What mutual aid is and why it matters

Last week, we were blown away by the 2,200 people who registered for our new Mutual Aid 101 Series.

We were fortunate to have Dean Spade, organizer, teacher, and the author of "Mutual Aid: Building Solidarity During this Crisis (and the Next)" and "Love in a Fucked Up World: How to Build Relationships, Hook Up, and Raise Hell, Together" lead the first session.

Dean dropped some serious knowledge for nearly 90 minutes straight. All the while, the chat was on fire while a new learing community was being formed.

The series continues tomorrow, on Wednesday February 26th with Julian Rose from the New Economy Coalition and Endstate ATL and previous guest on The Response, Stephanie Rearick from Human's United for Mutual Aid Networks. They'll be focussing on how to build and sustain mutual aid projects while not burning out.

The first phase of this series runs through the end of March with several more trainings scheduled throughout the rest of the year.

There's also the Mutual Aid 101 Community Canvas, where we're posting recordings, resources, and session updates.

There are links to everything I just mentioned in the show notes.

Through out this season of The Response, we'll be sharing a mix of original interviews, dispatches from the front lines of disasters, and excerpts from Mutual Aid 101 (like this one).

Today, we'll be playing the full recording from Dean's training. We've posted the video, slides, and transcript to Canvas, so you can create an account there to follow along.

• Mutual Aid 101 Learning Series
• Mutual Aid 101 Community Canvas
• Mutual Aid 101 w/ Dean Spade (Video)
• Mutual Aid 101 w/ Dean Spade (Transcript)
• Mutual Aid 101 w/ Dean Spade (Slides)
• Mutual Aid 101 w/ Dean Spade (Links from Dean + chat)
• Dean's Books
• Donate to The Response

• Hosted and executive produced by Tom Llewellyn
• Produced and edited by Paige Kelly
• Theme Music by Cultivate Beats

Follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org — or wherever you get your podcasts.

The Response is an award-winning podcast series produced by Shareable exploring how communities respond to disaster — from hurricanes to wildfires to reactionary politics and more.

Want to help spread the word? Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify — it makes a huge difference in reaching new people who may otherwise not hear about this show.