More than once, I've seen activism campaigns not only encouraging us to contact our elected representatives about the issue in question (which is perfectly reasonable) but also asking us to then contact the organizing campaign and tell them that we've contacted our representatives. Why? Why do they care? What do they do with this information?
And why do they think it's any of their business? I kind of see the communication between myself and my elected representatives as a private matter.
And when I do see people in facebook groups etc. saying that they did email their elected representatives, it comes across as wanting a pat on a head. "Look at me! Am I a good girl?"
4 comments:
One or both of:
* They need -- well, want -- to know how well their communications strategy is working.
* They want to be able to say in issue ads or news releases or fundraising letters "thanks to the X people who contacted their MPs...."
What s/he said. We want to know if people are hearing our message and acting on it. We want to be able to say - in my case not for fundraising purposes, but for organizing strategy - when we did this, 100 people emailed, but when we did this, 500 people emailed, and discuss from there.
Some supporters enjoy having that contact, too. They want to feel part of the larger effort, and that feeling of connection helps them be more active.
"Fundraising" was a bit cynical; the value of a count, in addition to strategy in the sense L-girl said, is to say to pols "when we say call, 15,000 people call, imagine what happens when we say whom to vote for."
It would be interesting to know (but impossible to find out) what percentage of the audience reports back on the action they've taken, and whether the action taken by the percentage that doesn't report back is different. Because on top of people like me who don't think it's anyone's business, there are also people who go "Meh, I've already done the important part."
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