Process
Status Items Highlights Done See section below Claims None Questions None Output None
Highlights
id1017752109
How did we win? There were many reasons, but here is one of the most important: we saw even our most radical acts of resistance as a civic duty, rather than political activism.
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When King George III imposed taxation without representation, the founding fathers stole his company’s tea and dumped it in the Boston Harbor. When police assaulted Black citizens for sitting in whites-only seats on buses and at lunch counters, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. organized peaceful resistance and became a symbol of America. Our de facto state religion is civil resistance—to disobey when our leaders abuse their power.
id1017752372
The focus of the campaign, repeated over and over, was that dogs are being hurt, and they need our help. That was not a message about politics or even activism. It was about our duty to help members of our community who were suffering abuse. We also repeated an old line from the women’s suffrage movement: “We’re not law breakers. We’re law makers.” We were acting to bring the system back into alignment with its own rules and values.
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Our focus on duty also destabilized the industry’s efforts to caricature us as criminals or terrorists. How could we be dangerous extremists when we were merely fulfilling our obligations to our community?
✏️ People see advocates or activists as “telling people what to do.” He’s arguing that you invert things into “serving people and the community” instead. 🔗 View Highlight