Resistance Through Mutual Aid

so much power. Like mutual aid really is the way of the future. So this is basically just a precursor to what I feel like will be a world like avoid of police and and like constant state violence. Is will have these net works in mutual aid communities that UM will basically make that obsolete. So that's really huge for us. That's Jedi, a local organizer and musician. As the protests in Portland and around the nation moved into their third month, Governor Kate Brown announced that the FEDS

were pulling out of the city. With the announcement, the crowds of thousands that had come out and forced to protest the federal presence shrunk By the second week of August, ongoing protests drew only a few hundred people into the streets each night. For the people that wanted to defund and abolish the Portland police, the federal draw down meant that it was time to get back to the real fight. Months of being gassed and beaten together had given this

community of protesters a powerful sense of shared purpose. At the same time, the drop off in numbers raised the specter of burnout for activists and pointed to a long road ahead. Systems of mutual aid began to spring up, both out of need and out of a desire by many to finally start building the world they wanted to live in. To narry the next part of this here's Donovan Smith, a local Portland journalist and one of the

authors of this series. After more than two months in the streets, protesters in Portland were exhausted and traumatized, but ready to return to the real fight of defunding the police. But the enormous protests of early June were now months passed, and after the wild circuits of violence that was fed occupation, people were tired, and there were questions about how to direct the attention of the city back from Trump to the violence of Portland Police Bureau. Jacob Burrow's of Direct

Action Alliance talks about organizing exhaustion. Well, to be honest with you, it doesn't really like everyone. Everyone falls off. Everyone gets tired and falls off, and it's it's the solidarity that comes into play at that point. So, I mean, I'll take months off where I just can't anymore, where I'm I'm just exhausted to the bone, where I I literally have nothing left to give. And during those times is when my comrade come in and do what they

need to do. And then when they're tired, that's when I come in and do what I need to do. And that's how we kind of keep it perpetually going. Is that you've got to be there for folks. When you see someone who's you know you people, that's the problem. It's it's fatiguing, it caused there's a huge toll. Organizing takes a huge toll on people. Even just organizing one event, it takes three days of my life away from my kids, from my responsibilities at home, from what I need to do,

and it's it's exhausting. And that's that's just the organizing part. You know, you still have to consider the emotional toll that it takes to go out and do this and put yourself on the line. You have to take into account the threats that you get from the right, You have to take into account the threats that you get from the government. So there's all of these things and no one is just a superperson that can go and

power through it. And that's that's a big thing. A big misconception I think is people think that the faith is you know, there's some people who who their face has become prominent or their name has become prominent, and people think that it's all them, and it's not. There's there's a huge, huge effort behind everything of support of mutual aid that keeps everything going. So the reason it's been able to go for ten years isn't because there's people who have been able to keep going for ten

years straight. It's because every time someone falls back and can't do it and need to break someone else were we are lucky enough to be in a community and that's how it keeps ongoing, is that every time, every time there's a hole in the line, we have comrades who are willing to step back in and fill it up. And that's how that's how we've been able to kind of keep this momentum going is because there's always someone who's willing to step up when someone has when another

person has kind of reached their limit. And that's that's how you keep it going is by building those connections, those trust bonds, and those those solidarity connections and mutual aid can actions where we're all helping each other out. We all have to be there for each other, and using social media and telegram, the community stepped up to

fill holes in the line. Nightly actions began to be organized autonomously anonymous calls to action with post locations, mostly of different police precincts for the Portland Ice facility, and people would show up to the protests. If the police were going to continue to brutalize people, then protesters planned

on wearing them down and exhausting their budget. Every night of the week, people assembled at some park around the city and would march to a different precincts, yelling, chanting, and standing in the street for hours until the police would charge, clearing them out with gas, batons and brute force. While these actions were referred to as d a's or direct actions. The nights often consisted of protesters hurling more insults than anything else, adding in an occasional dumpster fire

to mix it up. Despite the nightly actions of getting to follow up predictable pattern that usually ended with police roll rushing people down unlit neighborhood streets for the crimes of yelling in the road. PPB press releases portrayed each evening as an intense battle with dangerous radicals. These claims were not borne out by the arrest that they made.

The charges leveled at protesters arrested were almost all I p O or interference with the police officer, the charge that they could file if you did not move fast enough when they bull rushed. I PO was one of the charges that d A. Mike Schmidt had announced on August eighth that his office would decline to prosecute. Thereafter, nearly all protester charges were dropped, possibly to compensate for the loss of legal cloud. Portland police ramped up on

the brutality. Acts of minor vandalism will be answered by baton charges, and any protesters are unable to outrun the bull rush would be knocked to the ground, body slammed, or beaten and then often left lying on the pavement with no attempt made to arrest. Police made it very clear that their intent was to punish protesters whether or

not they had legal recourse. It was an exhausting period, however, and start contrast to the brutality of the nighttime actions, by August, protesters were spending the days building on the mutual aid networks that had already existed in Portland and expanding them in new ways to support the community. But what is mutual aid? To answer that, I'm going to turn this over to activists on the ground who were implementing it. PDX treat Medics formed during the summer, and

we'll talk more about their work later. But here's their definition of mutual aid. It's bringing some amount of equity where there is none, you know, in this very small sense of like the street max. If someone can't afford repairs, UM usually they would have to go into debt to get that repaired at an auto shop, where um usually they would be up sold several thousand dollars in repairs

