I don’t like fishing with live worms. First off, it’s disgusting. Just the worms themselves: they are the color of chicken liver and about the consistency as well. Except that they always are moving: frontward, backward (and it can be hard to tell which is which) squirming, and coiling. Then you hook them and they squirm some more, exuding dirt crap out of what you now discover is their backsides. Wriggling on your hook, you cast the worm out into the water and wait, doing nothing except staring at your bobber, until a fish attracted by the theatre of cruelty you’ve staged below the surface decides to bite. Or nibble, slowly and steadily stripping the hook of the work so you have to go through the whole disgusting process of re-worming again. I would swear off fishing with worms except for one thing: worms work. Really, really well. When nothing else is catching fish, threading a writhing worm onto the hook and tossing it out into the water is almost guaranteed to get you a fish. It’s wonderful to have a perfect cast, a skillful retrieve, and an artful lure. But in the end the goal is catching a fish.
The “creative activism” I specialize in gets a lot of attention these days. For good reason, too. Remember the first rule of guerrilla warfare: to know your terrain and use it to your advantage? Well, our current political landscape is made up of signs and symbols, stories and spectacles, and activists have begun to realize that to work successfully on this terrain means becoming more artistic activists. Besides, artistic activism is also new and flashy and fun. Yet, at times I have my doubts. I’ve been doing and teaching this sort of activism for over two decades, and I will likely continue for another two decades, but this little voice in my head keeps asking the question: Does it work? That’s a hard question to answer, for all sorts of reasons, but an important question to ask, for in the end what matters is attaining objectives and winning campaigns, and if artistic activism is not working there are other tactics that might. Phone banking, canvassing door-to-door, lobbying politicians and meeting with their aides, attending and speaking up at community meetings are old, dull, and not much fun. But they sometimes work better than what’s flashy, fun, and new. A good activist needs to be open to a whole range of tactics, both fashionable and old-fashioned, and always ask themselves, do I just want to look cool, or do I want to win?