Formed at the beginning of last year, The Georgetown Progressive is a publication that, according to their mission statement, “lies at the intersection of the ideas, talents and creativity of progressive activists on Georgetown University’s campus … [and seeks] to educate our campus, demonstrate to the country how strong the progressive movement … is, and generate ideas about progressive politics.” The groups that comprise what is known as the Progressive Coalition are Amnesty International, an organization that fights for global human rights; Eco-Action, devoted to promoting environmental stability; Georgetown Solidarity Committee, which takes action in support of struggles of workers; the Georgetown University Legislative Advocates, which increases the levels of issue-based advocacy by providing resources to students or student groups who wish to advocate for a national or local issue; GU pride, the LGBTQ society on campus; H*yas for Choice, the unofficial pro-choice and pro-reproductive health group; the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán; Take Back the Night and United Feminists. This week, The Guide sat down with Kelly Sawyers (COL ’11), director of The Georgetown Progressive and a staff writer for The Hoya, to better understand how this publication provides a forum in which these groups can express the views central to their cause and to advance awareness on campus.

What is The Georgetown Progressive and why was it formed?

The Progressive was formed to be the literary arm of the Georgetown Progressive Coalition, to advance the causes of all the groups encompassed by the Progressive Coalition. Such member groups are the College Democrats and H*yas for Choice. The site, however, is an autonomous organization separate from all the other members of the Progressive Coalition, but we reach out and we organize coalition meetings, and we cross publicize issues, pieces of campus news and upcoming events. The Georgetown Progressive has a core staff and is updated every day, but anyone can contribute articles to the site or write in our blog. Mainly the contributors are from the likeminded groups, but if someone has a very pressing issue that they feel strongly about and really want to get their voice out there, we can make that happen. All they need to do is to send us the piece, we’ll edit it and post it on the site.

What does the editing process of these opinion-based articles entail?

Editing is really just for grammatical errors and copy errors only. We don’t change opinions — that’s the point of the Progressive Coalition and the point of The Georgetown Progressive.

What are the biggest issues you want The Progressive to address?

The Progressive is meant to address a wide range of issues. Basically our aim is to promote progressives and the infinite ideas that are encompassed by that ideology. Personally, the issues I find very important are the economic situation in the country, the environment and social issues, such as equal rights for all people, however they identify themselves. For me, as I wrote in one article, Georgetown ranks 124 of 139 for its sexual health education and its services. This is appalling. Issues of sexual health are incredibly important, and they are not best addressed by turning a blind eye and ignoring them.

Because The Progressive does try to address the points of view of many constituent coalition groups, do you often come across points of conflict within your group over ideological differences?

Since there are so many members of the coalition, there are bound to be issues that come up that we disagree on, but one of the best things about having our publication online is that we are able to have a dialogue and go back and forth. So, yes, there are disagreements on individual issues, but we all still fall in the “progressive” category.

Do you feel that using the Internet as a mode of communication has colored the issues? With the advent of the blog, what do you see as the good and bad effects on these dialogues?

The Internet is an amazing resource and because of it, we can engage in constant dialogue. There is really just so much information that is available at our fingertips. With the rise of the Internet and the 24/7 media cycle, there is just new information coming in all the time. There is so much that we need to get educated about and now, with the Internet, there are so many ways to get involved. The Georgetown Progressive is really trying to latch on to this movement and take advantage of all of the benefits that the Internet has to offer as a resource in terms of advancing debate and discussion of some really critical issues. Now, one negative outcome of the Internet is the increased amount of anonymity. If someone can post a response on a blog and not have their name attached to it, it leaves them very open to say what they want and to have the freedom to say many offensive and unnecessary things. Now, we are an opinionated site, so we expect the things we say to be met with a certain amount of disagreement. What we hope is that we are opening up dialogues and debates and not letting the Internet become a platform and a method to say hateful and intolerant things. That wouldn’t be a responsible use for such an incredible tool.

I see that one of the focuses of the web site now is on the coming election. Once the election has come and gone, where do you see the focus of The Progressive shifting? In what direction would you like to see The Progressive move?

You’re absolutely right that right now we have a lot of our attention centered on the coming election. There are just so many important issues to cover and good opportunities for humor as well. After the election, I hope that The Progressive will shift its focus on projected ideas about how the new administration will deal with certain issues like abortion, gay marriage, other social issues, equality issues, the economy, what have you. Then once the new administration takes office in January, we will turn our focus to how that administration is actually implementing policy, affecting the issues at hand, and how we feel about those effects. We’ll also, hopefully, be addressing a lot more current events and use event-based issues as the basis for our discussion.

What is your opinion of this quote from Winston Churchill in light of the mission of The Progressive and the issues you deal with: “Any man who is under 30 and is not a liberal, has no heart; and any man who is over 30 and not a conservative, has no brains.”

That is a great quote because it really raises a lot of important issues. The progressive movement doesn’t think that the way things were in the past is the way things should be in the future. Culture, society, government and law need to be malleable and able to grow and change as our society and country evolves. We’ve also grown up in a much more tolerant country and time than even our parents did. We are discussing and challenging in our generation a lot of issues that have been deeply entrenched in society. That being said, I don’t think that being a liberal after 30 means you don’t have a brain!

Hopefully The Georgetown Progressive can help usher in new awarenesses and keep our society moving towards more tolerance and social growth.