Article published on Vapenewsmagazine - Author: Susan Oser - Translator: The Vape Club
Marcy Coyne (VapingMarcy) is the creator and author of the #Iamavaperproject. It is a collaboration between vapers and advocacy organizations that have stood up to fight for vaping rights. With the recent announcement of the FDA bill, the group’s popularity has skyrocketed.
So where did the team get the idea for this project? According to Coyne, it started out as a small idea, encouraging a few people to make a video and end it with the line “I’m a vaper, not a smoker.” That’s it, a simple video project. But she didn’t expect that after people heard about the idea, it would become a huge hit. It seems like this project was something the vaping community had wanted and been looking for for a long time, but didn’t know when or where to start.
A video participating in the #Iamavaperproject
Coyne isn’t alone in this project. She has a few assistants helping her spread the word and make sure only accurate information is shared with the community. Chris Meyers, the manager of Pope Juice, jumped on board when he heard about the #Iamavaperproject. He’s been a big help in setting up the event page and filming videos from some of the events she’s attended. Brandon from Blue Collar Vapes and BRM has also been a huge help.
According to Brandon, social media is currently the primary way to get the word out about the project. In fact, if you search for “vaping groups” on Facebook, there are thousands of groups from almost every state and city. This is why the group has posted collaborative videos on YouTube, on Twitter, on Tumbler, and more. While the online community of vapers may seem like a small fraction of the actual population, the community is actually quite large, and by reaching out to the vapers who are active in these groups, they hope to bring it out into the real world. Sadly, even the vapers who frequent their locations are unaware of what is circulating online.
There has been a lot of panic lately about the FDA, and the group is still emphasizing that everyone needs to stay calm and act professionally. This has been emphasized on the Facebook group rules page and to those making videos.
In an effort to gain more exposure, the group is considering creating a PayPal account for donations, creating additional merchandise like stickers and t-shirts, and possibly hosting a fundraiser in the near future. So far, the #Iamavaperproject management has made appearances and videos at VPX, Vape Bash, and smaller venues. Eventually, the group hopes to appear at shows and events like those hosted by Vaping Militia, SFATA, and CASAA.
So what is the long-term plan for #Iamavaperproject? They simply want everyone to join together to fight for the industry. If you count all the vapers online and offline, there are over 10 million vapers in the US alone. If they all spoke up and took action, let the media know about the benefits of vaping, get involved in government, or just vote, a lot of positive change would happen. Sadly, it hasn’t happened yet, and #Iamavaperproject wants to emphasize that.
When you join the Facebook group (where #Iamavaperproject is primarily active), you not only get to interact with other vapers, but you also see video calls calling for collaborative projects, a few articles about vaping, and CASAA's call for action to contact lawmakers.
Let’s face it, if the FDA had accepted that drugs like Chantix didn’t have suicidal side effects, vaping wouldn’t have gotten the attention it did. If the FDA had approved nicotine patches as effective, no one would be vaping.
It should be emphasized that #Iamavaperproject does not intend to replace any group, what they want to do is encourage those groups to work together for one sole purpose: fighting for vape rights.
