catharine (it’s me. I’m writing this for me)
step one– figure out who they are:
- Congress.gov
- (Go to “Find your member by address,” input your address, and it will show you who your representatives are).
step two– pick a reasonable number.
- I personally go with two, national level: one senator, one house of representatives member. Because I live in a blue state, I tend to ignore state people, but there is also the option of looking up your state senator/ state house of reps people, but don’t if this will derail you. If you live in a red state, in some ways, contacting state reps may make a bigger difference than contacting people in Washington. I’d just pick a maximum of 4 people total for your list. I personally go with 2 because that keeps me from getting stuck in limbo.
step three– cut and paste their websites into a place on your PC or phone where it’s easy to find them. Could be the Notes app on an iPhone. I use a draft in my email that auto-saves.
step four– when mad, identify what your message is.
- Remember that no one cares about your grammar or how good it sounds; it will only get added to a tally. It doesn’t have to be long. 2-3 sentences is great.
- Example “X situation doesn’t represent the America I believe in. Please fight for Y to happen instead.”
- Example (not saying these are “good”- just examples of how short it can be): “Current ICE actions are unethical, inhuman, and unamerican. Please fight to abolish ICE and protect the rights of immigrant communities, who deserve safety.”
- Example: “Current government actions to target the LGBQT+ community are unamerican and put peoples’ lives at risk. Please fight for a government that respects all people and does not discriminate based on sexual or gender factors.”
- You don’t have to get eloquent and verbose. Your person will most likely never see what you said- they will see the tally of how many people contacted the office about a topic (smaller reps might actually see your message, but this is often true for the ones representing many people).
- Do one contact a day max for a rep- I don’t think you can get tallied more than once a day. You CAN make your call/email about several different topics, if you want to- just present them one at a time so it’s easy for the person to tally what your message is.
- You can re-use the same message for the other reps. That’s what I do. I literally cut and paste the same message, and just change the name of the person I’m writing to.
- You can re-use the same message on different days. If it’s a different day, it counts as a different time of contacting the rep, for the tally. Slight variation might not be the worst thing for emails in case there is some bot filter, but that’s not something I actually know about.
step five– write it down when you either email or call, on the same location where your website links are saved. it reinforces the behavior and also has a mental health benefit, and helps you keep track too
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Note that if you want to call, what to expect is the staff member will ask for your name, phone number, and address (to verify that you’re actually a constituent), then ask what your message is. If you don’t want to give your actual phone number, I recommend using a VOIP number (I use a TossableDigits number that has texts and voicemails emailed to me, for this and anything else where I don’t want to end up getting called later. One of my old phone numbers got ported there when I started getting many calls a day for “Juan” a few years back. Now it’s just convenient. I think you can get a free VOIP number through Google Voice).
Anyway.
They’ll ask for your contact info.
Then read them something you wrote first, or speak from the heart. This trips me up- why I tend to email instead- but if email trips you up, then maybe this is the method.
Remember they’re just an unpaid intern, probably, who is trying to make a difference, and will be figuring out what topic you’re calling about (and what you’re asking for) and add you to a tally.
To my knowledge, emails and calls are treated with equal weight, but that may eventually change. Calls have the ability to physically overwhelm a phone, so they can be a bit more disruptive, but in the end it is better to do something rather than nothing.
I’m an HSP enneagram 4 INFJ empathetic intense emotional disaster, which means I email my reps when I manage to think about it, and blog to try to motivate other people to do it too. It’s my thing! Do whatever your thing is. But do something.
Think of it like self-care (if it reframes and cuts the resistence)- because it is. When you read something emotionally distressing, the natural response is to be angry and want to do something, so do do something. Honor your emotions. It’s honoring not only to the situation and what it warrants and who is being hurt, but also to your own body that is seriously doing its best amid a fucked up set of current events, and it will make you better able to function and resist through not becoming jaded.
Do be safe. If you live in an anti-abortion state, don’t leave a message talking about how you just had an abortion and everyone else should get to too. Sorry I don’t know how else to say this without sounding dramatic but please do be safe.
Some people like protesting and that’s valid too. Donating (especially small amounts on auto-donation- my preferred method because it removes it from the to-do list mental load) is something too. There’s no one right way. I’m just highlighting this in case it is something you’ve been wanting to do but feel stuck about, because that’s me a lot of the time too
for a long time I felt very self conscious about it and then when I realized someone was just adding me to a tally and it didn’t need to be in a “paragraph” format, I felt relieved
