How to REALLY make a difference

Hi guys. Here is how to really make sure Comprehensive Immigration Reform/Dream Act really takes off.

In theory, support for CIR/DA among the public correlates with the pool of voters and congress. As public support increases, voters in the public sphere votes their conscience and speaks their mind. Congress thus follows suit, content in the knowledge that they are not losing their constituents.

My proposal is to work on public support. We are already doing that, but here is a more comprehensive framework for doing so. Two foundational principles that guide our endeavor:

a) Perception Is Reality. This is especially true in the media: How the public perceives you is the be-all and end-all of whether they support your cause.

b) Perception needs to be managed. Major corporations do this. Political parties and governments do this. Celebrities do this. This is what PR (public relations) is all about. This is what image consultants are all about. We need to do this.

What are the key perceptions points we need to address (DREAM-specific). These points are divided into defensive and offensive perception points.

Defensive perceptions are intended to defend the image of undocumented students. Offensive perceptions are intended to defeat the opposition by damaging the image of those who stand against resolving this problem.

An example of an offensive/attacking perception is the Conservative strategy of using the term "Amnesty" as an insult and a rallying call against immigration reform. The result was that anything that was associated with amnesty became a volatile issue and everybody was scared to touch it.

Defensive perceptions that we need to evoke:
1) We are Americans more than immigrants.
2) The status quo is an injustice.
3) Undocumented students are "the good guys".
4) Undocumented students' benefits to society need to be highlighted:
-Statistically, we are of above average intelligence, above average education, above average income/tax bracket, above average contributors to economy and workplace, below average criminal/delinquency rates, etc.
5) (to be continued)

Offensive perceptions (for best effect, these are used after defensive perceptions have saturated the media):
1) People who support the status quo are perpetuating injustice.
2) Ignorance/intolerance/nativism/occasionally even racism and ethnocentrism is behind inaction/resistance against the DREAM Act.
3) (to be continued)

Even when you are not making the above statements, you are transmitting the message in the tone of your voice, body language, behavior, decisions, etc. Your mannerisms need to be congruent with your message.

eg. Protester who says "Undocumented students are good!", followed by news reports of undocumented students being violent, unruly or committing crimes.

Another example of communication congruence:
Scenario 1: Protesters who do not justify their protests sometimes depict this message: "We are protesting disruptively because we believe this is wrong and we want to communicate what we feel."

Scenario 2: Protesters who justify their protests give off the feeling that: "We love you guys and we don't want to be an inconvenience. However, we HAVE to protest because we have tried all others means of communication and negotiation, but the opposition is simply not receptive. Regrettably, this was our final straw."

The second scenario builds more empathy among the indifferent. It portrays the opposition as the bad guys and puts them on the defensive.

Other points:
-Anyone who has studied media/PR/advertising should know other techniques:
Use simple messages and simple words, emotions > logic, etc.

Have you presented this framework to DreamActivist?

I emailed Juan, but he appears not to be responding to my email.

I know I sound like a total dork with all this stuff, but I have a real interest in psychology and mass media, so I key in to a lot of this stuff.

I think your ideas are interesting. Would love to see how they can be put into practice. I can get a hold of Juan if you'd like. Also, you can contact Nick via PM for more input!

This is interesting & true, & stuff we have been putting into practice for a while. These ideas have been integrated into media trainings, organizing toolkits, messaging & talking points, & current efforts to change the tone of the rhetoric surrounding the Dream Act online & offline.

If you have any specific ideas about positive media/messaging, we're open ears. Thanks.

Specifically, I've started work on something along the line of what I've mentioned.

The goal is to pick out common objections to CIR/DA and refute them comprehensively and clearly, time and time again through any media outlet possible so that these objections will not come up again.

If this is communicated with the right tone (less combative and aggressive and more rational and even-handed), I'm confident it will reap rewards. But the key is in how we refute the message. We should NEVER come across like activists peddling a message, otherwise we will be characterized as partisan. We need to come across very even-handed, almost as if we have no invested interest in the outcome.

I've made a basic framework of important points here, found another list here as well. In order to build on this, I find an effective way is to simply trawl online articles and read the responses to get a feeling of what points the nativists tend to bring up.

The one thing I cannot do is go in front of the media. I don't have the right contacts, don't have a means of assembling or taking part in a campaign physically. The actual dissemination of information will have to be taken on by the relevant groups who have enough sway so that Maddow, O'Reilly, Chris Matthews and whoever will actually notice them, let alone buy the story.

If this was a project in the works, I would love to put my heart and soul into it, formulating answers, editing, researching, etc.

How about we form a collaborative project and put it on youtube.

That's certainly one way to go about it. We need to collect data first though.

Are you good at researching and making arguments?

Invictus, I saw your link to the wiki today. I will go to the website Abaddon mentioned and start putting together talking points from that in the wiki. We also need somehow to come up with a place to put links that people kind find easily to follow to post comments on articles.

I really appreciate your doing all of this. It seems like we may be able to build a group of dreamers to do this online advocacy work that is important to change public perceptions of DREAM

Are you talking about Citizen Orange? I went to that blog but I couldn't find a lot of relevant information. Maybe I'm navigation impaired.