13 Rules For Radicals – Alinsky’s Guide For Activists

Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals (1971)

What follows is for those who want to change the world from what it is to what they believe it should be. The Prince was written by Machiavelli for the Haves on how to hold power. Rules for Radicals is written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away.

The first step in community organization is community disorganization.

The organizer… must first rub raw the resentments of the people of the community; fan the latent hostilities of many of the people to the point of overt expression. He must search out controversy and issues, rather than avoid them, for unless there is controversy people are not concerned enough to act. . . . An organizer must stir up dissatisfaction and discontent; provide a channel into which the people can angrily pour their frustrations… you must agitate to the point of conflict.

RULE 1: Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have. If your organization is small, hide your numbers in the dark and raise a din that will make everyone think you have many more people than you do.
RULE 2: Never go outside the experience of your people… the result is confusion, fear, and retreat… [and] the collapse of communication.
RULE 3: Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy. Here you want to cause confusion, fear, and retreat.
RULE 4: Make the enemy live up to their own book of rules. You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity
RULE 5: Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. It’s hard to counter attack ridicule, and it infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage.
RULE 6: A good tactic is one that your people enjoy. If your people aren’t having a ball doing it, there is something very wrong with the tactic.
RULE 7: A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag. Commitment may become ritualistic as people turn to other issues
RULE 8: Keep the pressure on, with different tactics and actions, and utilize all events of the period for your purpose*.
RULE 9: The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.
RULE 10: The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition. It is this unceasing pressure that results in the reactions from the opposition that are essential for the success of the campaign.
RULE 11: If you push a negative hard and deep enough it will break through into its counterside. This is based on the principle that every positive has its negative*.
RULE 12: The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative. Avoid being trapped by an opponent or an interviewer who says, “Okay, what would you do?”
RULE 13. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. Don’t try to attack abstract corporations or bureaucracies. Identify a responsible individual. Ignore attempts to shift or spread the blame. The real action is in the enemy’s reaction. The enemy properly goaded and guided in his reaction will be your major strength.

Dostoevski said that taking a new step is what people fear most. Any revolutionary change must be preceded by a passive, affirmative, non-challenging attitude toward change among the mass of our people. They must feel so frustrated, so defeated, so lost, so futureless in the prevailing system that they are willing to let go of the past and change the future. This acceptance is the reformation essential to any revolution. — Saul Alinsky — Rules for Radicals, prologue

The end is what you want and the means is how you get it
– In war the end justifies almost any means
– Any effective means is automatically judged by the opposition to be unethical
Tactics, like life, require that you move with the action
– Tactics means doing what you can with what you have
– Tactics is the art of how to take and how to give
For an elementary illustration of tactics, take parts of your face as the point of reference; your eyes, your ears, and your nose.

First the eyes; if you have organized a vast, mass-based people’s organization, you can parade it visibly before the enemy and openly show your power.

Second the ears; if your organization is small in numbers, then do what Gideon did: conceal the members in the dark but raise a din and clamor that will make the listener believe that your organization numbers many more than it does.

Third, the nose; if your organization is too tiny even for noise, stink up the place

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Next post in this series: I Am Vegan – there is power in a word
*NOTE*: Rules For Radicals is long out of print, along with Reveille for Radicals (1946) and many of the sources I used have different versions of the rules, some have had comments added, without saying that they are not from the Alinsky original, these have then been copies and pasted. As far as I can tell, these are the rules — in Alinksy’s own words.

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Post 2011 ‘Vegan Animal Liberation Alliance’. Copying and distribution of this entire article, text and / or graphic, is permitted in any medium, but please include the credit:
Written by RedGlitter of VALA http://redglitterx.wordpress.com/
or at least a link to this page, that would be nice

Vegan Bootcamp: 101 days of Animal Rights Activism

This post is the first in a series that will cover Animal Rights Activism from as many angles as possible. Tactics, techniques, methods, historical figures, current controversies, inspirational essays-quotes-graphics, campaigns, movements – from education, agitation, resistance to revolution.

