We’re writing to let you know that MISN will be going on a hiatus from external organizing for a little while. Everything is okay, there’s nothing wrong! We’ve just experienced some shifts in the membership of our core collective recently that has been making our capacity feel a little lower than usual. We will still be busy over the next couple of months… but as an act of care to ourselves and in service of long-term sustainable organizing, we will be focusing our energy on developing new models for investing in new mining justice activists, recruiting and onboarding new core collective members, and generally building our power and capacity. We think this is a very good and exciting thing!
We’re trying to be as open about this as possible for two major reasons:
#1: We’re not going to be around that much this fall or available to support the global mining justice movement/Toronto-based organizing as much as usual. We won’t be planning any actions/events, taking on new relationships with mining-impacted communities, or agreeing to many requests to speak/present/educate/table/co-host/etc. But we haven’t gone away! We’re just focusing inwardly right now.
#2: We want to model the fact that taking breaks is okay. Resting is okay! Saying “I’m tired” is okay. We’re in this for the long haul, folks, and we want you to be too. Capitalism and colonialism aren’t going to abolish themselves, and so we need our collective strength, which can only be maintained through mutual aid, solidarity, friendship, rest, perspective, and whatever else nourishes our spirits.
To anybody who’s been thinking of joining MISN for a while: now is a REALLY good time to get in touch with us about that. We will be holding a new member’s orientation later in the fall, but please email us about this anytime, especially if you are an experienced organizer. We are a small but mighty feminist-minded, anti-capitalist, anti-colonial collective that strongly values thoughtfulness, creativity, humour, and liking the people we organize with. We’d love to have you join us as we work to build our numbers, energy, and capacity!
See you in January 2018, friends!
Love, the MISN collective <3
p.s. And to you, if you work for the mining industry and are reading this: do not interpret this as a sign of weakness. We will be back soon… bigger, better, bolder, and more ready than ever to f*ck you up. Get ready.