Why you should send money to Minneapolis right now
You should send money. I know most people don’t like sending money to random, unvetted recipients. But here’s why you should do that now.
All over Minneapolis there are neighboorhood groups on the ground helping people who have gone into hiding because of ICE. Hiding is isolating and scary. They cannot go to their jobs, they can’t take their kids to school, they can’t access their community support system.
Most of us can’t go to Minneapolis, but we can help by sending money to help care for these families. There are small organizations helping, and sometimes it’s one or two people. I know this because I found a very thorough list of ways to help, and I sent money to as many places as I could.
I know what you’ll say: How do you know the money is helping? Maybe it’s a scam. Maybe it’s wasted.
You’re right. There are no guarantees. But it’s a risk you should take. Because the only way to let the people of Minneapolis know how much support they have from around the US is to send money.
Ten dollars matters. It adds up fast, and it’s not that risky for any one donor. A small donation tells someone in hiding that they have support. It also tells the person caring for the family that they’re not doing the job alone. Think of it as a vote. $10 so your voice is heard.
I tell you this from firsthand experience. I’ve been on both sides.
I was at the World Trade Center when it fell, and afterwards I received a lot of aid. In hindsight it wasn’t so much the amount of the aid as the timing (fast!) and the kindness that came with it. Even three weeks later I could barely shower. I had no idea how I’d ever make money again. Aid in crisis is a bridge that keeps life from falling apart. I had the Red Cross, but the people in Minneapolis are in hiding. They can’t access large organizations right now.
I also have experience caring for a family who came to the US with nothing. I kept telling myself I wouldn’t spend more money but I’d go to the house and see that the little girl had only three crayons. Or the family had hot dogs but no buns. There were so many things I could do to make their days a little better. And I saw what a difference it made. Parents want more than anything to be able to care for their kids. I was giving them resources to feel like a family.
Sometimes I didn’t like what they did with the money I gave them. I thought the birthday party was extravagant. I thought makeup shouldn’t have been a priority. But if the roles were reversed, I’m sure people would have found fault with how I spent money.
This family taught me that spending money is very personal. There’s dignity in giving someone the chance to make their own financial decisions. You probably would not have spent as much money on the family as I did. There were two trips to Ikea. And then they moved and couldn’t take the furniture.
But I wasn’t upset. I was one of the only people helping them, and I was happy they found a place where they could get more help. I was happy I had the experience of getting to know them by knowing what they needed. And I was happy to let them know that someone here cares about them and wants them to succeed.
You’ll have that warm feeling if you send money to Minneapolis. Regardless of what someone chooses to do with the money.
It’s difficult to help and let go of how they use your help. Whether it’s gifts or money. I think of the book ‘Your money or your life’. A social worker talked about helping a family get money and the Dad spent it on a huge stereo necause he felt they had had such a hard time and needed something nice. Sometimes it can seem so hard deal with all the day to day hardships of bills ,food etc that it feels good to get dopamine from a one off thing that might be considered frivilous. Maybe it gives you enough of a boost to kerp gping. It was kind of you to pay it forward after you benefited from help.
It feels frightening to have to help people in secret/ hiding. The World Trade Centre was awful but nobody had to hide
Absolutely not. I love immigrants. I married one and probably half of my friends are immigrants. But ICE is doing the job I want them to do – going after the illegal and troublemaker ones. The ICE agent that Renee Good plowed into suffered internal bleeding and somehow he is the bad guy? The problem here as I see it, is not ICE but the horribly biased media. They desperately want a George Floyd 2.
Just curious. Did you actually watch any of the multiple videos of the woman getting shot in the face, or are you just going off what Fox News and Trump’s people are saying?
Carrie. Here’s a tip. If I were trying to defend ICE’s right to detain and shoot people — which I am not — I think I would look to constitutional lawyers who are defending Trump’s right to extrajudicial behavior. I definitely would not build my argument around the absurd way ICE is conducting themselves in Minneapolis.
I don’t know what you are trying to say. Maybe you should make a post about it! I’d love to read it.
Internal injuries? Are you kidding me? I have seen no video evidence that the ICE agent was touched, let alone knocked backwards or had internal injuries. But I have seen evidence that six prosecutors have just resigned, that the feds are not properly investigating, and in fact are locking the state police out from their investigation. If the F.B.I. is not courteously sharing evidence with patriotic police then I think I know why.
I don’t want to distract from the issue of immigrants, but I am speaking up because how we got into this mess in the first place was people and legacy media passing over lies, instead of calling them out.
And no, the ICE guys were not pushing their car out of the snow the way the White House claimed. Because several videos all show a lack of snow on the road.
Well you can ask AI about it. The agent was hit and suffered from internal bleeding. I’m taking the fact that you didn’t know that as proof that the legacy media lies by the sin of omission on your side, too.
I see no reason to disbelieve the snow remark. The roads are plowed, that’s why there’s no snow on the road. The plowed snow is piled up along the sides of the road. In the videos I see, the snow is at least half as high as the car in some places, so I could see how there could be a problem with a stuck car. People should not be antagonizing ICE when they are working, as Good and her partner clearly were. I’m sad she were shot, but they messed around that day and suffered the consequences.
Critical thinking is nice, but there is an even nicer comfort in believing everything the Dear Leader says, hook, line and sinker.
For my part, if any anti-immigrant person says, “They’re eating the dogs” or “the election was stolen” then I put on my while lab coat and ask three questions:
Who said so? Who’s he? How does he know?
Kindly, how do you know what you think you know? All of us need to ask ourselves that question these days. If you claim Trump is an anti-immigrant person, how do you square that with the fact that he married not one, but two immigrants? Perhaps he’s not as anti-immigrant as you claim. You’d have more credibility if you trashed him on more verifiable topics, like his inability to stay married.
A native Minnesotan has put together this site aggregating places that are taking donations. https://www.standwithminnesota.com/
That’s a great link. Thank you.