chima
January 10, 2025, 10:59pm
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If you have questions about any of these action items, please schedule a quick Zoom meeting with a member of the Steering Committee here . We were elected to help members achieve the goals you voted for, so don’t hesitate to book a meeting!
Timeline: January 17 – January 30
At the General Meeting , we planned to organize a Medicare for All Town Hall. We had a discussion about what it would look like during the meeting, but we need to settle on a more concrete plan. Then we can start advertising it and hold it mid-February.
Medicare for All-esque Townhall Side-Quest
Collect healthcare stories
Townhall to take advantage of current heighten discussion around healthcare/CEOs
Discussion Summary
@Turcotte : Voices of the Working class, have a QR code where people tell their stories, and write their stories in an article. Good to refocus things away from Luigi and back to healthcareBella: used to work in healthcare specifically hospice, issues within healthcare even for the workers
@PeterKraljev : talk about pre-Mccarthyism when socialist organization created mutual funds, community health plans, and funded youth groups and cemeteries. Tie it back to working class history@HipGnosis : success story cecosesola in venezuela started out as funeral home to make sure people were buried and now feed half of the city they are based in, direct people towards this. Anarchists had history of propaganda of deed and learned that it doesn’t work@Bozzii : Egypt healthcare is only for the elites so many people do mutual aid for medications and checkups. During townhall mention that the issue isn’t the leader, its the system itself@chima : point of it is to reorienting people to build class consciousness@Bozzii : we ourselves are not the solution, people uniting in their struggles is. People are looking for a savior, but there won’t be one person that comes in and saves us all like Luigi@Adri_Martinez : should think about what to do for people that are having issues now. If people are trying to come to us for what they should do and need help now. How do we prepare for that@HipGnosis : being part of a network of GoFundMe’s for emergency funds isn’t a solution but it is a bandaid so we can@Turcotte : townhall idea should lead to people sharing stories and make it a coalition of GoFundMe’s that way people actually get help. for 6-week plan start off with getting people stories
After the GM, a few of us talked more about it. Here are the notes from that:
Healthcare Town Hall
Adri suggested referring people to free clinics like EMAC at our Medicare for All Town Hall. We discussed the challenge of determining whom we should invite and what we’re offering them. If we’re asking for healthcare stories, those who attend might be people facing financial hardships or other healthcare issues. There are existing solutions available: payment reduction plans, letter templates to appeal insurance denials, free clinics, and income-based payment reductions.
This raised the question of our role as a socialist organization. Should we act as intermediaries between people and these nonprofits? These organizations already receive funding for outreach. Does it make sense for us to do additional outreach on their behalf? What kind of relationship would we establish with them? Alternatively, should our focus be on building class consciousness among those who are angry, ready to be active, and have the capacity to contribute to our current efforts?
Similarly to the Tenant Union Workshop, there are questions around who are audience should be, what the goals of this town hall, what do we want people to do after attending this town hall, etc.
chima
January 11, 2025, 2:18am
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I thought this was a good article on where Medicare for All ended up: https://www.sublationmag.com/post/medicare-for-all-requiem-for-a-dream