything “feminine,” often destroying their ability to recog-nize and respond to their own emotions, to relate to others, or tofully embody their artistic and spiritual lives. Most obviously, theoppression of women harms anymen who fall sufficiently outsideof these strictures as to be targeted for violence, discriminationand ostracism themselves. Further, oppression of women harmsany man who cares for women, as the physical and psychologicalscars of patriarchy cause men indirect suffering in the form offeelings of helplessness and sadness in the face of loved ones’pain, diminished intimacy and trust in male-female interactionsand relationships, and the harmful effects of secondary trauma.These themes have been well covered, and the positive respon-siveness of men to activism which focuses on them is well estab-lished. Feminism is only now beginning to build a much neededmen’s movement with the help of this approach.Where much of feminism, particularly white, middle-class

feminism, has not succeeded is in offering an analysis of patri-archy as it harms oppressed men.Many activists give lip serviceto the concept of the interdependence of oppressions, without

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genuinely engaging the implications of this, to the great detri-ment of anti-oppression movements. By failing to discuss theimplications of patriarchy for oppressed men, we fall into thetrap of universalizing the imagined ideal of a straight wealthycisgender white man, thus reifying the same hegemonic identitythat feminism seeks to decentre.We accept without question the

claim that patriarchy servesall men equally. In fact,patriarchy does great harmto oppressed men. It harmsmen of colour by allowingwhite supremacist culture tojustify everything from theprison industrial complex to

imperialist war in the name of “protecting” white women andchildren. It allows the corporate agenda to crush workers’ rightsby convincing poor and middle-class people to vote against theirown economic interests in the name of restricting women’s free-doms. Its impact on the movement for LGBTQ equality is per-haps most obvious, with rigidly enforced gender policing causingdirect harm to gay, bisexual, and transgender men. Just asracism has prevented and destroyed poor people’s movementsthat would ultimately have helped white people, patriarchysplits the progressive movement, often forcing the most giftedfemale activists to divide their energies or choose between move-ments, in the process harming oppressed men. It fractures vir-tually every anti-oppression movement, causing schisms thatprevent men’s advancement. Oppressions are interdependent,and part of building an effective movement against oppressionwill be recognizing this fact in practice.If we are going to reach people to grow the movement, we

must help them understand oppression in a way that connects totheir understanding and experience of the world as it is, not aswe wish it was. In the case of oppressed people who hold privi-lege in some areas, recognizing the intersections of oppressionand identity is key. Nearly everyone is oppressed in some way,and therefore shares an interest in ending all oppression. In thecase of those who are not targeted for oppression in any obviousway, we have to be willing to have some empathy for them — toaccept their starting point. We are, after all, telling people that

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Oppressions are interdependent,and part of building an effectivemovement against oppression willbe recognizing this fact in practice.

everything they have been taught is wrong. We’re asking themto see that the pain in the world is exponentially greater thanwhat they knew, and that they have been contributing to thatpain.We’re completely shaking the foundations of their identityand worldview. I’ve heard social justice activists use the analogyof coming to recognize oppressive social structures as “taking thered pill.” I’d say it’s more like a grenade.I’m not claiming that privileged people refuse to acknowledge

their privilege because oppressed people use the wrong “tone” intheir demands for equality. That tired trope is almost always abald attempt to control discourse, silence social justice activists,and make necessarily uncomfortable truths comfortable for priv-ileged people. I’m certainly not saying that the best way to reachpeople is always with gentle hand-holding; sometimes a right-eous display of anger is exactly what someone needs to under-stand how urgent an issue is. But we do have to begin from aplace of respect for each person’s life experience, and faith intheir ability to change. It is neither effective nor consistent withan anti-kyriarchal worldview to give up on anyone. We believethat people can change. If we didn’t, what would be the point ofsocial justice work?If we really are committed to building a movement that con-

fronts kyriarchy on every level, I believe that our effectivenesswill be commensurate with our willingness to make a constanteffort to practice compassion. Compassion for ourselves as wefind ways to hold the depth of suffering and despair in thisworld without giving up. And, just as essential, compassion forour oppressors with the recognition that if we had lived theirlives, we would be who they are. I believe that if we can learn towork in this spirit of radical compassion and hope, we can devel-op the strong sense of community and mutuality in our move-ment that the radical free market libertarians seem to have fos-tered in theirs.

* * *

Ashley Burczak is the founder and former executive director ofStudents Active For Ending Rape (SAFER), a grassroots organizationdevoted to empowering U.S. college students to improve their sexualassault prevention and response policies. While she understands

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social justice work primarily through a gender lens, she has come toview an intersectional understanding of oppression as key to effectivefeminist organizing. She is a recent graduate of Union TheologicalSeminary, and plans to pursue a career in chaplaincy.

ENDNOTES

1 Jeff Horwitz, “My right-wing Degree,” Salon, May 25, 2005http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/2005/05/25/blackwell/.2 Eric Alterman, “Ideas Have Consequences: So Does Money,” Center ForAmerican Progress Website, October 14, 2004. http://www.american-progress.org/issues/2004/10/b222111.html.3 Patricia Cohen, “Conservatives Try New Tack on Campuses,”New YorkTimes, September 21, 2008.4 Kors, “Saving Freedom”.5 Kyriarchy: a neologism coined by Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza andderived from the Greek words for “lord” or “master” (kyrios) and “to rule ordominate” (archein) which seeks to redefine the analytic category of patri-archy in terms of multiplicative intersecting structures of domination.Kyriarchy is best theorized as a complex pyramidal system of intersectingmultiplicative social structures of superordination and subordination, ofruling and oppression. (Glossary,Wisdom Ways, Orbis Books. New York2001).While I first encountered the word through my study of theology,the writing of Lisa Factora-Borchers in her blog “My Ecdysis” allowed meto see its radical possibilities.

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