In March 2020, wares infoshop started a mutual aid initiative in response to the Covid-19 pandemic and impending quarantine. This was informed by the work of similar autonomous and anarchist groups and spaces in other cities, and happened in parallel to other projects for community solidarity in Singapore. Our take on mutual aid was centred on a set of volunteer-maintained online tools made using Google Sheets that remotely and directly connect people with one another based on asks and offers for support. As a tiny all-volunteer group we do not handle any funds but focused on facilitating links and updates using existing social networking accounts a Telegram broadcast channel and chat.
In principle, the initiative exists apart from and counter to government initiatives and charity bodies that often enforce logics of racist, sexist, ableist, nationalist capitalist competition and deservingness for help, instead encouraging a communal sharing of resources and abilities towards growing capacity for shared life in common, with no eligibility process in the way.
Over the past two years, numerous folks have organised support and care groups, created localised and specialised networks, formed personal connections between each other, bought groceries, donated computers, offered space, raised tens of thousands of dollars in direct aid with distributed small-scale actions, and done inspiring work keeping up with contact and needs even when wares fell behind with our own initiative.
With the pandemic still raging on amidst the government's push for us to "live with" a still deadly virus – now allowed to spread rampantly as healthcare workers are stretched to the limit and migrant workers are still interned in dormitories – it is clear there are ever more people struggling due to oppressive structural features of social and economic life here, be it in predatory lending, wage theft, precarious and exploitative labour, criminalisation of poverty, or racist hiring norms. Yet this also comes with a reduction in general interest and involvement to help as "life returns to normal" and emergency is hidden from view. Reflecting a scale and depth to problems that seem themselves designed to negate alternatives, powerlessness is a common feeling. Many, including ourselves, have faced fatigue and burnout without recourse in the absence of community.
There are obvious shortcomings with our initiative that need to be grappled with, such as: reliance on virtual connection, which cannot replace the challenging task of building face-to-face relations against isolation, which is also a challenge of geography, mobility, time, and access to spaces to meet, socialise, or organise; the risk of devolving into modes of transactional relating that mirror charity and social work, driven by (understandable) logics of guilt and individualist discourse centred on "privilege"; the depoliticisation of a radical practice in the face of prioritising urgent fundraising; and a lack of collective capacities to couple care with antagonism and agitation directed towards power and those that defend the status quo.
Also taking into consideration issues that have arisen around accountability, abuse, and trust, many systems we initially built turned out to be unsustainable without close attention, and this labour drifted from original intentions, even creating situations that could be harmful and traumatic. We need to pause and seriously re-examine and reorganise how we go about things. We are certainly still committed to interdependence, solidarity, and mutual aid and care, but perhaps in a more organic and entangled way. The broad goal is to build decentralised networks which support anti-capitalist, anti-hierarchical principles through localised everyday practices, and to host information on resources specific to locations and needs, made by and for communities of people. The question is what paths do we take to get there, and if we should be doing things that groups with funding can do better.
We've paused all parts of this project, from the forms to sheets and the telegram chat, but if you are part of an existing network, please continue to check in with and look after one another, while not denying space for yourself too. We can still help with boosting calls for direct aid on our social networking accounts. If you're looking for help, we ask for your patience and understanding, none of this is taken lightly. We hope to be back with new ideas when we are better able to do so – let's make mutual aid and care daily practice, outside of emergency.
google sheets (paused and archived): tinyurl.com/waresmutualaid
telegram (chat paused): t.me/waresmutualaid
email for enquiries only: waresmutualaid@gmail.com
Last updated: March 2022