People don’t care if you’re upset. They care when you organize. - Al Sharpton

It was Gandhi who said “if you do nothing, there will be no result“, so, the time for talking is over.

Now is the time to act. It’s time to get organised.
First, you have to make the decision that you want it… no, it’s more than that, you NEED it, you NEED to be an Active participant in the struggle for Animal Rights.

For many ARA’s (Animal Rights Activists) that I have met, they can’t live any other way. They simply cannot live a life without putting the fight for animal rights front and centre of almost everything they do.

Today, is about making that decision. You know you want to, have to be an Activist. You can no longer sit by and do nothing while animals are suffering. You have reached a point in your life where you must do something.

If you hear about some unspeakable horrendous act of cruelty against an animal, or you hear about the billions upon billions of animal killed for food each year, or any other act of abuse and you find yourself saying “Somebody must do something… and I think that somey will be me.” then it’s time to learn, act, think, agitate and bring about changes in the world.

And if you already are an AR Activist, then you will know that you have made the right decision.
For Animal Rights Activists, there are two questions:

–1–

What do we want?

–2–How will we get it?

This can be summed up simply as “Objectives” and “Tactics“.
1. Objectives (the ENDS)
What those Objectives / Goals are may vary between individuals; long term education or short term direct action*, local or global, educate one person or agitate for a change in legislation.

2. Tactics (the MEANS)
Tactics, strategy, methods, plans, to-do-list, techniques – using the most appropriate method for your personal circumstance and objectives. This will vary depending on the desired outcome.
Although, I will cover these in more depth in a follow up piece soon, ‘Planning a Campaign’, a few quick words about Objectives and Tactics.

Getting 5000 names on a petition isn’t an objective, a petition is a tactic to achieve the specific goal. If spending time, money and energy on doing something doesn’t get you close to your goal, then why are you doing it?

Raising awareness is not an objective – you raise awareness, and then what? – you raise awareness so that people will change their behaviour, raising awareness is a tactic.

Networking, socialising, hanging out on social networks are not objectives, that are part of a tactic. Ah, you say, but I like hanging out with my friends. Ok, we all need down-time, some hours to switch off and recharge the brain, let go of the negative tension.

Knowledge without action is useless; action without knowledge is dangerous. – D. L. Chu

What’s Next?

Once you have your Objectives and planned your Tactics, then comes another crucial part of all . . . ACTION.

Napoleon Bonaparte, the French military and political leader said: “A Revolution is an idea which has found its bayonets.” (or as I say: A revolution is a theory with an army.)

Or to paraphrase a leading animal welfare advocate “The philosophers can debate the revolution, but the Bandits must carry it out”.

This is not a suggestion that violence is necessary for a Vegan Revolution** – instead, after all the theorising about Animal Rights, the thinking, planning, debating, in the end, the work still needs to be done.

The military call this “boots on the ground” – those people will to carry out the plans, physically do the work – and often times in AR Activism, the person deciding the plan of action is the same person who is carrying it out.

Activism doesn’t require a lot of people, just dedicated people doing what needs to be done.

As Margaret Mead said: Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.

Do it, and don’t be distracted by people who would tear you down. The haters for some reason are unable to act on their own, and so seek to destroy those who are.

Lead, follow, or get out of the way. — Thomas Paine

Time to stop Feeding the Trolls.

I think most of us have met an ARA at some point, who you just know doesn’t do anything practical, they are “Facebook Crusaders”, you know, the kind of person who says to you:
‘See here, in this 1984 essay you wrote, you said “factory farm”, but all farms involve cruelty… what are you some kind of enabler or something, you are as Evil as a viviesector’.

The Anti-Activists attack you, and other ARAs all of the time, they follow you from blog to blog, from forum to social network, always reminding you of the time you said “factory farm” not “farm”.

They never work on a campaign of their own. You start to think – is this All that you do? have all the animal exploiters suddenly disappeared, and left you with so much free time that you can launch character assassinations on people who are actually doing something for the animals!

And then finally when you tell them you are not wasting any more of your time debating them, you are walking away – they declare they have “won”.

