I want to do something, anything, but organizing/participating in orgs is really hard with how my brain works. Theres chapters/locals out here, dsa, psl, frso, etc., but i feel like i cant participate.
I get overwhelmed by noise and large groups, especially if those groups are shouting or chanting. Protests and marches and demonstrations are a nonstarter cause having panic or anxiety incidents at those does more harm than good. Ive tried attending meetings and discussion groups, but theyve been so incredibly difficult for me and i end up contributing nothing and taking nothing away. I cant hear what people are saying cause if multiple people are talking it all blurs into a single sentence. And my body dumps literally all the cortisol into my blood and i have to recover for a good while afterwards.
What can i even do? Like, i could admin a *nix box that serves stuff, i can cook, i can do (very basic) firearm safety, i can do things, but the social aspect is really hard for me. Organizers want to fire people up, but that firing up incapacitates me. How can i attend a meeting when that meeting is geared toward not-me and within 15 minutes im in emergency mode and lose the ability to form solid memories from the meeting, or lose the ability to speak? Last one i went to, it started with chants and that was kinda it for me. I stayed thru the end, but it was really intense and i needed to lay down cry and be held afterwards. I cant participate in those kinds of things in a manner that is sustainable for me.
I want to do stuff, i want to contribute, i want to make the world even just a little bit better, but i feel like all the activities and actions that are available to me are things that are either veryvery difficult or incapacitating for me.
I say don’t go to those meetings.
In my local org I tend to dip into the organizing committees meetings only when I have capacity and when there is genuine need for my input, then I quickly dip out again. I stick to an unofficial advisory or consultant (except internal) role and handle some of the structure and I’m a bit of a gal friday, finding areas of need and points of friction then coming up with ways to fix them. People come to me for troubleshooting and advice.
In my experience, orgs struggle the most with back-end volunteers - the people who write up minutes and send out reminder messages and provide intake info and organize their documents and all of that other stuff.
In your case it’s worth looking at an org as having a dual aspect - there’s the front-facing part with meetings and outreach and activism then there’s the back-end administrative/bureaucratic part. If you can’t do the front-facing part then approach the leadership and ask if they have any administrative tasks that you can do. Basically every org’s leadership is bogged down by them having to manage the administrative side and they are all desperate for people who are good at this stuff that are willing to do it. They are desperate for PA type people to help, trust me.
So if you like an org and you have a connection to them or people who can vouch for you, approach someone in leadership and explain what you have done here in a simplified way and ask if you can take on some secretarial type duties. Tell them you can do IT. Tell them you can do social media posts and stuff like that.
Either they will find a place for your contributions and they will respect you for it or they won’t get it. But whichever it is, you’ll have your answer about whether it’s an org that is worthy of contributing to.
Leave the meetings for people who care. They are mostly a circus anyway. No need to burn yourself out over it because it’s seen as The One Way™ to be involved in organizing.
Accommodations start with you; they start with knowing what you need to thrive then finding those who respect that and are willing to work with your accommodation needs. Be ruthless and relentless in this. Become the staunch advocate that you deserve.
Are you going to that meeting? No. Not gonna happen. Don’t even bother asking.
Are you going to clear a backlog of 6 months of administrative logjam? Yes. And if that isn’t seen as a crucial contribution to organizing then whoever feels that way can fuck right off.The revolution needs leaders and debates and outreach efforts but it also needs janitors equally as much. Salute to all the people working on the back-end who keep the orgs running, the unsung heroes.
This was really helpful, thank you.
In my experience, orgs struggle the most with back-end volunteers - the people who write up minutes and send out reminder messages and provide intake info and organize their documents and all of that other stuff.
This was heartening, i cant do suuuuper fast steno typing to get everything people say, but i can do minutes and the like (im at maybe 60-75 WPM and proud of it). I can organize shit, i can do administrative work and all of this stuff. This makes me feel like theres (potentially) a place here for me.
Are you going to that meeting? No. Not gonna happen. Don’t even bother asking. Are you going to clear a backlog of 6 months of administrative logjam? Yes. And if that isn’t seen as a crucial contribution to organizing then whoever feels that way can fuck right off.
Me. This is me. Fuck meetings. Give me the sweet sweet admin backlog!
I’m really glad it’s helpful to you!
Don’t worry to much about WPM. If you know how to take notes, you don’t even need to have a great typing speed because you’ll abbreviate and skip useless filler words and all of that. You can always go back and make meeting minutes coherent on a second pass when you aren’t working under time pressure.
