Tips for today

Well folks the 2nd annual tax day tea party protests are going to be starting this morning and into the afternoon and even evening hopefully, this is a great article I found on the People's Press Collective (PPC and yes they are conservative its title is mostly ironic) about how to deal with things today. PLEASE READ!

“Progressive” Tea Party Infiltrators: What You Can Do to Thwart Them

by T.L. James | 12:03 am, April 14, 2010

**Welcome Michelle Malkin readers!

**Update 2: Stay up-to-date with Colorado Tea Party developments at #coteaparty

**Update: The last time we saw the Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist Movement-Denver folks was during the Democratic National Convention. They’re back to “greet” the Denver Tea Party tomorrow:

The Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist Movement is calling on all radicals – anarchists and communists, Mexican and Black nationalists, Third Worldists and Indigenists, students, social critics and anti-racists – to come out and oppose this vile, hateful message in the midst of the Tea Party Movement. Bring signs, bullhorns, props, a hat and sunglasses, etc. Cut loose and let these racist crackers know they are opposed.

And our good friend Bill Menezes, formerly of the now defunct Colorado Media Matters offers a new Tea Party slur–“teabaggers” has become “tea klanners.”Cute.

Much has been written in the past few days about the supposed plans by “Progressives” to inflitrate and embarrass the Tea Party rallies to be held across the country on Thursday. Many posts and articles seem to come back to one site:

“We will act on behalf of the Tea Party in ways which exaggerate their least appealing qualities (misspelled protest signs, wild claims in TV interviews, etc.) to further distance them from mainstream America and damage the public’s opinion of them. We will also use the inside information that we have gained in order to disrupt and derail their plans.”

This guy doesn’t especially worry me – after all, why would one announce such a thing publicly? Doing so gives the Tea Party movement an all-encompassing plausible deniability if anything unseemly does happen on Thursday. Any embarrassing sign, slogan, shout, or scuffle can now be handily (and believably) dismissed by Tea Party organizers as the doings of the opposition, regardless of who the culprit might be.

Of course that won’t stop Big Media or mendacious tools like Michael Huttner from focusing like a laser on anything unsavory, and taking at face value that it came from the Tea Party movement itself – it’s what they do. Nor will having their punch so blatantly telegraphed stop anyone interested in infiltrating and stirring up controversy from doing so. So it’s up to us as individuals to document the truth ourselves to counter the lies from the Fourth Estate, and to inoculate the events as best we can from criticism earned by legitimate participants.

Thwarting Big Media Lies

Carefully-selected and deliberately slanted video clips, soundbites, or photographs can easily distort the truth about what really happened at a Tea Party rally, especially when Big Media outlets present only one or two items to characterize the event. Citizen journalism can completely undermine their ability to control the story.

• Bring your own cameras and camcorders, and document the event yourself. Post a large collection of photos and video on free sites such as Flickr and YouTube, then share the links with your friends and neighbors, in blog comments, and on your own blog if you have one.
• Take wide-angle photographs of the crowd to help document crowd size, and prove that those “dozens” your local newspaper reported showing up at the rally were in fact thousands.
• Record (video or audio) the entirety of the speeches at the Tea Party rallylive Denver Tea Party webcast.) and post them on YouTube. If Big Media then claim that a certain speaker said something they did not, you will have proof of what was said, in its full context. (Note: PPC already has it covered for the Denver rally, with our planned
• Photograph as many Tea Party rally signs as you can to prove, in the event an unflattering or obnoxious sign does turn up, that the objectionable sign wasn’t as representative of the entire gathering as Big Media would have the public believe.
• Take and post photographs of attendees who demonstrate the breadth of the Tea Party demographic, disproving the commentariat’s threadbare assertion that it’s a movement of “old white men“.
• If there is a counterprotest nearby, repeat the above with their signs, slogans, and demographics. Based on PPC’s experience with left wing events, there’s bound to be far more objectionable material to be found in the counter-protest than in the main event. Hold the opposition accountable for the same offenses they claim to see in the Tea Party movement.

Being a Responsible Participant

If you’re not interested in or able to photograph or record the rally, and plan to attend as an ordinary participant, there are a few helpful things to keep in mind – adapted from comments by Eileen Mahony, PPC’s Washington Bureau Chief:

1. Please spell check your posters
2. Check your bleedin’ facts; this includes attributing quotes and citing bills on your signs and in conversation.
3. Leave the conspiracy theories at home. The Tea Parties are about small government, fiscal responsibility, and liberty — not birth certificates or black helicopters. Likewise for social issues.
4. Lay off the references to Nazis, communists, fascists and murderers. No matter how historically accurate your own particular reference may be (or not), it distracts from your broader message: freedom. Don’t be against statism (although you are), be for freedom. Don’t be against Obama, or Congress, or your local elected disasters, be for positive, pro-liberty reforms. Bring a positive rather than a negative message.
5. Go easy on the political flair. You do not work at T.G.I. Fridays. You may think wearing enough bling on your shirt to function as plate mail makes you look ultra-committed. It does not. It simply makes you look as if you were savaged by a roving gang of campaign buttons.
6. Should you be asked for comments by some media outlet, speak in soundbites. DO NOT RAMBLE. While you’re at it, please be aware that not everyone talking to you at a rally is necessarily on your side, and may be recording you in hopes you say something “useful”.
7. Do your homework; if you make a contentious statement and then cannot back it up when challenged, the sum total of your contribution will probably be negative.
8. Screaming is not debate. Trading insults is not debate. Keep calm, stay rational, and if you argue, argue on the facts.
9. Laugh, smile, have a good time. That’s something you rarely see at the excessively earnest, humorless, and anger-filled protests the opposition puts on.
10. Keep your focus on the core issues of the Tea Party movement: small and limited government, fiscal responsibility and accountability, and liberty-minded reforms.
11. Really, please, just spell check your posters.

What To Do About Unfortunate Situations

You may despite everything find yourself in a situation where racist, hate-filled, moronic, or just plain crazy signs are present or speech is being used. Here are some ideas on how to handle it constructively:

• First, stay calm. Don’t let it get you angry – anger won’t help, and will most likely make things worse. After all, that’s part of what the infiltrators are after, right? Don’t give them what they want.
• If you have a camera, capture images or video of the objectionable attendee. If the person is an infiltrator, it might be possible to identify them later and publicly shame them for stirring up trouble. Post the images and video for public rebuke – do not try to cover these things up: expose and shame the persons involved, whether infiltrators or not.
• Recognize the fact that not all such instances will be the result of infiltrators – there is, after all, a reason why they think what they’re doing is an effective tactic. You may be able to persuade the person or people in question to stop their objectionable behavior by politely asking them to do so, or by going a step further and explaining why it is both inappropriate and potentially harmful to the movement they claim to support.
• If you have a video camera, record yourself, a friend, or a bystander calmly and rationally confronting offenders about their objectionable material. Make them aware (on camera) that what they or their sign are saying is not acceptable and not welcome at a rally for liberty, small government, and fiscal responsibility. Post the video on YouTube after the event, to demonstrate that, whatever the origins of the offensive sign or speech, the offender was clearly not accepted or condoned by the other rally-goers.

None of this should be particularly new to anyone who has been to a rally before. And it’s quite likely that no one will be there causing problems apart from the unfortunate elements at the fringe of the Tea Party movement itself. But everyone should keep these things in mind, keep alert, and keep a camera in hand, just in case.

And if you do take pictures and/or video at the Tea Party rally, please let PPC know. We will have an open thread for the purpose once the rally starts, where you can post a link to your own citizen journalist coverage in the comments.