Yesterday I tweeted that someone I've known my whole life, who is just now opening their mind to radical politics, has been DMing folks a video w abolitionist takes on the police & I was happy about this. Someone immediately popped up to insist she should be publicly radical.

The reply insisting this person needed to be loud and public about this growth in their politics got four likes from y'all. This is what I mean when I say that some of you desperately need organizing 101s. Bc organizers appreciate growth and progress and what those things mean.

I had shared nothing about this person's environment, background, vocation or identity, and yet ppl were quick to assume that going public w their evolving views around police, rather than having private convos w a lot of people, was immediately important. Let me tell you why.

Because this society has taught a lot of y'all that emoting in public is political action.

What would she have accomplished by sharing the vid as a post (which would be dangerous for her btw) that she is not accomplishing by sending it to everyone she knows who she thinks might listen, and talking to them directly? Why is the public part what you think is important?

Why are you more interested in how people perform their politics on fb than whether they are actually persuading anyone? I hope everyone gets to a place where they are loud and proud about abolition. But I am also an organizer who appreciate growth and progress.

Unsurprisingly, with her lil DM outreach effort, the person sharing that video is reaching people who are outside my sphere of my influence, who might not even talk to someone like me. That's a good thing. This shit isn't just about putting on a show about who you are.

It's work y'all. And the work of changing minds means understanding that people change over time. There are meaningful things people can do at every stage of growth. Figure out how to work with those realities.

Personally, I'm thrilled that this person has come so far. I never would've imagined it. And she is dear to many people who are now being exposed to her evolving perspective & engaged by it, who might be changed in some way themselves by those dialogues. To me, that's a big win.

Btw the person who made the comment I'm complaining about called me condescending. When someone w a lot of experience explains something you don't yet understand about organizing, it may sound condescending, esp when it means you were doing something wrong. Try to check your ego.

There are people with more experience than me, and some with less, who will sometimes tell me that I am looking at a thing wrong, or that my first impulse does not reflect our goals, and I am grateful for those people. My work would not exist without them. We build shit.

Our organizing is not the product of our personalities. It is not about us simply emoting in public. It is work. It is education, persuasion and action. It is both an emergency and a long game. It is about relationships and growth.