Dear Beloved,
March 21st marked the first day of spring. It was also Mother’s Day in the Arab world, as it has been since the time of pharaohs. Mothers are celebrated in the spring when flowers bloom because motherhood is life.
We live in a world where we can watch the indiscriminate annihilation of beloveds throughout Palestine during Islam’s holiest month. With a swipe of a thumb, we can read an authoritarian retiree gleefully promising deportation and imprisonment for anyone who speaks against genocide or - god forbid - destroy a Nazi’s property. They are nothing more than death-worshipping monsters.
That is why it’s more important than ever for us to choose life, Beloved, and to honor and love this world - our world.
"Take up the battle. Take it up. It's yours. This is your life. This is your world."
- Maya Angelou
On Building Life-Affirming Institutions
We live within empire - monopolized by the so-called United States, an extension of centuries-old western imperialism. Since its infancy as a settler colony of the British Empire, the United States has repeatedly proven it has no love or respect for life. Not in its policies, its relationship with citizens and non-citizens, its “safety” protocols, or its interactions with other nations and planet. Continually, the US chooses profit over people, planet, and future.
Accelerationists call for empire’s immediate dismantlement, and it is by no means an unreasonable demand. However, as we grasp empire by the root and pull it from beneath us, we must also seed and cultivate a healthier ecosystem in its place. In her book We Will Not Cancel Us, adrienne maree brown wrote, “In order to generate a future in which we all know we can belong, be human, and be held, we must build life-affirming institutions, including our movements.”
Yes, we must heal our relationship to land and waters. To do this, it is imperative the land is given back to Indigenous stewards and their sovereignty respected. Settlers must also reshape how they interact with the land and work towards reconciliation.
Yes, we must abolish police and the entire prison industrial complex. We must also resource communities to prevent harm and create adaptive systems of transformational justice to repair when harm is done. What networks will you weave to keep each other safe, and how will you support survivors? Check out Seattle’s growing Affected Person Program which aims to support survivors of violence and their families or Eugene, OR’s Crisis Assistance Helping Out on the Streets for ideas.
Yes, we must dismantle student debt and the profit-motivated education system. It’s time we divested from war-profiting universities that sell out their students to fascists. Instead, we must build alternative, accessible models of education. Read about Kansas City’s recently launched Abolitionist Freedom School.
Yes, we must move past capitalism. We must also build alternative economic models that ensure all needs are met so our communities may thrive in a post-capitalist society. Learn about time banking, resource fairs, trade & barter markets, and skill-sharing (the cool radical one, not the weird tech bro site).
Yes, we must dismantle society as it was created by colonizers and oligarchs. We must also build seed libraries, childcare co-operatives, free clinics, medicine makers and healers,
Ultimately: we need each other.
On Creating the Beloved Community
Tell me, Beloved, do you know your neighbors by name? Would you recognize them by their face alone? I’ll be honest: No, I don’t and except for a few, I wouldn’t know my neighbors if I walked past them on the street. And if you live somewhere enmeshed in white supremacy culture, you probably also answered yes.
This is by design.
The 1% have the power they have solely because of how they divide us, and their tactics are as blatantly malevolent as segregation and apartheid and as seemingly benign as how a neighborhood is built. When we circumvent division and return to each other, oligarchs freak the fuck out.
Yes, all of those cheesy children’s movies where the power of friendship conquers evil are right. Why, Beloved, do you think adult media are so cynical in comparison? Why are we forced fed stories of harsh realities and tragedy when there is so much more in life?
My job is to open my palms to theirs, to receive the half- moon echoes of their fingernails as we make our way through. - Annalise Parady, "Between Us"
On Choosing Life Over Despair and Apathy
As we witnessed in the first 50 days of the reinstated Trump regime, the militaristic shock and awe of executive orders and the targeting of migrant communities share a singular cruel purpose: to make us think resistance is futile.
In times such as this, it is easy to give into despair. It is easier still to surrender to apathy. It is also lazy to point at the inaction of others to excuse one’s own passivity.
This is the opposite of toxic positivity or delusion. I am not asking you to walk towards fascism with rose-tinted sunglasses. I’m telling you to confront it, stare it down defiantly, and refuse to accept it.