they don't need. So where we step in, we are saving them that bill and then being able to make sure they're able to keep other needs ment and through that action is a small amount of equity where there would be none. I was just gonna say, kind of piggybacking off Cyprusus point. Um I I kind of see, you know, what we're doing as a you know, I

think it's it's kind of it. It's trying to challenge the current system, you know, and in this system is a system that has so many, so many flaws, and I think that mutual Aid is kind of trying to uh address some of those flaws or try to mitigate some of those flaws in the sense that you know, kind of living this we live under capitalism, you know, we live under in a system that tolerates you know, homelessness. Uh, you know we live under yeah, I mean a system

that oppresses so many minorities and stuff like that. Um So I think that just what mutual aid is, and you know, specifically, maybe our role is kind of at least the way I see it, is challenging that system of capitals and challenging you know, being like hey, like you know, you don't you know, We're going to try to just help people, not based on you know, gaining anything out of it. We're just helping people because that's

what we're supposed to do as humans. I think that's something that we really need to keep in the center of reminds me to thinking about mitchial Aid is that the people who lose the most in our current system have the tend to have the least ability to change anything. UM. And that is one of the or like motivating factors

behind mutually UM. Where it is people who are really like living truly paycheck to paycheck, or don't even have any stable income and are living in a car and it's like slowly slowly breakaking down and there's just nothing

to do about it. UM. These are the kind of situations in which that little bit of extra help can really mean that that person can continue to have a life, and that life can continue to be good, and that life can continue to be something that's worth fighting for, and that way those people can continue to fight for their own lives. UM. If community support doesn't really happen, and mutually it's really just a fancy word for community support.

If that doesn't actually happen, those people aren't going to be able to fight because they're trying to survive. And we need to be able to get a little bit beyond survival in order to really organize and fight and resist on the scale that is necessary for dealing with the problem that we're basing. Something that I about a bunch in this ort, in this group is that I actually sometimes don't think that organizations can provide mutual aid um.

That instead people have to provide mutualate and that because that principle isn't about like mutually, it's about seeing activity and women like acting within the um, whereas charity is all about like creating this other thing. You're providing business, and there's like a lot of citying and a lot of like apologizing that happens in that relationship that mutually. Really. Some mutual aid groups existed in Portland prior to the

George Floyd uprising. As COVID swept the country in spring, new mutualay organizations popped up all over the city, and some groups that were already active look for new ways to help rose hips. A medic collective has been around for eleven years. They began making hands and tides are in distributing it around the city at the beginning of the pandemic. As protests intensified, they were to reverse engineer chemical wives to help with tear gas and pepper spray.

Medics loaded with cards filled with water, energy drinks, and I cleaning kids were a common sight every night. James A rose Hip Street medic describes the early days of the uprisings. Yeah, I remember the first time that I went to a protest um after the pandemic uh suprising began to happen at the same time, I think the Peninsula Park and like, we just brought a bunch of hand sanitizer, and we're like, I don't know, let's walk

around and hands hand sanitizer out to people. And we also have these masks, so let's hand these things out, and like all of our supply was was gone within like half an hour, and there was a large, a whole park full of people at that time. And so, you know, initially it was just handing out to people before the marching began um. And then once the protests really picked up steam and started to be responded to with more repression, we started to ask ourselves, like what

else can we distributed? Basically, and one thing that treatmatics usually do, or or that streament is a really trained to do, is to flush out people's eyes if they've been either pepper sprayed or tear gas. But that necessarily creates aerosolized particles from people's eyeballs because you're squirting water into people's eyes high velocity. And so we're like, this doesn't feel like a safe activity anymore. Can we hand

out preportioned bottles of our preferred eye wash solution? Yes, we have all these bottles lying around, and so like, let's do that. And then someone asked, you know, these these chemical weapons removing wipes, Like what's in these? Can

we make our own? And then some very smart people who are not me like figured out the recipe and created a whole manufacturing apparatus to produce and distribute huge numbers of chemical weapons wipes UM every day and so and then because the demand kept increasing, particularly as the violence and increased, UM and people use the products, and then we're like, we really need these. These are great and people, you know, they saw us around, maybe who

we were. We started to put our name on things, just that was clear that like it's us building up this trust community and not some other random group. UM. Then people started to UM. So just sort of like the demand created the whole chain of events, and because people already knew us from distributing hand sanitizer, we had

a lot of good will with UM. I would say, community groups who wouldn't ordinarily think to themselves radical leftist street protesters are our people UM, but like churches and whatnot who a lot of work with people living outside, We're like, okay, you seem to be more or less on the same page with us. So that's how those networks.

Other groups that were already on the ground were the PDX General Defense Committee and Defense Fund PDX, who raised bail money and helped make sure that protesters made it home and jail support waited outside the central precinct every night with food, hot drinks, and support. The Witches had already been present before the summer, handing out water bottles and supplies. Somebody Else's PDX had begun as a coalition of mutual aid groups. However, when COVID hit, the work

connecting communities and mutual aid expanded. So yeah, at the beginning of before COVID hit, UH symbiosis was mostly focused on UM. At the time, our our project merk or Munisipalist Go Resiliency Project, where we were working on kind of UM connect again and with that dual power lens, trying to UM consolidate uh like food access and production infrastructure for the community UM, as well as like doing

some housing rights work UM. When COVID hit, we're a really small organization UM and immediately just kind of like called this sixty sixty organ wide coalition call to be like, hey, Radical Left, this is a big fucking deal. What do we want to do about it? How can we support each other in doing that? And through that work, we were able to kind of UM more succinctly find what gaps in the radical left infrastructure there was, so that we could work on filling that need. Part of that

