Speaker 1: I need sports on it. If you don't get out
Speaker 1: of here, everybody each other, I'm awful, get out of here.
Speaker 1: The first thing that comes to mind is just like
Speaker 1: the power of mutual aid UM. The smaller events really
Speaker 1: build the community ties together UM and just it enables
Speaker 1: people to like lean on each other for safety and
Speaker 1: for any resources and pretty much anything that somebody needs. UM.
Speaker 1: These smaller, like well being based kind of events, like
Speaker 1: it keeps everybody together, and I think, I mean, there's
Speaker 1: so much power. Like mutual aid really is the way
Speaker 1: of the future. So this is basically just a precursor
Speaker 1: to what I feel like will be a world like
Speaker 1: avoid of police and and like constant state violence. Is
Speaker 1: will have these net works in mutual aid communities that
Speaker 1: UM will basically make that obsolete. So that's really huge
Speaker 1: for us. That's Jedi, a local organizer and musician. As
Speaker 1: the protests in Portland and around the nation moved into
Speaker 1: their third month, Governor Kate Brown announced that the FEDS
Speaker 1: were pulling out of the city. With the announcement, the
Speaker 1: crowds of thousands that had come out and forced to
Speaker 1: protest the federal presence shrunk By the second week of August,
Speaker 1: ongoing protests drew only a few hundred people into the
Speaker 1: streets each night. For the people that wanted to defund
Speaker 1: and abolish the Portland police, the federal draw down meant
Speaker 1: that it was time to get back to the real fight.
Speaker 1: Months of being gassed and beaten together had given this
Speaker 1: community of protesters a powerful sense of shared purpose. At
Speaker 1: the same time, the drop off in numbers raised the
Speaker 1: specter of burnout for activists and pointed to a long
Speaker 1: road ahead. Systems of mutual aid began to spring up,
Speaker 1: both out of need and out of a desire by
Speaker 1: many to finally start building the world they wanted to
Speaker 1: live in. To narry the next part of this here's
Speaker 1: Donovan Smith, a local Portland journalist and one of the
Speaker 1: authors of this series. After more than two months in
Speaker 1: the streets, protesters in Portland were exhausted and traumatized, but
Speaker 1: ready to return to the real fight of defunding the police.
Speaker 1: But the enormous protests of early June were now months passed,
Speaker 1: and after the wild circuits of violence that was fed occupation,
Speaker 1: people were tired, and there were questions about how to
Speaker 1: direct the attention of the city back from Trump to
Speaker 1: the violence of Portland Police Bureau. Jacob Burrow's of Direct
Speaker 1: Action Alliance talks about organizing exhaustion. Well, to be honest
Speaker 1: with you, it doesn't really like everyone. Everyone falls off.
Speaker 1: Everyone gets tired and falls off, and it's it's the
Speaker 1: solidarity that comes into play at that point. So, I mean,
Speaker 1: I'll take months off where I just can't anymore, where
Speaker 1: I'm I'm just exhausted to the bone, where I I
Speaker 1: literally have nothing left to give. And during those times
Speaker 1: is when my comrade come in and do what they
Speaker 1: need to do. And then when they're tired, that's when
Speaker 1: I come in and do what I need to do.
Speaker 1: And that's how we kind of keep it perpetually going.
Speaker 1: Is that you've got to be there for folks. When
Speaker 1: you see someone who's you know you people, that's the problem.
Speaker 1: It's it's fatiguing, it caused there's a huge toll. Organizing
Speaker 1: takes a huge toll on people. Even just organizing one event,
Speaker 1: it takes three days of my life away from my kids,
Speaker 1: from my responsibilities at home, from what I need to do,
Speaker 1: and it's it's exhausting. And that's that's just the organizing part.
Speaker 1: You know, you still have to consider the emotional toll
Speaker 1: that it takes to go out and do this and
Speaker 1: put yourself on the line. You have to take into
Speaker 1: account the threats that you get from the right, You
Speaker 1: have to take into account the threats that you get
Speaker 1: from the government. So there's all of these things and
Speaker 1: no one is just a superperson that can go and
Speaker 1: power through it. And that's that's a big thing. A
Speaker 1: big misconception I think is people think that the faith
Speaker 1: is you know, there's some people who who their face
Speaker 1: has become prominent or their name has become prominent, and
Speaker 1: people think that it's all them, and it's not. There's
Speaker 1: there's a huge, huge effort behind everything of support of
Speaker 1: mutual aid that keeps everything going. So the reason it's
Speaker 1: been able to go for ten years isn't because there's
Speaker 1: people who have been able to keep going for ten
Speaker 1: years straight. It's because every time someone falls back and
Speaker 1: can't do it and need to break someone else were
Speaker 1: we are lucky enough to be in a community and
Speaker 1: that's how it keeps ongoing, is that every time, every
Speaker 1: time there's a hole in the line, we have comrades
Speaker 1: who are willing to step back in and fill it up.
Speaker 1: And that's how that's how we've been able to kind
Speaker 1: of keep this momentum going is because there's always someone
Speaker 1: who's willing to step up when someone has when another
Speaker 1: person has kind of reached their limit. And that's that's
Speaker 1: how you keep it going is by building those connections,
Speaker 1: those trust bonds, and those those solidarity connections and mutual
Speaker 1: aid can actions where we're all helping each other out.
Speaker 1: We all have to be there for each other, and
Speaker 1: using social media and telegram, the community stepped up to
Speaker 1: fill holes in the line. Nightly actions began to be
Speaker 1: organized autonomously anonymous calls to action with post locations, mostly
Speaker 1: of different police precincts for the Portland Ice facility, and
Speaker 1: people would show up to the protests. If the police
Speaker 1: were going to continue to brutalize people, then protesters planned
Speaker 1: on wearing them down and exhausting their budget. Every night
Speaker 1: of the week, people assembled at some park around the
Speaker 1: city and would march to a different precincts, yelling, chanting,
Speaker 1: and standing in the street for hours until the police
Speaker 1: would charge, clearing them out with gas, batons and brute force.
Speaker 1: While these actions were referred to as d a's or
Speaker 1: direct actions. The nights often consisted of protesters hurling more
Speaker 1: insults than anything else, adding in an occasional dumpster fire
Speaker 1: to mix it up. Despite the nightly actions of getting
Speaker 1: to follow up predictable pattern that usually ended with police
Speaker 1: roll rushing people down unlit neighborhood streets for the crimes
Speaker 1: of yelling in the road. PPB press releases portrayed each
Speaker 1: evening as an intense battle with dangerous radicals. These claims
Speaker 1: were not borne out by the arrest that they made.
