Mutual Aid

Hunger Stalks The United States

September 18, 2021 Kei Pritsker And Eugene Puryear, People's Dispatch. Create! Food Security, Hunger, Mutual Aid, Philadelphia

According to the United Nations, the world produces enough food to feed 10 billion people. Yet this year, even in the United States, the world’s richest country, 1 in 3 American families with kids went hungry. Even before the pandemic, in 2019, official statistics from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) detailed that 35 million people went hungry–10 million of them children. The COVID-19 pandemic supercharged the situation, exposing even those who felt “secure” to the possibility of going without eating. In a society where food is not a human right but a good to be purchased, how were people supposed to eat if they couldn’t work? The short answer: they didn’t. Receiving almost no help from the federal government, working people in the United States were laid off by the millions.

The ZAD: Between Utopian Radicalism And Negotiated Pragmatism

September 13, 2021 Fareen Parvez And Stellan Vinthagen, ROAR Magazine. Resist! Autonomous Zone, France, Mutual Aid

The global coronavirus pandemic has brought into sharp relief the many failures of contemporary capitalist states around the globe. These include the failure to ensure social and economic justice and to provide basic protections for the most vulnerable individuals and communities, from refugees to the houseless. Consequently, it has also made clear the need for social movements to not only resist the violence of the state and its facilitation of global capitalism, but to simultaneously and actively build a prefigurative politics toward an alternative society. Carving out autonomous spaces for mutual aid and radical politics is more important than ever. Among the multitude of ways movements engage in prefigurative politics, land occupation struggles have long been central...

After Hurricane Ida, Mutual Aid Provides Safety And Survival

September 11, 2021 Jordan Flaherty , Waging Nonviolence. Create! climate crisis, Extreme weather, Mutual Aid, New Orleans

In the aftermath of disasters, those most in need are also who the state often leaves behind. Into this vacuum, communities come together for mutual aid. While charity rarely challenges the root causes behind disasters, and often divides recipients into worthy and unworthy, mutual aid comes from a principle of solidarity. As Dean Spade has written, “First, we need to organize to help people survive the devastating conditions unfolding every day. Second, we need to mobilize hundreds of millions of people for resistance so we can tackle the underlying causes of these crises.” In New Orleans, the entire city was without electricity for nearly a week (and tens of thousands still have not had their power turned back on).

Communique On Brutal NYPD Eviction Of Mutual Aid Hub

July 29, 2021 It's Going Down. Educate! Housing, Mutual Aid, New York City (NYC), Police

We are The Gym, an organizing network focused on mutual aid and community support along the Myrtle-Broadway corridor of Bushwick on the occupied Lenape land known as Brooklyn, New York. On Saturday, July 24, the NYPD violently attacked our neighbors, friends, and comrades at the behest of the landlord, Richard Pogostin. We began using the sidewalk space in front of The Gym storefront at 1083 Broadway in August 2020, when Pogostin’s corporation, Dodworth Development of New Rochelle, originally harassed us and removed the mutual aid and organizing efforts in the space. Last week, after nearly a year of daily operations on the sidewalk, The Gym reclaimed the storefront, which had been kept vacant and neglected.

Saving Ourselves: Autonomous Disaster Relief In Texas

March 13, 2021 It's Going Down. Create! Extreme weather, Failed State, Mutual Aid, Texas

On this episode of the It’s Going Down podcast, we speak with participants in autonomous groups across Texas, including Cooperation Denton, Stop the Sweeps in Austin, Mutual Aid Houston, Houston Tenants Union, and North Texas Rural Resilience. The first in a two part series, this episode discusses the devastating storms which rocked Texas and the Southwest and the context that the “big freeze” happened within: from anti-Black police violence and attacks on the homeless community, to widespread neoliberal policies that left infrastructure and housing stock dilapidated and on the verge of collapse.

Jackson’s Water Crisis: How You Can Help

March 10, 2021 Tim Majors and Scalawag Editors, Scalawag Magazine. Create! Infrastructure, Mississippi, Mutual Aid, Water

"This is the first time that we've ever had record-breaking, five to six straight days of below-freezing temperatures," Ronnie Crudup Jr., Member of the Mississippi House of Representatives and Executive Director of ‎New Horizon Ministries told WURD radio in an interview on Wednesday. "Our infrastructure just could not handle that." The ice on the ground didn't help the speed of government aid either once Jackson's water treatment plant went down. "The local guys are doing the best they can," Crudup said. State leaders have done little to help with on-the-ground needs or longer-term efforts to replace the sewer and water treatment system, estimated to cost $2 billion—six times the city's annual budget. "We haven't seen the federal government at all." "Just that 'landmass' in between, right? It's just like that. We're always last.

