COVID-19 Mutual Aid Project – Details and how we’re staying safe

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How did it start?

Over the past view days, community members affiliated with Direct Action Monterey Network in Pacific Grove, Seaside, Marina, and Monterey have been discussing the potential impact of social and economic disruptions, and how these will hurt the peninsula’s vulnerable populations hardest: houseless people, people with disabilities, the elderly, and those who are immunodeficient. Practicing social distancing didn’t seem like enough.

After seeing other groups create autonomous mutual aid networks in response to the pandemic, they decided to try it here at home. They linked up with Santa Cruz Tenant Power who were setting up a network up there. That group shared their resources, advice, and helped the Monterey volunteers set up their online forms.

Mental Health Resources – COVID 19 MUTUAL AID PROJECT

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Most of us here on the Monterey Peninsula have never experienced anything like the situation we are encountering during the COVID-19 outbreak.

This webpage will be a resource for anyone suffering from mental stress or anxiety who might benefit from the guides, counseling, etc. that is on offer.

This list is under construction. If you have ideas, can offer informal counseling or emotional care, please sign up to volunteer with the MONTEREY COVID-19 MUTUAL AID PROJECT, form available here: FORM HERE

Mental health resources:

• The national Disaster Distress Helpline (call 1-800-985-5990 or text TalkWithUs to 66746) offers 24/7 emotional support & if you have any medical concerns speak to a trusted healthcare provider.
• Managing Stress and Anxiety related to COVID-19
• COVID-19: Potential Implications for Individuals with Substance Use Disorders
• Mental Health Considerations during COVID-19 Outbreak – mental health ideas developed by the World Health Organization

COVID-19 Mutual Aid Project

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Direct Action Monterey Network is collaborating with local volunteers to facilitate a MUTUAL AID project.

If you would like to volunteer or if you need assistance, please fill out this form.
FORM AVAILABLE HERE

We have been inspired by other groups around the U.S. and the world responding autonomously to the crisis of the pandemic. Like others, we are working to create new (and strengthen pre-existing) networks so we can all be there and show up for each other. In these moments of community crisis we must organize and push for systemic responses that will ensure that the most marginalized in our communities can survive, especially those marginalized by white supremacy, capitalism, and ableism – who will likely be hit hardest by the virus and the fall out from the economic collapse and lock downs.

Monterey Peninsula | Santa Cruz |  Salinas

Mutual Aid: In this situation, we are understanding mutual aid as a way for people to directly assist their neighbors during this crisis. This can be by picking up prescriptions or food. It can be by providing childcare or lending family board games. We all love our community, and as the state continually demonstrates its failings, we must step in for each other.

As well as volunteering our time and our love, we call for the immediate release of all people from ICE detention centers and prisons, rent bans/strikes, free testing and treatment, and universal health care. No one is disposable, and sharing resources based on need is essential.

Want to stay indoors but still want to help?

There are so many things you can do while still staying indoors. If you don’t want to leave your home, here is how you can still volunteer:

• Check in with people by phone
• Do research for people to find resources
• Lend board games, books, video games
• Translate aid request form into different languages
• Be a calming person who can call people experiencing fear and anxiety

If you would like to get involved with the project as a volunteer, please fill out the form above.

For questions about DAMN please email centralcoastdirectaction (a) gmail.com

BONFIRE Call for Submissions

bonfire: a central coast zine of radical politics
A journal of the Direct Action Monterey Network and the Monterey Community Education Project

bonfire is a ‘zine committed to connecting local voices and experiences to critical thought and global struggles. As we face climate disaster, intensifying state violence, emboldened white nationalism, and globalized capitalism that enriches the few at the expense of the many, there is a rising sense that the current system is no longer tenable. Now is the time to think beyond the limits of what we are told is possible and to imagine and bring to life the kind of world that can meaningfully sustain all of us. 

Any sustainable bonfire begins with the kindling, the glowing embers that ensure that every revolutionary spark will burn longer and stronger. We are all kindling, with the ability to ignite community networks of solidarity, mutual aid, and shared political analysis to overcome the coming storms. bonfire is one step in that direction. 

