Silver Threads Podcast

Happy winter solstice! In these darker days, it feels an apt time to shine a light on our past so that we may better illuminate a future - manifested by imagination, holding joy, hope, fear and despair as we still walk, still wake. carla and Eleanor share some of their own stories as we reflect on previous episodes and consider the road ahead - both in terms of personal projects, and systemic shifts. Transcripts for this episode available here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/12rB3f6WKYuVhz3438rMF50cqXo-leqfR8VtD3hTEYAY/edit#

"Radicalism to me is aligning my passion with what my community needs." Katie Pettit is a radical organizer who re-envisions community-driven initiatives through art, film, and technology. She joins the show to discuss creative works as visions for the future, the undercurrents as the source of our collective power, and more! Mutual Aid goes to Katie's org, Current Movements: Current Movements: currentmovements.com  Transcripts for the show available here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QqCoUY9JIZJqvoEbkt1f7faRVOrDkYZ4qo5337osY4A/edit?usp=sharing  

"Climate is a powerful gateway to the world of anti-capitalism." Sina Reisch is a climate justice and civil disobedience advocate from Germany. She joins the show to talk about her work at the intersections of issues, growing up in the shadow of fascism, the power of direct action, imagining the past and more! Mutual aid goes to Ende Gelaende and their fight for climate justice: https://www.ende-gelaende.org/en/ Read the transcript for this show here: https://bit.ly/30DUqwf

"Don't aim for what's realistic - aim for what actually kicks you in the guts. Aim for what is so beautiful that you're gonna give it everything you've got collectively to make it happen." Juliette is an author and independent journalist who joins us from France to talk about the power of imagining the impossible, territories in struggle, collective solidarity and more! Mutual Aid goes to: collectif justice et vérité pour Babacar Gueye; a collective founded by Awa Gueye, whose brother was shot by police in the French city of Rennes. The collective aims to support Awa in her struggle to demand truth and justice for her brother's death. Project: https://justicepourbabacar.wordpress.com/ Money: https://www.lepotcommun.fr/pot/15pqogdr   Transcript available here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wdbDTYmMaEOLQQ8T9wPFwBprGXnVfv58HjRnaGVHn8g/edit?usp=sharing

"It took me a long time to get to the point where I could be honest about my background - to get rid of that shame around growing up in poverty and say, ‘hey, these are my people.'" Dani Burlison is a mom, writer, teacher, activist and witch who joins the show to discuss recent watershed moments, reconciling with her past, raw fear and hope for the future, and more! Solidarity Funds go to UndocuFund.org Read the transcript here

"We're not trying to hack the system in our unschooling - we're trying to burn it down." Antonio founded Abrome to support the liberation of children and fundamentally change the way people think about education. He joins ST to discuss his military past that gave way to a militant present, the difference between emancipation and liberation, daring to respect kids and more!    Mutual Aid this week goes to Street Form ATX: https://opencollective.com/street-forum  

"It doesn't have to be The Walking Dead or Mad Max - there's more to the future than these hellish, violent scenarios." Dad and rapper Sole, aka Tim, joins the show to discuss the possibilities in the present and future, finding and building radicality wherever you are, the power of art and more!   Solidarity donations go to: Final Straw Podcast

20 years after 9/11, Joy Damiani, a veteran and artist, joins the show to reflect on 911, the Military Industrial Complex, simple radicalism, systemic narcissism and more. Solidarity Funds go to: Highlander Research Center - highlander center.org Veterans for Peace - veteransforpeace.org Mutual Aid PDX - Venmo @pdxra

"We need to create spaces for gentleness. In the harshness that we live in, we don't think about that gentleness enough, and the kindness that's going to be required to build a new world." This week, we sit down with Am Johal, connector of radicals, builder of worlds and local organizer in Vancouver to talk about art, fight, play, gentleness and more!   Mutual Aid donations this week go to: Carnegie Community Action Project (Vancouver based): http://www.carnegieaction.org/  Union of BC Indian Chiefs: https://www.ubcic.bc.ca/ 

