We had our first meeting last night. A little under ten people showed up. It went really, really well. Will we actually accomplish anything? Who knows. All we know is that we are here, and we fucking hate the way things are going.
I've tried to start groups like this before but with extremely limited success. Here's what I did differently this time:
DM'd people on Facebook. That's it.
You know who your neighbors are who fucking hate liberal politics. People who post ACAB shit and who never told anyone to vote for Biden. Berners who are still angry.
Message those people.
Propose a zoom meeting.
Work out a time together.
When you meet, make sure everyone speaks, if they want to.
Bada bing, bada boom. Some of the people who show up might also know about other activist groups in the area you haven't heard of. (They often form around single issues, like local environmental destruction which may not directly affect people a few towns over.) Even if your group doesn't work out, you might be able to find other groups to join.
What was your agenda/meeting goals?
Edit : this is great and something that I want to do. I wanted to understand how you framed the meeting purpose - that is, was it to just meet, or to define some organizational goals or ideals? That is, what did you tell people the purpose of the meeting was. Also, was it successful in that framework, or do you have advice to make it more successful?
I asked left-seeming people if they wanted to have a zoom meeting to form a group dedicated to local activism, electoralism, protesting, that sort of thing. I mentioned training with guns to make sure to weed out people who are too liberal, but I also said that everyone involved could choose what we use the group for. I'm cool with almost any kind of activism but am not quite ready to go to jail at the moment, especially since jails seem to be coronavirus death traps.
The agenda was: introduce yourself (as much or as little as you want), what do you expect from this group? What kind of organization should we have? When should we meet next and what should our goals be?
I came away feeling really good about how it turned out. We decided to meet next week and to each try to get one more person to join us. We'll see if anyone actually comes, but I think the feeling was pretty good all around. Almost everyone is surrounded by liberals or fascists, so it feels really good to talk with people who have crossed that line into anti-capitalism. The group members include an anarchist, several Marxists, a socialist who's pretty into electoralism, someone who works at a homeless shelter, and a boomer who loves unions. It's a good group.
I can PM you the messages I sent out if you want. Ask any other questions if you have them.