This event takes place in person at Charis and on Crowdcast, Charis' virtual event platform. This event is free, but registration is required for virtual attendance. Please read the in-person event guidelines at the bottom of this page to be sure you can participate in the event.

Charis welcomes Michael Czajkowski for Things Can Be Better: How to Change Minds and Stop Propaganda, a workshop around propaganda, misinformation, and offering hope and skills for a way forward.

I feel vulnerable. Everyday I feel strained and uncertain about my future and safety due to current events. Maybe you do too. To make real progress seems to require the changing of so many minds that feel so close yet so far away. This might feel bleak to you, but I feel hope about this. Based in science. This workshop is to spread this hope.

I will review the lesser-known and yet most powerful challenges to the progress of society, which will be difficult to face. We will then go through a large-scale strategy which turns these challenges into advantages. Finally, core to this strategy is a lesser known set of interpersonal communication habits, which we will practice together.

Michael Czajkowski is the Director of Advocacy for the nonprofit Science for Georgia working on community science translation projects to support community autonomy, awareness of environmental health threats, and resistance against more general forms of misinformation and manipulation. They have diverse experiences working in art, science, facilitation, community organizing  and many different levels of education, which is hopefully leading to useful new insights and perspectives. Michael’s background in soft matter physics is not so relevant to this, but is pretty fun and they love to talk about it.

The event is free and open to all people, especially to those who have no income or low income, but we encourage and appreciate a donation of $5-20 in support of the work of Charis Circle, our programming non-profit. Charis Circle's mission is to foster sustainable feminist communities, work for social justice, and encourage the expression of diverse and marginalized voices. Donate on Crowdcast or via our website: www.chariscircle.org/donate.

All attendees must wear a face mask during the event.

We will begin seating people at 1:30PM EST.

This event will be live-streamed via Crowdcast. 

As a reminder: If you are not feeling well, please do not come to the event.

If you have any questions regarding these guidelines or to request specific accessibility accommodations, please contact info@charisbooksandmore.com or call the store at 404-524-0304.

Please contact us at info@chariscircle.org or 404-524-0304 if you would like ASL interpretation at this event. If you would like to watch the event with live AI captions, you may do so by watching it in Google Chrome and enabling captions: Instructions here. If you have other accessibility needs or if you are someone who has skills in making digital events more accessible please don't hesitate to reach out to info@chariscircle.org.

By attending our event, whether in person or virtually, you agree to our Code of Conduct: Our event seeks to provide a harassment-free experience for everyone, regardless of gender, gender identity and expression, age, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, ethnicity, religion (or lack thereof), class, or technology choices. We do not tolerate harassment in any form. Unsolicited sexual language and imagery are not appropriate. Anyone violating these rules will be expelled from this event and all future events at the discretion of the organizers. Please report all harassment to Charis staff immediately or email info@chariscircle.org.

Things Can Be Better: How to Change Minds and Stop Propaganda with Michael Czajkowski