unfinished idea, mutual aid
Thinking of offering discounts on my (generally pretty well-paid) freelance work in exchange for customers sending money directly to people asking for aid (eg. on fedi), to cut out myself as the middleman, but this feels like something that could have unintended effects if not thought through carefully...
The idea being to normalize sending money directly to people who need it, as a part of business procedures
unfinished idea, mutual aid
I currently charge more for my work so that I can divert part of my income to mutual aid requests, but I don't like that this whole scheme depends on my decisions as the middleman?
unfinished idea, mutual aid
@joepie91 That is often part of what I do when teaching white people about anti-racism I even talk about it in my rates document. Because so many people are so reticent to participate in mutual aid and I perceive some of that reticence as white supremacist in origin/inspiration. Here's my rate sheet's current version (Google Docs): https://docs.google.com/document/d/10GS8pAyodimogoKYeylKVW36ooB1bbhPxzAi2foNWCA/edit
TBH it needs an update and more links/language about donations and mutual aid.
unfinished idea, mutual aid
@perigee Yep, that document was what inspired this idea originally, actually (though I couldn't recall where I'd seen it as it was a while ago, thanks!)
Mostly I'm concerned about ways this could backfire, especially when the customers are for technical services and the recipients are meant to be individuals rather than organizations that are prepared to deal with this sort of thing.
I don't have any *specific* problems in mind, I'm just generally wary about pointing 'detached' folks (like tech customers) at marginalized folks for any reason, but at the same time I think normalizing direct engagement (rather than with relatively faceless charities) is important, so feedback on that point would be very welcome
unfinished idea, mutual aid
@joepie91 well on one level, receipts are receipts. An individual or an organization can, if they choose to, contribute to any organization or individual.
IME, it does take some cultural education to get people and organizations to shift gears from tax deductible charitable organizations to non-tax-deductible contributions to individuals in need. And I usually start by asking my clients to donate to nonprofit organizations first, then talk to them about the politics and necessities of individual mutual aid.
re: unfinished idea, mutual aid
@joepie91 taxes around this sounds complicated, maybe you can partly shift the middleman role by setting a non-profit up next to it, and making them make a donation to said non-profit, normalizing at least that some of it goes to charities (and it's tax deductible so actually attractive to companies)
re: unfinished idea, mutual aid
@eater I want to specifically avoid the donations going through an institution, and have them go directly to the recipient - institutional donations make it too easy for corporate folks to hide behind 'professionalism' and never engage with the underlying experiences of the recipients and how their situations came to be
re: unfinished idea, mutual aid
@eater Like, you know the phenomenon of how 5 casualties are a tragedy but 50k casualties are just a news headline?
I want to push this specifically into the former bucket, where people have to engage with the experience of marginalized folks directly rather than as some abstract notion of "some have it worse" without ever *really* feeling or understanding what that means
unfinished idea, mutual aid
(Underlying reasoning: implementing 'mutual aid' as "mostly poor folks supporting other poor folks" is not really sustainable and it's about time that the people with the money start doing their part without hiding behind charitable institutions)