was UM creating uh hubs around town. UH there there was a few all the existing and stuff. So that's where we created SHARE or the Symbiosis Hub and Resource Exchange program, where we were able to be some of the first uh first on the ground responders to making sure that our communities have the PPE they needed when we were being told that we that we shouldn't have PPE because we should save it for other people. So

we we were distributing PPE. We'd organized the solidarity Stitchers, which we're both producing their own masks and kind of teaching each other how to sew and learning basic organizing skills and how to interact with one another in this directly democratic way. But we're also activating the community by

creating these groups. The Solidarity Stitchers group online that allowed us to then increase our production to being able to basically hand make masks that nobody could find anywhere, UH numbering in the thousands, UM and and getting and partnering. We also created the Solidarity UH Fund UM this Inbiosis Solidarity Fund, which basically was not only UM giving individuals in the Portland area who were experiencing economic hardship and

response to the COVID pandemic UM directly. We were giving them funds like people who needed medical expenses, covered, people who needed transportation needs, covered people, et cetera, but as well as well as grassroots organizations that needed money to continue their vital programming for example UH Portland Action Medics and UH slash the rose Hip Medic Collective. UH we were able to make sure to get them multiple thousands of dollars to continue the hand sanitizer project that they

were doing. From there, we were able to slowly grow through our our mutual aid program through share and solidarity stitchers, the Solidarity Fund into UM also expanding within ourselves sort of this education and outreach work that we were doing to further further within our organization and out in in the general public, educate about communalism, mutual aid, what it means to be an accomplice, things about the the radical

left movement that have been forgotten or never learned. This group to encompass connections with the Warrant Springs Reservation, distributing supplies PPE and clean water with fires igniting the spirit. When the water main for the reservation broke when the protests began, Symbios's moved to make sure that PPE and resources were available there as well. We were printing zines

and showing up at protests UM. At the protests, we were also the first group on the ground essentially to provide PPE, recognizing that yes, this uprising is going to happen, regardless of the risk, because the need is that great. But we're gonna do that and seed a culture of

taking care of each other. UM. So yeah, in distributing zines and UH and educational material of other sorts, and stuff and getting people plugged into organizing other much way formed in the early days of the protests, fueled by the desire to help out however possible. Early on, snack Mom was realized that they were not interested in running from the police, but they can make sure that the people in the streets had food and supplies. Uh, snack MoMA number one. I go by Shiba um where I

guess we're mutual A. Yeah. Yeah. We hand out snacks and waters and things that nature. Anything you know, anybody would need, uh soot things like that, stash medical supplies, any like extra like mass or gas masks or protective gear that we can possibly get our hands on. Um, lots of stuff. I mean there's been a lot of endom stuff that we put out there is whatever the needs are, but mainly just snacks and drinks. Um. And I'm snack Mama too. I've already been docks, so I'm

not even worried about my name. I go by Amanda, and yeah, that's pretty much what we do, mutual aid. Yeah. How did you get started, Like when when did you first start coming to the out to the protests? Like how did you get started coming out to the protests. UM, what was thetis for you to come out? Well? UM, when the whole George Floyd video was released and I've seen that it was, it was mortified. I cried because it was it was definitely just hard to watch UM

again again and again and again and again. And this was just coming the last off for everyone, you know, I feel like UM. And then there were protests going on down town. UM, so we went and checked them out. And then after that we started going out pretty much every night after that and just checking them out. UM. I don't exactly remember when it was, but we have started up with UM, the next partner of mine, now he started I remember it was the beginning of June.

I drugged them with me. We wouldn't check it out, you know. UM. So then after that we had started cooking where we're cooking downtown. UM. We did that for like maybe a month too or two. UM. We're what we're called Don't Starve PDX. Yeah, don't Start UM. Yeah. So that was us UM. And then August fifteen, there was a domestic dispute between me and my partner UM, who was part of Don't Start. It was part of Don't Start UM. And then after that, I mean, the

the original snack band. He was supposed to get that. UM. And then after the domestic dispute, UM, the owner of the van pulled out from underneath him was like, you know, I can't support this. UM. Then he offered me the van and then me and her UM had this van and we're like, okay, what can we do with this? UM? So then that's when we started doing snack Mamas. It took us a minute to come up with the name, but eventually we did. But at that point people kind

of already knew who we were. UM. So then we you know, came out with snack Mamas and that's what we've been doing ever since. Yeah, I remember seeing you out when you were doing the adult Starve. UM. What really was just like to feed people? UM? I think I think we just want to support the movement. And I mean, honestly, we're a couple of chunky girls. You know, we were we were no like match for these you know officers that are like fit, you know, trying to

chase us. We're like trying to find like bushes or like holes die and or you know what I mean. We're just like, man, this is like this is too much for us because I cannot run. For yeah, the first time I know that that isn't for me. Um, I'm standing there and all of a sudden, I see this metal objects moving towards me and it's on fire and it's spinning, and I'm like oh, and I like, you know, instantly start freaking out, and I'm like okay, so you know, I take off and I start running,

and I'm like, okay, this isn't for me. You know, I can't outrun objects, I can't outrun the cops, you know, so defend. So I just didn't have any gas master or anything yet or at that point for like stuffing our faces with stuff, trying to breathe still and try and like protect ourselves. And yeah, yes it's harsh times, but we wanted to support like in whatever way we could, right. I think that's kind of where we started, like doing that for other people that wanted to protests but didn't

feel comfortable going out alone. Comrade collective connected protesters to each other, sparking the connections that help sustain the movement. That's a tough has a kind of a tough one to summarize. Um, I guess the best way to say it is that UM community has kind of been a

limiting factor for a lot of people in protests. And right around the time of uh fourth of July and like right after that, Shark Youth started kind of becoming a kind of a meeting point for folks through social media, through Telegram, and from there there's been several um definit iterations, Disabled commeron Collective, Care Collective, UM soon to be Queer Comedy Collective as well, all kind of forming from that.

