Let’s talk about: Mutual Aid
What is Mutual Aid, and how can I get involved?
Please join us on
November 21st, 2pm pst
RSVP here
Mutual Aid has been a hot topic in the social justice world since the George Floyd protests and COVID pandemic underscored that all politics is local. However, misconceptions about Mutual Aid run wild. Responses from public officials range from tacit support, to co-optation, to criminalization, to active violence.
During this talk, we will set the record straight about Mutual Aid. Mutual Aid is not charity, it is not for money, not for clout, not for politics, and not for police. It does not exonerate politicians who fail to provide services; it offers an alternative.
Mutual Aid is the result of autonomous community care combined with widespread social movements, filling gaps in resource distribution while transforming the systems that profit off inequality. Shannon Thomas will lead us in a conversation on this critical issue by sharing their insights and giving examples of current projects and ways to get involved.
Shannon Andrea Thomas is the founder of Just Media LLC, a mediation and transformative justice agency that provides affordable conflict resolution support to vulnerable communities. She is a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley and Harvard Kennedy School of Government’s Masters in Public Policy. Shannon is utilizing her negotiations background to build local coalitions of community organizers in solidarity with global anti-violence movements. You can learn more about her work at: https://www.justmedia.online/about
Synopsis
For Shannon, mutual aid is both a local and a global movement that allows her to contribute to conflict resolution through solidarity at international and local levels. During the George Floyd protests, she and several others began organizing local support initiatives to ensure that protesters had enough water, food and medical supplies. This was not a coordinated effort, but rather an organic phenomenon where people just showed up to help. Their mutual aid group first met in May 2020 and has been working together on a weekly basis ever since. In parallel with the protests, the unhoused population living in large encampments in Downtown LA became aware of her "Snack Squat" and stopped by to ask for a water bottle or some fruit. So Shannon turned to Food Forward and reclaimed 800 to 900 pounds of food a week over the past year to provide meals to LA's homeless communities.
Her main message is that you don’t have to wait for anyone to empower you or to have an organization to do the work of “Mutual Aid” but that there are needs all around us and ways to get started right away.
