it's Joe

I’ve been shown how to join the conversation, so here I am, to answer any Qs about Musick Creek’s work.

Some context: We haven’t begun any of our programs yet. The organization only just came into existence to try and buy the property and pursue this mission.

Pics: Anything you see in pictures is a scrapping together of documentation from past uses of the property, so as to excite interest in ecological beauty, not designed in regard to future uses or intentions. Those photos are of some of the visitors to that property. Others have been people of color, certainly. The communities in the area where we’ve begun our work are generally a mix of white, Latinx and Nyyhmy (a.k.a. Northfork Mono) in order of population numbers and we have developed our planning ideas in colaboration with the Native American Nyyhmy community. I appreciate that our messaging must strive to be welcoming to people of all identities, and we are intent on developing a more representative photo sampling—not easy in a place where technology has been minimally present and hardly any pictures exist. Had we gone out of our way to feature the various POC in past gatherings by taking photos with them in particular, that might have felt like tokenism, especially since that region is mostly populated by poor white people.

Future demographics: Our intentions and plans are heading toward additional connections with people from outside that region, most importantly people from urban and suburban lifestyles. You can be assured that collaborations will be with programs serving many POC.

Awesome Foundation: Not a real foundation, just a group of people who give no-strings gifts and pretend it’s a grant. Yes, we gave $500 to the crowd-funding effort for OC.

Social justice: The SJ components of our work are embedded in the ideas that (1) anyone can and must become aware of the inextricable connectedness of ecological systems with social systems, politics and economics. They are not separate topics. (2) One of our fundamental principles is that future participants in our group, whether they choose to organize or be program-goers, will choose their own participation content and commitments, without dues or fee requirements. (3) We wish to research, coalesce, test and set examples of non- and anti-capitalist methods for building inclusive, empowering communities and individuals of that region and those connecting in from elsewhere. (4) We have already helped build personal connections and meaningful experiences between people who would perhaps otherwise not intersect or have access to one another’s background and ethnic stories.