‘In every crisis there is opportunity,’ says the author of 'Shut It Down: Stories from a Fierce Loving Resistance'
In a global culture characterized by massive and ever-increasing social inequality, polarized politics and rapid ecological decline, we have more well-meaning people working toward remedying these ills than ever before. From the 1980s on, we have witnessed an explosion of nonprofits, non-governmental organizations, and other charitable or humanitarian organizations. But still there is a pall of inertia to move the dial when it comes to climate change.
To understand how we might effectively go about creating such change, Street Roots talked with Lisa Fithian. Fithian’s expertise comes from decades of experience working on the frontlines of grassroots social movements as a trainer, organizer and tireless advocate for nonviolent direct action and civil disobedience. Among countless others, she has been instrumental in supporting the uprisings during the Battle of Seattle; Occupy Wall Street; Ferguson, Mo.; and Standing Rock. Fithian is on a national tour promoting her new book, “Shut It Down: Stories from a Fierce Loving Resistance,” and giving workshops titled “Escalating Resistance: Mass Rebellion Training.”
She started “Shut It Down” seven years ago, around the time of the Occupy movement. And she feels like it’s coming out at exactly the right time.
Eric Elmore: Why this book now? What do you hope your workshops accomplish?
Lisa Fithian: I am hoping and feeling like this is one of those moments that people are going to be open to hearing and listening in a new way. Maybe this book will help them not only understand what some of our movements are doing, but why and how we are doing it. The goal of the workshop is to help people understand that there are some foundational pieces that will help us get to where we need to be. One of those foundational pieces is that we have to actually create an escalating crisis, social disruption – organized chaos, if you will. People are afraid of chaos. We have people in power that are also creating that chaos every day for people. So we know that it can be destabilizing.
We also know that in every crisis there is opportunity. And so the question is whenever there is a crisis, there are different forces that might be poised to move that crisis in certain directions. There is a natural and organic way that change happens, and we need to set the foundation. We need to build the conditions. We need to hold a vision. So that when things are emerging, while we are not in control, we can move them in the direction we want. I want us to be poised to be doing that very intentionally.
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Elmore: Why are complexity science, intentional crises and chaos positive and essential aspects of social movements and change?
Fithian: Complexity science is the science behind why direct action networks work. We are so deadened by the dominant culture. We so believe we don’t have any power. We so believe that we can’t make a difference. I often talk about being in a “culture of death” that allows these forces that do harm to continue to profit and benefit by us being deadened. When we are intentionally creating a crisis, we are changing conditions, not only for ourselves, but the people we are trying to change. I have continued to organize around nonviolent direct action because I think it’s the most rapid and radical method and transformative strategy for change. When people do this stuff, they come back to life. When we are working collectively and exercising collective power, we’re this unstoppable force. … We need to make our interests their interests. When our interests are their interests, they have an opportunity to change.
Because we are in such an imbalance right now, I have found that it’s really through that creating crisis that we can make more fundamental change. We need radical, fundamental system change. When Trump came in, we saw people freaking out with movements starting to rise, but it was movements that were dominated by nonprofits, who in certain moments reacted. We weren’t staying on the offensive and building power. We were reacting and then moving on to the next moment – not building towards crisis, not making it fundamentally destabilizing for that administration. We have hardly even mitigated damage. We continue to lose. So we have to go in a different direction.
Elmore: Out of the movements you have supported, what were the common elements of success between them?
Fithian: There is no one way. There is no right way. We have to have multiple strategies, (and) confront them from multiple directions. Everybody is needed. We have to be in right relationship, with ourselves and others, because so often our movements become toxic because we are not in right relationship. We pit against each other, and we throw one another under the bus. We can’t do that anymore. There are a myriad of ways we divide ourselves and re-enact a lot of the oppressions of the dominant culture.
We need to embrace more of the “yes,” not just the “no.” We are always “against.” We need to be “for.” A lot of my life has been about stopping things – war, stopping deportation, harmful policy. And yes, we need to do that. But we also have to be embodying alternatives. If we use the lessons of the past, and use our work differently, maybe we will get somewhere different.
We have to be strategic. We have limited time, energy and resources. We have unlimited people. So how are we working in ways until we get to the scale that tips it? We need to be in right relationships between grassroots and nonprofit (organizations), locally and nationally.
Fundamentally it is building these networks rooted in relationships that are going to give us our greatest flexibility, versatility and strength to go after everything we are facing. We have to organize.
We have to build relationships that are rooted in reclaiming our humanity, undoing the systems of oppression that we enact because that is how we were socialized. We act it out. We need networks rooted in shared power and direct democracy; take the free will we all have and direct it toward some agency in our lives – in love, beauty, joy, humane culture building. …
It’s a lot of work, but it’s good work. We need meaningful work. We need to have our needs met, beyond just (receiving) a paycheck. Our exploitative jobs are part of the problem. We need to imagine how we can reorganize our social relations and wealth to meet each other’s needs and care for one another.
