Hide Description of Additional Trainings

The first step in recognizing security risks in a community is working towards creating a security culture. Just because we're non-violent doesn't meant that the police don't see us as a threat. It also doesn't mean that we will not be charged with violent crimes if arrested. Maintaining a tight security culture is essential for creating a cohesive, safe, and effective movement based on the principals of trust and solidarity. As our direct action movement becomes more effective, government harassment will only increase. Violations of security culture include behavior that is inappropriate because it intensifies government harassment, jeopardizes the freedom of other activists, and destroys the trust within the movement. This workshop explores how to stay two steps ahead of the government, versus two steps behind in paranoia. Covers the basics of creating and implementing security within your group, and throughout the rest of your life; office, home, personal life, and on your computers.

Hide Description of Security Culture 101

Nowhere else is the saying "knowledge is power" more applicable than when dealing with the legal system and the men in blue who enforce it. Despite corporate capital interests having a strong presence even on the bench of the U.S. Supreme Court, the legal system still affords us useful guarantees. Knowing the tools available to you, the traps you could get hung-up in, and having a basic familiarity with the process will help you act as level-headed as possible when tension and emotions are running high at an action.

This training covers all of the basic legal information for interactions with police. The training teaches you what your basic rights are when you are questioned, searched, detained, and/or arrested, and what methods the police use to manipulate these rights on the spot. The training also takes you through the step by step process from the first interaction with the police, through detainment, arrest, and the court systems. Other topics discussed: tips on jail solidarity, current federal and state legislation threatening your rights, and what to take with you and leave home during an action.

Hide Description of Know Your Rights

If we are ever going to elevate human rights above that of criminal corporate or investor interests we need a way to gauge our effectiveness, especially with movement-building work. Although social change has anything but a linear direction to it, we can still develop way-points to orient the direction of our efforts. Grand Strategy highlights a set of principles and theoretical framework which can be utilized for evaluating the effectiveness of our actions and tactics. Topics explored include conceptual frameworks for understanding conflict, building power, the role of social movements in relation to political reform, and creating a sympathetic identity for ones cause through principles-based communications.

Hide Description of Grand Strategy Training

Some people wonder if the state of the world needs to get worse to motivate more people to make it better. More likely, we need to organize more effectively. An endless montage of creative tactics wont win us the world we want. Our campaigns are much more likely to succeed if we cultivate the skills needed to alleviate our nearsightedness and develop a long-term vision. Also, we can hardly be effective agents of change without some degree of personal care to make our engagement sustainable.

Looking at the big picture - strategy, targets, setting goals/objectives, choosing tactics etc. This workshop goes over the basics of how to build the campaign you need to create change. It will cover: planning campaigns to be more cohesive, effective and strategic steps needed to implement an effective campaign, identifying your targets, building a network of strategic alliances, and how to coherently evaluate what’s working and not working in existing campaigns. The workshop also explores the concept of burn out in the activist movement, and how to avoid it within your group.