Speaker 1: The charges leveled at protesters arrested were almost all I
Speaker 1: p O or interference with the police officer, the charge
Speaker 1: that they could file if you did not move fast
Speaker 1: enough when they bull rushed. I PO was one of
Speaker 1: the charges that d A. Mike Schmidt had announced on
Speaker 1: August eighth that his office would decline to prosecute. Thereafter,
Speaker 1: nearly all protester charges were dropped, possibly to compensate for
Speaker 1: the loss of legal cloud. Portland police ramped up on
Speaker 1: the brutality. Acts of minor vandalism will be answered by
Speaker 1: baton charges, and any protesters are unable to outrun the
Speaker 1: bull rush would be knocked to the ground, body slammed,
Speaker 1: or beaten and then often left lying on the pavement
Speaker 1: with no attempt made to arrest. Police made it very
Speaker 1: clear that their intent was to punish protesters whether or
Speaker 1: not they had legal recourse. It was an exhausting period, however,
Speaker 1: and start contrast to the brutality of the nighttime actions,
Speaker 1: by August, protesters were spending the days building on the
Speaker 1: mutual aid networks that had already existed in Portland and
Speaker 1: expanding them in new ways to support the community. But
Speaker 1: what is mutual aid? To answer that, I'm going to
Speaker 1: turn this over to activists on the ground who were
Speaker 1: implementing it. PDX treat Medics formed during the summer, and
Speaker 1: we'll talk more about their work later. But here's their
Speaker 1: definition of mutual aid. It's bringing some amount of equity
Speaker 1: where there is none, you know, in this very small
Speaker 1: sense of like the street max. If someone can't afford repairs,
Speaker 1: UM usually they would have to go into debt to
Speaker 1: get that repaired at an auto shop, where um usually
Speaker 1: they would be up sold several thousand dollars in repairs
Speaker 1: they don't need. So where we step in, we are
Speaker 1: saving them that bill and then being able to make
Speaker 1: sure they're able to keep other needs ment and through
Speaker 1: that action is a small amount of equity where there
Speaker 1: would be none. I was just gonna say, kind of
Speaker 1: piggybacking off Cyprusus point. Um I I kind of see,
Speaker 1: you know, what we're doing as a you know, I
Speaker 1: think it's it's kind of it. It's trying to challenge
Speaker 1: the current system, you know, and in this system is
Speaker 1: a system that has so many, so many flaws, and
Speaker 1: I think that mutual Aid is kind of trying to
Speaker 1: uh address some of those flaws or try to mitigate
Speaker 1: some of those flaws in the sense that you know,
Speaker 1: kind of living this we live under capitalism, you know,
Speaker 1: we live under in a system that tolerates you know, homelessness. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know we live under yeah, I mean a system
Speaker 1: that oppresses so many minorities and stuff like that. Um
Speaker 1: So I think that just what mutual aid is, and
Speaker 1: you know, specifically, maybe our role is kind of at
Speaker 1: least the way I see it, is challenging that system
Speaker 1: of capitals and challenging you know, being like hey, like
Speaker 1: you know, you don't you know, We're going to try
Speaker 1: to just help people, not based on you know, gaining
Speaker 1: anything out of it. We're just helping people because that's
Speaker 1: what we're supposed to do as humans. I think that's
Speaker 1: something that we really need to keep in the center
Speaker 1: of reminds me to thinking about mitchial Aid is that
Speaker 1: the people who lose the most in our current system
Speaker 1: have the tend to have the least ability to change anything. UM.
Speaker 1: And that is one of the or like motivating factors
Speaker 1: behind mutually UM. Where it is people who are really
Speaker 1: like living truly paycheck to paycheck, or don't even have
Speaker 1: any stable income and are living in a car and
Speaker 1: it's like slowly slowly breakaking down and there's just nothing
Speaker 1: to do about it. UM. These are the kind of
Speaker 1: situations in which that little bit of extra help can
Speaker 1: really mean that that person can continue to have a life,
Speaker 1: and that life can continue to be good, and that
Speaker 1: life can continue to be something that's worth fighting for,
Speaker 1: and that way those people can continue to fight for
Speaker 1: their own lives. UM. If community support doesn't really happen,
Speaker 1: and mutually it's really just a fancy word for community support.
Speaker 1: If that doesn't actually happen, those people aren't going to
Speaker 1: be able to fight because they're trying to survive. And
Speaker 1: we need to be able to get a little bit
Speaker 1: beyond survival in order to really organize and fight and
Speaker 1: resist on the scale that is necessary for dealing with
Speaker 1: the problem that we're basing. Something that I about a
Speaker 1: bunch in this ort, in this group is that I
Speaker 1: actually sometimes don't think that organizations can provide mutual aid um.
Speaker 1: That instead people have to provide mutualate and that because
Speaker 1: that principle isn't about like mutually, it's about seeing activity
Speaker 1: and women like acting within the um, whereas charity is
Speaker 1: all about like creating this other thing. You're providing business,
Speaker 1: and there's like a lot of citying and a lot
Speaker 1: of like apologizing that happens in that relationship that mutually. Really.
Speaker 1: Some mutual aid groups existed in Portland prior to the
Speaker 1: George Floyd uprising. As COVID swept the country in spring,
Speaker 1: new mutualay organizations popped up all over the city, and
Speaker 1: some groups that were already active look for new ways
Speaker 1: to help rose hips. A medic collective has been around
Speaker 1: for eleven years. They began making hands and tides are
Speaker 1: in distributing it around the city at the beginning of
Speaker 1: the pandemic. As protests intensified, they were to reverse engineer
Speaker 1: chemical wives to help with tear gas and pepper spray.
Speaker 1: Medics loaded with cards filled with water, energy drinks, and
Speaker 1: I cleaning kids were a common sight every night. James
Speaker 1: A rose Hip Street medic describes the early days of
Speaker 1: the uprisings. Yeah, I remember the first time that I
Speaker 1: went to a protest um after the pandemic uh suprising
Speaker 1: began to happen at the same time, I think the
Speaker 1: Peninsula Park and like, we just brought a bunch of
Speaker 1: hand sanitizer, and we're like, I don't know, let's walk
Speaker 1: around and hands hand sanitizer out to people. And we
Speaker 1: also have these masks, so let's hand these things out,
Speaker 1: and like all of our supply was was gone within
Speaker 1: like half an hour, and there was a large, a
Speaker 1: whole park full of people at that time. And so,
Speaker 1: you know, initially it was just handing out to people
Speaker 1: before the marching began um. And then once the protests
Speaker 1: really picked up steam and started to be responded to
Speaker 1: with more repression, we started to ask ourselves, like what
Speaker 1: else can we distributed? Basically, and one thing that treatmatics
Speaker 1: usually do, or or that streament is a really trained
Speaker 1: to do, is to flush out people's eyes if they've
Speaker 1: been either pepper sprayed or tear gas. But that necessarily
Speaker 1: creates aerosolized particles from people's eyeballs because you're squirting water
Speaker 1: into people's eyes high velocity. And so we're like, this
Speaker 1: doesn't feel like a safe activity anymore. Can we hand
Speaker 1: out preportioned bottles of our preferred eye wash solution? Yes,
Speaker 1: we have all these bottles lying around, and so like,
Speaker 1: let's do that. And then someone asked, you know, these
Speaker 1: these chemical weapons removing wipes, Like what's in these? Can
Speaker 1: we make our own? And then some very smart people
Speaker 1: who are not me like figured out the recipe and
Speaker 1: created a whole manufacturing apparatus to produce and distribute huge
Speaker 1: numbers of chemical weapons wipes UM every day and so
Speaker 1: and then because the demand kept increasing, particularly as the
Speaker 1: violence and increased, UM and people use the products, and
Speaker 1: then we're like, we really need these. These are great
Speaker 1: and people, you know, they saw us around, maybe who
Speaker 1: we were. We started to put our name on things,
Speaker 1: just that was clear that like it's us building up
Speaker 1: this trust community and not some other random group. UM.
Speaker 1: Then people started to UM. So just sort of like
Speaker 1: the demand created the whole chain of events, and because
Speaker 1: people already knew us from distributing hand sanitizer, we had
Speaker 1: a lot of good will with UM. I would say,
Speaker 1: community groups who wouldn't ordinarily think to themselves radical leftist
Speaker 1: street protesters are our people UM, but like churches and
Speaker 1: whatnot who a lot of work with people living outside,
Speaker 1: We're like, okay, you seem to be more or less
Speaker 1: on the same page with us. So that's how those networks.
