WeUnite

When it comes to protests I've noticed two issues:

1. Protests especially in local cities are not being covered at all.

2. The media focuses almost exclusively on the violent aspect which is just a tiny portion of protest activity and a lot is just opportunities who don't care at all about the protest cause and are taking advantage of the fact that police are distracted to cause destruction and steal from stores.

We have the power to fight back. We can contact the media and first of all for local media use their tip line to say where and when there will be peaceful protests. This will increase the likelihood your local media will cover it which can trickle up to national media.

The second thing is for national media use the feedback option to contact them and demand they accurately cover the protests.

Here are some links to submit feedback to national media:

ABC News: https://support.abc.com/hc/en-us/requests/new?ticket_form_id=360003079511

NBC News: https://www.nbcnews.com/information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521

CBS News: https://www.cbs.com/showfeedback/

CNN: https://help.cnn.com/us/feedback

For how to write the feedback I'd just say keep it short and speak your mind. Don't worry too much about being perfect, the most important thing is they get lots of feedback from real people.

Here is a sample. Please do NOT copy and paste, it's just a starting point.

I saw your show the other day and I feel that it wasn't representative of what the protests are like. When I was there it was completely peaceful and I've seen lots of videos online on social media showing peaceful protests but your coverage didn't include that, instead it showed video of people who are opportunists who are not involved with protesting causing chaos.

I'm calling on {NEWS STATION REPLACE THIS PART ex: ABC News} to spend a lot more time covering the peaceful protests which represent the vast majority of the protests and show less footage of the violence.

When it comes to protests I've noticed two issues:

1. Protests especially in local cities are not being covered at all.

2. The media focuses almost exclusively on the violent aspect which is just a tiny portion of protest activity and a lot is just opportunities who don't care at all about the protest cause and are taking advantage of the fact that police are distracted to cause destruction and steal from stores.

We have the power to fight back. We can contact the media and first of all for local media use their tip line to say where and when there will be peaceful protests. This will increase the likelihood your local media will cover it which can trickle up to national media.

The second thing is for national media use the feedback option to contact them and demand they accurately cover the protests.

Here are some links to submit feedback to national media:

ABC News: https://support.abc.com/hc/en-us/requests/new?ticket_form_id=360003079511

NBC News: https://www.nbcnews.com/information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521

CBS News: https://www.cbs.com/showfeedback/

CNN: https://help.cnn.com/us/feedback

For how to write the feedback I'd just say keep it short and speak your mind. Don't worry too much about being perfect, the most important thing is they get lots of feedback from real people.

Here is a sample. Please do NOT copy and paste, it's just a starting point.

I saw your show the other day and I feel that it wasn't representative of what the protests are like. When I was there it was completely peaceful and I've seen lots of videos online on social media showing peaceful protests but your coverage didn't include that, instead it showed video of people who are opportunists who are not involved with protesting causing chaos.

I'm calling on {NEWS STATION REPLACE THIS PART ex: ABC News} to spend a lot more time covering the peaceful protests which represent the vast majority of the protests and show less footage of the violence.

Archive link: https://web.archive.org/web/20250609174157/https://bsky.app/profile/anneapplebaum.bsky.social/post/3lr6ssiwzic2l

Remember that Twitter is also giving a platform to neo-Nazis. That's why it's important everyone stop using Twitter and switch to alternatives such as Bluesky and Mastodon.

For the protests Trump is hoping for one of two outcomes:

1. The protests escalate and he seizes power just like Hitler did: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/06/hitler-public-order/683098/
2. People roll over, stay silent and comply with the administration out of fear.

If fact I wonder if #1 would be more ideal for Trump because it would be a unifying cause for Republicans who are currently divided and soon face economic uncertainty. Remember that Trump's polling was worst in April during times of greatest economic uncertainty. However let's not give him either of those. Let's humiliate Trump by making all the people he brought in, in hopes of escalating useless and bored. Imagine the pictures of them standing around with nothing to do. It will foil the well used dictator playbook for seizing power.

The reality is a vast, vast majority of the protests are going to be peaceful no matter what. The problem is that the media even the mainstream media will focus on any violence there is so we need we really need to be as perfect as we can so let's do everything we can to ensure that every single protest remains as peaceful as possible and also take charge of the narrative too.

