Monday, December 16, 2013
Week 11
This week we discussed Michael Gecan's Going Public which gave numerous accounts of his public participation. Gecan emphasizes the importance of forming personal relationships and building a community voice in order to be heard by the government. An example of one of his actions is he went to a supermarket with others and inspected the food, most of which was moldy and out of date, and requested that the owner fixes the foods' standards. This confrontation and persistence led to the change that Gecan and his community wanted. Do you guys have any examples of times when you speaking up led to a positive change? Have you ever used Gecan's tactics?
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Yeah, having a community organizing background, I've been a part of such organized actions where we would pressure bosses or tenant owners treating their workers or residents unfairly. We would also utilize legal services to also help us as my organization had a lot of connections to legal service offices.
ReplyDeleteBesides that, Gecan is really a true demonstrator of one who is aware of their public self. Like wow, how he stormed out of the mayor's office like that?! Probably one of the coolest moments of the book. Because, I wouldn't take any of that shit either. If he were to take that shit, then all the other groups and people he represented at that meeting would be kinda like taking that same shit too, which would not be cool. Some individuals think it's a right to be able to really do whatever they want, like it's themselves that only matter. I don't want to say that individuals don't matter, because they do, but because we come from communities and spaces we identify with, I think it's a disservice to them to act without consideration.