Speaker 1: Other groups that were already on the ground were the
Speaker 1: PDX General Defense Committee and Defense Fund PDX, who raised
Speaker 1: bail money and helped make sure that protesters made it
Speaker 1: home and jail support waited outside the central precinct every
Speaker 1: night with food, hot drinks, and support. The Witches had
Speaker 1: already been present before the summer, handing out water bottles
Speaker 1: and supplies. Somebody Else's PDX had begun as a coalition
Speaker 1: of mutual aid groups. However, when COVID hit, the work
Speaker 1: connecting communities and mutual aid expanded. So yeah, at the
Speaker 1: beginning of before COVID hit, UH symbiosis was mostly focused
Speaker 1: on UM. At the time, our our project merk or
Speaker 1: Munisipalist Go Resiliency Project, where we were working on kind
Speaker 1: of UM connect again and with that dual power lens,
Speaker 1: trying to UM consolidate uh like food access and production
Speaker 1: infrastructure for the community UM, as well as like doing
Speaker 1: some housing rights work UM. When COVID hit, we're a
Speaker 1: really small organization UM and immediately just kind of like
Speaker 1: called this sixty sixty organ wide coalition call to be like, hey,
Speaker 1: Radical Left, this is a big fucking deal. What do
Speaker 1: we want to do about it? How can we support
Speaker 1: each other in doing that? And through that work, we
Speaker 1: were able to kind of UM more succinctly find what
Speaker 1: gaps in the radical left infrastructure there was, so that
Speaker 1: we could work on filling that need. Part of that
Speaker 1: was UM creating uh hubs around town. UH there there
Speaker 1: was a few all the existing and stuff. So that's
Speaker 1: where we created SHARE or the Symbiosis Hub and Resource
Speaker 1: Exchange program, where we were able to be some of
Speaker 1: the first uh first on the ground responders to making
Speaker 1: sure that our communities have the PPE they needed when
Speaker 1: we were being told that we that we shouldn't have
Speaker 1: PPE because we should save it for other people. So
Speaker 1: we we were distributing PPE. We'd organized the solidarity Stitchers,
Speaker 1: which we're both producing their own masks and kind of
Speaker 1: teaching each other how to sew and learning basic organizing
Speaker 1: skills and how to interact with one another in this
Speaker 1: directly democratic way. But we're also activating the community by
Speaker 1: creating these groups. The Solidarity Stitchers group online that allowed
Speaker 1: us to then increase our production to being able to
Speaker 1: basically hand make masks that nobody could find anywhere, UH
Speaker 1: numbering in the thousands, UM and and getting and partnering.
Speaker 1: We also created the Solidarity UH Fund UM this Inbiosis
Speaker 1: Solidarity Fund, which basically was not only UM giving individuals
Speaker 1: in the Portland area who were experiencing economic hardship and
Speaker 1: response to the COVID pandemic UM directly. We were giving
Speaker 1: them funds like people who needed medical expenses, covered, people
Speaker 1: who needed transportation needs, covered people, et cetera, but as
Speaker 1: well as well as grassroots organizations that needed money to
Speaker 1: continue their vital programming for example UH Portland Action Medics
Speaker 1: and UH slash the rose Hip Medic Collective. UH we
Speaker 1: were able to make sure to get them multiple thousands
Speaker 1: of dollars to continue the hand sanitizer project that they
Speaker 1: were doing. From there, we were able to slowly grow
Speaker 1: through our our mutual aid program through share and solidarity stitchers,
Speaker 1: the Solidarity Fund into UM also expanding within ourselves sort
Speaker 1: of this education and outreach work that we were doing
Speaker 1: to further further within our organization and out in in
Speaker 1: the general public, educate about communalism, mutual aid, what it
Speaker 1: means to be an accomplice, things about the the radical
Speaker 1: left movement that have been forgotten or never learned. This
Speaker 1: group to encompass connections with the Warrant Springs Reservation, distributing
Speaker 1: supplies PPE and clean water with fires igniting the spirit.
Speaker 1: When the water main for the reservation broke when the
Speaker 1: protests began, Symbios's moved to make sure that PPE and
Speaker 1: resources were available there as well. We were printing zines
Speaker 1: and showing up at protests UM. At the protests, we
Speaker 1: were also the first group on the ground essentially to
Speaker 1: provide PPE, recognizing that yes, this uprising is going to happen,
Speaker 1: regardless of the risk, because the need is that great.
Speaker 1: But we're gonna do that and seed a culture of
Speaker 1: taking care of each other. UM. So yeah, in distributing
Speaker 1: zines and UH and educational material of other sorts, and
Speaker 1: stuff and getting people plugged into organizing other much way
Speaker 1: formed in the early days of the protests, fueled by
Speaker 1: the desire to help out however possible. Early on, snack
Speaker 1: Mom was realized that they were not interested in running
Speaker 1: from the police, but they can make sure that the
Speaker 1: people in the streets had food and supplies. Uh, snack
Speaker 1: MoMA number one. I go by Shiba um where I
Speaker 1: guess we're mutual A. Yeah. Yeah. We hand out snacks
Speaker 1: and waters and things that nature. Anything you know, anybody
Speaker 1: would need, uh soot things like that, stash medical supplies,
Speaker 1: any like extra like mass or gas masks or protective
Speaker 1: gear that we can possibly get our hands on. Um,
Speaker 1: lots of stuff. I mean there's been a lot of
Speaker 1: endom stuff that we put out there is whatever the
Speaker 1: needs are, but mainly just snacks and drinks. Um. And
Speaker 1: I'm snack Mama too. I've already been docks, so I'm
Speaker 1: not even worried about my name. I go by Amanda,
Speaker 1: and yeah, that's pretty much what we do, mutual aid. Yeah.
Speaker 1: How did you get started, Like when when did you
Speaker 1: first start coming to the out to the protests? Like
Speaker 1: how did you get started coming out to the protests. UM,
Speaker 1: what was thetis for you to come out? Well? UM,
Speaker 1: when the whole George Floyd video was released and I've
Speaker 1: seen that it was, it was mortified. I cried because
Speaker 1: it was it was definitely just hard to watch UM
Speaker 1: again again and again and again and again. And this
Speaker 1: was just coming the last off for everyone, you know,
Speaker 1: I feel like UM. And then there were protests going
Speaker 1: on down town. UM, so we went and checked them out.
Speaker 1: And then after that we started going out pretty much
Speaker 1: every night after that and just checking them out. UM.
Speaker 1: I don't exactly remember when it was, but we have
Speaker 1: started up with UM, the next partner of mine, now
Speaker 1: he started I remember it was the beginning of June.
Speaker 1: I drugged them with me. We wouldn't check it out,
Speaker 1: you know. UM. So then after that we had started
Speaker 1: cooking where we're cooking downtown. UM. We did that for
Speaker 1: like maybe a month too or two. UM. We're what
Speaker 1: we're called Don't Starve PDX. Yeah, don't Start UM. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So that was us UM. And then August fifteen, there
Speaker 1: was a domestic dispute between me and my partner UM,
Speaker 1: who was part of Don't Start. It was part of
Speaker 1: Don't Start UM. And then after that, I mean, the
Speaker 1: the original snack band. He was supposed to get that. UM.
Speaker 1: And then after the domestic dispute, UM, the owner of
Speaker 1: the van pulled out from underneath him was like, you know,
Speaker 1: I can't support this. UM. Then he offered me the
Speaker 1: van and then me and her UM had this van
Speaker 1: and we're like, okay, what can we do with this? UM?
Speaker 1: So then that's when we started doing snack Mamas. It
Speaker 1: took us a minute to come up with the name,
Speaker 1: but eventually we did. But at that point people kind
Speaker 1: of already knew who we were. UM. So then we
Speaker 1: you know, came out with snack Mamas and that's what
Speaker 1: we've been doing ever since. Yeah, I remember seeing you
Speaker 1: out when you were doing the adult Starve. UM. What
Speaker 1: really was just like to feed people? UM? I think
Speaker 1: I think we just want to support the movement. And
Speaker 1: I mean, honestly, we're a couple of chunky girls. You know,
Speaker 1: we were we were no like match for these you
Speaker 1: know officers that are like fit, you know, trying to
Speaker 1: chase us. We're like trying to find like bushes or
Speaker 1: like holes die and or you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: We're just like, man, this is like this is too
Speaker 1: much for us because I cannot run. For yeah, the
Speaker 1: first time I know that that isn't for me. Um,
Speaker 1: I'm standing there and all of a sudden, I see
Speaker 1: this metal objects moving towards me and it's on fire
Speaker 1: and it's spinning, and I'm like oh, and I like,
Speaker 1: you know, instantly start freaking out, and I'm like okay,
Speaker 1: so you know, I take off and I start running,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, okay, this isn't for me. You know,
Speaker 1: I can't outrun objects, I can't outrun the cops, you know,
Speaker 1: so defend. So I just didn't have any gas master
Speaker 1: or anything yet or at that point for like stuffing
Speaker 1: our faces with stuff, trying to breathe still and try
Speaker 1: and like protect ourselves. And yeah, yes it's harsh times,
Speaker 1: but we wanted to support like in whatever way we could, right.
