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Heartbroken? Yes. Shocked? No.

As long as we continue to underestimate the force of the white supremacist capitalist patriarchy on all aspects of our lives, we will find ourselves inevitably here.

I don’t say this to be cynical or to fill you with despair. It is essential that we reckon with where we ARE so that we can work with it and through it in all the ways - at the level of systems in how they’ve been designed and shaped around racial capitalism, at the level of culture and how it continues to shape shift to uphold and maintain dominance, and at the level of self in how WE have internalized the very logics we are resisting and raging against.

And so here we are and what little I know is that the work is still the work. We keep going. We let this “new” reality jolt us into the understanding that the practice of politics is not just cyclical but everyday. We chop wood and carry water. Here are some ways to get started:

• Don’t scapegoat. Organize. People are going to try to blame those who are most impacted for the election results - Black women, Arab and Muslims, immigrants, disabled folks, trans and non conforming people and poor communities. Recognize these as fascist tactics and stay focused on the work of getting organized.

• Embrace follower-ship. Everyone has a “hot take” right now. Resist the neo-liberal temptation to be right or to become another pundit or expert. Rather, listen and follow the people who know the way; those on the front lines of survival, those who have seen this coming for some time, those who are already doing the work.

• Get ready. The work ahead is going to demand more courage and capacity from all of us. Take this time get educated, to rest and nourish yourself, to build relationships of mutual care, to reorganize yourself and your life for more engaged action and to cultivate imagination and faith in a better future.

• Build care infrastructure. We cannot rely on the state to take care of us. We must take care of us. If you haven’t already, find your pod - the people you can rely and who can rely on your on for help, support, protection, nourishment, grief, care and joy.

• Be kind to each other. Be mindful of how you talk to each other. Getting free is going to require us to listen for understanding, organize with people we don’t agree with and find common ground.

• Hope is a discipline. I know this might feel out of reach right now, but hope is not positive vibes only. Hope is rigor, consistency and action in the face of uncertainty and chaos. Hope is an “axe you break down doors with in an emergency” (Rebecca Solnit). It is the smoldering fire that keeps us fired up, that keeps us moving. Don’t lose hope. Practice it.

I don’t know where we go from here; but I believe we must go together.

Kerri (she/her)

Art by @debbiemillman

NTK (need to know)

• “The working class feels abandoned”. Robin D G Kelley on why the American working classes and poor have been socialised for decades into believing the solution to their political and economic woes are to be found among the very architects of them.

• There’s No Denying It Anymore: Trump Is Not a Fluke—He’s America

  The United States chose Donald Trump in all his ugliness and cruelty, and the country will get what it deserves.

• Small tweaks won’t cut it. If Democrats continue to rely on cautious reform and appeals to institutional norms, they may find that they’ve left a vacuum, one that far-right authoritarians are all too eager to fill with promises of radical change. Waleed Shahid on how Democrats Need to Fundamentally Rethink Everything.

• 10 ways to be prepared and grounded now that Trump has won

  The key to taking effective action in a Trump world is to avoid perpetuating the autocrat’s goals of fear, isolation, exhaustion and disorientation.

• While there are plenty of reasons to feel anger and despair this morning, the news from Tuesday night wasn’t all bad. Some actually good news from election night.

HOW WE MOVE

There is this saying that I keep coming back over the last few days - “we blame society, but we are society”. It speaks to how we are impacted AND implicated. It also speaks to how we have the power to change the present and shape the future. In “On Going Along” Howard Zinn offers some advice on how we can stay engaged…”we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an endless succession of presents, and to live now was we think humans should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory”.

1. Don’t let those who have power intimidate you. No matter how much power they have, they cannot prevent you from choosing to live your life, speaking truth, taking care of yourself and each other, imagining beyond the status quo.

2. Find people with who have your values, your commitments but also have a sense of humor. Remembering that you are not alone in your heartbreak and in your hope is essential nourishment for the long haul.

3. Understand that the major media will not tell you all the acts of resistance taking place every day in the society, the strikes, the protests, the individual acts of courage in the face of authority. Look around and be willing to see, acknowledge and celebrate the small and big acts of resistance that are happening all around you.

4. Throughout history people have felt powerless before authority, but that at certain times these powerless - by organizing, acting, risking, persisting - have created enough power to change the work around them, even if a little. Look to the Black feminist movement, the labor movement, the anti-war movement, the disability justice movement, the LGBTQ+ movement for inspiration and guidance.

5. Remember that those who have power depend the obedience of others, and when those others begin withholding that obedience., begin defying authority, that power at the top turns out to be very fragile. When we refuse to consent and comply, when we withdraw our support…whether that be consumers boycotting corporations, workers striking employers, soldiers objecting and withdrawing from violence…the people in power are no longer powerful.

6. When we forget the fragility of that power on top, we become astounded when it crumbles in the face of rebellion. History teaches us that revolution is possible.

7. Don’t look for a moment of total triumph. It is not the destination but the journey. Along the way we will have wins and setbacks, we will learn from our mistakes and adapt, and we will cultivate the capacity to keep going. Because we are worth the effort. Keep going.

Art is by an unknown source, content by @theloveartist

CARE WORK

In the absence of systems that take care of us, WE must take care of us. Mutual care is a practice and politics of mutual responsibility. Mutual aid is not new, of course. Communities who have been marginalized by and excluded from systems of care have been figuring out how to survive for all of human history. Indigenous, immigrant, poor and working class, and disability communities have long engaged in creative and subversive community care outside the system to ensure people had what they needed to survive. The Black Panthers built an extensive system of mutual aid including free breakfast, free ambulances, free medical clinics, free rides to the elderly, and free education to children. And the Young Lords, a collective of Puerto Ricans in New York, confronted oppression head-on by taking survival into their own hands by commandeering an X-ray truck and hospital wing to provide direct healthcare to their community. But mutual care doesn’t just fill the gap. It also confronts the shame and stigma implied by capitalism - that our suffering is the result of our personal, moral failings as opposed to the exploitation and misappropriation of resources. And it calls us to confront our systems of scarcity, imagine and practice alternatives of care and build a culture that doesn’t leave anyone behind. Mutual care exposes how our systems are not only failing many of us, but that they created the crisis in the first place. It encourages us to build horizontal structures of care and cooperation rather than relying on the state or wealthy partnerships. Mutual care is a radical act of taking back our power and taking care of each other. Over the next few weeks/months we will be sharing resources on how to build care capacity and structures to survive the next few years and beyond. In the meantime, here are some spaces of courage and care to meet up and support one another:

• 11/8 @ 7PST: Love Power and Liberation with Angela Davis, Lama Rod Owens, Prentis Hemphill

• 11/13 @3PST: How We Move: Building a Politics of Care with CTZNWELL & friends

• 11/12 @9PST: Joy and Grief in Movement Power Building with adrienne maree brown, Malkia Devich Ceril and more.

WE-NESS

“Sometimes you don’t survive whole”. Essential wisdom from the great Toni Morrison

Art by @tinypricksproject

Thanks for subscribing to WELLREAD. For the last six years we’ve been providing folks with the need to know (NTK) news, calls to actions and resources for how to stay engaged and resourced along the way. But now, we’ve added an option to “upgrade to paid” to help sustain our work. While we will never put our content behind a pay wall, we depend on the support of our community to keep us going. 💛

Upgrade to paid