Triangle WILPF Holds Virtual Retreat

From left, WILPF members Lori Hoyt, Lorna Chafe, Lucy Lewis, and Miriam Thompson at a Fight For $15 rally at the North Carolina State Capitol in Raleigh in 2019.

By Lorna Chafe 
Triangle (NC) Branch

April 2021

Triangle WILPF in NC held a virtual retreat on February 27, 2021, over a three-hour period with members and invited guests eagerly taking in the teachings of a panel of young Black activists from our communities.

The three panelists represented labor, with the southeast coordinator for Fight for $15; human rights, with our NAACP branch secretary and director of Training for Action Progress Leaders; and environment, with the NC field coordinator of our Energy Democracy Program. We asked each to discuss their vision for the future in their area of work, how WILPF and allied groups in the area could help to enable those goals, and how they felt their work intersected with others working on issues of justice.    

A common theme was the need to support the most impacted people in taking on leadership roles in the communities. “Cultivating and celebrating the lived experience” of those who know the hardships and giving them the voice to organize and act. Electing them to office and supporting them to bring about change is critical.

The labor movement will rise in power when there is solidarity between all workers and McDonald's workers strikes are honored by hospital workers, etc. The uniting of faith communities with the labor movement is crucial to creating strength. Organizing is the key to power so a local Power Academy will train a group of activists this summer while giving them the financial support to make it possible for them to attend.

There are so many fronts on which to fight egregious environmental actions from coal ash to cutting our NC trees to burn as wood pellets in European stoves. The Peoples Energy Plan is emerging over the next year and Triangle WILPF will play a role in bringing out voices of the community in listening groups.

After the inspiring speakers, we broke into five small groups to address how we and partner organizations could help to bring about some of the important outcomes mentioned and what we as individuals felt we could contribute. Representation from so many local partners in social justice made these conversations very rich and productive.

In addition to planning for listening groups on the energy plan needs, our branch will focus on supporting impacted members of our community for election to office where we can unite to bring about change. We will look to BIPOC for direction and give our support to their voices.

All struggles for freedom from oppression are linked. “We will only get what we are organized
to take.”