Speaker 1: I think that's kind of where we started, like doing
Speaker 1: that for other people that wanted to protests but didn't
Speaker 1: feel comfortable going out alone. Comrade collective connected protesters to
Speaker 1: each other, sparking the connections that help sustain the movement.
Speaker 1: That's a tough has a kind of a tough one
Speaker 1: to summarize. Um, I guess the best way to say
Speaker 1: it is that UM community has kind of been a
Speaker 1: limiting factor for a lot of people in protests. And
Speaker 1: right around the time of uh fourth of July and
Speaker 1: like right after that, Shark Youth started kind of becoming
Speaker 1: a kind of a meeting point for folks through social media,
Speaker 1: through Telegram, and from there there's been several um definit iterations,
Speaker 1: Disabled commeron Collective, Care Collective, UM soon to be Queer
Speaker 1: Comedy Collective as well, all kind of forming from that.
Speaker 1: I don't know, locusts of just like community, just like
Speaker 1: folks trying to find the necessary connections to get their
Speaker 1: ideas off the ground. Yeah. I mean for me personally,
Speaker 1: I just sort of started sitting in a park with
Speaker 1: a sign, just asking people if they needed buddies. I
Speaker 1: was going to be there anyway. It figured like it
Speaker 1: was something easy to do, and I started a Twitter
Speaker 1: and one thing just sort of snowballed into another. Now
Speaker 1: here we are Disabled Comrade Collective have form to meet
Speaker 1: the needs of people with disabilities or who have alternative
Speaker 1: needs to be able to participate in protests. Yeah. How
Speaker 1: um so, how Disabled Comrade Collective started was kind of like, um, so,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm disabled and chronically ill, so like I can't
Speaker 1: be on the ground all the time. It's like here
Speaker 1: and there, and then when I am, it takes a
Speaker 1: lot out of me. UM and so uh Sylvan who
Speaker 1: is like like the main person of UM like handling
Speaker 1: disabled comrade collective. Uh, they also are disabled and chronically
Speaker 1: ill and so um. They just kind of like we
Speaker 1: were just complaining on Twitter, like they were like, man, like,
Speaker 1: there needs to be like a group for like disabled
Speaker 1: and ill people like to have different needs and like
Speaker 1: neuro divergent and then like, um, it just everyone was
Speaker 1: like yeah, and then it just kind of uh went
Speaker 1: onto Sylvan and they're like, I guess I'm doing this thing.
Speaker 1: So that's how that started. The e Walks also formed
Speaker 1: early in the protests, but through the course of the
Speaker 1: summer they found that their mission change. E Walks is
Speaker 1: a humanitarian aid coalition made up of crisis and medical
Speaker 1: workers were fighting integrated medical and mental health care that's
Speaker 1: trauma informed and harm reductive in nature. This service model
Speaker 1: was really adapted from another organization that we worked with
Speaker 1: um as organizers called Whitebird Medicine UM and they've been
Speaker 1: the attention of National news recently for their cooods program. However,
Speaker 1: looking at the situations in Portland and the socio political
Speaker 1: inequities that are being enforced every single day, it became
Speaker 1: increasingly clear that Britland's model was going to need to
Speaker 1: look at little bit different. So we beefed up our
Speaker 1: teams and we got a hole off the ground side
Speaker 1: and now we've sort of moved morphed into like a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of different things we do UH protest work.
Speaker 1: Still we're committed in UM supporting the community for as
Speaker 1: long as that needs to happen. One thing that became
Speaker 1: increasingly clear as public reliance on the police force has
Speaker 1: begun to reflect the police forces ability to protect people
Speaker 1: who served them, UM E walks has really taken a
Speaker 1: look at what the city needs most. And our shift
Speaker 1: was born out of seeing a complete lack of actually
Speaker 1: reachable mental health services within our city. UM costs are
Speaker 1: prohibited access to those actual things within standalone buildings does
Speaker 1: not work for many patients and it also leaves our
Speaker 1: houses community severely lacking as always in services and outreach. UM.
Speaker 1: As we began looking at adapting our model and taking
Speaker 1: a look at what this community needed, one of the
Speaker 1: things that struck us most was that there is a
Speaker 1: complete lack about tornadove resources to police involvement, and while
Speaker 1: EOX is not there yet, we would like to envision
Speaker 1: a future where we have a place in helping form
Speaker 1: a service that can do just such a thing. Meeting
Speaker 1: in the front of the Federal Courthouse. During the Fed War,
Speaker 1: Optical Block began doing eye exams, helping people get prescriptions
Speaker 1: and glasses, organizing around the Mutual eight tents of Riot Ribs.
Speaker 1: As Riot Ribs imploded at the end of July, the
Speaker 1: number of mutual Aid Quote blocks organizing services to protesters
Speaker 1: and marginalized communities exploded. These groups organized around identifying and
Speaker 1: helping with one community need at a time. Protesters set
Speaker 1: up a wide ranging network of alternative organizing to help
Speaker 1: each other outside of the frameworks of the city or capitalism.
Speaker 1: In many cases, the blocks were explicit that in an
Speaker 1: abolition this framework, the goal was to meet needs without
Speaker 1: the charity and violence that often accompanied the state and
Speaker 1: more traditional types of existence. Instead organized as a community
Speaker 1: to give people's needs met. As activist Mariah explains, there
Speaker 1: was a block for everything, like pet block, Yeah, oh gosh,
Speaker 1: I mean, I can't say I have a favorite. They're
Speaker 1: all amazing, Like they they honestly like shocked me every
Speaker 1: day because I'm just like, oh do we I even
Speaker 1: asked them, like, yo, do we have a kram plastic
Speaker 1: Block Like yeah, I don't say I have a favorite.
Speaker 1: I am just amazed by people being able to come
Speaker 1: together and do that. I've seen job Block, I've seen
Speaker 1: I've seen stuff I couldn't even think of, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: that's just amazing. I think it's amazing for like, yeah,
Speaker 1: this little community. I'm like, I wish people like would
Speaker 1: know more about this. I wanna say no more about this,
Speaker 1: but get more involved because I'm like the community is
Speaker 1: just doing it and like, yeah, we protect us and
Speaker 1: it's amazing. As August continued, community events in mutual full
Speaker 1: affairs became common. Mending Block could repair your clothes and
Speaker 1: made bockle buzz for anonymity at night actions. Beauty Block
Speaker 1: could give you a manicure, but also made bath bombs
Speaker 1: and care packages for jail support. Community art therapy happened
Speaker 1: weekly as people try to process the stress and brutality.
Speaker 1: Tech Block assisted people with computers and devices while we
Speaker 1: don't have time to cover every group that arose during
Speaker 1: that time. We can't have Some of the activists describe
Speaker 1: how and why they formed. Jedi explains Plant Block. So,
Speaker 1: Plant Block literally came out of mutual Aid, Like it
Speaker 1: formed out of like mac already being in contact with
Speaker 1: a bunch of community members, already having his own garden
Speaker 1: kind of things set up, and then just pull everybody
Speaker 1: together and creating digitals with flowers or provide people with
Speaker 1: just like vegetable bags and stuff like that. So like nowadays,
Speaker 1: if you go to any kind of like well, this
Speaker 1: was certainly true. I mean, we're not having as many
Speaker 1: because it's so cold and wet now. But like a
Speaker 1: lot of the the community events that we would hold, um,
Speaker 1: half of those like vendors that would be at these
Speaker 1: community events literally were formed within this movement. They didn't
Speaker 1: exist prior to George Floyd. So seeing how you know,
Speaker 1: the tragic death of of of him and many others
Speaker 1: fallen before him have kind of, in a way like
Speaker 1: been a catalyst for strengthening mutual Aid in our city.
Speaker 1: UM And anybody who's been on the ground, been going
Speaker 1: to these events has seen it with their own eyes.