Jackson Water Crisis: Collective Effort Is Critical To Community Sustainability

March 7, 2021 Anoa Changa, News One. Organize! Mississippi, Mutual Aid, Systemic Racism, Water

While the Mississippi city of Jackson works to fully restore water, various community organizations have been filling in the gaps with relief. Mutual aid is a new term for some, but providing it is an old practice in many Black communities. “As a southern Black girl, who grew up in rural Mississippi, mutual aid has always existed in my life,” Calandra Davis, an organizer with the Jackson chapter of Black Youth Project 100 (BYP 100), told NewsOne. Davis said community institutions have always provided aid in times of need. “The churches [and families] in my community always provided mutual aid,” she added. Providing support to communities in Jackson and across the state, the Mississippi Rapid Response & Relief Coalition is a statewide coalition, including rural partners. Member organizations include the Mississippi Poor People’s Campaign, the People’s Advocacy Institute, the Milestone Cooperative, Mississippi M.O.V.E., Mississippi Prison Reform Coalition, BYP 100 and Sarah’s Touch.

We Who Believe In Freedom Cannot Rest Until It Comes

February 26, 2021 Anoa Changa, Scalawag Magazine. Organize! Failed State, Joe Biden, Mutual Aid, Southern Movement Assembly

As winter storms rocked Texas and others across the South last week, Southern organizers waited for no one to do what they do best: stepping up to make it happen. Volunteers signed up to phonebank for wellness checks, and mutual aid networks continue to expand their capacity to intervene where policy has failed. The government failures may continue to pile up while Southern communities are left to resolve multiple crises on their own, but people are building collective power across the South—people committed to making sure our communities not only survive, but thrive. Mutual aid—along with regional action and local policy change—is just one of the tactics central to the People's First 100 Days, a regional organizing campaign to grow Southern movement power.

How One Community Creatively Solved Keeping Its Residents Fed During A Pandemic

February 21, 2021 April M. Short, Pressenza. Create! Canada, Hunger, Mutual Aid, Pandemic

Hunger and food insecurity have increased worldwide since COVID-19 took hold. In December 2020, the United Nations warned of the threat of “catastrophic global famine,” urging worldwide governments to prioritize food security and humanitarian needs in their COVID-19 response plans. The global, industrialized food supply chain is strained and fraying. Production and shipping delays are increasingly commonplace. Given the lack of substantial response by many governments to food insecurity, it has often fallen to individuals to step in and feed their communities. Neighborhood-based volunteer groups across major U.S. cities and beyond have come up with strategies to support themselves from within, working to curb hunger with creative initiatives like community free-food fridges, volunteer grocery deliveries and other mutual aid efforts.

Dean Spade’s New Guide To Mutual Aid

February 2, 2021 Renee Feltz, The Indypendent. Create! Book Review, COVID-19, Mutual Aid, New York (NY)

Out of both compassion and necessity, the COVID-19 pandemic prompted many of us to engage in mutual aid projects — such as signing up to buy groceries for an immuno-comprimised neighbor, or helping tutor a child struggling with remote learning — even if we don’t fully understand the concept. Fortunately, Dean Spade has written an accessible primer with practical tips for people who want to start mutual aid projects or who are already in them and want to see them flourish. At just over 150 pages, his book can easily live in your day bag in order to be consulted regularly. It is broken into two parts. The first defines mutual aid as “collective coordination to meet each other’s needs’’ and examines key elements.

Don’t Be Fooled: The Official Unemployment Numbers Are A Lie

January 28, 2021 Eleanor Goldfield, Mintpress News. Educate! Gig Workers, Mutual Aid, Underemployed, Unemployment

The official unemployment rate now stands at 6.7%. But that doesn’t feel right, does it? Unless you live in a gated community, the reality on the ground feels more dire and more destitute. Behind that cheery 6.7% stand millions of uncounted people – uncounted by design. “’Underemployed’ would be the most accurate, but there’s not really a good definition,” A.K. says, responding to my question of how he would identify his employment status. “As a freelancer, we’re put aside to kind of fend for ourselves, even before all this.” He’s a freelance cinematographer and the owner of a production company. Now he’s working a part-time minimum wage job and getting production gigs where he can, a prospect that demands he put his health at risk to show up for in-person gigs.

Mariame Kaba Talks Abolition, Mutual Aid And Campus Police

January 17, 2021 Binah Schatsky, Daily Northwestern. Educate! Abolition, Campus Police, Martin Luther King Jr, Mutual Aid

Activist and prison-industrial complex abolitionist Mariame Kaba celebrated the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. by praising NU Community Not Cops and speaking to the importance of mutual aid and political organizing in Wednesday’s MLK Dream Week virtual keynote. The keynote, which was broadcast to over 1,000 attendees, began with a virtual performance of “Lift Every Voice and Sing” by Northwestern Community Ensemble members and alumni. Kaba then delivered her speech in which she laid out core tenets of abolitionist practice, tying the current movement to King’s principles. “Abolitionists have a lot to learn from Dr. King,” Kaba said.

Native Youth Provide For Community And Elders During Covid Pandemic

December 28, 2020 Rae Rose, Last Real Indians. Create! COVID-19, Indigenous Peoples, Mutual Aid, Youth Activism

2020 has been a year of many trials across Indian Country. Across our many Nations, rural, city and everywhere in between, we are all coping with the catastrophic effects of the COVID-19 virus. We have missed gatherings, ceremonies, and the everyday celebrations as part of quarantine and to keep those we love safe. Our loved ones lost during this time often died alone, while those of us left behind have had to mourn them without the touch and care of being physically together. Left to pick up the pieces as we try to move forward has left so much anxiety and depression in our young, elders, and even us adults.

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