Ashley Acord- Tactic #5 and #6 Tabling and March Forth on March 4th

Ashley I. Acord

Social Movements M/W 3:30-4:45pm

Dr. Kubal

Tabling and March Forth on March 4^th: Tactic #5 and #6

            On March 4^th, 2014 our Social Movements class participated in an event called March Forth on March 4^th. We were one of many colleges that participated in this national event. Our whole class met at the regular time of 3:30pm and then walked together to set up tables by the free speech area across from our Henry Madden library. This tactic called tabling was used to inform onlookers or passersby of the specific issue attached to each of our groups we chose to be a part of during in our Social Movements course. We all had our different tables displayed with poster boards and flyers of statistics and important data supporting our causes.  

 I am part of the environmental activist group called S.A.F.F.E. Our group is committed to being more environmentally conscious with our decisions regarding fossil fuel usage and rising energy consumption in the hopes that this will cause continuous environmental improvement. We believe we have a chance of doing this by focusing on decreasing our use and dependence on fossil fuels. By making small commitments as a community we can help make a difference on a global scale. Some of the ways we believe we can do this are by: Reducing, Reusing, Recycling, carpooling, driving less and making a commitment to planting something. By encouraging fellow students to do the same, we feel we can make a change.

            Our S.A.F.F.E. table did not receive a large amount of traffic due in part possibly to the lack of understanding of our acronym in general. Maybe most college students want to live on the dangerous side. I did notice that other groups such as, "A Helping Hand for the Hungry", seemed to have a lot of people frequenting their table. I feel over-all, the most popular, and well-known issues that had more obvious acronyms seem to attract a more continuous flow of visitors.

            We did the tabling for about thirty minutes and we able to talk to a few intrigued students before we were finished. Then we all lined up to march and protest together around campus. We were marching and protesting for women who get raped on school campus and are not shown justice or clarity in the reconciliation from their administration. The idea is, if a crime like this happens, it in no way should be constituted  as an acceptable occurrence, or handled by a slap of the hand nonchalance.

            During the march we yelled things such as, "What do we want?...Justice!....When do we want it?....Now!" I was really excited to do this protest with my whole class and support such a impactful cause. We didn't really see very many people due to the time of day. Most traffic was inside or already dispersed off of campus. Even though, this aspect sort of made the protest less impactful, we all put ourselves out there, most of us for the first time.

            This two tactic event was really great to be a part of. I feel we got a lot of important information out to fellow individuals on campus and also came together in a communal form to make a change. I now know what the statement; "There is power in numbers" stands for, because I felt it while doing the protest. It made me want to do another protest with my group as a sparate tactic and later we did. I would definitely like to try this again, or even better, be a part of a huge protest somewhere like Washington D.C. or New York with large masses. There is a huge rush that comes over you when you subject yourself for judgment and scrutiny in that way. It is a little addicting.