At the Alternatives to Marriage Project (AtMP), we are committed to your privacy. We realize that privacy may be of particular concern because of discrimination and prejudice against unmarried people. We are not a faceless corporation seeking to steal your privacy so we can profit. Rather, we're a small, grassroots, non-profit organization that will gladly honor your privacy and address any specific concerns you might have. Please don't hesitate to contact us with your questions or concerns. Email us here or call us at 718-788-1911.

As growing national organization, we rely on web visitors like you to provide us valuable feedback, insights, and support as we strive to do our work better. By providing us with your contact information, you help AtMP to grow and you get connected to a community of people interested in unmarried people and family diversity.

Any changes to this privacy policy will be posted here. This current policy was originally posted on March 18, 2001.  Updates: 9/14/2004, 1/3/2008, 3/19/2008.

How we collect information:

The Alternatives to Marriage Project collects information at several different points on our website, using online forms. These forms include our online survey and our contact-us form . We also collect information through emails (including our interactive listserv), postal mail, telephone calls and in-person events.

AtMP does not use cookies on our website. A cookie is a piece of data stored on the user's hard drive containing information about the user. It is unlikely that AtMP will use cookies on this website anytime in the near future. If we were to begin doing so, we will update this privacy policy to reflect the change.

AtMP also uses four online service providers to help us do a better job of serving the public. Each of them collects information and sends it to us.

    a) Democracy In Action facilitates our email blasts and advocacy campaigns; it collects information when you signup to receive AtMP communications or take action on an AtMP campaign. They send us any contact information you provide. If you take an action that does not require entering contact information (such as clicking on a link in an email), they tell that the action was taken but not by whom. If you use their form to tell friends about us, they neither collect nor send us the information you provide. Our understanding, from reading Democracy In Action’s privacy statement , is that they will not use information you provide for any purpose other than aggregate statistics.

    b) CCNow is the online credit card retailer for our bookstore ; it collects information via a secure server. CCNow sends us your name, mailing address, email address and phone number in addition to your purchase and shipping instructions. They do not send us your credit card information. Our understanding, from reading CCNow's privacy statement is that they will only use the information you provide to them to process your order.

    c) Network for Good / Groundspring processes our online donations ; it collects information via a secure server. Unless you choose to donate anonymously, they share with us the information you provide at the time you donate, which may include: name, address, phone, email address, and donation amount. They do not send us your credit card information. If you use their form to tell friends about us, they neither collect nor send us the information you provide. Our understanding, from reading Network for Good / Groundspring’s privacy statement , is that they reserve the right contact you using the information you provide in the event that they need to verify your personal information, and that they collect credit card information so that they can process donations but do not retain, share, store or use personally identifiable information for any secondary purposes.

Types of information we collect, why we ask for it and what we do with it:

    1. contact information

By providing us with your contact information, you stay connected with a community of people interested in unmarried people and family diversity. We count as a member each person from whom we have a valid email or postal mail address and permission to communicate. As of December 2007, AtMP has nearly 9,000 members.

    a) Email addresses provided on our website are added to our email list. A few times per year, people on our email list receive our newsletter, the Alternatives to Marriage Update, and opportunities to make tax-deductible contributions to support AtMP’s work.

    b) If you provide geographic information (whether your complete postal address or just your city, state and /or zip code) or information about topics that interest you, you may receive invitations to AtMP events in your local/interest area about once per year; you may also receive alerts about news affecting unmarried people in your area.

    c) Complete postal addresses are added to our mailing list. People on our mailing list receive letters a few times per year providing an opportunity to donate to the organization. People who provide postal addresses and make contributions to support AtMP’s work receive paper copies of our newsletter and Annual Report, unless they request publications via email only. If we were contacting you via email but your email address stopped working, we may try contacting you via postal mail instead.

AtMP will never trade, share or sell its email or postal mailing lists.

    2. personal stories, questions and ideas

As an organization, we seek to better understand our constituency; therefore we give you many opportunities to tell us about yourself.

    a) Aggregate information: We learn from people’s feedback and use what we’ve learned to better meet the needs of all unmarried people. For example, we select advocacy priorities based on the concerns raised by members and website users (more survey respondents cite marital status discrimination in health insurance than any other issue, so our top priority is achieving truly universal health care).

    b) Anonymous anecdotes: We may condense and re-tell your stories, without using your real name, in order to bring dry statistics and policies to life.

    c) Personally-identifiable information: We use what you tell us to provide you with information and action opportunities that might be of special interest to you. For example, if we know you’re concerned about health insurance, we might alert you when Congress proposes a new health care reform.

One of the most important things AtMP does is help journalists contact members who are willing to be interviewed. This is one way that AtMP helps the media present the full story about the experiences and concerns of unmarried people. We use background information that members tell us to match journalists with the members who can bring their stories to life. AtMP will never publicly link your name to any personal information, nor share your contact information with the media, unless we have your permission.

A note on links: This website contains many links to other sites. Please be aware that AtMP is not responsible for the privacy practices of such other sites. We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of each and every web site that collects personally identifiable information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by AtMP.

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