We are very excited to introduce an inspiring organization that is providing a fresh, effective tool to help us bring Mutual Aid to life in our communities.
Mutual Aid is a voluntary reciprocal exchange of resources and services for mutual benefit, and is as ancient as human culture, but has been lost in recent decades in Western culture.
Before the 1920’s over 1/4 of the US population was in Mutual Aids (also known as fraternal societies or friendly societies) “A group of working-class people would form an association (or “lodge,”) and pay monthly fees into the association’s treasury; individual members would then be able to draw on the pooled resources in time of need. The fraternal societies thus operated as a form of self-help insurance company.”
Find out what THEN happened in this video (or read about it HERE)
Mutual aid is met by attending to both personal and interpersonal needs, and to encourage people to use their strengths to help others as well as themselves. We are constantly on the search for new ways that we can use Mutual Aid to reconnect with our local communities while reducing our dependency upon the larger socio-economic structure.
Imagine an edible urban landscape, overflowing with food for all. Imagine fresh food that comes from a micro-farm, window garden, or fruit tree in your neighbor’s backyards. RipeNearMe is an edible food tracking web app that is striving to make that dream a reality.
Anyone is allowed to post food that they grow themselves, or post produce growing in public space. It’s all about community and ultra-local food, mapped across the globe!
Driven by a desire to make a positive change, this organization’s aim is to make it easy to find, share, swap, buy and sell local and homegrown foods. Anyone is allowed to post food that they grow themselves, or post produce growing in public space. It’s all about community and ultra-local food, mapped across the globe!
