[Peace] Raising support for "Fahrenheit 9/11"

Matt Evans revans at cyrus.psych.uiuc.edu
Thu Jun 24 20:40:14 CDT 2004


I know that people are organizing various efforts around Moore's film in 
Champaign. These are necessary efforts, and I plan to help, but not much is 
being done at a grassroots level to get people to the film in the first 
place. We should bring as many people to the discussion as possible. I 
think that in Champaign and other places, people should work in lieu of the 
television and try to get people to see the film. I have been distributing 
around the internet a list of possible actions people can take to help get 
people to the theater. If you approve of this list, you might take the 
actions yourself, organize a group to take action, or distribute the list 
of potential actions to others who might act on them. The more people who 
engage in these efforts, the better.

Several things people can do are:
1. Encourage theaters to show the film.
2. Tell friends, family, coworkers, employees, employers, customers and
everyone else about the film and where it's playing.
3. Make homemade flyers advertising the film and place them where people
will see them in college classrooms, bookstores, libraries, public
restrooms, cinemas, beside ATMs, at churches, and wherever else you think 
they would be most effective and seen by the greatest number of people. 
Handing them out to individuals can waste resources, but just placing 
individual flyers or small stacks of them in prominent places does better.
4. Call public radio stations and cool commercial radio stations and ask
them to announce where the film is playing.
5. Contact prominent individuals and organizations (e.g., Bill Clinton,
Noam Chomsky, Dennis Kucinich, Howard Zinn, Jesse Jackson, Ralph Nader, Amy 
Goodman, commondreams.org, moveon.org), and ask them to advocate the film 
once it comes out.
6. Hang out at cinemas where the film is playing and induce people to see 
the film. This could take the form of making a t-shirt that advertises the 
film and wearing it around the ticket booth of the cinema, walking up to 
people outside the theater and telling them about the film and suggesting 
they see it, or hanging out with a group of people with picket signs 
advertising the film.  There are many other things along these lines that 
could be done too, and the more the merrier.
7. After showings of the film, distribute a small list of books and
resources that people might find useful in answering the questions the film 
raised for them.
8. Distribute this list (with your amendments and additions) in email
groups and on message boards. The more people who do these suggested
actions, the more people will see the film, and the more powerful it will 
be as an influence on the election.
9. Tell others about your efforts, such as on message boards like this and 
elsewhere.






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