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Two hands, one black and one white, clasped together under the words "We are in this together"
Category: Food & Nutrition

What we love about mutual aid

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At Solid Ground, we strive to help people overcome poverty by meeting their basic needs and nurturing their success. But we also acknowledge that as a modern, hierarchical nonprofit organization, we operate within the very systems that oppress people and keep them in poverty in the first place. That’s why we admire and celebrate community members working to help their neighbors using an entirely different approach: mutual aid.

What is mutual aid?

Mutual aid is rooted in the belief that neighbors and community members have a duty to take care of one another, recognizing that we each have unique needs, strengths, and resources we can use to support each other. Mutual aid isn’t charity. Instead, it’s based on solidarity, trust, and mutual support. At its core is the understanding that traditional support systems (like government and nonprofits) have long centered whiteness while neglecting the particular needs of our BIPOC, elderly, immigrant, undocumented, unhoused, disabled, queer, and trans neighbors.

Jump to Mutual Aid Groups

Mutual aid is the idea that we all share the responsibility of caring for our community. It can look like direct cash assistance, grocery and meal distribution, community bail funds, bystander intervention, copwatch (community members who document police activity, misconduct, and brutality), fundraising for personal care items, or disability ally projects.

Mutual aid isn’t a new concept, but the way it’s practiced has changed and evolved as communities have. Traditions and customs of mutual aid might look like bringing pre-cooked meals for those grieving the loss of a loved one, taking care of neighbors’ kids, sharing food from your garden, or helping new parents with groceries or household chores.

Unlike charity, mutual aid rejects individualism and instead favors social collectivism. The value of a society isn’t determined by how hard individuals can work to remain outside of poverty; emphasis is placed on how a community can work together to support everyone’s quality of life. Mutual aid asks us to equitably redistribute resources to community members and forces us to ask why resources are so inequitably allocated in the first place.

The systemic changes needed to fix these inequities can be threatening to those in power, which is why nonprofits that are mostly funded by government grants and wealthy donors are often unwilling  or unable to seek meaningful change to the status quo. Mutual aid efforts, on the other hand, aren’t beholden to donors or funders, so they can be better positioned to get at the roots of inequities. (Check out author Dean Spade’s Mutual Aid Chart highlighting some differences between nonprofits and mutual aid networks.)

This past year, the combination of a global pandemic, racist police violence, and economic turmoil has exposed what we already knew: Our society is deeply unequal and rooted in systemic oppression – and for many marginalized communities, mutual aid means survival. There have always been powerful mutual aid networks by and for Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color, from the Black Panther Party’s free breakfast program – which served 20,000 meals a week to Black children and provided political education, childcare, health care, and legal aid programs – to the potlatch of Indigenous communities of the Pacific Northwest.

BIPOC-led mutual aid efforts have often been targeted and criminalized. For example, the Black Panther Party was labeled “dangerous” by the FBI and infiltrated and dismantled. Indigenous communities of the Pacific Northwest were punished with mandatory jail sentences if caught practicing potlatch. Even so, many communities continued the tradition underground. There are also many ways grassroots BIPOC-led mutual aid can also be co-opted, like when the USDA started a free meal program for children after the government dismantled the Black Panther Party.

Just as recent societal traumas have unearthed deep, systemic oppressions, they’ve also catalyzed new and existing mutual aid efforts across our country and the globe – giving individual communities self-determination, solidarity, and support to meet their own needs.

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Take action

Feeling inspired to start your own mutual aid project?
  • Think about your own strengths. What skills, knowledge, time, tools, or financial resources do you have? Are you bilingual? Can you grow food? Do you have a big kitchen? A car to give people rides in?
  • Now think about your community. What do your neighbors need? Grocery help? Childcare? Transportation to appointments?

If you’re not sure what people need, ask them! Meet people in your community and tell them you’re there for them. And remember: Mutual aid is mutual, so don’t forget to think about what kind of support you might need, too!

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Seattle-area mutual aid groups

Some of our favorites include:
Prepared meals
Musang Community Kitchen 
  • On South Beacon Hill: 2524 Beacon Ave S, Seattle, WA 98144
  • Open Mondays and Tuesdays, 12-4pm
  • Requires all guests to show proof of vaccination or recent negative COVID-19 tests. Children who are too young to be vaccinated are welcome.
  • You can reserve a table or order takeout.
Seattle Food Not Bombs
Open Meal Service with OSLserves and Uplift Northwest
  • At Uplift Northwest in Belltown (2515 Western Ave, Seattle, WA 98121)
  • Monday – Friday: breakfast 8-9am, lunch 12:30-1:30pm, dinner 5-6pm
  • Saturday and Sunday: breakfast 10-11am, lunch 12:30-1:30pm, dinner 5-6pm
Free Vegetarian Food Truck 
The Long Haul Mutual Aid Kitchen
Grocery support
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Sources and citations:

  • Featured image above by Pete Railand, made available through the Justseeds Artists’ Cooperative.

  • This piece is a co-creation by Solid Ground Community Food Education (CFE) staff, Program Assistant Abby Findley and Volunteer and Outreach Coordinator Shana McCann.

About Community Food Education (CFE)

The CFE team believes all people have a right to healthy, nutritious, and culturally appropriate food. We give people information, confidence, resources, and skills to understand how the US food system works. We build relationships, create positive learning opportunities, and encourage class participants to stand up for their right to food. We work against barriers to food access – like racism and poverty – and we listen to, learn from, and follow the lead of people most impacted by lack of access to nutritious food. Visit our Food and Nutrition webpage for recipes, cooking demos, and resources for eating healthfully on a budget.

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