Making Connections
Our goals included widening the circle of those who shared progressive values and deepening their understanding of what these values mean.
The arms race is deeply bound up with intervention, racism, sexism, and other inequities in our society. Breaking these deadly connections requires more than building human connections across fragmented and suspicious coalitions of activists. It means informing, involving, and empowering the vast majority of people. So when we at Michigan Alliance for Disarmament (MAD) reconstituted our newsletter into The Connection, we aimed to create a magazine for a broad audience. Our goals included widening the circle of those who share progressive values and deepening their understanding of what these values mean.
Every issue of The Connection is structured around a central theme-racism, the education system, the Vietnam war, Gorbachev, etc. All of our articles are original. Some have attracted national attention. Some have excited controversy. We wish to promote debate and hope our readers will send in letters.
An unvaried diet of analysis fails to reflect the many sources of commitment--cultural, artistic, emotional, human--to building a more just and peaceful world. Therefore, we feature interviews and personal profiles as well as a section on poetry and the arts.
Presentation is as important as content. In our writing, we strive for a sober, unpolemical style, free from rhetoric, cliches, or "politically correct" moralizing. Our object is to promote reasoned discussion of the connections among the issues and across different constituencies. In our layout, we strive for a polished look that underlines our claim to be a journal, not just a newsletter. Professionalism is a value we mean to promote.
In three years, we have succeeded in finding a large and diverse audience. The magazine reaches over 1,200 households, about one-third U-M students and each issue is read by around three people on the average.
The Connection is run as an open editorial collective. Anyone is welcome to participate on any level, from writing, editing, and graphics, to selling the advertising which keeps us in print, to stapling, folding, and mailing each issue. We try to make decisions on a consensus basis. When we differ, we talk until we agree, or at least see where the disagreement lies.
The Connection serves as a newsletter for MAD as well as a journal. MAD activities are described in the first few pages, and listed in a calendar on the back cover. Our finances come from MAD's general funds, and probably amount to the greater part of MAD's regular expenses. But Connection advertising and subscriptions are probably MAD's major regular source of revenue. A journal of The Connection's caliber is a major project for a group like MAD, requiring vast investments of time, money, and resources. In terms of our goals and the good experience we have had with it, it has been more than worthwhile.
The Connection is available by subscription only. Subscriptions are $5 a year (donations are gratefully welcomed) from Michigan Alliance for Disarmament, 4104 Michigan Union, Ann Arbor MI, 48103. Connection meetings are every Wednesday, 116 W. Jefferson #2, Ann Arbor, MI., 995-0183.