Idea/Plan for my Ecofeminist Activist Action

I have to admit when I first saw the prompt for this week’s blog to implement by one ecofeminist action I was a bit overwhelmed. So many ideas were running through my head on what I could do, how I can make this action come to life and be successful. I knew it might be more difficult now than a few months ago to create a successful activist action. The pandemic the world is going through right now is affecting everyone in so many different ways. The COV-ID 19 Virus has basically flipped our world upside down. So many innocent lives are being taken due to this virus, people are losing loved ones. Not only that I read that around 16 million people have lost their jobs due to the virus, therefore they are losing income and money they need to support themselves and their families. Kids are out of school, creating strenuous conditions for mothers especially who would usually rely on school time to get things done or go to work and make money. I have thought about my potential idea for ecofeminist action for days now. I found the article, “13 simple ways to support feminist activism this internation women’s day” quite helpful. The first step is an important one and helps get your thoughts flowing, “identify what gets your blood boiling.” It made me more upset than anything to learn that many kids were going hungry and not able to get a nutritious breakfast or lunch because they would usually rely on their meals at school to fill their bellies. It made me particularly upset knowing this because kids can not really fend for themselves, they rely on adults to take care of them. There were so many things I wanted to do but in this article it states, “knowing you can’t do everything is a crucial part of effective activism… Remember concentrating on one topic doesn’t mean you don’t care about the others, it just means you’ve made a thoughtful decision about where to expend your energy.”  This quote specifically gave me confidence and made me feel better knowing I am only one person therefore it would be difficult to cover all the topics I care for. After this I knew I wanted to focus on helping out families with kids who are still in grade school, preschool- 12th grade. I knew it would be specifically important to help out those families with single mothers who are the sole providers of their children. 

Now that I have my idea in place I knew I had to create a plan of action. I did my research and found out that an organization in my town called, “WellSpring” which is a multi-service center in my town, was providing breakfast and lunches for the families in need. I knew reaching out to WellSpring would be a great start to my action. This organization not only provides a food pantry to those in need, but clothes, appliances, education and many other services. I know volunteering to help out at Wellspring would be a good start to my plan to help create a solution for my idea. I am now focusing on step 4- having conversations. I know it would be a great idea to get others involved with my plan of action. I have worked at a local deli inside a convenience store for almost five years now. I work with mostly women and over this semester I have talked to them a lot about my ecofeminism class and all I have been learning. They always seemed very intrigued so I knew they would want to help out as much as they could during this tough time. We are very grateful and fortunate to still have our jobs because we work at a convenience store so we want to help out those families who are not working or are having trouble feeding themselves and their children. A few of my coworkers have agreed to help me in this plan of action in order to help donate food and clothes to Wellspring. There is still a lot of work to be done as we go through this extremely difficult time, but I am very confident that I will be able to have a successful ecofeminist action by the end of this semester!