Social Change is a Black, Brown or Queer, lived-experience run vehicle for change that uplifts, empowers, and liberates marginalized individuals and communities via storytelling, direct action and advocacy.
Storytelling is the best way to make sure people don’t just see, but feel the pain other’s experience. When experiencing that, our humanity compels us to act. We create opportunities for both experiences to take place principally via our International Social Change Film Festival—which shares untold stories from all over the world via film and art— but also through testimonials gathered and provided by community members, traditional and social media, and beyond.
As a result, we have had the chance to share these powerful stories in over 300 press opportunities and 15 of our International Social Change Film Festivals (also called ChangeFests in Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta and New York). The struggle shared in those stories are paired with opportunities for those inspired by the respective story to work with those directly impacted and related experts to address the issues in the film.
The issues we address may vary widely, but the approach to each is the same. We empower and organize alongside people directly impacted to assemble the coalition necessary to respond directly to many of the issues our brothers and sisters are enduring worldwide. These impactful directives have come in the form of creating and bringing free health clinics, legal clinics and farmers markets to places where those fundamental resources are non-existent. They have also manifested in protests against police brutality and voter suppression and efforts to support Black farmers, migrants, our unhoused, our LGBTQ+ brothers and sisters, mothers and so much more. Our direct response efforts have even resulted in our serving over 1,000,000 lbs of food and seeds, sanitizer, hygiene products, diapers, formula, ppe, legal assistance, housing, voting, job and other resources to over 100,000 individuals nationwide.
But, we’ll be hosting resource fairs and engaging in direct service forever if we don’t actually address the root causes responsible for creating the significant, persistent and pervasive pain in the first place. That’s why we also engage in work to empower community members nationwide to disrupt the practices, policies and systems responsible for allowing these life-shattering issues to remain for generations. We do this by organizing, training, empowering and supporting community efforts to identify and address systemic issues. Thankfully, we’ve done so successfully, resulting in the changing, creating and passing of over 30 pieces of jobs, housing and justice-related legislation into law.
Why did you establish Social Change?
The people closest to the pain are the very people who should be closest to the solution.
It’s that basic principal that led our Co-Founder, Emile Cambry Jr., and I to co-found Social Change in the first place.
We noticed that, as two men of color who knew struggle firsthand, there were a lot of people and organizations telling and profiting off our community’s stories, speaking on our community’s behalf and getting millions of dollars to help address our issues, that have—and never will have—any idea what it’s like to actually experience them.
We wanted to change that by creating an organization for run and led by people with many of the same stories and struggles as those we serve. The unique understanding that comes with that allows us to more effectively assess, strategize, engage and address issues in a way that is much more impactful per dollar than others.
Tell us about your top three goals for the organization.
Right now, our top three goals as an organization are to:
1. Address health disparities so people in communities mere miles away from another no longer have a life expectancy that is decades fewer;
2. Provide the legal assistance and system disrupting advocacy necessary to address the civil rights issue of our time, the new Jim Crow, which continues to shatter the lives of over 80 million people nationwide; and,
3. Fight to address policies and practices causing real harm to our unhoused, non-affluent, undocumented, LGBTQ+, incarcerated and otherwise disenfranchised sisters and brothers across the nation.
Tell us about your most proud work.
Some of the first thoughts that came to mind were how proud I am of the way we have: provided hundreds of thousands of pounds of food, ppe and vaccines to so many in need during the pandemic; changed 10 plus laws to give the gift of freedom to some of the millions victimized by the new Jim Crow; or, how we helped engage hundreds of thousands of voters during critical run-off elections in Georgia.
But, in all, I think that, as proud as I am of the work we’ve done; I’m most proud of how we have done it.
We’ve done all this with a shoestring budget. And the reason we’ve been able to is because when we serve, we intentionally and authentically serve. We intentionally and authentically support and uplift our communities in such a way that not only are our community members being served; they are being empowered, feeling loved, and are excited to join—and lead—their own fight or movement for Change.
That’s why, even as a small organization, we have hundreds of volunteers of all ages, nationalities, identities, classes and creeds across the nation engaging in this work alongside us. When the way you serve inspires people of all backgrounds to join the movement, start their own, or otherwise stand up and speak out with real power, that’s the sort of magic that can transform not just a life or a community; but the entire world.
How did the pandemic impact the organization?
When the pandemic shut the world down, it meant that a lot of service organizations shut down, as well.
Social Change was not one of them.
Instead of shutting down and playing it safe, we risked our lives to ramp up even more to fill the tremendous increase in need created by the resource vacuum and the exacerbation of need that resulted from millions losing their jobs, lives, security and supports due to the pandemic.
And the result is that we leveraged every network, every volunteer, and every dollar we had to go into 10 separate states—CA, GA, IL, IN, LA, MO, NC, NY, TX & WI—and gather and give hundreds of thousands of pounds of free food, ppe and vaccines to families in need during that life-changing time.
Tell us about Social Change’s International Film Festival.
The stories people tell aren’t just about what they say about you, they also show how they feel about you. And how someone feels about you speaks to how they treat you.
Before our International Social Change Film Festival was founded, called ChangeFest for short, it was clear that the negative and false narratives and stories being told about our communities were effectively dehumanizing us, polarizing communities and creating the space where hate and violence could thrive.
We formed ChangeFest to be the antidote to that poison.
ChangeFest is a vehicle that uses arts and culture to help people who experience ChangeFest hear, see and feel stories that capture the humanity and the truth of the realities many share worldwide. This isn’t done just to make a spectacle of the pain shown in the films, but to inspire and compel people to do something about it. That’s why the film and art experiences at ChangeFest are always paired with real opportunities to engage in dialogue on the issues and chances to work with directly impacted leaders, filmmakers, and other experts working to address the issues in the film shown. That way, stories inspire the action that leads to real change.
How can people support Social Change?
We’re an entirely Black, Brown or Queer led-organization with the lived experience to know and understand the most grave issues impacting our communities firsthand and the network, organizing abilities and know-how to efficiently, sustainably and successfully address those issues.
If I had to make a checklist for what sorts of organizations merit not just passing support but deep involvement, this org would check all the boxes.
So when people ask how they can support, I ask them in turn what they would do if they knew how much each dollar invested in Change truly meant?
Where $20,000 can fully fund an entire legal clinic where people can receive the free legal assistance they need for the hundreds of men, women and kids directly impacted to truly be set free from the bondage of a criminal record?
Where $15,000 brings a free Farmer’s market and seeds to communities where the nearest quality produce is hours away so people can have the chance to replace the harmful items in diets in the short and long-term that cause entire generations to die prematurely.
Where $10,000 will fund the showcasing of several powerful stories, documenting any range of hardships, for the world to see and join or create the movements to address those hardships while also breaking down the barriers of polarization and ignorance.
Our organization, and the work we’re fortunate to do, yields more impact per moment and dollar than others, and we are proud of that. Just as important, the people who invest in us are proud of the investment they make, as well.
What does success look like for Social Change?
What success looks like for us may surprise you.
Every day, our goal is to do everything in our power to bring our organization one step closer to one thing: going out of business.
Meaning, if we’re doing what we’re supposed to in terms of empowering leader after leader, and those leaders so the same, and we continue to disrupt systems, and the empowered leaders do the same, and we keep amplifying stories that radically change false narratives, and the empowered leaders do the same, what’s left are vibrant, safe, prosperous, healthy, joy and opportunity-saturated communities that don’t need Social Change, government programs, or anyone or anything else. That’s what liberation looks like, and that what Social Change is fighting for.
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