Join the Impact

Across the country in hundreds of cities, we came together on December 20th in vigil. This was a protest in the spirit of the holiday season, and one that helped us reach 1 Million people with our message of equality. While we didn’t change the hearts and minds of all 1 Million, we did change the lives of many. This highly successful event grew our base, and that growth will show with our next goal: 1 Million Signatures.

On January 10th, 2009 we ask that you join us to unite again! This movement WILL NOT BE WON WITHOUT VISIBILITY. 50 Cities across the country have already jumped on board to organize. And that’s just in a few days of planning. We got 300 cities with 1 week of notice on November 15th. We can easily exceed that this time around. So, on January 10th, we ask that you join us in your city for one or all of the following events:

• A protest in your area to bring attention to DOMA and the promise that Barack Obama made to repeal DOMA.
• Organize a transportation unit in your city to get people to the closest DOMA protest
• Canvas your city to get signatures for our Open Letter to Barack Obama.

In response to President-elect Barack Obama’s “Open Letter to the Gay Community,” we ask that you join us in signing our “Open Letter to Barack Obama,” to be revealed soon. It’s time we show the government how numerous we are. We need to show our impact and we’re going to take it to the White House!

The work done over this weekend will help us achieve and exceed this important goal. Help us get 1 Million signatures, and we’ll get it the letter in Obama’s hands.

LOGO TO PARTIPCIPATE IN JOINTHEIMPACT.COM’S

“LIGHT UP THE NIGHT FOR EQUALITY” ON-AIR AND ONLINE ON SATURDAY, DECEMBER 20, 2008

NEW YORK, NY – December 17, 2008 – The gay marriage debate continues across the United States. In response to JoinTheImpact.com’s “Light Up the Night for Equality,” LOGO will participate on-air and online in the nationwide candle light vigil occurring on December 20, 2008.

As members of the LGBT community and allies gather across the nation, LOGO will keep its audience up-to-date that evening with an “on-air candle” directing viewers to the latest news from 365gay.com, the online source for the latest LGBT news, opinion, video blogs and streaming video news. Updated news will be posted throughout the weekend, further supporting LOGO’s status as the ultimate aggregator of LGBT related content across all platforms: on-air, online, on mobile and on-demand.

LOGO continues to reach all various digital platforms on issues that affect the LGBT community including the recent “Day Without a Gay.” LOGO’s NewNowNext.com created a witty, but poignant viral video demonstrating what would happen if people called out “gay” at work in response to the nationwide “Day Without a Gay,” thus generating dialogue within the community and in the press. In addition, on-air efforts include “365Gay News,” LOGO’s half-hour weekly magazine-style LGBT news show, airing Thursdays at 7 PM ET/PT on LOGO and 365gay.com hosted by Emmy-award television journalist Ross Palombo. “365Gay News” has covered extensive issues related to LGBT rights including a recent special on Harvey Milk and political issues including gay marriage on its multiplatform brand “Road to Gay Marriage” on-air and on 365gay.com.

For more information on “Light Up the Night for Equality,” go to JointheImpact.com and for the latest in LGBT news and entertainment, go to 365gay.com and LOGOonline.com.

On December 20, 2008, JointheImpact.com, the official organizers of the nationwide November 15 protests against California’s Proposition 8, have called all LGBTQ individuals and allies of the community to participate in a peaceful demonstration in local commercial district areas in congruence with their National Food Drive for Equality.

LOGO TO PARTIPCIPATE IN JOINTHEIMPACT.COM’S

“LIGHT UP THE NIGHT FOR EQUALITY” ON-AIR AND ONLINE ON SATURDAY, DECEMBER 20, 2008

NEW YORK, NY – December 17, 2008 – The gay marriage debate continues across the United States. In response to JoinTheImpact.com’s “Light Up the Night for Equality,” LOGO will participate on-air and online in the nationwide candle light vigil occurring on December 20, 2008.

As members of the LGBT community and allies gather across the nation, LOGO will keep its audience up-to-date that evening with an “on-air candle” directing viewers to the latest news from 365gay.com, the online source for the latest LGBT news, opinion, video blogs and streaming video news. Updated news will be posted throughout the weekend, further supporting LOGO’s status as the ultimate aggregator of LGBT related content across all platforms: on-air, online, on mobile and on-demand.

LOGO continues to reach all various digital platforms on issues that affect the LGBT community including the recent “Day Without a Gay.” LOGO’s NewNowNext.com created a witty, but poignant viral video demonstrating what would happen if people called out “gay” at work in response to the nationwide “Day Without a Gay,” thus generating dialogue within the community and in the press. In addition, on-air efforts include “365Gay News,” LOGO’s half-hour weekly magazine-style LGBT news show, airing Thursdays at 7 PM ET/PT on LOGO and 365gay.com hosted by Emmy-award television journalist Ross Palombo. “365Gay News” has covered extensive issues related to LGBT rights including a recent special on Harvey Milk and political issues including gay marriage on its multiplatform brand “Road to Gay Marriage” on-air and on 365gay.com.

