Don't Kid Yourself: This Ain't Organizing, It's Capitalism

Movements powered by the people change things. IF changing people’s lives in meaningful ways is the goal. Tina Strawn breaks down the state AND definition of organizing in our current America.

They say it will be easier to organize under a Kamala presidency than under a Trump presidency. That is exactly why so many Republicans are falling all over themselves to endorse Kamala, so they will have an easier time pushing the policies of Project 2025, which by the way, Trump says he hasn’t even read. 

Nonetheless, this Project 2025 seems to be the ‘single issue’ that trumped the other ‘single issue’ that is the 12+ month, 76-year long genocide of the Palestinian people by the settler colonial state of Israel (funded by the United States) for many Democrats. 

But for those of us who won’t be voting for either of the red or blue genocidal options, and for those of us who have some understanding of the reality that regardless of who becomes the next President of the United States of America, we know that we are going to have to figure out how to survive. 

Survive by organizing, which apparently, will be easier under Kamala. Organizing being the key word here. I’m trying to understand what that means exactly . . . as in what exactly do folks mean by “organizing” and what motivates them to “organize”. 

Take for example, June 5 of last year in Denver. When Here4TheKids was established in the spring of 2023, we were able to organize some incredible things in a relatively short amount of time. Our goal of getting 25,000 white women to show up at the capitol in Denver to demand that Governor Jared Polis (Democrat) sign an executive order to ban guns was audacious. 

When we held our very first Zoom call and more than 300 people attended wanting to be a part of a movement aimed at saving our kids from guns — the thing killing them more than anything else — we were inspired and encouraged. Our email list grew. Our Instagram following exploded. Throngs of white women went door-to-door all over Colorado beckoning fellow white women to join them. White women across the country began making plans to be in Denver as we prepared to fight for our children’s lives in a very unique way. 

Our strategy of white women showing up to put their bodies, their privilege, and their power on the line to save all of our kids was due to the fact that historically and statistically, white women were the least likely to be brutalized by the police.

Not only was this strategy innovative, but it was also very intentional and centered on protecting Black, brown, and other people of the global majority and marginalized folks who have been leading and organizing justice movements for generations, repeatedly putting our bodies in danger.  

June 5, Denver, CO

When it comes to the successful organizing of people, we looked to the blueprint of the Civil Rights movement and the hundreds of Black leaders, and ordinary, everyday people, who gathered in Selma to march to Montgomery to demand voting rights for Black people.

First they were met with violent police brutality. But ultimately, they completed the march, inspired a nation, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was signed. 

A huge organizing win . . . that is, IF your definition of organizing is coming together in community to effect social and political change in service of humanity.

Another powerful example of organizing done exceptionally well is the Montgomery Bus Boycott, where 100% of the Black people living in Montgomery decided that they would come together, organize, coordinate and participate in strategic ways to get Black people to and from where they needed to be without taking buses, for over a year. And they were able to accomplish this, which led to the desegregation of the buses in Montgomery. 

Another example from Alabama that proves that organizing works*. That is, IF your definition of organizing is coming together in community to effect social and political change in service of humanity.

Movements powered by the people change things. IF changing people’s lives in meaningful ways — rather than changing the dictator in the Oval Office — is your goal.

*Pardon me, I should say worked, past tense.

Which brings me back to June 2023. When it came to applying pressure and demanding that the Colorado Democrat governor ban guns and buy them back so kids could be safe in schools, at malls, in their homes, 25,000 white women did not show up (and neither did the police as we predicted with just white women who weren’t seen as any kind of a threat). 

Now if we were to analyze why they didn’t show up, I’m sure there would be many reasons. But I think it’s safe to say that either the reason of trying to save our kids from dying by guns wasn’t enough of a motivating factor, or there were more important reasons that kept them from showing up. 

I was all but convinced that Americans, particularly white women, just couldn’t get themselves together enough to organize in significantly large numbers around an important cause, not even one that would save the lives of their own kids. 

But it turns out that I was wrong. 