Facebook is not the battle, Facebook is a tool. If these TROLLS think they have “won” something by harassing animal rights activists, then they are not in it for the Animals.

And, what do you “WIN” by continuing to engage with them – nothing much.

If the Anti-Activists are distracting you, they are stealing your time and energy that you could use saving animals. See the trolls for what they are – COLLABORATORS.

You can accomplish a lot of good in the world if you don’t care who gets the credit for it. – Myles Horton

Next post in this series: Rules For Radicals
The phrase “Vegan Bootcamp” comes from the book, ‘Vegan Bootcamp: Guide to Animal Rights Activism’, it inspired me to do a series of posts on AR activism.

*Direct Action
Although some people think direct action means ‘violence’, that is not necessarily so:
Lee Hall “Veganism is direct action“.
**Revolutions can be peaceful.
There are some who hear the word “revolution” and think Molotov’s and Kalashnikov’s, balaclavas and bombs, however, Revolutions can be peaceful, they are simple a change. It could be a change in government, it could be a change in thought process.

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Post 2011 ‘Vegan Animal Liberation Alliance’. Copying and distribution of this entire article, text and / or graphic, is permitted in any medium, but please include the credit:
Written by RedGlitter of VALA http://redglitterx.wordpress.com/
or at least a link to this page, that would be nice

9 of Your Vegan / Animal Rights Questions Get Answered

Because I believe “there are no stupid questions, it’s those who don’t ask that remain stupid”.

So, what is it that people ask me – not of vegans in general, I’m sure other vegans get asked different questions.

• Which animal rights advocates to follow on twitter?

Depends what kind of animal rights you are into – if you are abolitionist, they generally have “abolitionist” in their bio. If you are Liberationist maybe look for specific people. Search for the hashtag #vegan or #AnimalRights and you will find people you want to follow.

People who have forums, blogs, nings or facebuck sometimes include their twitter @name, if you find a blog you like, look for that.

• But, isn’t animal testing necessary for beauty products?

Beauty products that test on animals are not beautiful.

It is NOT necessary. Why they test is because they are using combinations of chemicals that might cause death, disfigurement, and long lasting health side-effects. These chemicals enter the blood stream and nobody knows what effect they will have on the body. Do we even know that BSE (mad cow disease) can’t be spread via cosmetics?

Now, isn’t it better to use healthy ingredients in the first place than take the risk with these dangerous products that “only” kill 50% of the lab rats they test on.

As this piece here Animal Testing: Pass or Fail explores, reasons for testing aren’t always about consumer health.

• Abolitionists talk about Non-violence being the only way to end animal cruelty, but doesn’t Noam Chomsky say that non-violence cannot work?

I’m generally reluctant to mention Nazis but Noam Chomksy said it first:

Non-violent resistance activities cannot succeed against an enemy that is able freely to use violence. That’s pretty obvious. You can’t have non-violent resistance against the Nazis in a concentration camp, to take an extreme case…
The Real History of Capitalism

• What are some veggie symbols?

I don’t know what “Veggie” means. Seriously, I don’t.
Does it mean Vegan or does it mean Vegetarian? Is it meant to be a combination of both?
Does it mean “vegetable”? I’m in Australia, we spell it “vegie”.
This Ⓥ is a symbol some vegans use on social network sites.

• Is Carrot cake Vegan?

It should be, yes.
But people will always find a way to shove animal products into any food. However, it does contain oil instead of eggs, and is not low fat, but is vegan.
This recipe contains fruits and vegetable, and is very easy to make, and non-vegans will love it, I mean, if they like carrot cake:

LINK >> Animal Liberation Carrot Cake – vegan recipe

• Does Angelina Jolie eat?

Maybe that was “WHAT does Jolie eat?”
I’m going to guess not a lot of vegetables, she thinks eating a vegan diet (“strict vegetarian”, because she continues to wear animal products) nearly killed her. She says “I joke that a big juicy steak is my beauty secret. But seriously, I love red meat.”

