Lancaster County Democratic Socialists of America

From KeyWiki
Jump to navigation Jump to search
56418272 795225420834293 7066323135909330944 n.jpg

Lancaster County Democratic Socialists of America is a Pennsylvania affiliate of Democratic Socialists of America.

Transgender support

Abbie Breckbill felt a sense of security standing in Penn Square among the crowd who turned out on a Saturday late march 2024, to support the trans community. After a bomb scare led to the cancellation of an LGBTQ+ event last week, then subsequent threats of violence, Breckbill said they needed to be near other trans people and allies.

Saturday afternoon’s peaceful rally in downtown Lancaster, hosted by the Lancaster County Democratic Socialists of America, drew about 100 people and marked the annual International Transgender Day of Visibility. To celebrate, members of the transgender community spoke about their experiences, sang songs and read poems.

Lancaster DSA hosted a webinar earlier this week to educate attendees on how to stay safe. Event organizers in bright yellow vests circulated through the crowd, keeping an eye out for threats.

Nic Prado-Carr, a member of Lancaster DSA, said there was never a doubt Saturday’s event would go on after Lancaster Pride canceled a Drag Queen Story Hour at Lancaster Public Library a week before in response to safety concerns. The cancellation followed a string of criticisms by local Republican officials asserting the story hour was not appropriate for children.

“Lancaster needs to hear from the trans community about their experiences. There is still a lot of staunch opposition in just the fact that we exist, the fact that we want to live freely, love freely,” Prado-Carr said. “We need to come together to be visible to the public to show them that we are real people.”

Parker Webb, a transgender man who leads Lititz Chooses Love, agreed it’s important to educate people on what it means to be transgender. He said many people have probably met a trans person in their life and don’t realize it.

“People are getting judged based on the way we look. That’s a huge part of the discrimination against our community,” Webb said. “It’s not safe for us all to be out. I do feel safe to be out, because I present as a white man. That gives me a lot of privilege, and I utilize that privilege to serve our community.”

Daphne Daulton, a transgender Lancaster city resident, spoke to concerns that the county’s Republican commissioners stirred up controversy around the library’s Drag Queen Story Hour. Many people this week criticized commissioners Josh Parsons and Ray D’Agostino, accusing them of creating a dangerous climate with the tone of their rhetoric in denouncing the event.

In addition to threats against the story hour, the Lancaster LGBTQ+ community remains in mourning after local transgender activist Ash Clatterbuck died by suicide last month.[1]

Reviving the chapter

Since December 2023, Brett Chalupa has been documenting the process of restarting a chapter in the Lancaster, Pa., region on the National Discussion Forums. The following is an excerpt adapted from his posts.

There was a DSA chapter in Lancaster before I moved here. It’s tough to tell why it went defunct. It appears to have lost momentum around 2020 or maybe a little earlier.
So, at the end of 2023, I attended the DSA chapter interest call with Dana (the Chapter Pipeline Coordinator) and Hayley (a field organizer for the western states). After fantasizing about what forming a chapter could be like for a couple months, it was great to be on a video call with other comrades looking to form chapters in their areas (Honolulu, Hawaii and Sarasota, Fla.), as well as get to ask questions about the process. To see chapters in the process of forming at various states and sizes was really motivating. I want to sit in more rooms with other socialists!
After taking a week to rest up as 2023 came to an end, I jumped right back into organizing the Lancaster chapter. I got some of the key next steps done such as registering some online accounts, creating an Action Network, and filling out the chapter’s zip code jurisdiction list so that at-large members in that area can be notified of the new chapter forming. I really hoped that last item would fan the flames so we could start having meetings and organizing.
We got some contacts through the Action Network interest form within a few days of launching it. Then when Dana from National sent out an email to at-large members in the proposed jurisdiction, we got a bunch more responses. Between those tools and Instagram, I was now in contact with about 20 people, half of which are dues-paying DSAers, within a few weeks of initiating the process. Since we had more than enough people to apply to become an Organizing Committee, I submitted that application in mid-January.
We started to do some outward-facing organizing. A group of us showed up at public comments for a new prison being built in our county, and I read a statement demanding fewer beds, carceral reform, and an advisory committee more representative of the people incarcerated. It was the spiciest comment there, but there was lots of support from the audience and the general sentiment was along the same lines. This action helped get the number of beds decreased in the new jail!
We also began organizing regular actions for Palestine. Some of us joined the January 13 March on Washington for Palestine, where we met up with DSA members from many different chapters. Then, on January 20, we organized our first local rally calling for a ceasefire with some other partner organizations. It went well, with over 55 people showing up despite temperatures in the teens. Since then, we’ve been holding rallies basically weekly.
Wwwwwwwwwoeeeurrttyy.PNG
Towards the end of January, we tabled at a local punk festival called Toilet Fest with the band Apes of the State. It was great to be out in the community and talk to people. Folks were stoked DSA was returning to Lancaster. We talked to over 30 people and got 17 sign ups of interest. People loved the buttons in particular. I tabled with Comrade Ayesha Mughal, a former co-chair of Central New Jersey Democratic Socialists of America who had moved to our area recently and started helping us reform the chapter.
Around this time, we also started getting more people actively helping to build the chapter, and we started to formalize our roles while we worked towards chapterhood. At the guidance of our field organizer Kaitlin, we formed an interim steering committee. People self-nominated, and, so far, I think it’s been really helpful to have these roles in place. It’s a nice way for people to test their interest in serving in these positions and gives some more clarity to ways people can be involved in these early days.
On February 2, DSA National officially recognized Lancaster DSA as an Organizing Committee! We started a weekly working session at a local coffee shop every Sunday so we can hang out and collaborate on campaigns. We also had our first Socialist Social, and let’s just say the commies took home the trivia trophy and a $25 gift card. People really enjoyed getting to meet one another in person and hang out!
Then, on March 10, we held our first general meeting. 14 people were there in person and 10 more joined us online. We didn’t have any resolutions or that sort of stuff, but I think we’ll prepare to get into that habit at our next general meeting.
At the beginning of February, I counted 22 dues-paying members with another dozen or so interested or supporters. About 8 to 10 of those people were engaging daily, or close to it, with chapter efforts. But now that we’re an OC, we get membership reports, and I was shocked to see that our official numbers report that we have 68 members in good standing and 94 constitutional members already. It’s comforting to know there are DSA members around who I haven’t met yet. The most engaged members are those who are new to the organization and excited. By the end of February we had about 20 people regularly showing up, engaging, collaborating, etc. Our next goals: draft bylaws, agree on them, and apply for chapterhood.[2]

Leaders

DSA Happy Hour

Carlomarxo.PNG

DSA Happy Hour Public · Hosted by Lancaster County Democratic Socialists of America.

Thursday, May 9, 2019 at 6 PM – 8 PM EDT

24 E King St, Lancaster, Pennsylvania 17602[3]

Registering interest on Facebook

Went

References

  1. ↑ [1]
  2. ↑ [2]
  3. ↑ [3]
Retrieved from "https://keywiki.org/index.php?title=Lancaster_County_Democratic_Socialists_of_America&oldid=637634"