Embrace revolutionary optimism and fight with us for us.
Mutual Aid for Maram and her family
“You are ideal citizens for your rulers, diligently paying taxes and funding terrorism with all your good hearts. You allow your country to make you a part of a geopolitical farce, without having a say in the destiny of your efforts and taxes.” - Maram N. Esmail
Maram is a Palestinian woman from Gaza. She is also a mother of three beautiful children: Jude, Ayloul, and Nai. Her daughter Nai is 4-years-old, and her name was chosen “to play a melody of love in our lives.” But baby Nai was born with a brain atrophy - resulting in Nai losing her ability to move, speak, and hearing. Before October 2023, Maram worked hard as a self-employed digital marketing professional to provide Nai with regular physical therapy, occupational therapy supplies, and hearing aids. Maram’s dream for Nai is the opportunity to walk and play with other children.
The US-Israel genocide stole Maram’s livelihood, her family’s home, anything remotely related to safety or stability, and critical healthcare for Nai. Because of displacement, Nai has lost progress from her private physical therapy sessions and her hearing aids. She also now suffers from spasms in her limbs due the cold.
Following the bombing of their home, Maram set up a fundraiser on GoFundMe to assist in her family’s evacuation and restart Nai’s treatment. While waiting for medical evacuation, without reason or warning, GoFundMe shut down Maram’s campaign.
Once again, Maram has to start all over again. She has set up a new campaign on Chuffed to raise $100,000. With your support, Maram and her family will secure:
$10,000 to coordinate for Maram and her husband Abdel Rahman
$7,500 to coordinate travel for their children Jude, Ayloul, and Nai
$2,000 to purchase for hearing aids for Nai
$17,500 for a cochlear implant to treat hearing loss for Nai
$6,000 for physical therapy sessions over two years to help Nai walk again
$2,000 for a stand walker and physical therapy equipment
$3,000 speech therapy sessions
$3,000 hearing rehabilitation sessions
$5.000 tendon surgeries
$5000 rent a house for one year
$40,000 to rebuild Maram’s family home to replace the one Israel bombed
Leftover funds will help Maram purchase a laptop to resume her career and support her family
“Donate [your hard-earned money] at your own will, and don't let them use it to fund terrorism, my friend. After my campaign was closed on GoFundMe, I am now waiting for your support and love on my campaign on Chuffed.” - Maram N. Esmail
Seeds for Change
Subscribe to the Electric Intifada. Recent issues include:
Transformative Mutual Aid Practices (T-Maps)
Transformative Mutual Aid Practices (T-MAPs) are a set of tools that provide space for building a personal “map” of wellness strategies, resilience practices, unique stories, and community resources. Creating a T-MAP will inspire you to connect your struggle to collective struggles. When we make and share our T-MAPs with others they become potent tools for healing and liberation.Resistance Lab: Making and Distributing Media Under Surveillance - Tuesday, April 8, 6 - 8 PM
Join Interrupting Criminalization’s Abolition Journalism Fellow Lewis Raven Wallace and fellow journalists and media makers for a resistance lab! In this two-hour session, facilitators will skill-share ways of keeping our communities and sources safer when reporting in a context of criminalization and surveillance.The first rule to fighting tyranny? Don’t obey in advance. Read, amplify, and embody Leakers to Musk: We’re ‘not Elon’s servants’
Keep your data safer! Check out
’s resource on auditing your apps.Create life-affirming structures of community care! Read from
on starting a babysitting co-op.Check out the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee’s pamphlets on withholding your hard-earned money from US-led war.
Know Your Rights Training Sign-Up - Hosted by Colorado Immigration
🌱 Questions? Email aleksanderaleksander@substack.com
🌱 Get updates on my projects and say hi at aleksanderaleksander.com.
🌱 Have any seeds for change or opportunities to root ourselves in community? Share them in the comments below!
This resonates deeply. The forces of empire want us isolated, overwhelmed, and convinced that there’s no alternative—but we build the alternative every time we choose each other over profit, life over destruction, and solidarity over silence. Mutual aid, land back, transformative justice, and cooperative economies aren’t just ideas; they’re necessary acts of resistance and survival. Thank you for weaving together these lifelines.