• Camille Marino / Steve Best

Wow, there is a lot of interest in these two. And often people are interested in CamilleMarinoAndSteveBest, as if it is one word, almost like they have morphed into one person with one brain. But no, they appear to be two separate people.

Best and Marino are USAmerican animal rights advocates. Best is from The Institute for Critical Animal Studies and has his own personal blog and together they are Negotiation Is Over.

Their use of a match as their symbol is problematic for me, since matches are an animal product, but no more problematic than PeTA using naked women and leather-wearing celebrities.

Do you need to follow their every word in order to be a good little MDA (Militant Direct Action) activist?
That’s a personal choice. Some people say NO.

• who is the woman in Moby’s “disco lies” video?

Shayna Steele, who also provided the female vocals. This is the video in which the chicken gets revenge on a KFC-inspired Colonel.

• Benjamin Zephaniah

Who is Benjamin Zephaniah, and where can I find a copy of his poem “Vegan Delight“?
Zephaniah is a British poet who has written and spoken about veganism. Some of his work is featured in this post on him Vegan Delight, Benjamin Zephaniah (plus vegan onion bhajji recipe).

Vegan Delight (and not Onion Delight) – is a poem that answers the question “What do vegans eat?”. When omnivores say that all vegans eat is tofu and broccoli, this poem would set them straight. With the exception of “omelettes” – I don’t know why that is listed in the poem.

VEGAN DELIGHT
Ackeess, chapatties, Dumplins an nan, Channa an rotis, Onion uttapam,
Masala dosa, Green callaloo, Bhel an samosa, Corn an aloo.
Yam an cassava, Pepperpot stew, Rotlo an guava, Rice an tofu,
Puri, paratha, Sesame casserole, Brown eggless pasta, An brown bread rolls.

Soya milked muesli, Soya bean curd, Soya sweet sweeties, Soya’s de word,
Soya bean margarine, Soya bean sauce, What can mek medicine?
Soya of course.

Soya meks yoghurt, Soya ice-cream, Or soya sorbet, Soya reigns supreme,
Soya sticks liquoriced, Soya salads, Try any soya dish
Soya is bad.

Plantain an tabouli, Cornmeal pudding, Onion bhajee, With plenty cumin,
Breadfruit an coconuts, Molasses tea, Dairy free omelettes, Very chilli.
Ginger bread, nut roast, Sorell, paw paw, Cocoa an rye toast, I tek dem on tour,
Drinking cool maubi, Meks me feel sweet,

What was dat question now?
WHAT DO WE EAT?

If you have any more questions, feel free to ask.

Animal Liberation group using animal products

Negotiation Is Over is a self-style global animal rights collective, yet, they are using images of an animal product to promote themselves.

In the post Negotiation is Over: Guide To Direct Action, (hover over link for preview) a picture of a burning match is used to illustrate that post.

The image of the match is also used in more than one place on this blog.

Presumably based on an image taken from the cover of this book:

For all their talk of revolutions, Gandhi is quoted in this book, just like he is in so many other books about social change. Which, in itself is far from revolutionary.

Much criticism has been leveled at PETA, and other large animal welfare groups for supporting initiatives such as cage-free eggs and anti-fur. How is this any different? The use of a match as a symbol perpetuates the idea that it is acceptable to use animal products.

And joining the chorus of detractors, against a blog that does a lot of work to bring attention to issues of animal welfare, does this actually achieve anything for the animals.

After all, it is just an image on the computer screen, it is a cover of book, it isn’t an actual match. But it does raise thoughts of what a “perfect vegan” is, and more importantly, does a perfect vegan in reality exist.

Or, is it only in theory, that someone can be a “perfect vegan”? Once you move beyond the abstract, the theoretical, all someone can do is reduce the suffering they cause.