I don't know, locusts of just like community, just like folks trying to find the necessary connections to get their ideas off the ground. Yeah. I mean for me personally, I just sort of started sitting in a park with a sign, just asking people if they needed buddies. I was going to be there anyway. It figured like it was something easy to do, and I started a Twitter

and one thing just sort of snowballed into another. Now here we are Disabled Comrade Collective have form to meet the needs of people with disabilities or who have alternative needs to be able to participate in protests. Yeah. How um so, how Disabled Comrade Collective started was kind of like, um, so, I'm I'm disabled and chronically ill, so like I can't be on the ground all the time. It's like here and there, and then when I am, it takes a

lot out of me. UM and so uh Sylvan who is like like the main person of UM like handling disabled comrade collective. Uh, they also are disabled and chronically

ill and so um. They just kind of like we were just complaining on Twitter, like they were like, man, like, there needs to be like a group for like disabled and ill people like to have different needs and like neuro divergent and then like, um, it just everyone was like yeah, and then it just kind of uh went onto Sylvan and they're like, I guess I'm doing this thing. So that's how that started. The e Walks also formed early in the protests, but through the course of the

summer they found that their mission change. E Walks is a humanitarian aid coalition made up of crisis and medical workers were fighting integrated medical and mental health care that's trauma informed and harm reductive in nature. This service model was really adapted from another organization that we worked with um as organizers called Whitebird Medicine UM and they've been

the attention of National news recently for their cooods program. However, looking at the situations in Portland and the socio political inequities that are being enforced every single day, it became increasingly clear that Britland's model was going to need to look at little bit different. So we beefed up our teams and we got a hole off the ground side and now we've sort of moved morphed into like a whole bunch of different things we do UH protest work.

Still we're committed in UM supporting the community for as long as that needs to happen. One thing that became increasingly clear as public reliance on the police force has begun to reflect the police forces ability to protect people who served them, UM E walks has really taken a look at what the city needs most. And our shift was born out of seeing a complete lack of actually

reachable mental health services within our city. UM costs are prohibited access to those actual things within standalone buildings does not work for many patients and it also leaves our

houses community severely lacking as always in services and outreach. UM. As we began looking at adapting our model and taking a look at what this community needed, one of the things that struck us most was that there is a complete lack about tornadove resources to police involvement, and while EOX is not there yet, we would like to envision a future where we have a place in helping form a service that can do just such a thing. Meeting

in the front of the Federal Courthouse. During the Fed War, Optical Block began doing eye exams, helping people get prescriptions and glasses, organizing around the Mutual eight tents of Riot Ribs. As Riot Ribs imploded at the end of July, the number of mutual Aid Quote blocks organizing services to protesters and marginalized communities exploded. These groups organized around identifying and

helping with one community need at a time. Protesters set up a wide ranging network of alternative organizing to help each other outside of the frameworks of the city or capitalism. In many cases, the blocks were explicit that in an abolition this framework, the goal was to meet needs without the charity and violence that often accompanied the state and more traditional types of existence. Instead organized as a community

to give people's needs met. As activist Mariah explains, there was a block for everything, like pet block, Yeah, oh gosh, I mean, I can't say I have a favorite. They're all amazing, Like they they honestly like shocked me every day because I'm just like, oh do we I even asked them, like, yo, do we have a kram plastic Block Like yeah, I don't say I have a favorite. I am just amazed by people being able to come

together and do that. I've seen job Block, I've seen I've seen stuff I couldn't even think of, and I'm like, that's just amazing. I think it's amazing for like, yeah, this little community. I'm like, I wish people like would know more about this. I wanna say no more about this, but get more involved because I'm like the community is just doing it and like, yeah, we protect us and it's amazing. As August continued, community events in mutual full

affairs became common. Mending Block could repair your clothes and made bockle buzz for anonymity at night actions. Beauty Block could give you a manicure, but also made bath bombs and care packages for jail support. Community art therapy happened weekly as people try to process the stress and brutality. Tech Block assisted people with computers and devices while we don't have time to cover every group that arose during that time. We can't have Some of the activists describe

how and why they formed. Jedi explains Plant Block. So, Plant Block literally came out of mutual Aid, Like it formed out of like mac already being in contact with a bunch of community members, already having his own garden kind of things set up, and then just pull everybody together and creating digitals with flowers or provide people with just like vegetable bags and stuff like that. So like nowadays, if you go to any kind of like well, this was certainly true. I mean, we're not having as many

because it's so cold and wet now. But like a lot of the the community events that we would hold, um, half of those like vendors that would be at these community events literally were formed within this movement. They didn't exist prior to George Floyd. So seeing how you know, the tragic death of of of him and many others fallen before him have kind of, in a way like been a catalyst for strengthening mutual Aid in our city.

