Stop yelling, get out your knitting needles and join the revolution!

A BRICK through a window, a torrent of emails or . . . a message handstitched on a handkerchief and delivered with a smile to the local MP?

A growing number of individuals who call themselves 'craftivists' are claiming the power of a more individual, personal, quiet and creative message.

Graffiti slogans have become fabric collages on garage doors and placards are now mini cross-stitch banners, streets are covered in knitting, petitions are strewn as bunting.

While some claim the approach is fluffy, twee and kitsch, its supporters believeits beauty and individuality is its unique power.

‘It's hard to feel threatened by a place that's covered in pompoms,’ the Knitting Guerillas told the Guardian newspaper when they decorated trees in a Leicestershire park, hoping it would help reduce the fear of crime in the area.

Attending a march through the city, American journalist Betsy Greer was struck how the crowd went silent as puppets of presidential candidates paraded past.

‘I always thought that activism had to be loud and in-your-face,’ she says. ‘It made me think about “quiet” activism and wonder how craft could be a part of it.’

She coined the term Craftivism in 2003 and the concept has since been adopted with a passion and a variety of interpretations, worldwide.

Projects raise awareness, build communities, tell stories, make political statements or encourage change. They include community quilts, graffiti cross-stitch, yarnstorming, upcycling clothing and guerilla gifts.

Justice

‘Activism is often about demonizing people,’ says Sarah Corbett who created the Craftivist Collective in the UK when she became disillusioned with the accepted practices of protest.

Sarah had been brought up in a family where engaging in social justice issues was the norm - her parents, a vicar and a councillor in West Everton, Liverpool, had taken her along to a sit-in when she was just three.

But, although she became a passionate campaigner throughout school, university and in her early work for international charities, Sarah felt that the large groups and confrontations, which were intrinsic elements of activism, made her uncomfortable and jarred with her essentially introvert personality.

‘As a Christian, that [approach] goes completely against my faith,’ she says. ‘Jesus had quiet conversations with people. He did ask difficult questions of his friends, but he didn't scream at them with placards.’

She now lectures widely, works with charities and community groups and offers kits through her website.

Here at the Craftivist Collective we focus on campaigning and activism where we question and challenge the root causes of poverty and suffering and look for long-term solutions to those problems.

‘We use craft, mostly hand-embroidery, as a powerful tool to create slow, quiet, thoughtful and compassionate activism as a catalyst for long-term positive change in our world and in ourselves.’

She has conceived Climate Rush handstitched petition train bunting, Don't Blow It hankies, Climate Coalition Heart on Your Sleeve brooches and embroidered jigsaw pieces featuring messages in support of Save the Children's Race Against Hunger.

Quiet

Messages prove more memorable and influential through being presented in this way, she says. ‘It means people are more intrigued and spend more time looking at [something which is cute or beautiful] and speaking to the person who made it.

‘Loving critical friends is more effective than being aggressive enemies when we want to change the world,’ she says. ‘Everyone is unique so we need to approach them in unique ways.’

The concept also has a positive impact on the craftivists themselves.

‘Craft is slow and quiet and repetitive with your hands, it's naturally very meditative,’ says Sarah. ‘For me it gave me time to think about a lot of injustices that I was very angry about, it made me put myself in the shoes of the victims and the perpetrators.

It made me think about how I could be the best global citizen I could be, the best consumer, the best neighbour. It also gave me time to stitch the messages I was passionate about.

‘It is a thinking exercise more than a craft exercise,’ says Sarah. ‘Craft connects your hands, your heart and your head and when you connect that to justice issues, I think it can be world-changing.’

Betsy Greer agrees: ‘The creation of things by hand leads to a better understanding of democracy, because it reminds us that we have power.

‘In hearing how to make things, we begin to understand that the $10 shirt we see in a store took hours to make and therefore $10 is not an adequate price.

‘People have grown tired of so-called traditional ways of activism,’ says Greer.

‘As craftivists we foment dialogue and so help the world become a better place, albeit on a smaller scale than activists who organize mass demonstrations.

‘People are looking for a way to connect and deepen their understanding of things.

‘Yelling doesn't change things, but dialogue does. This is less about mass action and more about realizing what you can do to make things around you better.’