Matches are products that are made from animal products,

Safety matches: all matches contain animal based adhesives on the head of the stick and on the striking strip on the box. In the monsoon this is substituted with casein derived from milk using acid. Wimco Home lights use casein throughout the year.
LINK: here

The vegan blogger “Vegansaurus” also details the animal products used in the production of matches:

gelatin is a part of the chemical cocktail on match heads, and …“animal protein” as an ingredient promoting oxidization… “animal glue” as both a combustor and adhesive, and isinglass as a “conditioner”
LINK: here

Although, what undermines their message is their use of animal products to sell that message.

To be fair, this book is an environmental wake-up call and not an animal liberation book. Although, one of the editors, Dr Steven Best, is one of the leaders of the animal rights movement and one of the editors on the Negotiation Is Over blog.

This is in no way intended to sound like Vegan Big Brother, carrying out hyper-surveillance on other animal advocates, this is just intended to highlight how ubiquitous the use of animals in every day life is.

It also highlights the absurdity of some vegans to push a concept of a perfect vegan. If you live in any society, and interact with other people you will come into contact with animal products, and there are some that are unavoidable.

There are many lists, in books and online that list just some of the ways animals are used and abused to make consumer products, such as this one LINK: here.

It brings into question the entire concept of being a “perfect vegan”, perhaps, people should just strive to be a better vegan than they were the day before, and stop worrying about what other vegans are or are not doing.

So when vegans gang up on other vegans and vegetarians and carnivores and call them out for not being perfect, maybe they should take a long look at their own lives and see how perfect they are.

Does it matter what image they use? Matches for Direct Action animal liberationists, or naked women for anti-fur PeTA campaigns, does the ends justify the means?

Any opinions welcome

Liberation: for Animals & Earth

No real social change has ever been brought about without a revolution…
revolution is but thought carried into action.
Emma Goldman

From the Liberation archives

Animal liberation = earth liberation = people liberation

The liberation of animals and the earth will require nothing short of a total revolution in thinking and in action.

How can it possibly require anything less? The status quo has produced the largest extinction of plants and animals since the dinosaurs disappeared. And this time it is man-made.

Daytime TV psychologists will tell you “if you keep doing what you have always done, you will keep getting what you have always gotten”.

So why do we continue to do the same “vegan education” that we have always done and expect to produce different outcomes.

Why do we continue to fight each about “direct action”, when we fight each other, the Animal Abusers just laugh at how childish we act and just continue to do what they have always done.

It is not a competition over whose oppression is worse, oppression is oppression, exploitation and cruelty are exploitation and cruelty, the oppressor is the same – a system run by a small group of people (rich, white, male, capitalists) who profit from the exploitation of people, animals and the earth.

From my perspective, a lot of animal rights activists have forgotten what they are fighting for. They are preoccupied with the methods they will use – “non violent education” or “taking action” – but what has been overlooked in the middle is the animals.

The fight for animal liberation and earth liberation needs to be put front and centre of activism, instead of defending our weapons of choice, which is what we are doing now.

As Steven Best has said “It is becoming increasingly clear that human, animal, and earth liberation movements are inseparably linked, such that none can be free until all are free. This is not a new insight, but rather a lost wisdom and truth.” Total Revolution: Revolution for the 21st Century, (Guerrilla News: Dispatches from the Frontlines).

Because it is in the fight to make a difference that revolution will occur, when people began to think differently about the part each one of us can play in the revolution for liberation, then they will begin to speak differently and act differently.

Every person is important, every person can make a difference.

I will stand with anyone who is fighting to make a difference for animal rights, earth liberation or social justice.

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Articles copyright 2010 ‘Vegan Animal Liberation Alliance’. Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided this notice is preserved.
Written by RedGlitter of VALA http://redglitterx.wordpress.com/

Feedback welcome.

A Militant, Radical and Powerful movement

These following two videos, are compliments of each other. The first one from Naomi Klein, talks about the reasons why we need to create a movement, the new radical left. While the second video, is from an insider’s point of view, Will Potter, an activist who knows very well the impact of the increasingly totalitarian laws designed to crush dissent but also thoughts of dissent.

“We have to build that independent left. It has to be so strong and so radical and so militant and so powerful that it becomes irresistible.”
Naomi Klein

Naomi Klein: Building a Real Left
- Watch more like this: here.

