Online Organizing: A trick or treat? - Episode 5

Panelists

MARIANA RUIZ FIRMAT, PRESENTE | @MRuizFirmat | @PresenteOrg

Mariana Ruiz Firmat is the Managing Director of Presente, where she oversees strategic campaigns. Before that, she was a Campaign Director at MoveOn.org for four years. She spent five years as a union organizer throughout New York City. She cut her organizing teeth working to end violence against women of color in California. When she's not working, Mariana can be found working on her poetry press, Three Sad Tigers. And if she isn't writing or hatching up strategies to end deportations you will find her slogging over the stove making her abuelo's arroz con pollo or riding her bicycle cross country. 

DANTE BARRY, #MILLIONHOODIES | MEDIA ACTION GRASSROOTS NETWORK | @dantebarry

Dante Barry is a racial justice organizer with 10+ years experience as a grassroots and online organizer in the racial justice, anti-war/violence, and student movements. Dante is an organizer with the Media Action Grassroots Network and currently the deputy director of Million Hoodies Movement for Justice, working at the intersections of media, community organizing, and technology. Dante has appeared on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, RT, Al Jazeera America, ABC News, Next City, Colorlines, and Huffington Post.

ALICIA GARZA, #BLACKLIVESMATTER | NATIONAL DOMESTIC WORKERS ALLIANCE | @aliciagarza

Alicia Garza is the Special Projects Director for the National Domestic Workers Alliance. She has been the recipient of multiple awards for her organizing work in Black and Latino communities, receiving the Local Hero award from the San Francisco Bay Guardian and the Jeanne Gauna Communicate Justice award from the Center for Media Justice in 2008. She has twice been honored by the Harvey Milk Democratic Club with the Bayard Rustin Community Activist award for her work fighting gentrification and environmental racism in San Francisco's largest remaining Black community. Alicia comes to NDWA after serving as Executive Director of People Organized to Win Employment Rights (POWER) in San Francisco since 2009. Under her leadership, POWER won free local public transportation for youth; fought for a seat at the table in some of the most important land use decisions affecting working-class families; beat back regressive local policies targeting undocumented people; organized against the chronic police violence in Black neighborhoods; and shed light on the ongoing wave of profit-driven development that contribute to a changing San Francisco.

In 2013, Alicia co-founded #BlackLivesMatter, an online platform developed after the murder of Trayvon Martin, designed to connect people interested in learning more about and fighting back against anti-Black racism.

Alicia currently serves on the Board of Directors for the School of Unity and Liberation (SOUL) in Oakland, California, and is a contributing writer for WarTimes magazine. She serves as trusted counsel for organizations across the country looking to build their capacity to lead and win organizing campaigns. When she's not scheming on freedom, Alicia enjoys dancing, reading and writing—and scheming some more.