For more information on “Light Up the Night for Equality,” go to JointheImpact.com and for the latest in LGBT news and entertainment, go to 365gay.com and LOGOonline.com.

On December 20, 2008, JointheImpact.com, the official organizers of the nationwide November 15 protests against California’s Proposition 8, have called all LGBTQ individuals and allies of the community to participate in a peaceful demonstration in local commercial district areas in congruence with their National Food Drive for Equality.

In just a few days, our community will join together once more to make an IMPACT this Holiday season. December 20th’s Light up the Night for Equal Rights event will be HUGE. Just like on November 15th, we have cities from all around the country and the world joining together to spread the message of equal rights. Light up the Night is an amazing opportunity to build allies and bridge the gap of understanding for those that oppose us.* Those involved will come together in vigil, to honor the rights lost to Proposition 8 and the rights still nonexistent to 1 in 10 U.S. citizens. On November 15th, we took to the streets. In a holiday twist, we ask that you take to your commercial shopping centers and reach out to people by the thousands.

There are still too many people in this country who do not understand what it is we are fighting for. Too many people believe the slanderous rumors about our community. They believe that we want “special” rights, that we already have equal rights, or that we are being “greedy.” IT’S TIME THIS STOPS! These people do not hate us, they just do not understand us. Many of them have gay friends. Many of them have gay family members. What they are missing, is awareness. On December 20th, we will SHED LIGHT ON OUR MOVEMENT AND GIVE THE GIFT OF AWARENESS TO ALL!

Traditional protests require people to seek out the truth. They require massive groups of individuals coming together in one space to chant for rights and hear the words of like-minded speakers. On December 20th, we plan on covering more ground, and here are 5 simple tools to do this:

• Grab a candle, glow stick, or flashlight to stand out from the other shoppers
• Go to your city page and join a group that is already organizing, or volunteer to organize in your city
• Make or Buy a “2nd Class Citizen” t-shirt and show everyone the rights not afforded to the LGBTQ community
• Print out our “5 Rights Holiday Cards” and pass them out to shoppers. This is a great way of educating the masses on the exact legal protections that our government does not provide us.
• Put together White Knots to pass out to new formed allies

If you want to get the word out in your area, email out the PRESS RELEASE and pass out fliers.

*Light Up the Night for Equal Rights was an idea brought to us by one of our many members and something that the Join The Impact community embraced. Join The Impact is YOURS. We are meant to be a platform for your voice and your needs. When members approach us with ways to make an impact, we want to give everyone the power and platform to make a change!

• NEXT EVENT: February 12th Marriage Counter Actions
• Obama Signature Drive EXTENDED to FEB 16th
• ACTION ALERT: What should we do next?  Share your ideas HERE
• JoinTheImpact Will be at the NGLTF’s Creating Change Conference
• Did you organize an event for JTI? Interested in organizing in the future? Sign up here

What we accomplished on Saturday was the first step of one amazing journey. Many people have asked me why Proposition 8 has caused such an uproar in our community. Honestly, this movement has been forging for many years, but Proposition 8 was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Many have called this Stonewall 2.0, and I won’t disagree. Stonewall awoke a wildfire in the gay rights movement and Saturday’s world-wide protests showed this work just how strong a wildfire can be!

As everyone knows, Saturday’s protests didn’t solve the problem overnight, but what they did was raise awareness across this world about the problem. Thanks to all of you, this conversation is no longer between “us and them.” This conversation is occuring all over the world in living rooms, coffee shops, airplanes, offices, college campuses, and even retirement communities. The worst thing we could do right now is let this conversation fizzel out! Help us keep this conversation going. Share your stories, your videos, and photos with us. Help us record Saturday’s history making initiative, help us spread the word, and work with us for full equality! We can never let people forget about what Proposition 8 did to 18,000 marriages. The word DOMA needs to be in everyone’s vocabulary. In a world where so many children need homes, people must know how a vote in Arkansas took the right of adoption away from unmarried and gay couples.
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Last week, some felt angry. Last week, some felt defeated. Last week, some felt hopeless.

