Jonquilyn Hill

I mean, it's a thing people have been doing forever, you know, everywhere.

It's neighbors helping neighbors and meeting their needs, drawing on resources that they have in their community.

It can be anything from people handing out food, putting on item exchanges where, you know, you basically bring a bunch of stuff together and give it back out for free.

Today, you might call someone who's, you know, walking a child to school or bringing them back home because their parents, you know, are scared to leave their home because of immigration raids.

You know, you could call that mutual aid.

Really, it's a huge range of practices that might fall under this umbrella.

What is the difference between mutual aid and philanthropy and charity?

What's the difference here?

Among a group of mutual aid networks, they see a big difference between what they're doing in their communities and what nonprofits and formal funders are doing.

One of the mantras of mutual aid is solidarity, not charity.

And what they're getting at there is that they see themselves as taking actions that meet their own needs and the needs of their neighbors.

And a lot of these groups try to eliminate any kind of hierarchy that might exist in the organizing.

There's not an executive director.

Instead, people make decisions with some sort of consensus.

You know, many of these groups are also not organized or incorporated as formal nonprofits.

You know, giving money to a mutual aid network, you know, won't give you necessarily a tax deduction if they're not an incorporated nonprofit.

So those are some of the differences.

Okay.

Have we seen an increase in mutual aid?

Like, how is that?