"I consider myself to be a conductor on the underground railroad." Sima is an organizer, educator and artist. She joins the show to talk about ideological pitfalls, cos-play radicalism, bringing (some of) the past forward and through her hip-hop, asking the tough questions like 'what is freedom?' Solidarity Funds go to Maroon Quest: paypal: fcrcollective@gmail.com Cashapp: $Simaleerbg Venmo: Simaleerbg https://simalee.bandcamp.com/

"We need to let our comrades be as brave as they wanna be, as brave as they can, and sometimes braver than us, and hopefully they inspire us." Mark k. Tilsen is an Oglala Lakota Poet Educator from the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. He joins the show to share poetry, the necessity of cynicism, what we're willing to give up and more. Solidarity Donations: Camp Mniluzahan & Creek Patrol https://www.mllegalfund.org/

"The way that I organize is deeply offensive to anyone who's really got a vested interest in a power dynamic being at play..." Community organizer Sierra Ramírez joins the show to talk about carving worlds, infighting, fear, and the beautifully messy work of building capacity and community - sprinkled with Orwell and Zapatista quotes.   Solidarity Funds: DC Ward 1 Mutual Aid DC IWW Emergency Hardship Fund

Nietzsche wrote that "One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star." Today, carla and Eleanor dive into the starbursting chaos, weaving through multitudes: discomfort, thriving, learning, boundaries and the boundless accordion time of past, present and future! Solidarity funds this week go to No One Is Illegal - Vancouver.

"We need to think about how we speak to people who have lost all agency, lost all hope and are living in a nihilistic existence - that's the sleeping giant that's gonna change things." Eugene Puryear is a longtime journalist and community organizer who joins the show to offer up new and animated viewpoints on root issues and radical solutions, highlighting the power of imagination, collectivity, personal growth and more! Solidarity Funds go to: Liberation Center in Philadelphia https://phillyliberationcenter.org/  

Hey all! Happy May Day! Just a quick message about some rad episodes to check out, and some updates on upcoming Silver Threads shows.    

"Love is older than doubt, so curiosity is older than doubt. Creation comes from curiosity." Hari Alluri joins the show to share poetic musings on everything from the concept of home to masculinity, weaving his own poetry between and into the threads of conversation that center creativity, humility, strength and radical love.   harialluri.com   Solidarity Funds: https://www.gofundme.com/f/memorial-for-yong-yue-and-family
 https://searafund.ca/donate


"Right now radicalism feels like a locked, very heavily loaded, hidden treasure chest." After 15 years of a fully nomadic lifeway, Korean diasporic experimentalist Jimmy Betts is stationary. And while the parked isolation of now being an exhausted working class queero in so-called Iowa is heavy, Jimmy remains a part of the radical roots, while being apart from them. They join the show to talk about home, growth, perspective, misunderstandings and more!   Des Moines Mutual Aid: https://www.facebook.com/DesMoinesMutualAid

"There is so much need for this storytelling. I want to be the bridge between these Kashmiri stories and the world." Ifat Gazia was born and raised in the most militarized place on earth, Kashmir. She grew up listening to stories of oppression, occupation and resilience and eventually became a storyteller, bringing the story of Kashmir to the world through her articles, research papers, films and podcast. She joins the show to talk about this storytelling, the manifold expressions of freedom, and being prepared for liberation.   Ifat's podcast: https://standwithkashmir.org/the-kashmir-pod-cast/ Solidarity funds: https://standwithkashmir.org/donate/

"The Black Panther Party allowed me to have a more developed view on what freedom might look like." Anarchist Panther Elder Ashanti Alston joins the show to talk about rifts and icons, of reading beyond the page and into life, of deep dives into fear, freedom, the internalizing of oppression, and of the ultimate exit - from empire. Solidarity Funds to The National Jericho Movement & Center for Grassroots Organizing https://www.thejerichomovement.com/ https://www.grassrootscenter.net/

"Mutual aid is actually the work of building the world that we want to live in." Natacia is an organizer with a broad and varied base of experience that's taken her across the globe and across the spectrum of charity, solidarity, hope and despair. She joins Silver Threads to dig into the past, present and future, to analyze the lenses with which we view the world, and the work of building new worlds - block by block.   Solidarity Funds to East of the River Mutual Aid: https://www.gofundme.com/f/east-of-the-river-mutual-aid-fund

