Register

Resistance Diary: A New Year's Revolution

By Peggy Roalf   Thursday January 11, 2018

Change only happens when individuals take action. There’s no other way, if it doesn’t start with people.
—Aliya Haq, National Resources Defence Council

This looks, on the surface, like a blinding glimpse of the obvious. However, most people know how difficult it is to make—and keep—a New Year’s Resolution. But a group of 12 artist/activists in Brooklyn and DC banded together following the 2016 presidential election, to create a platform for activism, resistance, and progress. A New Year’s Revolution (ANYR) is a collective that encourages daily resistance to the current administration and its policies, and fights for progressive change on a larger scale. Every single day of 2017, the group of volunteers distilled the chaos of the news cycle into easy, tangible actions (the #DailyRevolution) on their website, e-newsletter, and social media platforms. Info

ANYR has created a 2018 print calendar in collaboration with twelve like-minded artists. Supplemented by online toolkits and monthly newsletter Info, the calendar offers resources to support anyone’s personal revolution, and to help come together as a community. A portion of the proceeds will be donated to Planned Parenthood and the Southern Poverty Law Center. 


ANYR urges everyone to practice what you protest, offering handy checklists along with down and dirty info culled from responsible organizations, and links to informative news items that make it as real as it is. 

For example, saying NO to plastic bags and bottles. You’d think this would be easy but it’s not. But once you know that every year Americans throw away enough paper and plastic cups, forks, and spoons to circle the Equator 300 times, you’re on the right path. ANYR provides info and encouragement that makes it possible to ditch those plastics. The secret of success, ANYR continually urges, is action. Do it now. Like, “go to your kitchen right now and grab a metal fork, knife, and spoon. Wrap the trio up in a cloth napkin. Give yourself a high-five.” So every action you take right now reinforces a pattern you’ve previously found hard to launch.

Fighting voter suppression in your state sounds like a daunting prospect. The page on this action, however, gives a few salient facts to get your juices flowing, and a checklist of five ways to get started, along with links and phone numbers. ANYR includes sample scripts for making those phone calls, the right phone number to skip the hold, and sample texts for writing those postcards to members of Congress.

Worried about funding for science being cut? It’s a real worry, with employees of the Center for Disease Control avoiding the use of certain words [ex: science; fetus; evidence-based] in their funding requests so their programs won’t be targeted by Congress for cuts. ANYR offers pre-addressed postcards to CDC Director Brenda Fitzgerald that can be downloaded, printed, and sent, to urge putting science first, standing up to ideological interference, and protecting science- and evidence-based programs that are critical to the health and well-being of millions of Americans.

So that’s just a sample of the many things that A Daily Revolution makes easier to do to make a difference. And just in time for the one-year anniversary, on January 20th, of #NotMyPresident. And for info about the 2018 Women’s March NYC on Saturday, January 20, go here Information about ANYR was supplied by DART subscriber/artist/activist Jeanne Verdoux, who created plastic bag art, above. Thanks Jeanne!


DART