Thread by @Shoq

𝗠𝗮𝘆 𝗜 𝗵𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝗮 𝗺𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗼𝗳 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲, 𝗽𝗹𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗲?

The #midterms are too close for me to stay quiet about an idea I’ve been hinting at since early last year.

I’ve been conferring with some smart people who are helping me scope out a way we 1/26

might convince seasoned political influencers and organizers that well-mobilized #consumerPower holds the key to how we can push-back hard against a #RepublicanCoup we all know is in progress.

Only the uninformed are unaware of the mostly Republican-led 2/26

#AntiDemocrats who are busy building beachheads across the country, preparing to wage war against our elections, laws, politics, and values. They are doing this in plain view of the world. And without a serious plan to disrupt them, they are likely to succeed.

The 3/26

details of the idea don’t matter much, yet. The concept is elastic, not very complicated, and there’s plenty of room for extensibility and refinement.

At its most basic, the project will organize easy-to-join consumer boycotts of 𝘀𝗲𝗹𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗰𝘁𝘀 4/26

and services on a national or regional level. But rather than total boycotts, these are more limited “delays” in buying things people want or need, but are prepared to hold off on to make a statement. The short and long term revenue consequences for the companies 5/26

would be substantial and toxic for their quarterly earnings, so special to CEOs, shareholders and Wall Street. It takes minimal effort to participate, and the motivation to do so is quite clear to millions of citizens.

Sometimes called a “#ConsumptionStrike,” the 6/26

project would call for one or more new “actions” every week, seeking to create an unacceptable set of financial, social, or branding costs for the target companies.

On a rotating basis, hundreds of thousands of consumers (perhaps millions?) will be asked to delay 7/26

buying new TVs, appliances, cars and trucks, boats, travel packages, etc., for a specific period of time, from the top 3 companies in those sectors targeted for action if they “qualify” for it.

The delays in purchasing can and will disrupt not just real and 8/26

projected revenues, but also the marketing, advertising, staffing, support, and supply chain logistics of the targeted companies. Particularly resistant targets may also be hit with costly phone flooding tactics aimed at their (expensive) customer support 9/26

call-centers.

None of these are trivial consequences, and worse, they will be unpredictable as to when and where they happen. Nothing annoys shareholders more than the unpredictable, except predictable losses.

When combined with the “negative branding” of being 10/26

associated with such #AntiDemocratic efforts every day, across most social and broadcast media, the public relations cost of their choices will be significant.

So who qualifies as a target of these actions? Any company still contributing to any politician that 11/26

voted to overturn the 2020 U.S. presidential election. There must be accountability, and those businesses are the most deserving of being coerced into helping to bring some.

But there’s another non-negotiable demand, as well: those same targeted companies must 12/26

also pledge to not contribute to any politician who does not support the #JohnLewisVotingRightsAct.

Their combined corporate profits depend on us all enjoying a fair and democratic society arising from free and fair elections. It’s well past time that all American 13/26

companies paid into that vital mission. (Because, after all, what’s good for America is also good for General Motors, uh… right?)

This #ConsumerPowerNetwork might be just the way to force their hand to do the right thing, if only for their own shareholder’s 14/26

benefit.

American business earns trillions of dollars from we consumers, and that makes us bona fide partners in their projects, so it’s only fair that they be bona fide partners in ours.

America’s industrial base and its many self-interested actors have the 15/26

power to FORCE recalcitrant #AntiDemocrats to abandon their craven ambition to forcibly bend our society to their liking using abusive minority powers magnified by the reach and resources of wealthy elites, openly assisted by a complicit media.

Sadly, as I keep 16/26

suggesting here on Twitter, there will probably be no other plan besides this one. With a little over 9 months to go, there just isn’t enough time before the midterms for a lot of big ideas to surface and catch-on. If there were some magical solution in the wings, 17/26

we’d have heard someone offer at least a sketch of it by now. There is nothing besides the valiant legal challenges of people like @marcEelias going on. Beyond that, it’s mostly crickets. If the courts are the only firewall we have left, then our nation is in 18/26

@marceelias imminent danger of bursting into flames.

Waiting any longer to start forging a real operational strategy to stop these #AntiDemocrats in motion is just exposing our national survival to pointless and preventable risk. While no idea can be perfect, this one isn’t a 19/26

@marceelias big stretch to consider. There is plenty of precedent for much less organized boycotts and strikes having limited success. With the perils we are facing, and the numbers of people we can urge to participate so easily (it’s much easier to get people to not do 20/26

@marceelias something, than do something), this project promises dramatic, and perhaps even immediate results.

