MUTUAL AID
A Brief Introduction A Brief Introduction
FirstprintedanddistributedAugust2023
NYU Abolition Lab is a collection of NYU-affiliated persons dedicated to researching and articulating practices of surveillance, policing, erasure, and profit-accumulation on NYU's "global campus."
Our work is oriented towards democratizing and spreading information and knowledge as a means of counteracting the harmful, and often violent, cultural and physical work that NYU and all systems of policing and property accumulation participate in. We want many people to be able to read the information contained in this zine. Please reprint and share freely.
Connect with us on instagram @nyuabolitionlab. More of our work can be found at: linktr.ee/nyuabolitionlab.
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THE POSTMODERN WORLD
IS ORGANIZED AROUND PERVASIVE, WHITE SUPREMACIST IDEALS AND LATE-STAGE CAPITALIST FRAMEWORKS.
This looks like...
Cultures fraught with hyper individualism, myths of resource scarcity and competition, and forced engagement in extractive relationships with other people and our earth just to survive.
It is value attached to wealth, for-profit healthcare, rising housing costs, attacks on social welfare programs, budget cuts for public education, and the everexpanding carceral system that keeps slavery not only legal, but tax-funded.
You’re poor? Work harder!
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The profit-driven basis of capitalism leaves many social needs neglected, and pushes the blame of maldistribution and exploitation onto the individual. The government predominantly exists to protect and cater to the elite– this means their policies produce and exacerbate harm onto the vulnerable. It ensures BIPOC, lower class, trans, queer and other marginalized groups always bear the burden of pollution, disease, violence, and exploitation so the elite can live comfortably.
In this political and social context,
mutual aid is radical resistance against these conditions
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Mutual aid is the reciprocal exchange of resources, services, and skills in order to build community resiliency and solidarity
This includes (but is not limited to) the sharing of basic necessities, knowledge or wisdom, skills, a listening ear, etc.
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Dean Spade's "Solidarity Not Charity"
defines mutual aid as...
Spade argues that mutual aid is a necessary and vital aspect to a successful social movement.
*Found on page 136 of Social Text 142, Vol. 38, Mar 2020 This reading can be found for free with this link:
https://www.deanspade.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Mutual-AidArticle-Social-Text-Final.pdf
"a form of political participation in which people take responsibility for caring for one another and changing political conditions, not just through symbolic acts or putting pressure on their representatives in government but by actually building new social relations that are more survivable. ”*
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Mutual aid is based on the premise that everyone has something meaningful to contribute and should have equal agency. It is a long term commitment to community resiliency and the annihilation of white supremacy. Mutual aid means giving and receiving freely, when able, regardless if someone meets 'criteria' for receiving resources. Those who come to a mutual aid project for services are encouraged to join organizing efforts and learn about the oppressive systems that shape their conditions.
No-strings-attached distribution, where everyone is free to participate in any way they can, reduces the stigma and power imbalance that naturally arises from the giver-receiver relationships fraught in charities. It builds solidarity across race, class, religion, (dis)ability, gender and sexuality by opening space for groups – who are normally discouraged from interacting – to connect.
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Mutual aid is not new! Mutual aid is a more recent (Western) term used to describe a nonWestern tradition that has existed for all of human history.
Indigenous and Black communities regularly engage in mutual aid, both pre- and postcolonialism. For these groups, it is the natural order for long-term community resiliency and autonomy.
Black, Indigenous and POC communities are routinely targeted and criminalized for practicing mutual aid due to its power of resistance to the normalized power structures–capitalism, colonialism, and white supremacy. The recurring oppression of mutual aid
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"Mutual aid is a unifying term, putting a name to the practice that most of us (BIPOC) folx have been acting on all our lives. Mutual aid was not born out of survival, its proposed purpose is for communities to THRIVE. Yes, it has been used in times of crises to help the most targeted in our society so that they can survive, but that is not enough. We must be committed to seeing people thrive, not just scrape by"*
*from Regan De Loggans, "Let's Talk Mutual Aid" Zine
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WANT TO LEARN MORE ABOUT
THE HISTORY OF MUTUAL AID?
