Knowing Thy Neighbor

Good morning! It’s time to wake up and start the same day we’ve all been living for the last couple of years. Watch the news to see what terrible thing happened while you slept. Open Twitter for everyone’s knee-jerk reactions to the terrible thing. Text your loved ones about how awful today’s thing is. Fight your second cousin’s sister-in-law in the Facebook comments. Listen to a podcast about global leaders agreeing to address this terrible thing and pretend you understand it. 

With days like that, it’s more than tempting to give up on each other right now. That’s the point. We are being intentionally overwhelmed. We are fully adrift in the sea of hot takes, pushed further into extreme niches until organizing becomes impossible. 

It’s in these moments that we most need to resist. To resist, we need each other. We need community. No, not the kind that fits neatly in a Coca-Cola ad. Not even the kind that requires you to understand every little nuance.

I’m far from an expert, but when I personally think of community, I think of joy first. Community grows in well-loved lawn chairs on porches. It thrives with earnest curiosity about someone else. Community is doing what we can with what we have, for anyone who needs it.

Hatred or defensiveness can’t build a community. We don’t thrive on only the grief and pain of being “othered.” There has to be love and joy in the mix, or it will fall apart as quickly as it began. 

These actions are not “activism,” really. But it’s only become more clear over the last few years that closer communities and neighborhoods of all kinds make organized resistance stronger. Simply put, we work better together. Now, we need to figure out what “together” looks like nowadays.

A Beginner’s guide to reconnecting with the outside world

My first humble suggestion is to make informed decisions about when and how you gather online. It can sometimes feel like we are obligated to join in these spaces when we really aren’t. It’s crucial to be intentional about when, how and why we engage so we don’t speak over activists who have been leading these movements for years. 

For every op-ed about the ills of online action, you’ll find a million rebuttals. My suggestion? Read both and note the publishing dates. The Internet of 2012 is a few lifetimes removed from the Internet of 2022.

• I started with Malcolm Gladwell’s “Small Change,” published in 2010. Whether he’s right or wrong, it’s a tidy summary of the “anti social media” stance.
• Follow that up with a little optimism, courtesy of Jane Hu’s “The Second Act of Social-Media Activism” from 2020.
• I also recommend this entire piece about online abortion activism from June 2022. It unpacks how engaging in these topics can cause harm or risk digital privacy. I personally made many of the mistakes they covered. We need these reminders, early and often.

For some additional perspective, increase your media literacy by taking a look at a media bias chart to get a sense of where your regular news outlets might fall. The Allsides Media Bias chart and the Ad Fontes Media chart are two well-researched, transparent sources to start with. Note: these bias scores don’t rank one outlet as “better” than another. It is a reminder that journalists and editorial boards are human and aren’t always totally impartial. Knowing what biases you’re exposed to in your news is crucial for being media literate. 

Keep tabs on your local resources. Can you confidently say you know where the closest shelter is? Which restaurants provide free food for unhoused folks? Do you know if there’s a community center nearby with free programming? What services does your public library provide? (They probably have way, WAY more than you think). 

For most cities, this information is one Google search away. My recommendation is to use your Notes app or similar to jot down the info when you find a place like this. The next time you’re ready to give back, it’s as simple as checking your list. There’s power in knowing these spaces exist and helping people access what they need, even if you don’t need it yourself.

Learn about bystander intervention training and other non-violent tactics. As a white (passing) woman, I’m in the process of unpacking the learned paranoia I have about interpersonal violence. That’s an article for another time, but regardless, it’s been life-changing to replace my social anxiety and victim complex with feelings of belonging and responsibility to others.

Find a book, resource or training session and take a friend with you. Not only will you start feeling safer in public settings, but you get to make those settings safer for everyone else too.

Two ways to get started include:

• The Creative Interventions Toolkit: Practical Tools to Stop Interpersonal Violence.
• Right To Be: a nonprofit with resources for addressing street harassment.

Consider mutual aid. Mutual aid and direct support can be powerful in forming closer community ties. Have you donated to a friend’s GoFundMe or provided food for an unhoused person? Congrats, you’ve already done this! Keep up the good work and make it a consistent part of your routine. Note that it’s usually better to join existing networks instead of starting your own.

Make your support social. Invite a friend. Find a coworker to join you. Take your significant other to meetings. What’s most important is consolidating your power. Instead of fragmenting across multiple organizations, lend your support to the existing groups and activists who laid the foundation and just need more hands and voices.

Attend local city and neighborhood meetings. Yes, seriously. Many of these institutions are run by people who only hear one point of view which they believe represents the whole community. You’d be surprised how simple it is to create change in these spaces just because you showed up. Local politics helps shape federal policy and the more you speak up, show up and connect - the more likely your point of view is to be heard and acted upon. 

Become a regular. If you have the funds, consider being a regular monthly donor to your local food bank, community fridge, shelter or similar. If you have time, become a trained, consistent volunteer instead. Play to your strengths and don’t be afraid to focus your efforts on one or two places, max. Some examples are:

• Animal Shelters, like local favorites Austin Pets Alive! or Friends For Life. They don’t just need people to walk dogs or pick up poop. Consider supporting marketing efforts, shuttling animals to and from locations or supplying food or beds regularly.
• Planned Parenthood: Large organizations often need niche skills beyond your expected volunteer roles. You could be a clinic walker, do simple data entry or even support education programs. 
• Community Fridges, like those in Houston and Austin: you could transport food, work with local restaurants, repair the fridges or simply donate on your way back from the grocery store.
• Highly focused grassroots organizations that demonstrate a clear understanding of their vision. Hoochies of Houston is a favorite local example of ours.