Tag: politics

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You Can Be A Lobbyist

At our November gen­er­al meet­ing, our guest Monette Richards, pres­i­dent of  CFI Northeast Ohio, gave us some tips and ideas on how to become cit­i­zen lob­by­ists after the recent elec­tion.

Richards explained that you real­ly only need to call the local office of your elect­ed offi­cials and make an appoint­ment to speak to them. Some rep­re­se­n­a­tives hold office hours where they meet peo­ple with­out a for­mal appoint­ment. When you go to the appoint­ment have some talk­ing points to give to the offi­cial or their staff.

The thing she stressed is to do it. Big donor mon­ey gets a lot of atten­tion and our only way to get through that noise is to per­son­al­ly speak to the elect­ed peo­ple or their staffs and let them know what you think.

Richards also said it is good to find estab­lished groups that are work­ing on a issue you feel strong­ly about and join them so you aren’t rein­vent­ing the wheel.

She also sug­gest­ed a book, The Citizen Lobbyist by Amanda Knief and Rev. Barry W. Lynn, as a good primer. And if you need to invent the wheel because there isn’t an estab­lished group, the Skeptical Activism Campaign Manual will help start the ball rolling.

SHoWLE mem­ber Peggy C. also sug­gest­ed a web­site called  5 Calls.

Our next gen­er­al meet­ing is December 8th.

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We Strongly Condemn The Tree Of Life Synagogue Terrorist Attack

The Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie strong­ly con­demns the ter­ror­ist attack that hap­pened at the Tree of Life Synagogue this past Saturday.

Our con­do­lences go out to the friends and fam­i­ly of the vic­tims and wish a speedy recov­ery of those injured.

No one should be sin­gled out, harassed, dis­crim­i­nat­ed against, or sub­ject­ed to any vio­lence because of their reli­gious beliefs, lack of reli­gious beliefs, or polit­i­cal views.

The mur­ders on Saturday are a prime exam­ple why our cur­rent polit­i­cal lead­ers must stop try­ing to scape­goat a group of peo­ple to score cheap polit­i­cal points for their base.

When some­one like our President of the United States sin­gles out peo­ple he does­n’t like with base­less accu­sa­tions, it gives cov­er for oth­ers to actu­al­ly act against mem­bers of that same group.

The mur­ders on Saturday, the shoot­ing in Kentucky, and ser­i­al mail bomb­ings in recent days shows the ter­ri­ble side of some in this coun­try. Humanists will con­tin­ue to work on reduc­ing tox­ic trib­al­ism and angry nation­al­ism. All of us need to work togeth­er to let those who want to do harm know that they will not be wel­come and will be resist­ed.