The Nonprofit Inferiority Complex and Why We Need to Lose It Now
Here’s a thought exercise you can use to test yourself for the dreaded Nonprofit Inferiority Complex, the internalized idea that nonprofit work is inherently less... Read More
Breaking the Silence about Class in One Liberal Denomination
In 2012, I was lucky enough to attend a remarkable weekend-long Class Action Train-the-Trainers mega-workshop. I did not attend to learn techniques to raise awareness about class and... Read More
Four Ways Nonprofits Can Address the Classism Within
Several years ago, I was sitting in a diversity training of a nonprofit I helped manage. We’d spent the morning talking about inequality within the... Read More
Class Diversity Improves Your Nonprofit Board
Nonprofit organizations, which are legal entities that must be approved by state governments, allow people to join together and combine resources to achieve common goals.... Read More
Was the International Women’s Day Strike Classist?
What did you do for International Women’s Day? Did you strike? Well, I’m currently unemployed, and my partner has been supporting us while I’ve been more-or-less taking... Read More
Five Classist Pitfalls to #Resist in Your Activism
In a moment of potentially revolutionary activism and mobilization, don’t let classism undermine your efforts. The past few weeks have been both terrifying and inspiring.... Read More
Resistance Is Critical
The election outcome was a shock – but wasn’t something new. Throughout U.S. history we’ve had waves of right-wing populism, when people bought into explanations... Read More
Beyond Trump: Creating Class-Race Alliances
Part of the White, Working Class, and Worried about Trump (#WhiteWorkingClassVsTrump) Campaign*: I grew up in economically depressed, though beautiful, northeastern Vermont. My family was on... Read More
Beyond Trump: Building a Coalition for Change
Part of the White, Working Class, and Worried about Trump (#WhiteWorkingClassVsTrump) Campaign*: I grew up in South St. Louis City in a multi-racial, working-class neighborhood. My... Read More
Mother Jones in Philadelphia – 1903 and 2016?
I first met Cheri Honkala a couple of years ago at a Philadelphia protest against the Keystone XL Pipeline. Not knowing what she looked like,... Read More
Poor Little “Not-So-Rich” Girls
It wasn’t until I began to write about class from the perspective of the 19th century women about whom I’ve written two biographies that I... Read More
Class and the Labor-Environmental Divide
How do we address the deep class and culture divide that has opened up between workers and environmental activists? We are heading to a potentially... Read More
A surprising class culture pattern
When I was studying 25 social justice groups for Missing Class, one of my biggest surprises was a class category I hadn’t even thought to... Read More
Climate Justice Work Must Include Marginalized People
Late last year, I attended a 350.org divestment rally for climate justice at the University of Colorado in Boulder. Although the organizers made no claims... Read More
A classist comment from a feminist publisher
I wrote a paper on the classism I experienced as a poverty-class single mother in the feminist movement, and it was selected for inclusion in... Read More
Aging in Place: Junk Cars in Economically Diverse Neighborhoods
“We’ve got to get those junk cars out of people’s yards!” This was the challenge raised by a roomful of community organizers in a course... Read More
Roadblocks and Detours: Classism En Route to Drivers Ed
I was shocked when a well-known environmentalist criticized my students’ campaign to make drivers education accessible to low-income students. The campaign ran into a lot... Read More
Classism Exposed: Contradictions on the left
One of my pet peeves on The Left or other Progressive organizations is that when asking for donations, PLEASE tell me WHY it is okay... Read More
Poverty and Disability: the Vicious Circle
I first started to look at disability as a class issue when 18 of our members from Piedmont Peace Project and I attended a national... Read More
No-degree social movement thinkers
Who do you think of when you think of a social movement theorist? A professor? Two of the authors who have taught me the most... Read More
What about those hand signals?
The same week that Steven Colbert pretended to mock Occupy Wall Street’s hand signals, I saw them used at an Occupy Boston General Assembly, and... Read More
Occupiers’ Demands and Working-Class Activist Traditions
Thanks to Occupy Wall Street and its spin-offs, a national conversation has broken out over the purpose of protesting. I understand why defenders of the... Read More
Building Solidarity and Dealing with Racism
In 1971, when I was “lead organizer” for what became the All Peoples’ Coalition (APC), I learned a different approach to dealing with some racism... Read More
Connecticut Public Employee Activists Fight For Pension Justice
Out of the limelight, public employee activists have achieved a near victory in their quest for a fair pension plan. However, fulfillment of a national... Read More
After Wisconsin: Stop the Corporate Tax Dodgers
This is the strategic moment to dramatically juxtapose the pain of local budget cuts with the scandal of corporate tax dodging. This talk of austerity is unnecessary.
The Plague of the Nonprofits
How do you talk with your friends about a problem you think they’re causing? First: get their attention. That’s what my title’s designed to do. ... Read More
US Social Forum: A Sour Taste of Classism
A month has gone by since I experienced my first-ever social justice conference, the US Social Forum (USSF) in Detroit, and I’ve been trying to erase my memory of that time ever since. The lack of logistical planning we experienced had a classist effect that seemed antithetical to the forum’s message, and I was left with such a bad taste in my mouth for the progressive left that I will carefully reconsider attending any conference in the future.