Today we have shown the world that we will not be victims anymore! Today, our community has risen and shown our opponents that we are MUCH MORE THAN 1 MILLION STRONG! We brought the world’s attention to the outrage that is Proposition 8. We brought the conversation of equality into the living rooms of America and around the world! Today, we took a gigantic step into the next Civil Rights Movement. We have brought the conversation to a national stage. Now it’s time that we keep it going. Join us in a challenge over the next 10 months that will make an IMPACT. 10 months – 10 lives changed. Everyone in this movement must help keep the conversation going. We are asking each and every one of you to engage in 10 conversations with someone who does not understand our struggle and help them to see our point of view. We are not asking that you try to infringe on or disrespect their beliefs. Change can not occur with insult, it will only occur with respect. If all of us work hard to positively affect 10 lives, we can change this entire nation! To help keep the conversation going, we will work with you to launch (at least) 10 national demonstrations of equality outreach. We have already begun taking the steps toward our next big event: Day Without A Gay on December 10th. It is now time we work with our nation to help them see who we are: citizens of the USA who deserve equal protections under the law!
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Tomorrows events will turn out over 1million people organizing across 300 cities in all 50 states and 10 countries world-wide! Please get the word out to all of your friends. This has grown beyond a national event – this is HISTORICAL! Read the Press Release Here…

The past three days have seemed like an eternity. So much has happened, and I realized that in all this, we never gave you any background about JoinTheImpact. On Friday morning, November 7th, I (Amy) received an email from a good friend, Willow Witte (our Cleveland protest coordinator). Willow like many of us, was fired up about Proposition 8 and seeking a way to mobilize. She had put up a post on her blog with an email template for people to write their local LGBTQ organization and ask for help planning something – anything. I responded to Willow’s email saying that we shouldn’t wait, we need to mobilize now and we need to on a national level, at the exact same moment, throughout the country. We have allowed our opponents to take our issues and make them local. Once they have divided us, they take their national movement and attack our smaller state-wide or even city-wide one. JoinTheImpact was forged as a way to give our community a national stage. We all must work towards equality in our state, but we need to know that every member of our community, across the nation cares about what happens in every state. California, Arkansas, Florida, and Arizona should not stand alone in this fight. We must all stand with them and for each other. These ideals are what spawned JoinTheImpact. That is who we were on November 7th at 9am PST.

Now, 4 days later, we are more than anyone could have imagined. Look in the mirror. We are you. We are your family. We are your loved ones and your allies. JoinTheImpact has not just gone national, it has gone international! Here’s the timetable so far:

1. November 7th – Launch
2. 5 Hours post launch – First 10,000 visitors
3. Midnight on November 7th – 20 cities organizing
4. November 8th (Afternoon) – Thanks to the help of organizers, we made CNN’s iReport.
5. November 8th (Evening) – Our site hit 35K visitors
6. November 9th (Morning) – 30 cities organizing
7. November 9th (Afternoon) – We got the attention of ParezHilton.com
8. November 9th (Evening) – The tipping point – Traffic jumped to 50K visitors/hour. With the help of Hostdango.com, we immediately switched to a new web server (Generously donated by Hostdango!)
9. November 10th 8am PST – Our initiative goes international! Now there are protests being planned around the world for the exact same minute on November 15th!
10. November 10th 11am PST – WetPaint.com enters the mix of local Seattle based companies donating time and services. Thanks to WetPaint, we now have an amazing Wiki to upload contact information and protest locations for every single city! They created a social site just for us: http://jointheimpact.wetpaint.com.
11. November 10th 11pm PST – 49 states have local organizers in over 80 cities!!!
12. November 11th – 1am PST – We reached 1million visitors!!
13. November 11th 8am PST – Hostdango shows even more generosity by upgrading us to an amazingly robust dedicated server to ensure that we can handle the traffic!
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Hello Everyone! Thanks to the help of HostDango.com’s Web hosting services, we now have a lightening fast server and our site should not be bogged down by traffic anymore… unless we suddenly reach 2 million hits/day, and at that point, who would complain? Please thank them in anyway you can. They donated the server to us and are working hard to keep our site afloat amidst the amazing influx of traffic! I’ll have a page up shortly with ways that you can help thank the businesses that are very generously donating their time and services to this cause!

PLEASE NOTE the following changes:

• In our server transfer, we did lose a great deal of comments but have backed them up. We will work hard to create a comments page so that people can see all of the great things you have said in the past 3 days.
• Thanks to the generosity of WetPaint.com, we now have a contacts and locations Wiki for everyone to better organize their city. That is located here: http://jointheimpact.wetpaint.com
• Emails – Please know that we are responding to emails as fast as we can. If you have submitted an email or comment requesting a change of location/contacts or addition of either for protesting, please submit that request again at our new wiki (But please check first to make sure the city isn’t already updated).
• You can use the wetpaint wiki to request changes and updates to contacts/locations in your area.
• Finally, you have made this all possible! I know our site has had some slow load times, but we honestly didn’t expect such a large reaction so fast! We peaked at 50K visitors/hour which are the numbers that crashed Friendster in its startup days! Please keep getting the word out and keep up the good work!

More to come soon! Thanks for EVERYTHING!