This idea isn’t magic, nor is it subtle. It’s a brute-force solution, and that’s why some think it can work. And if we can finally master how to bring our formidable 21/26

@marceelias #ConsumerPower to these lopsided battles, where the rich and powerful always have a baked-in advantage, the future battlegrounds of our politics might change forever.

I have a lot of smart and informed people in my Twitter stream. Where there’s a flaw in my logic, 22/26

@marceelias they’ll find it and bring it to my attention and I’ll try to respond to it.

There is no guarantee that anything can stop these #AntiDemocrats that threaten all of us. But I feel that not trying such a simple, reasonable, non-violent approach to finding a remedy 23/26

@marceelias is tantamount to national suicide.

I really don’t think we should go there.

Would you like to help make this happen? Just direct people to this thread. I will be collecting those who wander by it and share their good ideas and comments with those helping me 24/26

@marceelias figure this out. And by all means, keep thinking and talking about about what a large-scale #ConsumerPowerNetwork could achieve that our dysfunctional politics has failed so miserably at. And be sure to keep the #climate in your thoughts, too. (That clock is also 25/26

@marceelias ticking.)

Perhaps you have the power (or money) to make it happen yourself? Awesome! Let us know how we can help. We’ll gladly spread the word for you.

We desperately need some heroes right now. So please don’t hesitate to be one.

https://twitter.com/Shoq/status/1479521108944642051

26/26

Good morning, Twitter. My thread last night has produced more DMs than replies, but the day is young. Now that this is out there, I can expand on it. I look forward to hearing all the “other” plans out there, making me feel foolish for thinking we had a shortage of same.

FOR SOME REASON, the thread is not showing up for everyone, nor as thread for tweetdeck users. I’m investigating the glitch.

Meanwhile, twitter.com shows the entire thread faithfully here

https://twitter.com/Shoq/status/1479639157479723008

𝗜 𝗵𝗮𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗿𝗲𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲𝘀 𝗶𝗻 𝘄𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘃𝗲:

1) First, to show that despite all the caterwauling and diagnostic diatribes we’ve all heard or read since last Jan. 6th, almost no one dares risk their personal brand 1/11

to offer any remedies (wild-eyed or otherwise) to this dire, alt-right project gone wild, which now threatens not only America, but the entire world. (Or at the very least, the Enlightenment.) Typically, they offer some earnest Teri_Kanefield-type exposition on 2/11

how we should have faith in our precious institutions. The ones that keep failing us, creating this predicament in the first place.

I wanted to set an example here. We can’t discuss ideas that MIGHT matter, if no one takes the risk to put them out there. For 3/11

months, I’ve tried to nudge many Twitter notables to offer their own prescriptions. Thus far, none has.

2) My second motive was to try and simplify our hashtags about this #RepublicanCoup in progress. Our enemies are not just Republicans, fascists, MAGAs, 4/11

cultists, seditionists, authoritarians, and grifters. They are all of the above. They are #AntiDemocrats pushing #AntiDemocratic plots and agendas, seeking some bizarre conception of an #AntiDemocracy that most of them don’t even understand, and are not likely to 5/11

welcome once they have it.

So let’s start calling it what it is: the “#AntiDemocracy Movement,” led by “#AntiDemocrats.”

3) Finally, I wanted to get more of my Twitter followers actively looking for people and ideas that might embellish this #ConsumerPowerNetwork 6/11

idea. It might not only solve our immediate political problems, but create a true global consumer force to level the playing field with the wealthy and corporate elites who have all the power, all the money, all the privilege, and at least some ability to help us 7/11

fix so many of our problems.

We have a lot of untapped power we can wield as the consumers who generate most of their wealth. We should learn to use it. There are nations, civilizations, and a sustainable climate at stake. A national or even global consumer union 8/11

can be as powerful a force as labor unions ever were. And probably much more.

Show me a million consumers willing to vote with their wallets and their negative tweets aimed at businesses with bad mojo, and I will show you corporations and politicians on the verge 9/11

of panic that their corrupt hold on our way of life is less persistent than they ever thought possible.

Worst case? It doesn’t work. So what? Elections are how honest societies make decisions. But we haven’t been one of those for quite a while. It’s time to 10/11

admit that failure, and try to set some new course that might restore that honesty again. At the very least, we might make it bit harder for bad actors to hurt us so often. It’s getting old.

𝗪𝗲 𝗵𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝗻𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗼 𝗹𝗼𝘀𝗲 𝗯𝘂𝘁 𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗻𝘀. 11/11

Left out of my thread above re: #consumerpowernetwork is our discussion last week of @anatosaurus’s work. Implicit in my concept is a full-time, well-funded messaging war room that would help American commerce understand the consequences of enabling the #antidemocrats.