Speaker 1: So many different mutual aid groups have formed because of
Speaker 1: u's just coming together so often, and the more that
Speaker 1: we come together, the more we realize we don't need
Speaker 1: to rely on the state UM to feed and clothe
Speaker 1: and keep us. During the Fed War, cars were damaged
Speaker 1: by right munitions and had their filters clagged with powdered
Speaker 1: tear gas. Portland Please developed a habit of repeatedly attacking
Speaker 1: protester vehicles protecting marches by stabbing out their tires. Those
Speaker 1: snack Mamas had their vans impounded and trash for handing
Speaker 1: out food and water. In response, pt Street Mechanics formed
Speaker 1: to help people repair their cars and provide vehicle assistance
Speaker 1: for protesters, but quickly in large their focus to help
Speaker 1: with other transportation needs. Here they explain how they formed.
Speaker 1: The Proton Street Mechanics started UM kind of just like
Speaker 1: on Twitter, primarily because there were calls for people's cars
Speaker 1: getting to repairs after having them being damaged out in protests. UM.
Speaker 1: It very quickly expanded well beyond that because car repair
Speaker 1: isn't something that you can do at protests UM, and
Speaker 1: that was one of our first things, is like, I know,
Speaker 1: we're actually just doing community car care UM. By moving
Speaker 1: away from the protests scene actually allows us to UM
Speaker 1: focus on other things UM and actually focus on the
Speaker 1: marginalized communities that are tend to be very active in
Speaker 1: protests but are also the reasons why we are protesting UM.
Speaker 1: And that was a big thing for us in our
Speaker 1: initial framing, was not necessarily just helping protesters kind of
Speaker 1: manage their day to day needs UM, but also helping
Speaker 1: to support the communities that are have historically been marginalized
Speaker 1: and have historically been oppressed UM so that these protests
Speaker 1: don't need to happen. We should not have to go
Speaker 1: and protest UM. And a big part of it is
Speaker 1: building the world that we want to see UM, So
Speaker 1: we kind of quickly moved into that perspective. I think
Speaker 1: a lot of plays we end up writing a lot
Speaker 1: of support for other blocks. So a lot of the
Speaker 1: people that we help and people reach out to us
Speaker 1: are people who are using their vehicles for MUTUALID and UM.
Speaker 1: Those people absolutely get UM like care from us. They
Speaker 1: get support in terms of making sure that their vehicles
Speaker 1: are reliable and safe UM so that they can provide
Speaker 1: their own kind of like practices. Because a lot of
Speaker 1: a lot of other MUTUALID systems or like organizations are
Speaker 1: about like just giving stuff away UM and providing those
Speaker 1: those goods UM. The service providing component UM kind of
Speaker 1: like breaks with that a little bit. So like we
Speaker 1: we haven't really been able to UM kind of meet
Speaker 1: up and go to a lot of like the or
Speaker 1: like some of the fares or some of the kind
Speaker 1: of like mutual aid meetups because we there's no spot
Speaker 1: to work on cars UM. So when we've run into
Speaker 1: some problems with that UM with like people being fine
Speaker 1: with people distributing food, but then we're like, oh, can
Speaker 1: we do an all change in your parking, It's like no,
Speaker 1: we can't do that. UM. So we end up having
Speaker 1: to to get really creative in terms of where we
Speaker 1: do our work and how we UM actually like just
Speaker 1: like logistically organized with other people. Coming up next is
Speaker 1: a Lane, my colleague in the streets and my partner
Speaker 1: in writing this podcast. The cycle of nightly protests and
Speaker 1: daily community building and mutual aid would continue unabated, and
Speaker 1: on September five, Portland had its hundredth night of continuous protest.
Speaker 1: The event was marked by a care fair featuring many
Speaker 1: of the mutual aid groups that had formed recently. Plant
Speaker 1: Blok had vegetables, sprouts and seeds that they were giving away,
Speaker 1: and care Block offered massages to protesters and Tea Symbiosis
Speaker 1: tabled books and zines, and people donated food and listened
Speaker 1: to speakers and music by local musicians. At one point,
Speaker 1: the car caravan, a reoccurring car protest frequented by people
Speaker 1: whose social distancing needs made other types of visible protest harder,
Speaker 1: came past, honking horns, waving signs declaring that black lives mattered.
Speaker 1: Mac was on the ground that day. You know, I
Speaker 1: think a lot of folks once once things went off
Speaker 1: in Minneapolis, and once we knew they were you know,
Speaker 1: once we had our first big riot here in Portland,
Speaker 1: we knew something was going to happen. Like we knew
Speaker 1: that there were going to be some protests and stuff
Speaker 1: last a little while. I don't think anyone at the
Speaker 1: start of it really called a hundred plus days continuous protest.
Speaker 1: When did you realize this is not a normal not
Speaker 1: just not a normal Portland protest, This isn't like a
Speaker 1: normal Portland summer of protests, and it would continue to
Speaker 1: not be a normal summer of protests. That night, Portland
Speaker 1: police pushed protesters blocks away from the East Portland precinct,
Speaker 1: gassing families in their homes, and at the beginning of September,
Speaker 1: ore Agon began one of its worst fire seasons on record.
Speaker 1: As one of the last marches commemorating the hundredth the
Speaker 1: day of protest while and through the St. John's neighborhood
Speaker 1: of North Portland, Mariah remembers how the sky slowly dimmed
Speaker 1: as smoke began rolling into the city from fires burning
Speaker 1: from the south and east. I won't, I won't for
Speaker 1: the day it started rolling into town. I was actually
Speaker 1: at the big march in St. John's because we all
Speaker 1: started coming back and we were just like coughing and
Speaker 1: and everything, and I was like, what the is going on?
Speaker 1: I looked in there and I was like, Okay, it's
Speaker 1: smoked from a fire. But I was like, but where
Speaker 1: And then obviously, you know, twenty four hours later we
Speaker 1: started becoming hell. But how much it just shows like
Speaker 1: the community transition to mutual aid in aiding like fire
Speaker 1: survivors and victims. Uh me as well. I also did,
Speaker 1: like I don't know, I raised like five thousand dollars
Speaker 1: and went and went shopping and dropped him off like
Speaker 1: they got a place near Lloyd's Center. UM and then
Speaker 1: out in Milwaukee. But it was so amazing to see
Speaker 1: the community be able to come together and help people.
Speaker 1: Dry conditions and hot winds sent fire sweeping four states.
Speaker 1: Oregon was enveloped in the worst fires the state had
Speaker 1: seen in decades. Smoke from multiple blazes blanketed the region,
Speaker 1: making breathing impossible and devastating huge swaths of the state.
Speaker 1: As thousands evacuated and whole towns were consumed by fire
Speaker 1: with no evidence, far right media exploded with rumors that
Speaker 1: Antifa and BLM were starting fires. Despite public officials trying
Speaker 1: to counteract the rumors, it was too little, too late.
Speaker 1: The fearmongering rhetoric had scared individuals and right wing militias
Speaker 1: to stay in fire areas, hindering evacuees, and to set
Speaker 1: up armed checkpoints and fire zones to harass anyone they
Speaker 1: thought didn't look right. Reporter Alyssa Tsar went out to
Speaker 1: the fire zone to talk with evacuees and report on
Speaker 1: the fire response. UM. Just seeing you know, the community
Speaker 1: come together and kind of a great example of we
Speaker 1: protect us, you know, manifesting right before um fuck, there
Speaker 1: were people that were like rollying together trailers to go
Speaker 1: help people evacuate their barn animals and take them to
Speaker 1: somewhere safe. So yeah, I mean that's what we went
Speaker 1: there for. Um And it's it's so funny because I
Speaker 1: believe the day before I went to Malala um or
Speaker 1: the day before that, so one or two days before,
Speaker 1: I had tweeted something and I was totally joking, but
Speaker 1: it was also very serious. It was along the lines
Speaker 1: of like, you know, right wingers on Twitter are saying,
Speaker 1: you know, Antifa started the wildfires. Meanwhile, every fucking leftist
Speaker 1: on Twitter at the time was like, hey, um, what's
Speaker 1: the most efficient way to bring a fire extinguisher to
Speaker 1: a protest? You know, because at the time there was
Speaker 1: also a fire risk and the protests were happening, and
Speaker 1: this is something people were super concerned about. Um And
Speaker 1: you know, we were making jokes about these circulating rumors.