Del Monte Manor Evictions and the Gentrification of Seaside

Recently, TerraCorp, the property management company for Seaside’s Del Monte Manor, served eviction notices to six units of residents due to their alleged participation in a rap video that was filmed on the premises without their permission. Del Monte Manor is the largest low-income housing residence on the Monterey Peninsula. With only 192 units, this speaks to the lack of regard for the growing housing crisis in the Peninsula and region as a whole. Seaside resident and video participant Michael “Da Bigg Homie” McKinney wrote a piece that gives a pointed (and on point) critique of the Monterey County Weekly report of the evictions. He clarifies, from his perspective, the tragedy of these events. McKinney states that the Weekly misrepresented the rap video as promoting violence and gang rivalry when it was in fact a call for unity in the wake of the murder of a Seaside resident.

Central Coast Collecting Supplies & Organizing Caravan to the Border

The Direct Action Monterey Network, in collaboration with other organizations in the region, will be collecting supplies and organizing a caravan to the border to support the refugees and immigrants who are attempting to apply for asylum.

Benefit show for refugees!

Redneck Revolt in Monterey

The Bay Area Redneck Revolt is coming to Monterey to discuss their organizing vision and tactics.

When: 9th February 2018 – 8pm
Where: Old Capitol Books, 559 Tyler Street, downtown Monterey

“Redneck Revolt is a national network of community defense projects from a broad spread of political, religious, and cultural backgrounds. It is a pro-worker, anti-racist organization that focuses on working class liberation from the oppressive systems which dominate our lives. In states where it is legal to practice armed community defense, many branches choose to become John Brown Gun Clubs, training ourselves and our communities in defense and mutual aid.”

“To us, redneck is a term that signifies a pride in our class as well as a pride in resistance to bosses, politicians, and all those that protect domination and tyranny.”

More information, media, and podcast available at Redneckrevolt.org

Theory & Philosophy Reading Group 31: James C. Scott

Old Capitol Books and the Direct Action Monterey Network are coming together for the thirtieth discussion in the Theory and Philosophy Reading Group. This is a mini-series within the broader project which explores anarchist theories of the state.

Thinking Critically about Society Seminar Series – Fall 2017

November 2017: It’s that time again! Old Capitol Books, the Direct Action Monterey Network, and the Monterey Community Education Project are teaming up to bring you a series of free seminars and discussions on critical thinking and social theory. This November we’re having three seminars: Marxist-Feminism, Post-Colonial Theory, and Learning from the Paris Commune. These discussions are facilitated by local professors at CSU Monterey Bay, local activists, and thinkers (just like you!)

When: November 3rd, 10th, and 17th
Where: Old Capitol Books, 559 Tyler Street, downtown Monterey

Theory & Philosophy Reading Group XXX: Mikhail Bakunin

Friday 29 September 2017, 7pm: Old Capitol Books and the Direct Action Monterey Network are coming together for the thirtieth discussion in the Theory and Philosophy Reading Group. This is a mini-series within the broader project which explores anarchist theories of the state.

Where: Old Capitol Books, 559 Tyler Street
When: Friday 29 September 2017, 7pm
Reading: “Rousseau’s Theory of the State” (available free here)

Mikhail Aleksandrovich Bakunin was one of the intellectual founding fathers of anarchism, often considered to be Marx’s major historical rival.

Bakunin was born in 1814 (the date is, however, disputed), in Premukhino, near the town of Torzhok in the Tver Gubernia (province). He was the eldest son in the family of a retired diplomat and landowner. Mikhail’s parents were hereditary noblemen of liberal political inclinations. His father was in Paris during the French Revolution, received his doctorate of philosophy in Padua and regarded himself as a disciple of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Bakunin’s mother was a member of the Muravyov family and three of her cousins were involved in the December rising of constitutionalists in 1825. [1]

Location: Old Capitol Books, 559 Tyler Street, downtown Monterey