Hey List-Makers! I need your help
A new photography project is brewing
Idea: I will take portraits of individuals, couples/families, members of The Resistance, holding objects that they could use in their battle against the authoritarian regime. This Photography Project, called The Resistance, is how I’m stepping up to be heard.
How are objects selected: Think about what is under threat to be taken away, things that were gained through democratic progress over the years. Such as, all types of health care for everyone (regardless of race, gender identity, income), same sex marriage, libraries, the Arts, educational funding, social programs, safe air/water/food, Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, retirement savings…the list seems endless. Those being photographed choose items that represent any of the issues listed (or yet to be added in the list below), something they want to fight to keep, or yet to be achieved (ERA amendment in the Constitution) for example, something that hits their soul, something they can use in the Resistance. Imagine the pitchforks and torches the peasants used in their uprisings. What is the modern equivalent?
Object List of Possibilities:
camera & photographs
food from the garden
health care tools (stethoscope, vaccine, speculum, medicine)
kitchen wares (soup pots, ladles, baking equipment)
protest signs
rainbow flag
same sex marriage certificate
sheltering (blankets, clothes, personal items)
artist tools (paint brushes, etc)
art (songs, visual creations)
musical instruments (Woody's guitar "this machine kills fascists")
needlework (sewing, knitting, crocheting, quilting, pussy hats)
pen & paper
books (banned, educational, recreational)
power tools (to build or fix homes, furniture, electricity, heat)
contraception (pills, condoms, surgery)
marijuana (edibles, medical, paraphernalia)
upside-down flag
computer (Internet, newsletters, spreading the word)
____________?
Good list. As you know, I'm deeply involved in resistance/solidarity right now, and have ideas from the struggle. Some may include or overlap what you already mentioned. Some are for/by those directly attacked by authoritarianism, some for those in solidarity, some for both.
Video documentation (add to camera & photos), graffiti, murals, barbed wire, makeshift solar energy sources (greatly needed when power is cut), water desalination methods (when water infrastructure destroyed), hunger fasts (by those in solidarity, not those suffering from forced starvation), spoken word, rap, poetry (add to art), labor union activity, mutual aid campaigns (in addition to charitable/political giving), etc. You might also peruse some sites like https://sashakurmaz.com/Tools-of-Resistance (which includes an image of a Molotov cocktail but I don't know whether you want to keep this strictly nonviolent). Hope there's something in here that helps.
I would add financial documents: checkbook, mortgage/lease, credit card, business loan, stock portfolio, IRA/401k, etc. My mother was born in 1936 and she reminds me about how she couldn’t open her own checking account or get a credit card in the 1960s unless my father co-signed. The power of financial freedom, something banks today still give freely to some and not others.