Speaker 1: I really did not think in a matter of two
Speaker 1: days they would manifest into a full blown, like actionable
Speaker 1: conspiracy theory unlessa soon found out how serious those conspiracy
Speaker 1: theories were being taken. At the time, the witches had
Speaker 1: showed up and they had brought a bunch of it's
Speaker 1: like swagons filled with supplies. Um, we were on our
Speaker 1: way to I think it was at the time, the
Speaker 1: airport um because that's where the firefighters had told us
Speaker 1: that they were gonna have the firefighters be stationed as
Speaker 1: well as be taking supplies. So on our way there,
Speaker 1: there was have you ever seen those uh those signs
Speaker 1: where it's like uh green yellow, red, and it's like
Speaker 1: a fire danger sign and the arrow points wherever. So
Speaker 1: the arrow was like all the way in the red
Speaker 1: and it was like leave now. So granted, we stopped
Speaker 1: to take a picture of that because it's there's just
Speaker 1: this like you know, field of like tall grass on
Speaker 1: the side of the road. Leave now. It was just
Speaker 1: a very picturesque moment, something really eerie about it. The
Speaker 1: road is like completely empty, but every now and then
Speaker 1: you can see like a line of cars trying to evacuate.
Speaker 1: But anyways, we we pulled over. Um, wow, I haven't
Speaker 1: thought about this in so long, but yeah, we've We've
Speaker 1: pulled over to take this picture and Justin and Sergio
Speaker 1: are kind of still standing next to the car um
Speaker 1: and this is public property. Um, it's on the side
Speaker 1: of the road. It's not anyone's like yard or anything.
Speaker 1: And they're still by the car, and I'm like in
Speaker 1: front of the sign and there's some like tall grass.
Speaker 1: I'm kind of crouched down taking a picture of it,
Speaker 1: and I'm like focused on the picture and hear someone talking.
Speaker 1: At first, I thought maybe it was like Justin and Sergio.
Speaker 1: But I look up and there's three dudes with with rifles, um,
Speaker 1: you know, pointing their rifles at us. And it it
Speaker 1: took a bit for me to register what was going
Speaker 1: on because I was really confused. UM, and I got
Speaker 1: up and they started interrogating me, and I'm answering, but
Speaker 1: I'm still like really confused because I'm like, Okay, they're
Speaker 1: not cops, but why are they so offended and so
Speaker 1: aggressive and hostile? Like I I was legit, just like
Speaker 1: I could not figure out what was going on. And
Speaker 1: then they kept asking questions, you know, like where are
Speaker 1: you from, why are you in ore in the city,
Speaker 1: or are you taking a picture of this. UM started
Speaker 1: talking about like because we all had our press credentials on,
Speaker 1: we were all in plain clothing, and you know, slowly
Speaker 1: like based off the questions they were asking. It slowly
Speaker 1: started to kind of click for me. But even when
Speaker 1: it clicked, I think that just kind of me more confused,
Speaker 1: because like, we were literally all tweeting about this jokingly
Speaker 1: last night, but somehow and fuck, literally two to three
Speaker 1: days this rumor manifested into a fucking conspiracy where people
Speaker 1: are holding people at gunpoint, militias are holding people up
Speaker 1: at gunpoint. It's it's just wild to me. They finally
Speaker 1: got to a point they started saying that, you know,
Speaker 1: there were people that were coming into their city that
Speaker 1: are starting fires so that they can loot. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: and they kept saying the word loot, and then um,
Speaker 1: they started talking about protesters from Portland, and it was
Speaker 1: just like you know, it was it was all like
Speaker 1: it was coming to me before, but it was coming
Speaker 1: to me in a way where it's like, okay, maybe,
Speaker 1: but there's no way. But then they started asking those questions.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, okay, they really do believe that
Speaker 1: I'm an Antifa starting the fires right now? Like okay, fuck?
Speaker 1: Um yeah, using words like like looting. And then they
Speaker 1: started talking about protesting, um, god fuck. And then it
Speaker 1: took a little bit before Justin and Sergio even saw
Speaker 1: and uh it was Justin who came down first and
Speaker 1: started to like talking and see what's going on. Oh funk.
Speaker 1: I just remember too, when Sergio finally like realized what
Speaker 1: was going on. He came up to us and he's like,
Speaker 1: are you just writing us? Man? Yeah? Yeah not and
Speaker 1: not physically nobody touched us, but just like a body
Speaker 1: language and the way that they were being, the way
Speaker 1: that they were positioned and like slowly like you know,
Speaker 1: edging forward when they would be speaking. Um, we were,
Speaker 1: I think when when Sergio got involved, him and Justin,
Speaker 1: we're just trying to be like and we're just trying
Speaker 1: to take pictures like we're not gonna bother you like
Speaker 1: like whatever. And also like we we also tried to
Speaker 1: explain to them like we're not here to like make
Speaker 1: this political or dehumanize anyone or whatever, like we're here
Speaker 1: with like sympathy and you know, like we're again this
Speaker 1: is like a humanitarian issue. This is just like what
Speaker 1: the fuck? Yeah, you know, we're not here to be
Speaker 1: like yeah, like you know, burn those whatever, like no,
Speaker 1: none of that. Um, So they really wanted us to
Speaker 1: just like pack it up and go back to Portland. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, and they were kind of insinuating that they
Speaker 1: would have their eyes on us. They took a picture
Speaker 1: of all of our faces. They took a picture of
Speaker 1: license plate. Um, so yeah, it's kind of creepy, but
Speaker 1: I will tell you for sure, none of us really
Speaker 1: realized what happened until like a few hours later, because
Speaker 1: we were fine, we were all fine, and I was
Speaker 1: tweeting about it. I'm like, ll guess what happened, And
Speaker 1: then like an hour or two later, we're just like, fuck,
Speaker 1: Like we got held up at gunpoint. Um the city
Speaker 1: Like by the time we got to where we stopped, Uh,
Speaker 1: that area was all burnt down already, So had something happened,
Speaker 1: there's a good chance no one would have found out
Speaker 1: about it. As we came to learn later, the cops
Speaker 1: are all very pro these right wing militias over there,
Speaker 1: So um, the seriousness of it definitely didn't kick in
Speaker 1: until a lot later. But what were protesters actually doing
Speaker 1: during this time, Well, many of the people being labeled
Speaker 1: as rioters and having rumors of arson spread about them
Speaker 1: were out in the community trying to help as many
Speaker 1: victims of the fires as possible. Alyssa continues. UM. You
Speaker 1: know Portland, Like mutual aid groups from Portland were dry
Speaker 1: being all the way down to Eugene to drop off
Speaker 1: some supplies and back, like you know, countless times back
Speaker 1: and forth. UM. So that was that was really great
Speaker 1: just seeing you know, what we're capable of. UM. And
Speaker 1: I think at first, you know, we talked about the
Speaker 1: protests kind of slowing down for the fires, UM And
Speaker 1: I think a lot of it at first was because
Speaker 1: it was unhealthy to go outside. But I think a
Speaker 1: huge part of it too is like wanting to prioritize,
Speaker 1: like there's people that need help right now, and like
Speaker 1: if we don't get on this, like you know, this
Speaker 1: is this is part of what we're here for. This
Speaker 1: is this is part of anarchy, you know. UM. And yeah,
Speaker 1: just seeing people really like commit was really incredible. I mean,
Speaker 1: did you make it down to mal Morgan from Team
Speaker 1: Raccoon had been coordinating filter exchanges and sourcing gas masks
Speaker 1: for children and rapidly changed their focus as the area
Speaker 1: was smothered by smoke. Yeah. Yeah, I was really fortunate
Speaker 1: to get to kind of collaborate with UM A lot
Speaker 1: of mutual aid groups for Malt the Mutual Aid Lloyd
Speaker 1: Theater and also Mama, the Milwaukee area of Mutual Aid. Um.
