Deadline Extended to March 10 for Get Up, Rise Up Funding Applications!
Spring is on its way, for those of us in the northern hemisphere. The air is warming. Seeds are sprouting and our revolutionary hearts are singing at the possibility of turning everything around. In spite of the heaviness of the present moment, we are practicing the discipline of hope for a future filled with compassion and care. Stay focused! Stay hydrated! Stay vigilant!
A few days left to apply to the Get Up, Rise Up fund!
The deadline for applications to the Get Up, Rise Up direct action fund has been extended to March 10. The fund's primary aim is to empower activists worldwide to catalyze transformative change through strategic nonviolent direct actions, ultimately fostering a more just, sustainable, and equitable global community.
This spring, we’ll be prioritizing funding for innovative and impactful initiatives that advocate for ceasefire, challenge the fossil fuel industry, and promote social and environmental justice.
We encourage activists to dream up actions that defy simplistic narratives, use compelling imagery, offer multiple avenues for participation, tailor their strategies to their target audience, demonstrate strategic coherence, and effectively engage with significant issues. Take inspiration from our guiding principles, tactical resources, and the rich history of nonviolent activism.
Don't miss this opportunity to make a difference. Submit your proposals for the next monthly round by March 10!
New tool in our toolkit: Pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will
Is it possible to be an effective activist while balanced on the knife’s edge between optimism and pessimism? Andrew Boyd answers with an exuberant YES in this new theory entry adapted from his most recent book. We need both hard-headed realism and full-hearted idealism to change the world, he argues.
(Keep reading this newsletter for a more personal update from Andrew below!)
Get Up, Rise Up fund alumni story: The art and activism of Sling Streetwear
In the face of severe and deadly repression during and after the 2021 coup in Myanmar, activists pushed back with a unique initiative known as “The Sling Streetwear.” This campaign emerged as a powerful amalgamation of art and activism, seeking to amplify the voices of the oppressed and make daily life a protest to counter the violent and deadly military crackdown.
Welcome our new Beautiful Trouble team members
Left: Mistress of Consequences, Zena Wubneh Right: Touwslager (Ropemaker), Rachel Jerusha Kinbar
Please welcome our new team members, Mistress of Consequences, Zena Wubneh and Touwslager (Ropemaker), Rachel Jerusha Kinbar.
Zena is an entrepreneur with 10 years of experience in accounting and finance working with nonprofits. She has knowledge in financial accounting, budgeting, financial analysis and reporting, grant proposals and grant reporting. She runs her own business assisting small businesses and individuals stay financially ready for strategic growth of their companies.
Rachel (they/zey/all) is Beautiful Trouble's Director of Operations. They are actively engaged in building a new commons while exploring what it means to be human, heal lineage, and honor ancestors. Zey are working for collective liberation as a local community and mutual aid organizer with Central Florida Mutual Aid and Orlando DSA, an Alternative Economy Fellow with the Center for Biological Diversity and Shareable, and as the program/project manager for the Jews of Color Mishpacha Project. They are also a writer, gardener, artist, half of noise/poetry duo Unfade, and co-editor of Bonk! magazine. Fun facts: Rachel holds two degrees in Jewish history (and a graduate certificate in publishing & editing), is a dual citizen of The Netherlands and the so-called U.S., lived for 11 years in Tallinn, Estonia, is married to a Belgian musician, and is parenting a teenager who plays trumpet. Perhaps most importantly of all, there is a cat named Noodle.
Eight ways to unleash the power of creative activism to win a ceasefire
Over the past few months, the world has seen a dramatic upsurge of creative and confrontational actions demanding liberation and protection for the people of Palestine. Yet the bombs continue to drop on Gaza. What tools can help us continue to escalate strategically in this horrific moment?
Here are eight insights from the Beautiful Trouble toolbox we hope may prove useful in pressuring Israel and its allies to stop the genocide.
How to disrupt a campaign event, from US Campaign for Palestinian Rights Action
No justice in Palestine = No peace for politicians
‘Shut it down’ is not a metaphor: those politicians who have chosen to show unrelenting allegiance to a continuing flow of weapons and diplomatic backing to Israel’s ongoing genocide, who aren’t responsive to less escalated tactics, will only be moved by a shift in power.
Last but not least: A message from our ex-Wrangler-in-Chief
Andrew Boyd here, ex-Wrangler-in-Chief of Beautiful Trouble and co-editor of the original book. I am incredibly honored to tell you that we’ve just added a new Theory piece to our ever-expanding toolbox, one that is near and dear to my heart: Pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will. It channels the spiritual and strategic insights of Italian revolutionary Antonio Gramsci, plus several other wisdom traditions, to help us harvest our failures and keep our eyes on the prize. It was inspired by some of the core ideas in my most recent book, I Want A Better Catastrophe: Navigating the Climate Crisis with Grief, Hope and Gallows Humor.
I officially took leave of the Beautiful Trouble collective back in April 2021. Since then, my book, Better Catastrophe, and the Beautiful Trouble-incubated sister project, the Climate Clock, have been my main focus. Apologies for not sending out an official departure email to all of you then — it was a crazy time — but here we are doing it now. Better late than never, right? Being part of Beautiful Trouble has been one of the great honors of my life, and I’m so glad to see it thriving without me. I’d love to stay connected with you all. If you wish, you can keep track of my ongoing doings and writings via my email list or give me a follow on Instagram. And I’m now blogging as the Tragic Optimist on the Substack platform — check it out for some heartbreaking hilarity and cutting-room floor excerpts from Better Catastrophe. A deep bow to everyone in this extraordinary community: thank you for all you do. With pessimism of the intellect and optimism of the will, let’s make even more beautiful-er trouble together across this most critical of decades!
