Below is a transcript from a Instagram post on July 17, 2024 on Mutual Aid. Please skip to the bottom for two campains to support for families in Gaza seeking funds to safely evacuate.
“Can we talk about mutual aid and what it looks like to provide collective care for one another on a day to day basis,
even when so many of us are struggling?
in the first Part of this series, I shared some resources on what mutual aid is.
If you missed Part 1, I suggest revisiting that first for more context.)
today, I’m gonna talk about what mutual aid looks like in practice.
First of all, I think it’s important to acknowledge an assumption that I carry and it’s that
We have everything we need to be free. But where do we start?
As @badschoolbadschool stresses, we start right where we are, with the people in our own hood.
The good thing about mutual aid is that we do not have to reinvent the wheel:
Each and every one of us engaged in mutual aid at some point.
Have you ever:
-ran errands or picked up groceries for a neighbor?
-been fed someone outside of your immediate household?
-worn a mask in public to protect your community?
-received of given money directly to someone in need?
Then you have engaged in mutual aid.
But in order for it to be effective, it must be sustainable and it must be grounded in 3 basic principles, described by Dean Spade, organizer and writer:
Meeting each other’s needs ourselves while building a shared understanding about why people don’t have why folks don’t have the things they need (and we do that through shared political education)
We gotta invite people in and build solidarities across struggles FROM the understanding that all of our struggles are connected.
We all gotta participate because we need all of our gifts, talents, energy. We are powerful together.
But many of us are scraping by, barely making ends meet. So what does mutual aid look like for us on the day to day???
First, we have to learn that our scarcity is manufactured.
Capitalist/individualism teaches us to hoard any excess of what we need.
As Rachel, a comrade and organizer, teaches us, we must examine critically our relationship to giving. She says that Folks who have the least, the global majority, often give the most; historically, we have had to as a matter of survival.
But for many here in the West— high earners, white folks, white folks with generational wealth—redistribution is not a familiar practice. so for those who are starting at nothing, there is ample space to lean into and practice.
Secondly, we must reorient ourselves around a different reality. Especially if we live in the so-called United States, where all of us have power —and therefore responsibility—relative to our siblings in the global south, as Audre Lorde reminds us.
Instead of thinking about mutual aid in terms of:
-yes I can give
-or no I cannot give
-or what specific amount should I give,
We must allow ourselves to be guided by the question of how,
how can we show up in this moment, how can we be guided by a commitment to honor one another’s dignity and the fact that we are always responsible for our neighbor, and our neighbor is always responsible for us.
(Sometimes, for some of us, that will mean being creative in the absence of material resources, and committing to things like masking in public spaces, lending a laptop to a friend and helping them search for public assistance, providing free childcare, helping clean a community members space weekly due to their chronic illness, etc).
So let’s put this practice into action.
Right now, Rachel, is sponsoring two families in Gaza. From what we know, there is possibility of one of the crossings opening in July to allow families in Gaza safe passage to evacuate.
These families are:
-Dina is a 24 year old mother of two toddlers, Julia (3) and Ahmed (1). They’ve been displaced many times, currently residing in Deir al Balah. Dina is funny, sweet, and gracious. She is more resilient than any mother should have to be. She hopes to evacuate her family as soon as that’s possible. When she calls, Ahmed is often crying in the background, of hunger pains and of fear. Dina’s fundraising goal is $30,000, which will cover the $5,000/person evacuation fees as well as other urgent basic necessities like food and water until they’re able to evacuate safely. They are currently at just over $7,000.
Lana (15) and Amr (17) are siblings living in Nuseirat, Gaza with three younger brothers. Their home was completely destroyed. They’ve been displaced over and over again, in search of safety. Lana has a congenital heart condition, with expensive daily treatment that she often has to forego due to lack of funds, and desperately needs a new pacemaker. They both hope to finish high school someday. Lana hopes to study electronics and programming and Amr wants to be a doctor. They are full of sweetness and rage, rightly so. They are each other’s fiercest advocates, reminding us that children shouldn’t have to beg for their lives on the internet. Lana’s fundraising goal is also $30,000. Her campaign is primarily for her urgent medical treatment. She is currently at just under $6,000.
Typically, between 1000-2000 people usually like my posts. We are asking that if you liked this post, if you learned something here, that you commit 1% of your next earnings to these families.
For folks who are high earners, white people, and especially white people with savings and generational wealth, I ask that you commit 2-3%.
If we can raise this money by the end of July, we can literally exercise power on behalf of our siblings in Gaza regardless of what our government officials chose to do. That’s people power, from the bottom up. Peace.”
Commit to giving sustainably for Dina’s family HERE.
Commit to giving sustainably to Lana’s family HERE.
Follow Bees and Watermelons, a mutual aid collective, organizing around Mutual Aid efforts in Gaza.
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