Ethical Action Committee (EAC)
Report on 2006-7 Activities
May 20, 2007
This report is a summary of the activities of the EHSoP EAC during the 2006-7 fiscal year. For more detailed information, readers should see the EAC minutes for each of its meetings during the year.
The EAC of 2006-7
Carole E, Arnold, Temma, Richard K., Saul, Ellen R., Nick (Co-chair), and Judith W. (Co-chair)
Also, in the functioning of EAC, we have frequently called on Leader Richard K. for program support and Administrator Jean B. for providing some publicity and handling the financial aspects of our activities.
The EAC had meetings from approximately 6:30 to approximately 7:30 at the Ethical Humanist Society on the second Wednesday each month from September 2006 through May 2007, except for February when we were snowed out.
Service Activities
1. We began the year with a voter registration project on the sidewalk in front of the Society, coordinated by Carole E. While we did not register many voters (because in this area, most passersby were already registered), Carole and Society got many compliments for providing the opportunity.
2 and 3. As in recent years, we distributed dictionaries to all (almost 100) third grade students at the Robert Morris Charter School in a poor section of north Philadelphia. And again, Temma coordinated the project. Also in another repeat from previous years around the holiday season, Temma spearheaded the collection of scarves, hats, mittens, books, and toys for children in the Robert Morris School.
4. In another repeat service project, we prepared and served dinners and coffee to 18-20 men at the Trinity Urban Center once a month this year for five months (December through April). Judith coordinated this project, which involved two Ethical Society members or attenders for each month.
5. On May 3, 2007, we responded to the "National Day of Prayer" with our own "Day of Caring" by preparing 138 meals of turkey breast, potatoes, gravy, and vegetables for elderly shut-in and disabled persons, in support of the local service organization Aid for Friends. Carole E. coordinated this event, which involved about a dozen Society members in the cooking and assembly of the meals.
6. Although not conducted by the EAC, Society members volunteered for construction and maintenance projects at Camp Linden, the Ethical Society's summer camp for inner-city kids in Chester County.
Social Change Activities
1. Beginning in October of 2006, we began a monthly call during platforms for signers of the three letters researched and composed by Amnesty International. Ron C. coordinated this project. Each month he had no trouble in obtaining as many signers as he had letters to be signed -- usually eight copies of each of the three letters.
2 and 3. Just before Christmas, Ron and Nick joined a demonstration against the military-industrial complex at the Lockheed-Martin headquarters, and in January, Nick and Jean showed the related film, Why We Fight, at the Society for the general public.
4. In protest of President Bush's "surge" in the Iraq War, most of the EAC members as well as others from the Society traveled to Washington, DC to join tens of thousands of other Americans for a big pro-peace and justice demonstration.
5. We took two actions to voice our opposition to the death penalty (both in giving monetary support from our EAC budget): We gave $50 to support the appearance of the mother of Vicky Schieber (a University of Pennsylvania student who was murdered in Philadelpia) in an anti-death-penalty event and $100 to sponsor an event at the National Liberty Museum with a exonerated death-row inmate speaker.
6. Twice EAC worked with the Project for Nuclear Awareness (PNA) when the Society hosted events highlighting the activities by the U.S. that are escalating the nuclear arms threat. One event was in October when Nick worked with the PNA to sponsor a forum featuring presentations by Bob Edgar, head of the National Council of Churches, and Craig Eisendrath, while Madeline S. helped carry out a presentation in May by Eisendrath on the weaponization of space.
7. In February, we hosted a panel on organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners in China. Our auditorium was fairly well full for that event, with many from the Asian community in the Philadelphia area attending. Nick served as liaison with local Falun Gong practitioners who arranged for the expert panelists.
8. In April, members of the EAC and others in the Society participated in a demonstration for the Scouting for All movement at the National Constitution Center, which was hosting a Boy Scouts event.
9. And just last week, the Society hosted an Amnesty International forum on human rights at the U.S. Guantanamo Bay detention center, with Ron C. coordinating the event with A.I. organizers.
Other
One other project that does not fit well into either the community service or the social change action categories was one we conducted in November. In place of a meal, Society members and attenders were encouraged to contribute to Oxfam's annual Fast Day project, which calls for contributions to provide sustainence for those in Africa and other parts of the world who are on the edge of survival. We collected $446 for the Oxfam Fast Day.
Also overlapping the service and social change categories, we announced during most Sunday platforms an "ethics in action," a timely action that could be taken by Society members and other platform attenders to put our values into action.
Because we valued Brandywine Peace Community's Robert Smith so much, we nominated him for the AEU Elliott-Black award.
We also facilitated the Society's proclamation that "We are a Society United in Support of Reproductive Freedom," which is now posted on our announcement board on the front of the Society building.
Procedural Stance
As in the previous year, the EAC has taken direction from members who want the EHSoP to act in some area of ethical concern. Taking the member-driven direction is a practical matter -- acknowledging that as volunteers we must have persons who are willing to invest themselves in researching, formulating, making arrangements, and coordinating in order to get anything actually acted on. The EAC meetings provide opportunities for discussing whether an activity is appropriate to pursue, but this has during the past year taken the form of making adjustments to the proposed idea in such a way to garner support of others on the EAC. New this year, however, was the only partially realized aim that all actions undertaken by the EAC should involve at least two people from the Society -- so that the action could more readily be understood as a Society action and not just an individual action taken by way of the Ethical Society.