Eriel is a Dënesųłiné mother from the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation (ACFN). Her work focuses on Indigenous rights and building intersectional dialogue between Indigenous rights, climate justice and other social justice movements. It is from these places without edges that she sits down to speak with us about the importance of not staying in our lanes, of voice vs. power, land back, the language beyond speaking and the issue of naming things and oh so much more! https://www.indigenousclimateaction.com/

“When we withhold trust from each other all the time, what is the world we create?" Freedom fighter, writer and singer YahNé Ndgo joins the show to discuss the power of "we," the power of art and the shedding of past shame in order to build beautiful futures. http://www.yahnendgo.com/

A radical and kinetic start to 2021! We sit down with Marina Sitrin, mother, dreamer and associate professor to discuss not just movements in time, but in space - journeys that shift paradigms and societies - from Greece to Argentina to upstate New York. https://www.marinasitrin.com/ http://groundedfutures.com/ https://www.artkillingapathy.com/

Behind the curtain, the 4th wall; beyond the distinction between guest and host - today, carla and Eleanor sit down with each other to dig into everything from pop culture embarrassments to melancholic hope and book recs. A perfectly radical way to wrap up the year in a nice bow, and drop kick our presence into the new year.    

“When I was growing up, I was instinctively an anarchist, an anti-capitalist, an environmentalist, but I didn't have the language for that yet.” Maia Ramnath (writer, historian, teacher, performing artist, aerialist, activist and more!) joins the show to dig to root causes and root words; to climb to the crowns of trees and explore the radical sharing and decolonizing solidarity in between.    

"Colonization is and always has been war" What better time than the week of so-called Thanksgiving to highlight Indigenous power and culture - to look to the future through a decolonizing lens that demands nothing less than the abolition of all oppressive systems? Klee Benally is an Indigenous anarchist, artist and agitator. He joins carla and Eleanor to talk about abolishing colonialism, the soundtrack of mutual aid, cyclical organizing and critical hope.   indigenousaction.org indigenousmutualaid.org

"Remaining hopeful could be holding onto our humanity - which is the very thing that capitalism and fascism tries to strip away from us." Dezeray Lyn is a mutual aid worker, a nurse and an author. She joins the show to talk about the power of creating worlds through her writing, what all solidarity efforts have in common, the foundation of radicalism and the radicalism of hope.  

"I only call myself an anarchist as shorthand. anarchy is a way I see the world. it does not define me." scott crow is a street philosopher, author, dreamer, and musician. In this episode, scott digs deep into his own history, the hammer of art that helped shape him, collective liberation, the danger of activist subcultures and more. https://www.scottcrow.org/

"We grew beautiful flowers during Jim Crow. And we need those skills back." Maurice Cook is a grassroots activist, a national organizer, historian and a fierce educator on all matters related to the liberation of black and brown people in Washington DC and around the world. He joins the Silver Threads Podcast to talk about the power of community care, invading white-only spaces, nuance in our worldviews, hope for the future and more. https://www.serveyourcitydc.org/

Zainab Amadahy has a multiracial background that includes African American, Cherokee, Seminole, and European. She is an author of screenplays, nonfiction and futurist fiction, and this week she joins us to talk about the Body in Motion: e-motion, replicating trauma and anger in movement spaces, deep healing, response-ability and more!   http://www.swallowsongs.com/ http://groundedfutures.com/

Cherri Foytlin is a Black indigenous Din'e woman, author, mother, speaker, artist, direct action leader and warrior in the US to protect the land and people. She joins the podcast to talk about her journey to the frontlines, the disease of colonization, where she finds hope for the future and more.  

Welcome to Silver Threads! The show where we trace our present path through the people and stories of the past - as we ourselves - long-term activists learn about each other, from each other and continue to walk, continue to wake. This is our first episode, our teaser, our promo. This is the first of many episodes that carve out a place to share our joy, humility, strength, lessons, hopes, fears and more - from that first step to the frontlines - looking back so we can build forwards. There are forks in the road, but they all lead us home - to the fight, to the build. http://groundedfutures.com