UM And anybody who's been on the ground, been going to these events has seen it with their own eyes. So many different mutual aid groups have formed because of u's just coming together so often, and the more that we come together, the more we realize we don't need to rely on the state UM to feed and clothe and keep us. During the Fed War, cars were damaged by right munitions and had their filters clagged with powdered tear gas. Portland Please developed a habit of repeatedly attacking

protester vehicles protecting marches by stabbing out their tires. Those snack Mamas had their vans impounded and trash for handing out food and water. In response, pt Street Mechanics formed to help people repair their cars and provide vehicle assistance for protesters, but quickly in large their focus to help with other transportation needs. Here they explain how they formed.

The Proton Street Mechanics started UM kind of just like on Twitter, primarily because there were calls for people's cars getting to repairs after having them being damaged out in protests. UM. It very quickly expanded well beyond that because car repair isn't something that you can do at protests UM, and that was one of our first things, is like, I know,

we're actually just doing community car care UM. By moving away from the protests scene actually allows us to UM focus on other things UM and actually focus on the marginalized communities that are tend to be very active in protests but are also the reasons why we are protesting UM.

And that was a big thing for us in our initial framing, was not necessarily just helping protesters kind of manage their day to day needs UM, but also helping to support the communities that are have historically been marginalized and have historically been oppressed UM so that these protests don't need to happen. We should not have to go and protest UM. And a big part of it is building the world that we want to see UM, So

we kind of quickly moved into that perspective. I think a lot of plays we end up writing a lot of support for other blocks. So a lot of the people that we help and people reach out to us are people who are using their vehicles for MUTUALID and UM. Those people absolutely get UM like care from us. They get support in terms of making sure that their vehicles are reliable and safe UM so that they can provide

their own kind of like practices. Because a lot of a lot of other MUTUALID systems or like organizations are about like just giving stuff away UM and providing those those goods UM. The service providing component UM kind of like breaks with that a little bit. So like we we haven't really been able to UM kind of meet up and go to a lot of like the or like some of the fares or some of the kind of like mutual aid meetups because we there's no spot

to work on cars UM. So when we've run into some problems with that UM with like people being fine with people distributing food, but then we're like, oh, can we do an all change in your parking, It's like no, we can't do that. UM. So we end up having to to get really creative in terms of where we do our work and how we UM actually like just like logistically organized with other people. Coming up next is a Lane, my colleague in the streets and my partner

in writing this podcast. The cycle of nightly protests and daily community building and mutual aid would continue unabated, and on September five, Portland had its hundredth night of continuous protest. The event was marked by a care fair featuring many

of the mutual aid groups that had formed recently. Plant Blok had vegetables, sprouts and seeds that they were giving away, and care Block offered massages to protesters and Tea Symbiosis tabled books and zines, and people donated food and listened

to speakers and music by local musicians. At one point, the car caravan, a reoccurring car protest frequented by people whose social distancing needs made other types of visible protest harder, came past, honking horns, waving signs declaring that black lives mattered. Mac was on the ground that day. You know, I think a lot of folks once once things went off in Minneapolis, and once we knew they were you know, once we had our first big riot here in Portland,

we knew something was going to happen. Like we knew that there were going to be some protests and stuff last a little while. I don't think anyone at the start of it really called a hundred plus days continuous protest. When did you realize this is not a normal not just not a normal Portland protest, This isn't like a normal Portland summer of protests, and it would continue to

not be a normal summer of protests. That night, Portland police pushed protesters blocks away from the East Portland precinct, gassing families in their homes, and at the beginning of September, ore Agon began one of its worst fire seasons on record. As one of the last marches commemorating the hundredth the day of protest while and through the St. John's neighborhood of North Portland, Mariah remembers how the sky slowly dimmed as smoke began rolling into the city from fires burning

from the south and east. I won't, I won't for the day it started rolling into town. I was actually at the big march in St. John's because we all started coming back and we were just like coughing and and everything, and I was like, what the is going on? I looked in there and I was like, Okay, it's smoked from a fire. But I was like, but where And then obviously, you know, twenty four hours later we

started becoming hell. But how much it just shows like the community transition to mutual aid in aiding like fire survivors and victims. Uh me as well. I also did, like I don't know, I raised like five thousand dollars and went and went shopping and dropped him off like they got a place near Lloyd's Center. UM and then out in Milwaukee. But it was so amazing to see the community be able to come together and help people. Dry conditions and hot winds sent fire sweeping four states.

Oregon was enveloped in the worst fires the state had seen in decades. Smoke from multiple blazes blanketed the region, making breathing impossible and devastating huge swaths of the state. As thousands evacuated and whole towns were consumed by fire with no evidence, far right media exploded with rumors that Antifa and BLM were starting fires. Despite public officials trying to counteract the rumors, it was too little, too late.

The fearmongering rhetoric had scared individuals and right wing militias to stay in fire areas, hindering evacuees, and to set up armed checkpoints and fire zones to harass anyone they thought didn't look right. Reporter Alyssa Tsar went out to the fire zone to talk with evacuees and report on

the fire response. UM. Just seeing you know, the community come together and kind of a great example of we protect us, you know, manifesting right before um fuck, there were people that were like rollying together trailers to go help people evacuate their barn animals and take them to somewhere safe. So yeah, I mean that's what we went

there for. Um And it's it's so funny because I believe the day before I went to Malala um or the day before that, so one or two days before, I had tweeted something and I was totally joking, but it was also very serious. It was along the lines of like, you know, right wingers on Twitter are saying, you know, Antifa started the wildfires. Meanwhile, every fucking leftist on Twitter at the time was like, hey, um, what's the most efficient way to bring a fire extinguisher to

a protest? You know, because at the time there was also a fire risk and the protests were happening, and this is something people were super concerned about. Um And you know, we were making jokes about these circulating rumors. I really did not think in a matter of two days they would manifest into a full blown, like actionable conspiracy theory unlessa soon found out how serious those conspiracy

theories were being taken. At the time, the witches had showed up and they had brought a bunch of it's like swagons filled with supplies. Um, we were on our way to I think it was at the time, the airport um because that's where the firefighters had told us that they were gonna have the firefighters be stationed as well as be taking supplies. So on our way there, there was have you ever seen those uh those signs where it's like uh green yellow, red, and it's like

a fire danger sign and the arrow points wherever. So the arrow was like all the way in the red and it was like leave now. So granted, we stopped to take a picture of that because it's there's just this like you know, field of like tall grass on the side of the road. Leave now. It was just a very picturesque moment, something really eerie about it. The road is like completely empty, but every now and then you can see like a line of cars trying to evacuate.

