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Protest March Press Release
by Dave Doctor
Protest marches are the most effective means to energize your peers and the most compelling tactic against unresponsive politicians. By marching along your city streets, you will begin a campaign that will change the lives of thousands of teens. Pasted below is a sample Protest March press release that you can use to alert the press about your march.
Before you stage a protest march, we highly recommend that you first distribute hundreds of general anti-curfew stickers to persuade people that something must be done to persuade your politicians to repeal the curfew. Then, about one month later, you should distribute hundreds of "PROTEST THE CURFEW" stickers to bring everyone to a boiling point. The constant site of stickers throughout your school will get people angry and encourage them to fight back.
You should also send out our Sticker Distribution press release to generate publicity for your efforts. This publicity will maximize the chance that your peers and the press will attend your march.
Send the press release to your neighborhood and city newspapers and to the news desks of the television and radio networks. Simply call the main numbers of your local news organizations and ask for the fax numbers and e-mail addresses for press releases. If you need help, contact NYRA.
To personalize the press release, change the bracketed information to your personal information and then remove the brackets. Also, the press release must fit on one page to make sure that there is no chance of anyone losing a second page. Therefore, make the informational lines at the beginning a very small font size. Also, as a matter of tradition, all press releases end with: -30-
Be sure to contact NYRA to let us know in advance, and to ask any questions you may have. Here is a short list of directions:
News from [Your Name]
[Your City, Your State]
For Immediate Release: Today’s Date
For additional information:
[Your Name]
Phone: #[Your Phone Number]
E-Mail: [Your eMail address]
WWW: [Your website address, contact NYRA if you need a page]
Curfew Protest Scheduled for [Friday] Night
[Your City], [Your State] -- At [9] p.m. on [Friday], [January 15], the NYRA-[your group name] chapter will lead a protest march from [location] to [location]. The curfew forbids people under the age of 18 from being on public roads and streets after [____] p.m.
At the march, protesters will wear and distribute anti-curfew stickers, which they claim can be used to nullify the curfew ordinance. The stickers display statements such as "Hanging out is not a crime," "Repeal the Curfew," and "...right of the people to peaceably assemble..." Any attempt to arrest a person wearing one of the stickers may be a violation of that person's First Amendment right to political expression.
During the past month, [First Name] [Last Name], organizer of the protest march, distributed more than[300] of these anti-curfew stickers throughout [Your City]. After receiving an enthusiastic response from people who received the stickers, [s/he] decided to stage the protest march to begin a campaign to repeal the law. [S/He] recently handed out a fourth type of sticker that says, "Protest the Curfew," which [s/he] hopes will turn people's anger into action.
[Last Name], who is head of the campaign, distributed stickers and organized the march because [s/he] claims that the curfew is a clear violation of the First Amendment, which states that Congress shall make no law which prohibits the right of people to assemble peacefully. "If the courts will not repeal these laws, then we must actively protest the curfew until our local politicians end their attack on our rights," said [Last Name].
[Last Name] is optimistic about repealing the law because of the success of other persecuted groups in American history. "If the Blacks of Birmingham can bury segregation, we can also place [Your City]'s curfew into the cemetery of oppressive laws, said [Last Name].
His/her campaign focuses on [Your City]'s curfew but it is also part of a national effort to repeal curfew laws. Other activists are distributing anti-curfew stickers in cities such as [San Antonio, Texas, Tucson, Arizona, Charlotte, North Carolina, and Huntington Beach, California.]
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Hand out stickers and tell the press with our Sticker Distribution press release.
Return to the Curfew Action area.
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