Roro and I (along w/ some friends of ours from PA -- hi Beth & Kris) marched in the Dyke March in Toronto on Saturday. Two big takeaways:
First, I was startled by the number of people who came out to watch! For the first leg, walking up Church and west across Bloor, it felt like we were at the academy awards in Hong Kong -- I have never seen so many South Asian men with photographic devices. Seriously. I know that Stats Canada has predicted that by 2017 50% of Torontonians will be part of a visible minority (which is one of the reasons I love Toronto!) but I had no idea that lesbians were such a draw to this group. Very interesting!
Second ... I think I've found my new calling: help small political movements with their information design and marketing messaging.
Predictably, at the Dyke March, you see lots of banners and placards. Some of these are clear, understandable, easy-to-read. For example, the Lesbian Latinas. Awesome slogan: "Silencio = Muerte". Written in big black block letters on a white posterboard. Clear, easy to read on a placard. Even a gringo like me gets it.
Some of them are not as clear.
There was a group behind us carrying a long horizontal banner. The banner was black. It had small white (grey) letters outlined in red on it. While waiting for the march to start, I had the opportunity to read: "Lesbian women and transgendered persons are the ticking timebombs at the heart of patriarchial society."
The only reason I was able to read this is a) we stood around for 20 minutes waiting to start and b) I was 2 feet away from the banner. If I had been a bystander watching the march, I could never had read it.
I fully support the half-dozen young women marching behind this banner and their message. But if they want more people to get engaged with their message, they need a) better information design skills and b) better marketing skills. I hate to admit it, but we live in an ADD-enabled, instant-gratification world (at least in wealthy North America). We will not work harder than we need to in order to decipher a message. And the message needs to be snappy and focused .. or at least have a snappy URL where I can get some more info.
So .. what if this banner were still black, but the BIG white block lettering that read: "Patriarchs Beware! tickingtimebomb.ca" Simpler, more direct, potentially more memorable. Alos, looks better in a press photo.
I love words. And I know my leftist-minded compatriots do as well. But we have to sacrifice volume for clarity and even precision for memorability -- to then get readers to a time and space (when *they* want hear more about a message and visit a website) where we can be more verbose and fully articulate revolutionary ideas.
There are some great resources out there for the design of posters: