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*This response pre-dates the creation of this Serendip page, and is being put up now for completeness of archival purposes.*

On Monday 9/23/2013 I did not go to the office, but instead accompanied the Policy and Advocacy Department to Harrisburg for a conference hosted by a statewide organization focused on ensuring full community access to healthcare.  This group has been the lead organization for a statewide campaign that focuses on influencing the implementation of the Affordable Care Act in Pennsylvania such that it benefits everyone in Pennsylvania to the greatest degree possible, with a focus on demographics that have traditionally had less access to health care – women, lower-income individuals, “minority” ethnic groups, etc.

            At the conference I attended a session each in the morning and afternoon, as well as sat in on the lunchtime and closing plenary sessions.  The information presented covered a number of topics regarding the ACA, such as how to message the opening of registration (on October 1) and the processes involved, what resources these organizations and their constituencies have available to them, what the ACA currently looks like as will be implemented in PA, and what various organizations are already doing and are planning to do going forward. 

The session I personally found most engaging and prompted the greatest response was in the afternoon, and addressed how to engage with “Vulnerable Populations.”  The three presenters for the session each represented an organization that worked primarily with so-called vulnerable populations: young adults, Latino and immigrant communities, and people with disabilities.  All of the presenters were interesting and had good insights to offer from their organizations’ work; but the presenter focusing on the position of people with disabilities particularly verbalized a few key concepts.  Most crucially, she stressed the need to advocate with the community, and not for the community.  This is especially crucial when engaging with a community of which you are not a part, but I would argue that it remains important even when one can claim membership in that community. 

To this end, this is something I worry about in my work.  Because we are not a direct-service organization, the most interaction we have with the community we are (in theory) working on behalf of is through social media and community events that we attend.  As strongly as I believe in the legitimacy and necessity of addressing the issues that the organization promotes, and even as a woman myself and as such a part of that same community, I do not believe that that is enough to reconcile our particular method of advocacy as “with” the community. 

As the presentation on Latino and immigrant communities addressed, developing personal relationships with the people you are working with is key.  The organization is able to do that on a one-time basis at community events, and really no other time or in a more lasting way; at least as far as I have been exposed to thus far.  Again, that may simply be one of the consequences we have to accept as an organization that doesn’t have a service-provision component; but then does that not also call into question the very legitimacy of an organization that identifies that way?

Furthermore, if the organization were to take even more care to emphasize working with the community, I believe it would more clearly demonstrate the way in which feminist issues must necessarily be intersectional.  So though all of the organization’s staff may be female identified, we are not all members of the other communities who are disproportionately affected by various causes we engage with.  All this is not to say that we do not in many significant ways genuinely heed that instruction; in many ways I do believe we do just so – as just one example, take the method by which they distribute grants (which is also a way in which the organization does work to ensure that it is engaged in a level of more immediate engagement with the community, albeit in an indirect manner).  I just want to put forward thoughts on ways in which that may not be so.

Additionally, the presenter brought up the importance of communicating one’s cause and engaging with the community in daily life and interactions.  This seems to me incredibly important as a way in which feminist theory must necessarily be translated into action.  While ideally all individuals should be aware of the world around them and act in such a way that they do not reinforce the kyriarchal structures of oppression we live in, advocates must be even more conscious of not treating their advocacy as a simple 9-5 job.  Not only does this dismiss the work as simply a function of garnering profit; but it also demonstrates the privilege the advocate has, to be able to ignore the issues when no longer at work.  Living the messages of advocacy in everyday life is yet one more way that feminist advocates and organizers can attempt to reconcile their own relative privileges and subvert oppression in our society.