What we need to do is protest peacefully and lawfully, be a little more spread out, stay away from situations that are violent. I'd also recommend staying away from police and military. Use the time to expose Trump's corruption and educate people and bring new people to the movement and maybe even help register people to vote. By building a broad peaceful coalition we can reach even those who are stuck in echo chambers where they will only see what little violence there is and not notice the peaceful protests. The only way to break through is to protest peacefully in your city so they can see that protests are peaceful or get previously neutral people involved in protesting who will talk to their friends who will in-turn talk to their friends and so on eventually reaching those in echo chambers.

I'd recommend bringing American flags, say we love our country, we believe ALL Americans have equal rights and that we support the constitution and upholding American tradition like separation of power, that no one is above the law and that there are no kings in America. The more people who do that the more chances the media will be forced to show this which disrupts the false narrative that we're not patriotic, in fact I feel we're way more patriotic than the people who still worship traitors like the confederates, those who want to destroy our country and those who feel that only Americans who have the right skin color, gender and socioeconomic status deserve rights.

Online and in person we must strongly push back against those who call for violence, balkanization or civil war. These things will be devastating to everyone. I can tell you that I'm a blue dot in a red state, I have lots of friends and family members who are as well. Nearly all of us are too poor and too deeply rooted in our communities to move. This could literally be deadly for us and millions of innocent people who don't support what's going on now and even if not deadly lots of us could one day be subject to a oppressive regime in a spin-off of part of America, that would be horrible. If we make it to the midterms we can win enough elections and make our country better in all 50 states peacefully and legally.

Remember: broad peaceful coalition, bring more and more people over, eventually even some Trump supporters will see the light and we'll resolve this peacefully. I know we can do it!

PS: Hands-off put together a list of articles about de-escalation training here: https://actionnetwork.org/user_files/user_files/000/122/370/original/Hands_Off!__De-escalation_resources_(4).pdf

The YouTube link in the PDF wasn't stripped of tracking so use this link to watch their de-escalation training: https://youtu.be/_Pgmn9QRr48

I also saw an interesting idea of having monitors in high visibility vests and using whistles whenever they see even initial signs of violence, in the original suggestion they advised sitting but I read some persuasive comments that mentioned sitting down could be dangerous, instead I think leaving is the best approach.

Erica Chenoweth initially thought that only violent protests were effective. However after analyzing 323 movements the results were opposite of what Erica thought:

For the next two years, Chenoweth and Stephan collected data on all violent and nonviolent campaigns from 1900 to 2006 that resulted in the overthrow of a government or in territorial liberation. They created a data set of 323 mass actions. Chenoweth analyzed nearly 160 variables related to success criteria, participant categories, state capacity, and more. The results turned her earlier paradigm on its head — in the aggregate, nonviolent civil resistance was far more effective in producing change.

If campaigns allow their repression to throw the movement into total disarray or they use it as a pretext to militarize their campaign, then they’re essentially co-signing what the regime wants — for the resisters to play on its own playing field. And they’re probably going to get totally crushed.

Imagine this you're talking to friends and you start talking about cars. Naturally you work the following statement into the conversation: "I'm never going to buy a Tesla, they have so many recalls, are unreliable, lie about their range, and have poor build quality". What you just did might matter a lot more than you think because perhaps your friends will repeat what you just said and the message spreads. What you said may also surface when it's time for them to buy a car.

Or you're talking about social media and your friend says he's tired of the content on social media. You could say, yeah I totally agree. I deleted my Twitter/X, Facebook and Instagram account. I now use Lemmy, Bluesky and Mastodon. My mental health has improved a lot after making the switch.

Now imagine this: you're talking to someone who you're very good friends with but you're never talked politics before. This can perhaps be a little risky but what if you bring up something small and innocent that could be used to gauge their views. Or just listen to their thoughts without judgement and see where they stand. Perhaps you'll find that you both agree on things you never knew you did and then you become allies and you work together to make a difference in your community.

Or most importantly if you have friends who share your political views. If you do please ask them these questions: Are you registered to vote? Is your registration up to date, active and current? Do you have a ride to get to the nearest/designated polling place? Do you know all the upcoming election dates and primaries? Sadly we need this question too: Republicans are trying to suppress your vote: do you have up to date identification and paperwork?

There's a concern that Republicans are going to try to pass more voter suppression laws in hopes of shifting the results in their favor. We can fight against this both by doing everything we can to prevent these policies from getting passed in the first place and if sadly they become law let's still win anyway despite the additional challenge. Remember people throughout history fought hard for the right to vote, the best way to preserve your rights is to exercise it. Even if it becomes harder to vote it's still imperative that you do it! Also there's not much harm in having up to date paperwork. In fact it might be beneficial for other reasons in the future.