Americans — even white American women — can, in fact, get themselves together to organize around an important cause. Saving American children just wasn’t the cause though. I can hardly believe that I’m typing this, but it turns out that the cause that’s brought hundreds of thousands of Americans together to organize around a single issue is . . .

Donald Trump. 

And by organizing, I mean raising hundreds of millions of dollars.

When Genocide Joe Biden stepped out of the running for President and endorsed his sidekick VP this past July, all of a sudden, Zoom calls for Kamala based on racial and gender identities sprung up out of nowhere.  

• Black women stepped up first. Within hours of Biden stepping down, I received an invitation to join the ‘Win With Black Women’ call (I declined to attend). 44,000 Black women. $1.4 million dollars raised.

• Then there was the Black men for Kamala call. 53,000 Black men. $1.3 million dollars raised in about six hours. 

• White dudes for Harris topped that (understandably). 144,000 white guys. More than $4 million.

• And if you guessed that no one was gonna outdo white women, you’d be correct. Becky, Karen and Shannon raised $11 million. 

Within one week, the Anointed One’s campaign raised $200 million dollars. The term for that apparently is ‘Kamalamentum.’

White women ‘answering the call’

What struck me is this: 

1. If the people are motivated enough, that motivation can be turned into real organizing power. With a motive they find compelling, they will organize fast and furiously. Donald Trump — and not ending the number one killer of kids — apparently is the compelling motive.

2. Organizing today is all about raising money. Full stop. All we are hearing about over and over and over is who has raised how many more millions than the other. Compare this with the march from Selma to Montgomery, which was actual humans joining together to effect change. Versus million-dollar Zoom marathons. 

Organizing is the Uncommitted Movement organizing more than 700,000 uncommitted votes across the nation to persuade Kamala and the DNC to stop sending bombs to Israel in exchange for votes. Harris and the Democratic Party will not agree to an arms embargo, and refused to even listen to the movement by meeting with reps and Palestinian families, therefore the movement will not endorse Kamala or any other candidate for president.

An organizing fail.

Versus the remarkably effective tactic of just cold hard cash, such as in AIPAC pouring millions of dollars of blood money into the pockets of legislators on both sides. AIPAC’s strategy put more than $11 million just in Black Democrats pockets alone to ensure their genocidal project of Palestine continues uninterrupted.

A money win.

What does this tell us? Should we be relieved that at least we still know how to organize, or should we be resigned to the fact that organizing has been replaced with fundraising?

It’s not that we don’t know how to organize . . . Zoom calls where hundreds of thousands of people attended took just days to coordinate. But the end result of that wasn’t healthcare for all, housing, reproductive justice, an end to American gun violence culture, an end to genocide. The end result, instead, has been hundreds of millions of dollars to elect someone who is the current Vice President underwriting mass death of Palestinians AND mass death of Americans by way of police brutality, no healthcare, no housing, guns, guns and more guns. 

Organizing TODAY seems to mean money, fundraising, another strategic, yet exploitive vehicle of — and in service of — capitalism. 

The people are perfectly able and capable of organizing themselves to come together and mobilize to raise millions of dollars in a matter of days for the purpose of trying to keep Donald Trump out of the White House again. 

Bravo. 

So this is where organizing has devolved . . . raising money and throwing it at the favored one of two evils.

Old school organizing in America has died, along with 40,000+ Palestinian babies, children, and people at the hands of Israel and the United States. Old school organizing in America has died along with the voice of the people, the millions of people and their voices who have shown up to protest the genocide of Palestinians and demand a ceasefire and an arms embargo. 

Rather than LISTENING to the people, our government — led by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris — have responded by sending more money and more weapons to Israel to slaughter more humans. 

For those tried and true blue voters who may have spent months shouting ‘Free Palestine,’ they certainly have changed course now, along with their Democratic Presidential hopeful. And all they really ‘hope’ for is that the rest of us who insist on demanding an end to this genocide would just shut up about it already. 

After all, she’s speaking.