Speaker 1: We decided to move MALT to Mama because it was
Speaker 1: damp out because of all the smoke cover and we
Speaker 1: were getting lots of donations of cloth goods like blankets
Speaker 1: and mattresses even and um, clothing in all kinds of
Speaker 1: things that we didn't want to mildew. Um. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I I was on the ground giving out respirators a
Speaker 1: lot at MALT. I have a really fond memory of
Speaker 1: giving a respirator to an eight year old and a
Speaker 1: spider man's sure, and the eight year old was on
Speaker 1: a scooter just scooting around pretending to be a robot
Speaker 1: spider man now that they had their respirator on, and
Speaker 1: that was fun. We had fun that day. Um. But um, yeah,
Speaker 1: I I was kind of just giving respirators out like
Speaker 1: candy during wildfire disaster relief. So I'm not totally sure
Speaker 1: how many went out just for that, but it was
Speaker 1: quite a bit. Um. Basically, we were trying to make
Speaker 1: sure that everybody who was going on supply runs to
Speaker 1: the actual camps themselves was getting a box of respirators
Speaker 1: to give out in case there were any people that
Speaker 1: were really struggling, any asthmatics, any people that um have
Speaker 1: respiratory ailments, because we had the worst air quality in
Speaker 1: the entire world. UM I gave I remember, I gave
Speaker 1: a box of like I think it was like eighteen
Speaker 1: respirators to somebody who was like, I actually work in
Speaker 1: an asthma clinic and I know a lot of patients,
Speaker 1: and I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, here you go.
Speaker 1: Here's a box of eighteen respirators. The Ewoks transformed an
Speaker 1: empty mall parking lot into a fire relief aid station
Speaker 1: almost overnight, becoming a node for a tremendous amount of
Speaker 1: supplies and care to bolth evacuees as well as to
Speaker 1: the houseless community that had nowhere to go to get
Speaker 1: out of the smoke. When the fires first started raging,
Speaker 1: there was this moment um sort of I remember it
Speaker 1: being a Tuesday or a Wednesday, just after the fires
Speaker 1: had started, where the protests calmed down a little bit,
Speaker 1: largely because it was a safety issue to be out
Speaker 1: in the smoke inhalation UM and even though all of
Speaker 1: our gear is built to protect from um C S gas,
Speaker 1: that doesn't necessarily translate to smoke air everywhere. In taking
Speaker 1: a look at what the community requests were, ewoks social
Speaker 1: media got a lot of requests of UM, calls for
Speaker 1: medical support, calls for supply provision UM. The other organs
Speaker 1: that are headed by EWOKS organizers began getting requests through
Speaker 1: their social media and it became really clear that the
Speaker 1: AID sites that were previously established were overworked and ineffective,
Speaker 1: and they're functioning UM largely because of the amount of
Speaker 1: people that they had coming through and the issues that
Speaker 1: happened when you have those that many people with differing
Speaker 1: views really meeting in the middle UM. When the Red
Speaker 1: Cross and the Salvation Army established a base at Clackmuths
Speaker 1: Town Center, or intent was initially to be further down
Speaker 1: south with them, but when that psyche quickly reached capacity
Speaker 1: and the overflow went to the organ convention center, we
Speaker 1: realized that there was going to be a whole group
Speaker 1: of people that weren't being serviced by the Salvation Army.
Speaker 1: The Salvation Army also does not provide any sort of
Speaker 1: food or diapers UM, and their clothing supplies are pretty
Speaker 1: much limited to what you can carry UM. The Malt
Speaker 1: site and MALTA is an acronym that stands for Mutual
Speaker 1: Aid at Lloyd Theater UM. We established in the Lloyd
Speaker 1: Movie Theater parking lot. Thankfully, the manager of that parking
Speaker 1: lot did not have an issue with it UM, but
Speaker 1: we began doing all of the supply provision that the
Speaker 1: Salvation Army at the Oregon Convention Center was unprepared to do. UM.
Speaker 1: We also found that we were getting a high level
Speaker 1: of UM migrant communities and minority communities that might otherwise
Speaker 1: feel grossly uncomfortable with organizations that have appeared to have
Speaker 1: room and participation and cooperation in the past. When sort
Speaker 1: of roll through started to slow down and the Oregon
Speaker 1: Convention Center began to stabilize UM as as paired with
Speaker 1: the breaking of the fire line and the actual fire
Speaker 1: danger moving a little bit further south, we moved into
Speaker 1: the clack of this area and our goal was finding
Speaker 1: a site that was going to be safe for humans
Speaker 1: to come through no matter what their resident or minority
Speaker 1: community status was UM to receive services, but also to
Speaker 1: be close enough to jump further down south if that
Speaker 1: was flow was accessary. Well. When we established the Mama's
Speaker 1: Site UM, and now that I'm thinking about it, I
Speaker 1: can't remember what Mamma stands for, and I apologize. Mama
Speaker 1: stands for Milwaukee Area Mutual Aid fare. We go thanks
Speaker 1: to UM. When we established the Mama's site, we had
Speaker 1: every intention of continuing to move further now south. Something
Speaker 1: really amazing happened while we were there, and putting us
Speaker 1: inside the mutual Aid area of Milwaukee allowed best to
Speaker 1: have resources within other organizations within the community and the
Speaker 1: mutual Aid network to send supplies further downs south. What
Speaker 1: that happened to move our site UM. That location ended
Speaker 1: up being really key in terms of in terms of
Speaker 1: being able to move supplies, gain supplies, and see community UM.
Speaker 1: And it also highlighted the needs that we were not
Speaker 1: able to meet within that which was the the property damage,
Speaker 1: in the economic impacts of having lost everything UM. In
Speaker 1: that respect, it allowed us to move more supplies to
Speaker 1: safer locations for humans because we were able to see
Speaker 1: that that was happening and able to pre plan for
Speaker 1: what their future coming needs would be. Some of those
Speaker 1: supply lines are still open and we are still funneling
Speaker 1: about supplies UM that have just been passed around groups
Speaker 1: since time. May I jump in yeah, so a couple
Speaker 1: of things. I'd like to add. One of the things
Speaker 1: that was really important about MALT or Mutual Aid at
Speaker 1: Lloyd Theater, we we were able to address the needs
Speaker 1: of our houseless community that did not want it to
Speaker 1: UM go inside and stay at the conventions entner UM.
Speaker 1: So one of the things that we did is resourced
Speaker 1: pretty much every respirator UM that was still in existence
Speaker 1: in the Portland metropolitan area. UM. I had volunteers calling
Speaker 1: getting into quarries UM, making purchases and delivering the respirators
Speaker 1: and filters to the houseless folks at UM for C
Speaker 1: three PO and other camps where people where people were
Speaker 1: UM just left to their own devices. I hear that
Speaker 1: the city or county was trying to find respirators on eBay,
Speaker 1: but of course we had better connections UM and then
Speaker 1: we were able to, you know, make sure that that
Speaker 1: our houseless community had their needs met UM. Before we
Speaker 1: moved to MAMA and UM. I think the really important
Speaker 1: part about MAMA was that it allowed people who were
Speaker 1: not safe at the Clackamas Town Center location to access
Speaker 1: Mutual Aid UM. The Immigrant and Refugee community UM, l
Speaker 1: g B t Q community UM there's there was a
Speaker 1: real disconnect in terms of providing safer spaces for UM people.
Speaker 1: UM at that Clackamus County, Clackamus towns, at the Clackamus
Speaker 1: Town Center site. UM. I think that's all I really
Speaker 1: wanted to add. The fires took a community that was
Speaker 1: based around brutality and trauma and helped remind people that
Speaker 1: not only do we take care of us, but that
Speaker 1: mutual aid and support were also the basis for larger change.
Speaker 1: After forming Bonds and Clouds of your Guest, there was
Speaker 1: something poetic and protesters turning their focus outwards to support
Speaker 1: others in a region where the air had been rendered
Speaker 1: unbreathable after the fires, more mutual aid and support would
Speaker 1: be directed outside of the immediate protester community and towards
Speaker 1: those displaced by fire, the chronically houseless, and those facing eviction.
Speaker 1: While these centers of collective care and support were forming
Speaker 1: among protesters, another group had been preparing to mobilize in Portland.
