The latest post from our Executive Director's blog on the Huffington Post on organizing your friends to do good. It features Kyle Thiermann, pictured above, and the organization Resource Generation.
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Close to three years ago, I stumbled into the organizing world for what was originally supposed to be a getaway in West Virginia for a conference called 'Leveraging Privilege for Social Change'. I was expecting a week away from email, time commitments and speakers. What I left with was a whole new outlook on what privilege meant and an understanding of the importance of peer-organizing.
I realized that 'leveraging privilege for social change' is much more broadly applicable and reaches beyond the typical domains of wealth and class that often come to mind. We all have communities of which we are a part and we all have privileges that only we have permission to speak about. Our privilege may lie in our relationships, our time, our energy or it may be our skills, abilities or resources, regardless we often need a little help to put them to use. We need a peer network to support us, to help us realize that not only do we have something to give, but that it is possible to make a difference.
I recently met with Kyle Thiermann who embodies just this. Kyle is a professional surfer from Santa Cruz and he decided to mobilize his community -- disengaged surfers. After a trip to Chile, Kyle learned that a proposed coal power plant, funded by the Bank of America, was going to ruin the surf breaks and local culture. He began to mobilize his community, to shoot videos and to advocate in telling people to move their money from the Bank of America to local banks. With his enthusiasm, the campaign grew; this was Kyle's community, this was his privilege. As a direct result of his organizing, he has been able to document that over $110 million dollars of lending power that has been moved from the bank. This is the power of organizing. (....)