Ben Rattray and Change.org

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | August 12, 2012 | Meredith May

[Cincinatus' Wife]

.....It was a learning moment for the entire family, and everyone, including Nick, emerged stronger for it. But it made Rattray re-examine all his priorities, about family, love, happiness and his goals. He decided that a life in pursuit of making money and personal indulgence was empty.

But he didn't know how he could empower people all by himself. He just knew that he didn't fit in anymore with the corporate banking track at Stanford.

............Spreading democracy

After graduating, he left for London to get a master's degree in political theory from the London School of Economics and Political Science. He dove into books about humanity and liberty, reading Isaiah Berlin, John Stuart Mill and "The End of History and the Last Man," in which Francis Fukuyama argues that the greatest asset of Rattray's generation is its ability to use people power to spread liberal democracy.

Unsure of where to go next, Rattray decided he would study public-interest law at New York University. During a recruitment meeting in 2005, someone showed him a new website being used by college students called The Facebook. It gave Rattray his first idea - instead of a site to post party pictures and random thoughts, what if there were a social network for social causes?

.....When Change.org first went online, it was hard to navigate. Visitors got lost in forums organized around conceptual topics such as global warming and gay rights. Some tried to start petitions, but the site was muddled, generic and bulky to use.

In its second version, Rattray and Dimas hired bloggers to lead discussions on the various causes. They put a petition tool button at the bottom, but didn't think anyone would use it. Everyone said the online petition was dead.

But then someone posted a petition to stop...

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Ben Rattray's privileged upbringing is important to this article because he saw the light about the evil of making money (although he is trying to make money). With all his degrees and (oh those awful student loans) it would seem he has spotted where the "marks" are). And he feels oh so relevant and good.

[raybbr]

Knew there had to be a homo angle in the story somewhere...

Nick, his younger brother, came out. Rattray, who knew a few months before the rest of his conservative family, never forgave himself for staying silent while Nick started skipping class, talking back to their parents, experimenting with drugs and threatening to run away.

"I knew what was going on with Nick, but didn't forcefully defend him," Rattray said. "The lack of active rejection of the venom of homophobia is still a tacit endorsement. It's exacerbated by people like me."

[Cincinatus' Wife]

More pertinent and informative is how he is going to capitalize on his “concern.”

A TRUE progressive.

[muir_redwoods]

So in other words a know-nothing, do-nothing, coddled, spoiled punk surviving on his family’s cushy wealth has now demonstrated (needlessly) that he is, in fact, worthless in the extreme.

[montag813]

Change.org is a fraud. You can “sign” any of their “petitions” unlimited number of times. I once scripted IE to do so 2,000 times with Looney Toones characters, and they were all accepted into the total. That is why none of their numbers can be trusted. It is a joke.