I canvassed for five years. For most of that time I was going door to door in suburban communities around New York City. I also spent some time canvassing in NYC apartment buildings.
I would hope that your trainers gave you some tips about rejection, since this is the first thing any canvasser has to learn to deal with. You need to understand that most places you will go, about a third of the people will automatically support you; a third will be totally against you, and a third will be persuadable.
At the beginning, I was canvassing on the equal rights amendment, which was designed to guarantee women equal rights under our constitution. It didn’t pass, but we gave it a good try. I moved on to many other issues after that.
The numbers I gave you above are approximate. I would say maybe one fifth of people automatically support gay rights and perhaps two fifths are against them, but I haven’t looked up the numbers, and it will be different in your area, anyway.
The point is, that you should not take rejection personally. People are not rejecting you. They are rejecting the issue. They may take it out on you, personally, but they don’t know you. If they are getting angry at you personally, they are just rude.
We were going into people’s houses. I was screamed at, threatened and had the cops called on me numerous times. I have been taken down to the cop shop. We were trained not to argue with cops. Just go down, and if necessary, they’d get a lawyer for us. It never turned out to be necessary, and it shouldn’t be a problem for you on street corners. It’s different when you are in a building and haven’t been invited.
Anyway, I trained my canvassers to think of themselves as ducks with a special kind of anti-insult oil in their feathers. When someone insults you, you let it roll right off your feathers and onto the street. You don’t even think about it. You move on to the next person.
Your job is to identify supporters and people who can be persuaded. Your job is not to argue with anyone. You are not even to spend much time trying to persuade people. If you can’t do it in two minutes, it isn’t worth your time.
Now sometimes I would spend five or ten minutes with a supporter just for laughs and to make myself feel better. Often I could get a much bigger check that way. So learn to identify supporters and haters fast. Dump the haters in two seconds. Spend time with supporters. Make them feel good about it. Get them to write a big check, or however you take money these days (credit cards weren’t so big when I was canvassing).
When you get good at this, you will not only know how to never be a lightning rod (unless you want to be), but also how to talk to people and sell people on anything. Of course, you will only sell people for good causes.
I’m not sure why my friend @CWOTUS thinks this isn’t work. I supported myself for five years of my life as a canvasser. I learned an awful lot about sales and training and leadership in the process. Many, many canvassers go on to hold positions in government or become elected public officials. I know of at least on congresswoman who I used to work for and whose house I stayed in while canvassing for her husband’s organization. There’s actually a career path here.
Learning to talk to people and to assess people and to calm people down are all great skills.
But the key is to not take this personally. When someone yells at you, you get that bad feeling in your chest and stomach. You feel bad. The key is to take a few deep breaths. Or do something else to calm yourself. Remind yourself there are plenty of supporters out there. Then approach the next person with confidence showing on your face. They need to feel you are glad to see them, but not in a fake way. It’s got to be real happiness. Then you introduce yourself and your issue.
By the way, I think the “do you have a few minutes to save a life” style of opening sucks. I was trained to use it, too. “Hi, I’m Wundayatta and I’m here for the Equal Rights Amendment. You know, equal pay for equal work for women?” Maybe there’s a way to soften it a little. People don’t want to stop, and you have to get them to take a few minutes. You have to play on their guilt a little, but not too much. Maybe even acknowledging they are busy, but saying it will just take a few minutes and they can really help make gay rights a reality in this country.
I always trained people to write their own lines. These days they seem to train folks to all use the same lines. I’m not in favor of that, but maybe things are different. Anyway, good luck. Here’s a check.
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