Speaker 1: In our next episode, we'll talk about how the Proud
Speaker 1: Boys and far right extremists were capitalizing on the same
Speaker 1: paranoia that had made malicious form checkpoints and start preparing
Speaker 1: for a violent return to the city to round us out. Though.
Speaker 1: Here are some final thoughts on mutual aid from activist
Speaker 1: Krim Bruley, the Ewoks, Courtney from Wall of Moms, and
Speaker 1: the street mechanic Block. One of the things you like
Speaker 1: to say is, uh, defund the police and invest in community.
Speaker 1: And you know, one of the things like my mom
Speaker 1: earlier and she's like, and that's your monitor, and now
Speaker 1: lady need one thing just like you can do the
Speaker 1: other thing, like stop by the battle and it's like
Speaker 1: help the people that need help. And we want to
Speaker 1: use society where the police aren't needed for every goddamn thing.
Speaker 1: The police aren't needed to harass the house with people
Speaker 1: in various locations. The police aren't he is to respond
Speaker 1: to various menial health situations of all high end all
Speaker 1: over the city. The police aren't. You know, basically, you
Speaker 1: don't have the presence they do and the potential they
Speaker 1: do to escalate every god dam situation. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: so what we can do instead of I guess taking
Speaker 1: away the power directly and you know, actually burning down
Speaker 1: p p A is just take their jobs in the
Speaker 1: sense of like takeaway all their responsibilities and believe them,
Speaker 1: what's nothing to do, uh, because that's the goal at
Speaker 1: the end of the day, is to have everyone in
Speaker 1: the community taken care of. Like that's all we want. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, it's like I said, the through line to
Speaker 1: like Black Lives Matter and to caaptism uh, like Polish
Speaker 1: and police. It's like we all just want the community
Speaker 1: taken care of, and all these people who see that
Speaker 1: needs to become through whatever different and specific ones this
Speaker 1: we need. UM. So yeah, it's it's more of a
Speaker 1: I hope it continues to do this way. I think
Speaker 1: it will is becoming more of a think of people
Speaker 1: are organizing action that is directly sitting their community. The
Speaker 1: one thing that really stands out is that Portland's infrastructure
Speaker 1: is what makes it possible for us to continue to
Speaker 1: stay out here and do this work, um and to
Speaker 1: continue to persist even as UM those that hold on
Speaker 1: to white supremacist structures really clean to the dying, gasping
Speaker 1: breadths of it. UM. If you are in another city
Speaker 1: and you are looking to form your own mutual aid
Speaker 1: support network, firstly and foremostly this is going to be
Speaker 1: a massive collaboration effort. It's going to feel like you
Speaker 1: want to do everything because everything needs to be done,
Speaker 1: and so the most important steps that you can take
Speaker 1: is recognizing your lane and recognizing how to stay in
Speaker 1: your lane and recognizing how to let your lane meet
Speaker 1: other people's late. UM, I think that just like the
Speaker 1: sense of like communities and people taking care of each other. Um,
Speaker 1: we're in a pandemic and a lot of people just
Speaker 1: don't even have jobs or are working right now, and
Speaker 1: the house of community is only like getting larger, and
Speaker 1: the police are talking the house of community as well.
Speaker 1: So UM, just seeing people rally around to take care
Speaker 1: of our community while the UM the government and UM
Speaker 1: the police that we actually pay with our tax dollars,
Speaker 1: I'm not doing shipped to people right now at this moment.
Speaker 1: UM seeing us gather around and really take care of
Speaker 1: each other, even though like we don't personally know each other,
Speaker 1: we're still you know, everyone is still a family and
Speaker 1: doing everything they can to provide um the necessities to
Speaker 1: live to each other. So I think that that's like
Speaker 1: something that's been really amazing is all of the mutual
Speaker 1: aid that's come out of this. Uh, what's been going
Speaker 1: on here in Portland is really beautiful. UM. People are
Speaker 1: able to make relent, people are starting to get jobs
Speaker 1: through other people's connections. People are able to eat, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, people are like providing shelter and you know,
Speaker 1: things to live to the house with community after like
Speaker 1: they've been taken and flashed by the police. So I
Speaker 1: think that that's just something that's outside of all of
Speaker 1: the protests. Is really amazing to see, uh this this
Speaker 1: maybe come together. And I actually took my children down
Speaker 1: to jail support to drop off some things this past
Speaker 1: weekend in Vancouver, and it's just a really great opportunity
Speaker 1: to show them how we as a community need to
Speaker 1: take care of each other and how much love is
Speaker 1: around all of this. It's hard for my kids to
Speaker 1: kind of understand what's going on and see like why
Speaker 1: I'm like put them to bed and then you know
Speaker 1: leave them with their dad to like go out every night.
Speaker 1: Um and then sure, and they see certain things on
Speaker 1: the news and stuff, so they have, like I tried
Speaker 1: to explain to them what's really going on, but it
Speaker 1: was really important for me to take them this weekend
Speaker 1: to show them that like we do, how like we
Speaker 1: we always say like we got us, like we really do,
Speaker 1: and um, explaining to them if anyone's going to take
Speaker 1: care of our community, like it's going to be us
Speaker 1: at the end of the day. So I just a'm
Speaker 1: like trying to eradicate I feel as had a young
Speaker 1: age and just teach them, um at a young age
Speaker 1: that you know that in the end, we are the
Speaker 1: ones that take care of each other. That I think
Speaker 1: about a lot in terms of where where things are going,
Speaker 1: is just about like all the skills that everybody's learning,
Speaker 1: UM from whatever they're doing. There are so many different
Speaker 1: mutually like groups and blocks popping up and trying to
Speaker 1: or like create material action. UM. But there's also a
Speaker 1: ton of things that are being learned on the street,
Speaker 1: and there are ton of being things being learned in
Speaker 1: terms of organizing protests and direct actions and media campaigns
Speaker 1: and all of these other kinds of things. And I
Speaker 1: think that UM, as the protests continue and as the
Speaker 1: kind of resistance to the powers that be continues, UM,
Speaker 1: I'm really hopeful that we all continue to grow and
Speaker 1: get better at what we're doing, UM, so that we
Speaker 1: can really like keep pushing forward and build the world
Speaker 1: that we want to see. I have a couple of
Speaker 1: things first, UM, anybody can do it. Anybody. It doesn't
Speaker 1: matter how small. It doesn't matter what you're doing, you
Speaker 1: can be part of a larger scale operation in the
Speaker 1: sense of if you have something, you can provide it,
Speaker 1: even if it's like helping something dig something off of
Speaker 1: the internet or you know, telling someone this is how
Speaker 1: this thing works. Anybody can do that. And also do
Speaker 1: not be afraid to ask people for help if you
Speaker 1: don't understand something or if you just need help in
Speaker 1: terms of resources, like these things are there, and the
Speaker 1: more people that are involved, the easier it becomes. Does
Speaker 1: that make sense? Yes, gritty, And also mutual aid can
Speaker 1: be as small as it needs to be and as
Speaker 1: quiet as it needs to be. Something like helping your
Speaker 1: neighbor jump a car like that can be mutual aid.
Speaker 1: It like you can start a group and raise ten
Speaker 1: tho dollars over the course of a few months, and
Speaker 1: you know, like give people vehicles. That's also mutually Um.
Speaker 1: You don't need to like you know, create weird hierarchies
Speaker 1: or um kind of prioritize one form of it over another. Um.
Speaker 1: It's really just like like like a means for helping
Speaker 1: each other. Uh. Where the grandpops who couldn't fathom the
Speaker 1: Obama sis, I don't hate America, just to me, And
Speaker 1: she keeps the promises in teens looking like the sixties.
Speaker 1: It's crazy, a nationwide dejab. What my people post to do?
Speaker 1: Go to schools named after the clan founder? We're around
Speaker 1: town is? I don't see why we frown in Native
Speaker 1: American students forced to learn about when Opeba Sarah? How
Speaker 1: was that fair? Bro? Some heroes unsung in some months.
Speaker 1: That's getting monuments built for them. But ain't be all
Speaker 1: a little bit of monthster we crook? You know this
Speaker 1: pass prepos