How do we go about motivating people that this is a war that needs to be acted against, not just watched? By being visible! As we see it, there are two different ways that should be used in conjunction with one another.
The first priority is to begin to educate the larger campus about the war. This was done on Swarthmore’s campus by sending an e-mail to the entire student body. See a copy of the e-mail.
We found the e-mail to be quite effective since it quickly announced Why War’s existence, and it also redefined our image as a group that is both objective and honest about the war.
An aside: In order to be trusted by students who are straddling the fence, it is important to decrease the rhetoric, and increase the honest interpretation of the war. This is a war that is both rationally and morally condemnable.
Getting the list of students on campus may present itself as a problem, but we suggest you look at any web-based search functions by which your college allow you to search for individual students. Search for *, then try to alter the search so that it gives you 1,000+ results at a time (check the URL), then copy the e-mail addresses into a spreadsheet program. This will allow you to create an editable database of students.
You should always remember that there are many student allies who are simply too busy with school to read and digest articles about the war. So a priority should always be to give people an opportunity to learn condensed information about the war. One way to do this is to post signs that people can read in their spare time. Below are some early posters we put up (feel free to use and/or modify):
“Three Questions”
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“Four Questions”
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We find the best spot for such signs are in bathroom stalls or in locations that everyone spends a few minutes a day (i.e. near bathroom mirrors, the cafeteria, on tables, etc.).
Immediately after sending the e-mail, plan on conducting an open discussion about the war so that students in the general population who are interested in learning more will have an immediate place to go. Be sure to pass around a sign-up sheet that asks people not only their name, e-mail address, and phone number, but also their special skills and interests.
The second way to motivate people is to give them specific tasks to do. Conducting “pamphletting” in the nearest city, for example, allows individuals to feel they are actively doing something about the war.
You should always be aware of the things that make your campus unique and capitalize on them. For example, at Swarthmore every Thursday night we have something called “Pub Nite” which is essentially a relaxed party that costs four dollars and serves as a fund raiser for the senior class. To capitalize on this, we threw a Why War? Pub Nite and asked people for a donation on top of their normal admission price. In one night we raised $60, which was enough to pay for the copying of the next weekend’s pamphlets.
We also threw a “Contemplate the War” theme night at our cafeteria. We placed questions about the war on all of the cafeteria tables and asked people to contemplate the war over dinner.
Simple things like this make your organization a visible part of the campus.
On to the next step.