With COVID-19 rendering some common activism tactics unsafe, student-led advocacy groups on campus have been adapting and changing their methods to fit the new physically-distanced reality.
Before the pandemic, activist groups had a wide array of tools available to them to conduct advocacy. Protests and sit-ins organized by the UBC student body have a long-running history and used to be common tactics of pushing for change.
Some examples from recent memory are the 2015 march against rising housing prices, the demonstration for Kashmiri resistance in October 2019 and the series of student protests that successfully pushed UBC to commit to fossil fuel divestment in November of the same year.
Other conventional events included roundtable discussions, fundraisers, socials, workshops and field trips. However, these have been rendered unsafe in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In response to these new developments, student groups have flocked to online platforms to continue amplifying their messages and engaging supporters.
Climate Justice UBC (formerly UBCC350) — the same organization that facilitated sit-ins and blockades in the past for climate action — said the group has been organizing mostly on Zoom. Aside from their virtual weekly meetings, they’ve also coordinated speaker events, phone zaps and media blasts, such as the one they held last week which promoted solidarity with Indigenous groups.
Clara Sismondo and Anna Mylvaganam, two representatives from Climate Justice UBC, said that the media blast gathered people from all over Canada. They noted that while the pandemic did force the club to adopt new tactics, its agenda stayed the same.
“We can’t have thousands of people marching on the street anymore, but we still have the same values and goals,” Mylvaganam said.
The pandemic allowed for creativity in online organizing, Sismondo and Mylvaganam said.
“There’s more interest in finding new ways to tell our story and be activists,” Sismondo said.
The Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights Club (SPHR) has also explored new avenues of activism.
“[The pandemic] allowed us to get more creative with how we plan our events and reach people. ... We’ve been able to connect with a lot of other organizations and build solidarity with them,” President Dalia Ahmad said.
For instance, the SPHR is planning to host several well-known speakers, such as Diana Buttu, Miko Peled and Lina Hadid, at an upcoming event, which Ahmad said would have been impossible before due to hefty flight costs.
However, Ahmad acknowledged that because the club’s advocacy was always more educational, they have had it relatively easier.
Indeed, the pandemic’s impacts on clubs haven’t been entirely proportional. While some have thrived, other clubs have had to slow down or pause their operations entirely, like UBC The Enlightenment of Hong Kong, a club that’s now temporarily inactive due to most members being out of the country.
Others face a more daunting transition. UBC Synapse — a club that advocates for those living with neurodegenerative diseases — relied heavily on in-person interactions to host fundraisers. The president, Julia Handra, said that the pandemic has forced them to redirect their aims.
“Instead of raising money for local neurodegenerative organizations, we’re hoping to highlight local organizations and action items,” Handra said. “It’s been harder to engage members ... it’s definitely also challenged us and made us start on things we haven’t been super active on before.”
In light of UBC announcing that term 2 instruction will be primarily online, campus advocacy groups are unlikely to return to holding large-scale in-person events anytime soon. They must continue finding new ways of amplifying their calls to action through virtual spaces and hope that it is enough to gather momentum.
“As long as you can mould your space to what people need at the time, there are people who will consistently show up,” Sismondo said.
This article has been updated to reflect that the writer spoke to Dalia Ahmad, not Danica Torrens.
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