Here's information about voter ID laws by state: https://www.usa.gov/voter-id

Here's my suggested list of actions. Hopefully you won't need to do all of these to vote but you might still find benefit to doing these things anyway because it could help you later in life.

1. Up to date voter registration. Check to make sure it's active and accurate. How do this will depend on where you live so check locally using official information from your local government for example their official website (which will typically end with .gov or (two letter state initials).gov) or calling them with their current phone number.
2. Ensure your driver's license is valid and up to date if you drive or consider alternative forms of acceptable voter ID if you don't.
3. Get a certified copy of your birth certificate
4. Apply for a passport (may also be helpful if the country were to go really bad and if there's an emergency you never know if you'll need this, also you can travel internationally which is great!)
5. Social security card. You can get a free replacement if you don't have one.

Helping your friends vote can make a big difference because they may feel empowered to help their friends too!

While I think it's better to avoid billionaire controlled social media platforms like Twitter, Threads, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and Facebook if for whatever reason you must use an account on those platforms I have some subtle habits you can instill in yourself that will make your life better and make a difference all by doing these simple actions that require very little of your time. Note that trying to get people to leave these billionaire platforms is better than continuing to use them. Also note these instructions work on almost any social media platform even the non-billionaire ones. Bluesky takes reports very seriously, I've seen imposter and scammer accounts get deleted just minutes after reporting them.

Here's how it works. Whenever you see disinformation or any content that violates the rules especially if the content is in particular reprehensible do the following:

1. Take a screenshot of it, for maximum impact if the post got a lot of engagement make sure the numbers were included. Also BrioxorMorbide suggested putting an X over the misinformation kind of like Snopes does because otherwise it can be reinforced in some people's brain.
2. Report the content
3. Wait for the results (you cannot lose no matter if they accept the report or don't)

I hear some of you thinking Facebook or whatever website hardly ever takes down rule breaking content, they always tell me that ${horrible_content} is allowed under the rules. Why bother reporting? The answer is because when they process your report you get an answer back saying they reviewed it and if they removed it or if they allowed it. If they allowed it you now have a powerful screenshot. Take a screenshot showing how your report was rejected. Then share that screenshot on places that you know will be strongly against whatever content was allowed on the social media platform. Someone did that recently and it had a powerful impact. Look at all the people saying they deleted their X accounts. The picture I posted for this post originally came from there but sadly the post was removed. Thankfully I saved a copy before it was deleted.

If they do remove that content that's also a good outcome because you just reduced the spread of hate/disinformation.

One powerful thing people in the EU can do is report posts which violate the DSA. If the large social media website doesn't respond quickly enough they get fined. Moreover your reports could perhaps become part of statistics regarding how much illegal content social media websites host.

Reporting also has the benefit that it will result in data. If people keep reporting a particular type of content it means they are not happy with it.

Here's another thing you can do. When you see right wing content that maybe doesn't directly violate the rules but instead comes close without breaking them like Fox News does click whatever equivalent there is to "I'm not interested in this". The goal here is to make the algorithm be less likely to show you things such as Fox News. The algorithms may be based on what similar people do so you could be reducing the chance Fox News will be shown to other people too. Likely if lots of people click that button the content will be penalized or deranked. Even if you're the only one who's impacted it will still help your mental health not to see that horrible content. That's why earlier I said "make your life better".

Also when you see disinformation or hateful content try to push back on it without wasting your too much of your time. Maybe respond with Snopes says that's not true and provide a fact check link or copy and paste a rebuttal to the post or for discriminatory content say something like we are all human being, let's love instead of hate each other. The goal here is to take into account that silence always benefits the oppressor but without wasting too much of your time which could be better spent doing more impactful forms of resisting like registering people to vote or something like that. Also be careful not to do something which will cause people to become more entrenched in their hateful ways.

Yet another thing you can do and you may already be doing this is post progressive content and try to reach new audiences. For example if you read an interesting article about how a Republican is corrupt (there are tons of these articles) might as well post it on all the social media accounts you have. Research shows that people do things if they think it's popular so you're helping people realize how popular it is to be progressive and spreading it.

There's been so much going on in the world so I wanted to take the time to say that the threat of Trump's cabinet is looming closer and closer each day.

There is something you can do about this and it only takes a few minutes. Call your senator and ask that they oppose Trump's radical cabinet picks.

Say no to Russian-asset Tulsi Gabbard, xenophobic Pete Hegseth, Qtard Kash Patel, nutjob quack RFK Jr.