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Elmore: You see direct action as the most effective means of transformative social change. Most people do want change but do not know what to do or have become cynical, passive or disempowered. Define direct action.
Fithian: Direct action is a strategy of intervening or interrupting a dynamic of power without permission to change the conditions of the outcomes. I see it as a way of life. It’s about understanding that we have power and agency, and that every choice we make is exercising that. Our choices will either liberate or oppress. How are we making choices about being in relationship to the world we are in? It is about taking our power back. We live in a world of “power over” and “power under.” Really what we are looking for is our power of being grounded, connected and calm, rather than apathetic, cynical, reactive. It is about being in that space. We live in an historic culture. They don’t want us to know our history of resistance. We have to learn what has and what has not worked.
Elmore: Do traditional legal methods of protest have any real place in effectively creating another world, as you mention in the dedication of your book?
Fithian: They could. But this is one of the problems. When the students in Parkland rose up, they got fierce, but they got totally co-opted by the Democratic forces, which operate through nonprofits. I am watching the youth rise up with 4 million people around the world. And now I am getting emails from the nonprofits. They are going to pivot all that energy to the elections, and completely undermine that fierce youth energy. Unless those in the direct action movement create some alternatives. So ultimately it’s on us.
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Learn from history. Don’t go home (from protests). Stay. Can you act with courage? Can you bring your people? But then don’t bring buses that bring them home. Support the grass roots infrastructure for people to stay, for us to be prepared for what we might face. We have been doing the same shit for decades and not getting to where we want to be. Shut it down.
We need organizers, but we don’t need managers or coordinators with a sense of authority. We have to build these more horizontal networks for people to exercise their own agency. … It’s not going to get to scale without that. How do we take that excitement and energy and get it to scale? It takes mass trainings. It takes pushing people to self-organize. It takes sharing strategies and values. If you are trying to lead a rebellion that is mimicking supremacy without an analysis, let’s please not do that.
Elmore: How does civil disobedience allow us to protect our deepest selves and reclaim our humanity?
Fithian: I consider it a sacred act. It is a willingness to put yourself in harm’s way. It’s a willingness to shut things down at great cost to yourself. As you do that, it amplifies (your) power because there is nothing the state can do to stop you anymore. An individual act of risk done together, mitigates the harm that might happen. (This) is why we have to do it in the collective with increasing numbers in a good way that is inspiring.
Elmore: What do you say to people who fear involving themselves in nonviolent direct action?
Fithian: Fear is real. But we have been taught to have a lot of irrational fears. We can be afraid and still act with courage. We get that courage by preparing ourselves, getting with other people, and knowing that we may have to take a little step first before we take that huge step. We are in that moment where we want to be taking huge steps. It would be insane to think that we wouldn’t be afraid when we know that the government can and will kill us. We have to believe in ourselves and what is possible. Let’s imagine it is what we really want. Let’s put our imagination there.
Let’s believe it’s possible. There is a peace in nature, in the universe that we have been separated from. Part of this is reconnecting with that and trusting. We have to take each others’ hands and walk through the fire. That is how we are going to get there. What else are we gonna do other than die? Let’s die gloriously. Let’s die fully alive. Let’s die knowing that our spirit and energy are here to help us.
Elmore: How do you reconcile “fierce resistance” in the title of your book, of violent, oppressive structures, with the humanity of those individuals perpetuating them?
Fithian: I understand that all of those people are damaged too. I also know that part of the trajectory of life is learning to take responsibility and make choices that are ideally supporting life. With direct action training, there is an escalation. That’s why we escalate. It gives those people the opportunity to do the right thing. If they do, great. If they don’t, then we escalate. We are giving them choices all along the way to do the right thing. We have to give people the opportunity to grow, learn, and change. We have to support them. But when people are consciously choosing to do harm, we have to shut that down to open things up. We have to be fierce.
In my approach to the police, I try to say, “You took a vow to protect the people, so take the badge off put the gun down and join the people. As long as you don’t do that, and you continue to represent the interest of the state, I don’t care how good of a person you are, you are making a choice that is doing harm.” It’s about forcing them into crisis to make the right choices.
Elmore: Considering the massive youth-led global climate strikes, what is your message to youths, and adults?
Fithian: I want people not to have false hope, but belief that they can change the world. They are at the right place and the right time. They need to trust their instincts, be willing to stay in their fierceness, to work intergenerationally, in right relationships, to guard against the co-optation of the nonprofits and the Democrats. (They need) to hold the vision of system change, not mitigation, to shut things down, to take that power that they have and go all the way.
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To the adults, trust and support their courage, their power. Back them up. Let them know we love them, that they are doing what is needed. (We need to) share our wisdom without telling them that’s the way to go. Let them take it and do as they will. Let them do what they need to do without steering them.
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