optimistic-red-velvet-walrus:

chekhov:

gaypocalypse:

i swear it’s like people think if a whitehouse.gov petition gets enough signatures it will instantly become law

Well obviously not, but it will force a response from the Obama administration which for certain marginalized groups is certainly better than nothing

So,

1. either you don’t do any organizing at all and just want to rely on the memetic nature of the internet and hey, you never know, it might just blow up and you get your 100,000 signatures in 30 days
2. but more likely, if you don’t do any organizing, it won’t get the signatures and you just start over again next month,
3. or you do organizing which means putting in a lot of resources (e.g., time, energy) to get the 100,00 signatures in 30 days.

If 2 happens, you are not just starting with a blank slate. Each time you start a new petition this way, you use up some of the good will of your supporters. People are amazing and can have so much energy but they are not infinite founts of good will that you can just use like that. It isn’t fair to anyone. You can build on the supporters of your last petition each time you start again, but I guarantee you’re not getting all of the previous supporters again each time.

If 1 or 3 happens, you get a response. These responses can get a little more in-depth or be a few quick paragraphs, but they are pretty tame as a rule. 3 is especially dangerous because organizers who can get 100,000 people to sign a petition within 30 days have power that can be used so much better than for a feel-good response about how Obama is listening and cares so much.

So, it is meaningful for people to be able to make a collective statement. This has power in itself. But I think it is disempowering to say that a petition through an official state website is where that power lies.

You don’t force decision makers to make concessions by following their rules and making requests on their terms. It is possible to start a public dialogue by forcing a public statement from the White House but again, you are allowing them to frame the statement. For example, I foresee the statement instead focusing on gains the White House has made in terms of trans issues and how they support a trans-inclusive ENDA, which misses the point.

So, what is usually the most powerful thing about a petition? Gathering the names and contact information of people who care about your cause that you can connect with. To use the language of fundraising, you are doing acquisition. Acquisition is important for developing a wide base of supporters, and then you move onto retention (keeping those supporters) and upgrade (increasing those supporters’ commitment of resources including time, money, etc.). None of this is possible when you go through whitehouse.org. People literally pay thousands or millions of dollars just for emails. By giving whitehouse.gov the opportunity to take those emails instead of you, you are giving up literally the only consistent benefit of a petition.

Like, what did the last petition about non-binary genders get? Several thousand signatures? If whoever made this petition in the first place had just those thousands of contacts and was able to connect with them and start talking about identifying an issue (i.e., a winnable solution that 1. has real impact on people’s lives, 2. helped people realize their power, and 3. altered existing power relations) and building a strategy, that would accomplish so much more than any of this.

Instead, you just have people spinning their wheels, waiting for a lackluster response, which is definitely worse than nothing.