HOUDINI: Mutual Aid Organizations | Some Thoughts on Hierarchy and the Creation of It Within Our Own OrganizationsAs some of you may know, I am a big fan of mutual aid as my primary form of organizing. I think going into your community, providing for the people, trying to build intentional communities, trying to give back to the people—going amongst the masses, doing good works—I do believe that is one of the most effective ways to bolster your connections to your community, connections to your neighborhood, connections to other people. Find new people who are allies. It's just a great starting point. And I think it's something that anyone can do, and it's a nonviolent logistical form of resistance that is infrastructure-focused on action. I'm a big fan of it. That said, I've learned many things in my time, whether it has been going and physically handing out meal kits, safety kits, and hygiene kits to people, or actually working at pop-up soup kitchens, or free fridge programs, what have you. I've learned some things, and I think that we're missing some of the points with mutual aid. Maybe I'm going to come off a little bit too ruthless here, but we are creating hierarchies in our own organizations, and we are effectively doing charity, not mutual aid community building.
https://erikhoudini.com/#post?id=629651&title=mutual-aid-organizations-some-thoughts-on-hierarchy-and-the-creation-of-it-within-our-own-organizationsWall Street To Insurers: Keep Denying CareA health care industry giant’s Wall Street overlords just admitted that the company’s sky-high health insurance coverage denial rates reaped them enormous profits — and to keep the money flowing, they’re suing to stop the insurer from approving more patient care. UnitedHealth Group has been facing growing discontent from its investors, a battle that — as the corporation faces mounting public scrutiny over its care denials — could shape the future of health insurance for 29 million people. A May 7 lawsuit brought by a small-time investor in UnitedHealth Group is one of the latest chapters in the battle, arguing that the company’s tanking stock performance this spring had cost its investors unfairly. Some corporate media reports framed the suit as investors taking on the company for its “aggressive, anti-consumer tactics.” But in reality, court documents reveal, some of UnitedHealth Group’s investors are concerned that the company’s changing “corporate practices” have been too consumer-friendly. And they suggest that these practices are a driving force behind UnitedHealth Group’s disastrous first quarter of 2025, which saw cratering stock value and the departure of longtime CEO Andrew Witty. UnitedHealth Group has one of the highest denial rates of any major insurer, which can force patients to forgo critical treatment, even under a doctor’s orders. The corporation was one of the first insurers to come under fire for using artificial intelligence tools to deny care. The company’s denial rates received renewed attention in December following the assassination of its CEO. In the months since, as it’s faced a Justice Department probe and several major lawsuits, the company has struggled to regain control of its public image. Amid its damage control, the insurer announced reforms to its use of prior authorizations, which theoretically could reduce denials and help people access more health care. The investor lawsuit has now been consolidated into a larger ongoing shareholder suit against UnitedHealth Group. In its annual shareholder meeting this week, the company tried its best to quell the growing discontent among investors, who are increasingly shaken by the company’s tanking stock value and poor financial outlook. As UnitedHealth Group’s investors revolt, the admissions in the lawsuit serve as a reminder that Wall Street greed is one of the reasons for its tendency to deny patients care. “The objectives of patients and shareholders are often at odds,” Wendell Potter, a former health insurance executive turned reform advocate, told The Lever. The most recent investor lawsuit, he said, showed that investors “certainly want to hold [UnitedHealth Group] accountable to make themselves richer, to enhance their earnings, their portfolio.” “That is not the same objective that most patients have,” he added. “But it is the way that our health care system is now being run.”
https://www.levernews.com/wall-street-to-insurers-keep-denying-care/The Conquest of Bread by Peter Kropotkin Chapter 9: The need for luxuryMan is not a being whose exclusive purpose in life is eating, drinking, and providing a shelter for himself. As soon as his material wants are satisfied, other needs, which, generally speaking, may be described as of an artistic character, will thrust themselves forward. These needs are of the greatest variety; they vary with each and every individual; and the more society is civilized, the more will individuality be developed, and the more will desires be varied. Even to-day we see men and women denying themselves necessaries to acquire mere trifles, to obtain some particular gratification, or some intellectual or material enjoyment. A Christian or an ascetic may disapprove of these desires for luxury; but it is precisely these trifles that break the monotony of existence and make it agreeable. Would life, with all its inevitable drudge and sorrows, be worth living, if, besides daily work, man could never obtain a single pleasure according to his individual tastes? If we wish for a Social Revolution, it is no doubt, first of all, to give bread to everyone; to transform this execrable society, in which we can every day see capable workmen dangling their arms for want of an employer who will exploit them; women and children wandering shelterless at night; whole families reduced to dry bread; men, women, and children dying for want of care and even for want of food. It is to put an end to these iniquities that we rebel. But we expect more from the Revolution. We see that the worker, compelled to struggle painfully for bare existence, is reduced to ignore the higher delights, the highest within man’s reach, of science, and especially of scientific discovery; of art, and especially of artistic creation. It is in order to obtain for all of us joys that are now reserved to a few; in order to give leisure and the possibility of developing everyone’s intellectual capacities, that the social revolution must guarantee daily bread to all. After bread has been secured, leisure is the supreme aim. No doubt, nowadays, when hundreds and thousands of human beings are in need of bread, coal, clothing, and shelter, luxury is a crime; to satisfy it, the worker’s child must go without bread! But in a society in which all have the necessary food and shelter, the needs which we consider luxuries to-day will be the more keenly felt. And as all men do not and cannot resemble one another (the variety of tastes and needs is the chief guarantee of human progress) there will always be, and it is desirable that there should always be, men and women whose desire will go beyond those of ordinary individuals in some particular direction.
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/kropotkin-peter/1892/bread.htm#chapter09