But anyways, we we pulled over. Um, wow, I haven't thought about this in so long, but yeah, we've We've pulled over to take this picture and Justin and Sergio are kind of still standing next to the car um and this is public property. Um, it's on the side of the road. It's not anyone's like yard or anything. And they're still by the car, and I'm like in front of the sign and there's some like tall grass.

I'm kind of crouched down taking a picture of it, and I'm like focused on the picture and hear someone talking. At first, I thought maybe it was like Justin and Sergio. But I look up and there's three dudes with with rifles, um, you know, pointing their rifles at us. And it it took a bit for me to register what was going

on because I was really confused. UM, and I got up and they started interrogating me, and I'm answering, but I'm still like really confused because I'm like, Okay, they're not cops, but why are they so offended and so aggressive and hostile? Like I I was legit, just like I could not figure out what was going on. And then they kept asking questions, you know, like where are you from, why are you in ore in the city,

or are you taking a picture of this. UM started talking about like because we all had our press credentials on, we were all in plain clothing, and you know, slowly like based off the questions they were asking. It slowly

started to kind of click for me. But even when it clicked, I think that just kind of me more confused, because like, we were literally all tweeting about this jokingly last night, but somehow and fuck, literally two to three days this rumor manifested into a fucking conspiracy where people are holding people at gunpoint, militias are holding people up

at gunpoint. It's it's just wild to me. They finally got to a point they started saying that, you know, there were people that were coming into their city that are starting fires so that they can loot. Um, you know, and they kept saying the word loot, and then um, they started talking about protesters from Portland, and it was just like you know, it was it was all like it was coming to me before, but it was coming to me in a way where it's like, okay, maybe,

but there's no way. But then they started asking those questions. I was like, oh, okay, they really do believe that I'm an Antifa starting the fires right now? Like okay, fuck? Um yeah, using words like like looting. And then they started talking about protesting, um, god fuck. And then it took a little bit before Justin and Sergio even saw and uh it was Justin who came down first and started to like talking and see what's going on. Oh funk.

I just remember too, when Sergio finally like realized what was going on. He came up to us and he's like, are you just writing us? Man? Yeah? Yeah not and not physically nobody touched us, but just like a body language and the way that they were being, the way that they were positioned and like slowly like you know,

edging forward when they would be speaking. Um, we were, I think when when Sergio got involved, him and Justin, we're just trying to be like and we're just trying to take pictures like we're not gonna bother you like like whatever. And also like we we also tried to explain to them like we're not here to like make this political or dehumanize anyone or whatever, like we're here with like sympathy and you know, like we're again this is like a humanitarian issue. This is just like what

the fuck? Yeah, you know, we're not here to be like yeah, like you know, burn those whatever, like no, none of that. Um, So they really wanted us to just like pack it up and go back to Portland. Um, you know, and they were kind of insinuating that they would have their eyes on us. They took a picture of all of our faces. They took a picture of

license plate. Um, so yeah, it's kind of creepy, but I will tell you for sure, none of us really realized what happened until like a few hours later, because we were fine, we were all fine, and I was tweeting about it. I'm like, ll guess what happened, And then like an hour or two later, we're just like, fuck,

Like we got held up at gunpoint. Um the city Like by the time we got to where we stopped, Uh, that area was all burnt down already, So had something happened, there's a good chance no one would have found out about it. As we came to learn later, the cops are all very pro these right wing militias over there, So um, the seriousness of it definitely didn't kick in

until a lot later. But what were protesters actually doing during this time, Well, many of the people being labeled as rioters and having rumors of arson spread about them were out in the community trying to help as many victims of the fires as possible. Alyssa continues. UM. You know Portland, Like mutual aid groups from Portland were dry being all the way down to Eugene to drop off some supplies and back, like you know, countless times back and forth. UM. So that was that was really great

just seeing you know, what we're capable of. UM. And I think at first, you know, we talked about the protests kind of slowing down for the fires, UM And I think a lot of it at first was because it was unhealthy to go outside. But I think a huge part of it too is like wanting to prioritize, like there's people that need help right now, and like if we don't get on this, like you know, this is this is part of what we're here for. This is this is part of anarchy, you know. UM. And yeah,

just seeing people really like commit was really incredible. I mean, did you make it down to mal Morgan from Team Raccoon had been coordinating filter exchanges and sourcing gas masks for children and rapidly changed their focus as the area was smothered by smoke. Yeah. Yeah, I was really fortunate to get to kind of collaborate with UM A lot of mutual aid groups for Malt the Mutual Aid Lloyd

