Individual Actions

This page is a list of resources about what individuals can do to take a step away from the exchange and accumulation economy (aka capitalism). If you have other resources that might be added to this list, email here.

Applications

www.buycott.com

This app lets the user find out info about the company that makes a product in question, including what company owns that company and what other companies are owned by that company.

Users can set criteria for what they want to support and avoid by choosing “campaigns” preloaded into the app. For example: “Demand GMO Labeling,” “Avoid Koch Enterprises,” “Support Bicycle Friendly Businesses” and “Justice for Bangladesh.” There are other campaigns to boycott companies that contribute to income inequality by overpaying executives and/or underpaying workers, chocolate companies that use slave labor, and companies that use animal testing for their products.

Right after users scan the product, they have the ability to tweet, call or e-mail corporations via the app.

Groups to Join or Support with Action

Living Room Conversations

Joan Blades, one of the founders of this organizations, is keen to collaborate with NVC folks. Living Room Conversations are designed to support people in talking across differences, especially ones that tend to create political polarization. They use a simple structured six person conversation format. Inspired by a desire to restore our connections across political differences in this time of toxic partisanship, it turns out these conversations are good for listening across many kinds of differences. Anyone who wants to can create a conversation using their guidelines, and anyone can find a co-host and actually have a conversation on one of dozens of prepared topics.

Since these conversations don’t require facilitators or any special skills, there are some ways that Joan and I thought NVC folks can be specifically helpful to such conversations, in order of challenge for us:

  • Join a conversation. The presence of people who know the power and beauty of listening and connection supports the conversations in being easier and often more transformative.
  • Host a conversation. It turns out that many people are now afraid to initiate conversations across differences. If you have a willingness to host one, you could try out a Living Room Conversation by video, or go straight to the topics page, choose a topic that you are curious to hear from others about, download the guide, find a co-host with a different opinion from yours, and have the Living Room Conversation. Note that short host trainings are offered to anyone who would like to talk to experienced hosts.
  • Spread the word. Joan and others who’ve been involved are excited about these conversations as a way to create culture change toward honoring the dignity and humanity of all our neighbors, which she sees as a core value shared with NVC. Many NVC folks are interested in similar paths, and if we spread the word in our community, it may well support this work.
  • Create a conversation. Are there topics that you would want to see talked about among people who disagree with each other to create better understanding and reduce divides? Read the list of topics, see how conversations are prepared and structured, and proceed. It’s really all about framing, and NVC offers us rich frames for many questions of depth that trouble humanity at this time.