Look into...
The Black Panther Party's 'Community Survival Programs'
The Young Lord's community aid programs
Sylvia Rivera Law Project
Mutual Aid Disaster Relief
Look into Indigenous tribes' history, practices, and present-day structures!
(It may help to start with the tribe whose land you currently occupy. Check out native-land.ca)
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WHY MUTUAL AID INSTEAD OF CHARITY?
(BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT THE SAME!)
Charity often refers to government or non-profit programs (mostly funded, and therefore controlled, by the wealthy) that decide who is allowed to receive services, the parameters
of the services, and what strings are attached to receiving services. Almost always
these decisions are made for (rather than collaboratively with) the people seeking support.
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Many programs come with eligibility requirements that determines if someone is deemed "worthy of help," such as: being sober, having legal citizenship, no criminal record, employed or working towards a degree, receiving mental health treatment, being below the "underprivileged" line making them eligible to receive resources – with the caveat of having those resources abruptly stripped away when they no longer meet criteria (even if they are far from stable), etc.
Charity does NOT address the root cause of oppression, poverty, or violence. Rather, "it is designed to help improve the image of the elites who are funding it and put a tiny, inadequate Band-Aid on the massive social wound that their greed creates.” Non profits are also a tax haven for the wealthy, making it clear that the privatization of social welfare services only benefits the upper class.
Quote from Dean Spade's Mutual Aid: Building Solidarity This Crisis (and the Next)
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Unlike mutual aid, charity does not provide a critical analysis of the issue they are trying to address with a collaborative solution. It does not encourage 'clients' of services to partake in organizing its work. There is no space to facilitate necessary conversation and build solidarity amongst different people. Essentially, charity actively works to uphold the status quo.
**Look into 'charity-washing' and the nonprofit industrial complex if you are interested in diving into the details of this more**
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Much of this zine is adapted by the ideas outlined in these two texts
Dean Spade's Mutual Aid: Building Solidarity During This Crisis (and the Next)
*Can be accessed online for free at theanarchistlibrary.org
"Let's Talk Mutual Aid," zine by Regan De Loggans
*Can be accessed online for free at mutualaiddisasterrelief.org
We highly recommend you check them out yourself!
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How To Get Involved
Abolition Lab Distro
IG: @nyuablab (check out our following list!)
Collection of NYU students that distribute hygiene supplies, recreational supplies, and food at Collect Pond Park.
Climate Care Collective NYC's Food Distro
IG: @cccollective.nyc
Collection of university students in NYC that use excess meal swipes to distribute food in Washington Square Park.
Washington Square Park Mutual Aid
IG: @wspmutualaid
Collection of NYC community members that distribute supplies for basic living necessities in WSP.
Friend of a Friend Distro
IG: @friendofafriend nyc
Collection of NYC community members that distribute supplies for basic living necessities in Columbus Park
mutualaid.nyc
Network of mutual aid groups in NYC. They have a section of their website that lists mutual aid projects in every neighborhood. Find something close to you that matches your interests!
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Brooklyn Eviction Defense
IG: @brooklynevictiondefense
Borough-wide tenant union combatting landlord harassment, disrepair, rising rent & threats of eviction.
Bushwick Ayuda Mutua
IG: bushwickayudamutua
Distributions, picnics, potlucks, and other community events by neighbors in Bushwick.
Norwood Community Library
IG: norwoodcommunitylibrary
Free books for all! A Bronx book exchange program with events primarily in the northern Bronx.
Bed-Stuy Strong
IG: bedstuystrong
Mutual aid network of neighbors helping one another and facilitating zine-making, organizing, and block party events
We the People
IG: wethepeople nyc
Mutual aid abolitionist collective in Bed-Stuy that provides direct responses to a broken system, including but not limited to hot food and material support.
Beyond Manhattan... 15