Will Potter of GreenIsTheNewRed talks how eco-campaigners are the new terrorists

Will Potter in this video says, “Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act … Non-violent civil disobedience as terrorism if it’s done by animal rights activists”

For a more in-depth look at Will Potter and the connection with AETA : Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act: Ever Heard of It?

Is there a connection between these two things?

Those in power, on all sides of the political spectrum, from the left to the right, it doesn’t matter – the poor, the marginalised, the working class, don’t all see a difference when they feel ignored, and life is getting harder, regardless of who is in charge.

Now, those in power are busy propping up the Wall Street and the banks and financial institutions that caused the GFC (Global Financial Crisis). The bail outs, have let the Masters Of The Universe off the hook, enabling them to keep doing more of the same, pillaging and plundering workers, environment, and consumers, without skipping a beat.

Recent legal efforts – from Arizona’s new racial profiling laws against Mexicans, to the expelling of Roma from France, and the manufactured outrage against a Muslim community centre in New York and the terrorist boat-people in Australia, the crack down on protesters and passers-by in Toronto during the G20 – these are all diverting attention from who is benefiting from this world wide financial crisis by blaming the poorest of the poor, activists who are trying to save lives, and the most marginalised.

Who will stop to ask why business leaders are making millions when it is so easy for fear-mongering shock jocks to the point the finger at Muslims, Hispanics, boat people, Roma, terror-babies, and say “they are the cause of your problems.

Although, it is hardly surprising that those who created global financial meltdown, are now holding their collective hands out, expecting tax payer bailouts, with cries of “we are too big to fail” yet, at the same time, claim they are uniquely qualified to solve this crisis, (yes, the crisis that they created).

But like the magicians sleight of hand trick, your eye follows where the finger points, and you don’t notice what the magicians other hand is doing.

When compassion is criminalised, when vandalism becomes terrorism, when babies are “terror-babies”, reality has been turned on it head.

Activists learn the lesson, step out of line and get punished, severely. This is new and improved McCarthy-era communist hunts, this is the modern age Witch-Hunt.

And like the witch-hunts of old, there were no real witches, in this case, there are no terrorists among the eco-warrirors and animal rights activists. It is all an illusion.

It is time to ask who benefiting?

Who gains an advantage when people who fight to save the lives of enslaved animals, the planet and poor are branded terrorist…..

The capitalist crisis & how to fight it… it must be emphatically stated that the struggle for socialism and to abolish capitalism requires the building of a revolutionary working-class party, steeped in the theory of Marxism and imbued with its revolutionary spirit.

Feedback welcome.

Liberation, Peace and Justice

Liberation, Peace, and Social Justice

This is a video clip I made (not just uploaded), against a background of John Lennon’s “Give Peace A Chance”, with quotes, clips, images from the past century. Ranging from women fighting for the vote, to the Gaza freedom flotilla of 2010. Focusing on civil rights and liberation movements, including John F Kennedy, Nelson Mandela, Gloria Steinem, Pearl Bailey and Bishop Desmond Tutu.

Social justice is something people must stand up for. The lessons through history are that people who stand up for their rights and the rights of others get them.

Northern Ireland, feminism, Palestine, Black Panthers, Nelson Mandela, Tienanmen Square, Suffragettes, Australian Aboriginal sovereignty, socialism, peace, justice, fighting hunger, Cesar Chavez, a montage of images and quotes to inspire Liberation of people and animals…

Tags: #46664, Aboriginal, Animal Liberation, Animal Rights, black power salute, burning monk, César Chávez, civil disobedience, civil rights, coffin, cupcakes, Desmond Tutu, Emmaline Pankhurst, famine, feminism, freedom fighter, Gaza, Gloria Steinem, Huey Newton, human rights, Iraq, Israel, It's Time, John Lennon, justice, liberation, Martin Luther King, Nelson Manela, Palestine, protest, revolution, sacrifice, socialist, soldiers, Sudan, Sydney, Tiananmen Square, toxic waste, vegan, Vietnam War, women's liberation