Theater and also Mama, the Milwaukee area of Mutual Aid. Um. We decided to move MALT to Mama because it was damp out because of all the smoke cover and we were getting lots of donations of cloth goods like blankets and mattresses even and um, clothing in all kinds of things that we didn't want to mildew. Um. But yeah, I I was on the ground giving out respirators a

lot at MALT. I have a really fond memory of giving a respirator to an eight year old and a spider man's sure, and the eight year old was on a scooter just scooting around pretending to be a robot spider man now that they had their respirator on, and that was fun. We had fun that day. Um. But um, yeah, I I was kind of just giving respirators out like candy during wildfire disaster relief. So I'm not totally sure how many went out just for that, but it was

quite a bit. Um. Basically, we were trying to make sure that everybody who was going on supply runs to the actual camps themselves was getting a box of respirators to give out in case there were any people that were really struggling, any asthmatics, any people that um have respiratory ailments, because we had the worst air quality in

the entire world. UM I gave I remember, I gave a box of like I think it was like eighteen respirators to somebody who was like, I actually work in an asthma clinic and I know a lot of patients, and I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, here you go.

Here's a box of eighteen respirators. The Ewoks transformed an empty mall parking lot into a fire relief aid station almost overnight, becoming a node for a tremendous amount of supplies and care to bolth evacuees as well as to the houseless community that had nowhere to go to get

out of the smoke. When the fires first started raging, there was this moment um sort of I remember it being a Tuesday or a Wednesday, just after the fires had started, where the protests calmed down a little bit, largely because it was a safety issue to be out in the smoke inhalation UM and even though all of our gear is built to protect from um C S gas,

that doesn't necessarily translate to smoke air everywhere. In taking a look at what the community requests were, ewoks social media got a lot of requests of UM, calls for

medical support, calls for supply provision UM. The other organs that are headed by EWOKS organizers began getting requests through their social media and it became really clear that the AID sites that were previously established were overworked and ineffective, and they're functioning UM largely because of the amount of people that they had coming through and the issues that happened when you have those that many people with differing

views really meeting in the middle UM. When the Red Cross and the Salvation Army established a base at Clackmuths Town Center, or intent was initially to be further down south with them, but when that psyche quickly reached capacity and the overflow went to the organ convention center, we realized that there was going to be a whole group of people that weren't being serviced by the Salvation Army.

The Salvation Army also does not provide any sort of food or diapers UM, and their clothing supplies are pretty much limited to what you can carry UM. The Malt site and MALTA is an acronym that stands for Mutual Aid at Lloyd Theater UM. We established in the Lloyd Movie Theater parking lot. Thankfully, the manager of that parking lot did not have an issue with it UM, but we began doing all of the supply provision that the

Salvation Army at the Oregon Convention Center was unprepared to do. UM. We also found that we were getting a high level of UM migrant communities and minority communities that might otherwise feel grossly uncomfortable with organizations that have appeared to have

room and participation and cooperation in the past. When sort of roll through started to slow down and the Oregon Convention Center began to stabilize UM as as paired with the breaking of the fire line and the actual fire danger moving a little bit further south, we moved into the clack of this area and our goal was finding a site that was going to be safe for humans to come through no matter what their resident or minority community status was UM to receive services, but also to

be close enough to jump further down south if that was flow was accessary. Well. When we established the Mama's Site UM, and now that I'm thinking about it, I can't remember what Mamma stands for, and I apologize. Mama stands for Milwaukee Area Mutual Aid fare. We go thanks to UM. When we established the Mama's site, we had

every intention of continuing to move further now south. Something really amazing happened while we were there, and putting us inside the mutual Aid area of Milwaukee allowed best to have resources within other organizations within the community and the mutual Aid network to send supplies further downs south. What that happened to move our site UM. That location ended up being really key in terms of in terms of being able to move supplies, gain supplies, and see community UM.

And it also highlighted the needs that we were not able to meet within that which was the the property damage, in the economic impacts of having lost everything UM. In that respect, it allowed us to move more supplies to safer locations for humans because we were able to see that that was happening and able to pre plan for what their future coming needs would be. Some of those supply lines are still open and we are still funneling about supplies UM that have just been passed around groups

since time. May I jump in yeah, so a couple of things. I'd like to add. One of the things that was really important about MALT or Mutual Aid at Lloyd Theater, we we were able to address the needs of our houseless community that did not want it to UM go inside and stay at the conventions entner UM. So one of the things that we did is resourced pretty much every respirator UM that was still in existence

in the Portland metropolitan area. UM. I had volunteers calling getting into quarries UM, making purchases and delivering the respirators and filters to the houseless folks at UM for C three PO and other camps where people where people were UM just left to their own devices. I hear that the city or county was trying to find respirators on eBay, but of course we had better connections UM and then we were able to, you know, make sure that that

our houseless community had their needs met UM. Before we moved to MAMA and UM. I think the really important part about MAMA was that it allowed people who were not safe at the Clackamas Town Center location to access Mutual Aid UM. The Immigrant and Refugee community UM, l g B t Q community UM there's there was a real disconnect in terms of providing safer spaces for UM people. UM at that Clackamus County, Clackamus towns, at the Clackamus Town Center site. UM. I think that's all I really

wanted to add. The fires took a community that was based around brutality and trauma and helped remind people that not only do we take care of us, but that mutual aid and support were also the basis for larger change.

After forming Bonds and Clouds of your Guest, there was something poetic and protesters turning their focus outwards to support others in a region where the air had been rendered unbreathable after the fires, more mutual aid and support would be directed outside of the immediate protester community and towards those displaced by fire, the chronically houseless, and those facing eviction.

