Dr. Amber Tierney’s 3-10-2020 Op Ed in Bangor Daily News
On March 10, 2020, Dr. Amber Tierney was a guest columnist for the Bangor Daily News as part of the Maine chapter of the national Scholars Strategy Network.
Want to win an election? Think more like an activist.
The race to seize the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination has given the people what they want: off-script, entertaining political theater, complete with all the journalistic horserace twists and turns we’ve grown to love. This type of journalism doesn’t always make for the best reporting, but it has managed to capture our narrowing attention span (at least, for now). In the aftermath of Joe Biden’s comeback Super Tuesday victory over what seemed like an almost certain slam-dunk win for Bernie Sanders, the political electoral terrain has shifted once again. We read these headlines, shrug our shoulders, dismiss these as random developments, and think: “Well, that’s politics!” In reality: “That’s social movements.” If we want to make sense of our elections, we need to start thinking more like activists.