Also two tips for increasing your typing speed:
On a device where you don’t need high security, put your password as “thequickbrownfoxjumpedoverthelazydog” or a similar pangram. Add a couple of characters/symbols at the end if you need better security. You’ll probably already get what the purpose is here - you’re gonna retype that password in so many times that you’ll develop muscle memory for it quicker than you’d imagine. It will be tedious at first but depending on how often you log in, it will only be a few weeks (and maybe less) before you see your typing speed and accuracy get a big bump.
The other one is The Typing Of The Dead. (There’s also the original one you can pirate out there.) It is the best typing game you’ll ever play because it’s fun, the atmosphere gives you so much pressure (in a good way), and as the difficulty increases they start throwing intentionally funny or tricky phrases at you to mess with you. I can genuinely play this for the love of the game. And it’s a typing game.
Give me the sweet sweet admin backlog!
You know exactly what you’re looking for. Go get it!
how often you log in
Sudo caches my password for like 3 minutes, so i type this all the time
typing of the dead
Omg i love itttt!
I’m going to be so brutally honest with you as somebody who is the same:
If you have ADHD and autism (like myself) and you aren’t medicated, it is even more crucial that you do whatever you can to get medicated for your ADHD. You need to take care of yourself and manage the part of your situation that is treatable medically. It sucks but it is actually a very real condition that impacts every single thing other thing in your life. Everybody is different, but for me it includes being significantly more comfortable socially.
It allows me to enter the organizing space while I’m feeling alright, not overwhelmed, and comfortable, and take on those roles that I know I will be able to handle if I’m having a day where I don’t think I can socially interact too heavily. In my role in my org, I was able to do a lot of the behind the scenes spreadsheet work and meeting scheduling. That takes a huge burden off of somebody else and frees up their other capacities as an organizer.
From each according to their ability, to each according to their needs. Any org worth organizing for will accommodate you with open arms,
If you have ADHD and autism (like myself) and you aren’t medicated, it is even more crucial that you do whatever you can to get medicated for your ADHD.
1000%. Im currently medicated (both stimulants and a2 (ant?)agonists) and getting on the meds was really really good for me. It made it possible for me to do things. Like super basic things. Its why i wasnt crying and freaking out at this most recent meeting i attended and instead was able to save that for afterwards.
Im not an org member rn, but have had interest in that for a while now. The panic is just a lot and all of my exposure to local orgs has been through these “fire the people up” type events. Idk if its the adhd, the autism, past traumas that are unknown to me (i have a lot of missing parts of my memory), or a combo of some or all of the above. Regardless of the why/the roots of my difficulties, from the comments here i think ill reach out to either psl or frso and ask about how i can contribute within my capacities.
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What does someone do if there isn’t any organization out there to help you? The advice I’ve received so far is that I should pull myself out of this mess and now I’m in a contradictory position. If I can’t pull myself out of here I’m effectively giving up and I don’t want to do that, but in order to move forward I must believe that my condition is benign enough to not qualify as a disability.
You’re probably not going to found a new chapter for a remote org and that’s OK. you can’t meet people half way if there’s nobody to meet.
to whatever extent you interact with people in “real life” you can reinforce people when they express opposition to the empire or sow doubt when they repeat outlandish claims about america’s enemies. The same kind of exposure that moderates some chuds who have never met a queer person before also applies to our political ideas. The latter doesn’t need to be in great detail just, reasonableness checking or “they lied to you about X are you really going to believe Y when it’s the same playbook?” kinda stuff and expose them to ideas so they’re more receptive later.
it’s rough and it’s not going to feel like you’re doing anything but it’s not literally doing nothing. same applies online, you don’t have to be Cowbee but it still helps.
I was in your position for a long time and feel like I can relate. ADHD to people who don’t have it is a funny little condition that some of the quirky and eccentric people they know have that makes them fun and silly.
The reality is that for some, like myself and perhaps you, it can be a completely debilitating disease that makes you feel incompatible anywhere you try to fit in with society. To us, it is a BASE LEVEL ISSUE. If you are an adult living independently, it is absolutely, beyond all doubt, the priority issue you need to address before the rest of the world slides away from you too.
It’s frustrating, it can be tiring, it can be expensive, but you need to do everything in your power to treat it before you can even attempt to fix the other things going on around you. I lost a few years of my life in what I’ve dubbed “The Slop™” where problem after problem could just be traced back to issues brought about by my adhd. First minor ones, then major ones, then the life altering ones.
ADHD treatment is stimulants. Do not abuse drugs, but treating it with reasonable amounts of caffeine will at least help you be somewhat more attentive and able to pursue real treatment. You may need to schedule multiple appointments back to back to back in a single day to find a doctor who will take you seriously. Some might think you’re faking, some might make you feel embarrassed, but only one needs to say yes and understand your situation to change your life.
Everything turned around for me when a doctor prescribed a small dose for 30 days to see how it impacted me. I was finally able to function the way I needed to in order to secure lasting treatment and eventually make a life for myself that I don’t feel trapped in. Do not spend your energy and focus on doing socialist organizing before you’ve secured proper baseline treatment for yourself. It is so worth continuing to try because you have no idea just how good life can be when you finally get properly treated. I sobbed my first day because I realized I got all of my house cleaning and self care done and I hadn’t heard my neighbor’s low battery smoke detector beep a single time even though it kept me up at night for weeks.
It’s life changing, and the least you owe yourself is a shot at seeing what it can become after sustained treatment for a serious disease.
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Could you elaborate on what you mean by an organization to help you? I’m not really following here and it’s because my brain is not firing on all cylinders.
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As a person who sporadically white-knuckles themselves out of being a disorganized mess briefly, only to lapse back into being a disorganized mess, I can relate.
I don’t mean to be obtuse here but are you saying that you are looking for consistent, ongoing care/management to support you so you can live a more fulfilling life in exchange for your work or are you saying that you are looking for an org that will treat you well and with consistency in exchange for your contributions to it? Sorry for not getting it the second time around.
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You gotta play to your strengths. Not everyone can be Lenin, not everyone can be an orator. I like dealing with trans people so I’m in the business of housing homeless ones. Trans people in this situation take to communism rapidly.
Gods i do not want to be a lenin lol, thats for others to do. I would love to be able to provide housing to other trans folks, but im scraping by and cant extend monetary resources to people. And yeah, didnt take long after coming out to myself to become a dirty filthy pinko¹
¹ silly tone
I mean we just have a two bedroom place we just gave up our extra space cause it was pretty much just a luxury to have
orgs that won’t accommodate disability don’t deserve our effort and will fail to accomplish anything meaningful.
if they are unaware of these conditions (in the general sense), you have to contact them somehow. An email or sending a friend to talk to someone is about all you can do and if they can’t or won’t make room then they can eat shit and you shouldn’t worry about it.
it shouldn’t be on people with social difficulties to build the entire revolution by ourselves because neurotypical people are too awful to be around.
Yeah. Ill contact local orgs then i guess, ask about how i can contribute given how my brain functions. youre right, it shouldnt be on us, but i definitely take it onto myself. A lifetime of my needs being ignored has instilled that “no one will accommodate me, ill just do my own thing away from everyone” mentality.
Thank you for the reminder and for the vehemence of your words, genuinely its helpful and appreciated
Conventional political activism means meetings, demonstrations, campaigns, lots of stuff that draws heavily on social skills.
We need unconventional activism for unconventional brains. I clicked right into place when I found myself in an org that has a prefigurative politics and orients itself toward building power largely in tangible, quantifiable ways. Yes, there are still meetings. But we operate outside of the rigid timetable too, and that’s where a lot of our progress gets made.
One major goal we have is increasing the capacity to house radicals and harbor vulnerable people. You can progress towards this without ever knocking on someone’s door or participating in a demo or even sitting through a standard general meeting.
I really struggle with the similar fears and anxiety (ADHD). My IRL organizing exists, but is really rather marginal. What I recommend doing is asking to speak with an organizer, and see if you can aid in some of the areas you mentioned as a strong suit! Cooking, IT support, all of those skills are very useful behind the scenes for many orgs!
exposure therapy, if things get really tough, remind yourself you are doing it for a bigger cause than yourself.
I’ll let you know when I figure it out, I’m struggling to find ways to organize and contribute and a lot of what you said sounds very familiar. Except I don’t even think I’ve gotten as far as you. The comments here are very helpful I think
Try to make a plan with the organizers to have maybe smaller rooms or sections to the side of the main event.
You can take advantage of your audhd to hyperfocus on a particular issue alongside a smaller and more intimate group of people.
People can join these groups according to problem-space, or they can go to the main event where a mass of people are.
My audhd is truly a blessing in some ways. I can spend a day on something hyperfocused on it and do so so much. I would love to put that energy and capability towards organizing.
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