While these centers of collective care and support were forming among protesters, another group had been preparing to mobilize in Portland. In our next episode, we'll talk about how the Proud Boys and far right extremists were capitalizing on the same paranoia that had made malicious form checkpoints and start preparing for a violent return to the city to round us out. Though. Here are some final thoughts on mutual aid from activist Krim Bruley, the Ewoks, Courtney from Wall of Moms, and

the street mechanic Block. One of the things you like to say is, uh, defund the police and invest in community. And you know, one of the things like my mom earlier and she's like, and that's your monitor, and now lady need one thing just like you can do the other thing, like stop by the battle and it's like help the people that need help. And we want to use society where the police aren't needed for every goddamn thing. The police aren't needed to harass the house with people

in various locations. The police aren't he is to respond to various menial health situations of all high end all over the city. The police aren't. You know, basically, you don't have the presence they do and the potential they

do to escalate every god dam situation. Um. You know, so what we can do instead of I guess taking away the power directly and you know, actually burning down p p A is just take their jobs in the sense of like takeaway all their responsibilities and believe them, what's nothing to do, uh, because that's the goal at the end of the day, is to have everyone in

the community taken care of. Like that's all we want. Um. You know, it's like I said, the through line to like Black Lives Matter and to caaptism uh, like Polish and police. It's like we all just want the community taken care of, and all these people who see that needs to become through whatever different and specific ones this we need. UM. So yeah, it's it's more of a I hope it continues to do this way. I think it will is becoming more of a think of people

are organizing action that is directly sitting their community. The one thing that really stands out is that Portland's infrastructure is what makes it possible for us to continue to stay out here and do this work, um and to continue to persist even as UM those that hold on to white supremacist structures really clean to the dying, gasping breadths of it. UM. If you are in another city and you are looking to form your own mutual aid support network, firstly and foremostly this is going to be

a massive collaboration effort. It's going to feel like you want to do everything because everything needs to be done, and so the most important steps that you can take is recognizing your lane and recognizing how to stay in your lane and recognizing how to let your lane meet other people's late. UM, I think that just like the

sense of like communities and people taking care of each other. Um, we're in a pandemic and a lot of people just don't even have jobs or are working right now, and the house of community is only like getting larger, and the police are talking the house of community as well. So UM, just seeing people rally around to take care of our community while the UM the government and UM the police that we actually pay with our tax dollars, I'm not doing shipped to people right now at this moment.

UM seeing us gather around and really take care of each other, even though like we don't personally know each other, we're still you know, everyone is still a family and doing everything they can to provide um the necessities to live to each other. So I think that that's like something that's been really amazing is all of the mutual aid that's come out of this. Uh, what's been going on here in Portland is really beautiful. UM. People are able to make relent, people are starting to get jobs

through other people's connections. People are able to eat, uh, you know, people are like providing shelter and you know, things to live to the house with community after like they've been taken and flashed by the police. So I think that that's just something that's outside of all of the protests. Is really amazing to see, uh this this

maybe come together. And I actually took my children down to jail support to drop off some things this past weekend in Vancouver, and it's just a really great opportunity to show them how we as a community need to take care of each other and how much love is around all of this. It's hard for my kids to kind of understand what's going on and see like why I'm like put them to bed and then you know leave them with their dad to like go out every night.

Um and then sure, and they see certain things on the news and stuff, so they have, like I tried to explain to them what's really going on, but it was really important for me to take them this weekend to show them that like we do, how like we we always say like we got us, like we really do, and um, explaining to them if anyone's going to take care of our community, like it's going to be us

at the end of the day. So I just a'm like trying to eradicate I feel as had a young age and just teach them, um at a young age that you know that in the end, we are the ones that take care of each other. That I think about a lot in terms of where where things are going, is just about like all the skills that everybody's learning, UM from whatever they're doing. There are so many different mutually like groups and blocks popping up and trying to

or like create material action. UM. But there's also a ton of things that are being learned on the street, and there are ton of being things being learned in terms of organizing protests and direct actions and media campaigns

and all of these other kinds of things. And I think that UM, as the protests continue and as the kind of resistance to the powers that be continues, UM, I'm really hopeful that we all continue to grow and get better at what we're doing, UM, so that we can really like keep pushing forward and build the world that we want to see. I have a couple of things first, UM, anybody can do it. Anybody. It doesn't

matter how small. It doesn't matter what you're doing, you can be part of a larger scale operation in the sense of if you have something, you can provide it, even if it's like helping something dig something off of the internet or you know, telling someone this is how this thing works. Anybody can do that. And also do not be afraid to ask people for help if you don't understand something or if you just need help in terms of resources, like these things are there, and the

more people that are involved, the easier it becomes. Does that make sense? Yes, gritty, And also mutual aid can be as small as it needs to be and as quiet as it needs to be. Something like helping your neighbor jump a car like that can be mutual aid. It like you can start a group and raise ten tho dollars over the course of a few months, and you know, like give people vehicles. That's also mutually Um. You don't need to like you know, create weird hierarchies

or um kind of prioritize one form of it over another. Um. It's really just like like like a means for helping each other. Uh. Where the grandpops who couldn't fathom the Obama sis, I don't hate America, just to me, And she keeps the promises in teens looking like the sixties. It's crazy, a nationwide dejab. What my people post to do? Go to schools named after the clan founder? We're around town is? I don't see why we frown in Native American students forced to learn about when Opeba Sarah? How

was that fair? Bro? Some heroes unsung in some months. That's getting monuments built for them. But ain't be all a little bit of monthster we crook? You know this pass prepos