Hi everyone. Welcome. Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. We're really glad to see so many people here and I'm really excited to be here with you. And so today we're going to be talking about how civilians engage with armed actors in conflict settings for their own protection and how humanitarian and peace actors can support that engagement. So in our wonderful panel, we're going to have the opportunity to hear from both nonviolent Peace Force and the Norwegian Refugee Council about some context specific examples of the work that their teams are doing in South Sudan and in the Central African Republic. And from the humanitarian policy group about some recent research that they've done in both of those countries. They have some forthcoming reports that I for one am very excited to read. And we're also going to hear a little bit about from nonviolent Peace Force about their reflections on their global work around engagement with armed actors. I'm just going to say a few words to sort of frame the topic and then we want to jump into the main event, which is really our speakers. So overall, I think in the past few years we can agree that we've seen the protection sector and the humanitarian sector more broadly really made some strong progress in our thinking on protection outcomes in the way that we were sort of acknowledging that it's our responsibility to reduce protection risk. I think we're recognizing more and more than an addition to coming into respond and support people who have been affected by violence. It's also our role to be proactive and to work to prevent protection risks from occurring. So one of the ways that I think that that progress has really been made and I really want to give a lot of credit to the global protection cluster and to the member organizations, many of whom are in the audience is really that focus on the risk equation that helps us understand protection risk. And so we're looking at the threat vulnerability and capacity those three components of protection risk that make up our understanding of those risks. However, I think that we do still continue to see that the component of that that gives us the most challenge is that threat component. It's the piece that we're really interested in understanding who's responsible for these protection risks. It really means that we have to understand the perpetrators. And in a lot of the context that we work in, of course, that means that we're looking at armed actors or actors closely affiliated with armed actors. That I think continues to be the most difficult part of that protection piece and that's what we're really going to be digging into today. There's a lot of reasons why historically I think this has been challenging for humanitarian actors. And today we're going to hear about how organizations are working on communities to address this to engage directly with armed actors alongside communities and with an eye towards changing that behavior that is behind the protection threat. I don't want to minimize the challenges here. I think that there are really there's still some continued barriers and that's going to be a lot of what we hear from today. I think there's still a lot of concerns that organizations have about our own organizational risk as well as fears that our actions may put community members at risk. I think that you know there's continuing conversations about how to make sure that we're doing good risk analysis there that we're not assuming risk where it might not be. And that we're really incorporating that analysis to make sure that we're clearly understanding what what might cause us risk and what might not. I think that we're also moving forward and I would push us to continue to make sure that we're thinking that you know it's easy to when we're concerned about sort of increasing our own risk it's easy to make a decision to not do something and recognizing that that's also an active decision and so really comparing all of the modalities of action that we're going to hear about today from organizations and incorporate that into our own risk assessment. And I think another piece of that it's it's really comes into where those deep community relationships are important. It's equally as important that we don't assume risk for civilians when it's not there and that we're listening to them their own analysis their own understanding and their own choices that they're making an engagement with armed actors. Some presenters today are also really going to talk about what it takes to build those relationships with armed actors to demystify something that I think continues to be a challenge for humanitarian organizations that can feel really difficult that can sometimes feel a little bit off limits. So we're going to hear a little bit about some best practice and about some good experience coming from the field that I think will help us all build our collective skills in those areas. And then of course just one one final sort of comment that I think is going to going to also come through in our with our presenters today is that really working on any of these issues requires a nuanced and deep understanding of community strategies for threat reduction for engagement with armed actors to make sure that our engagement or any external engagement doesn't undermine those strategies. And I think this is going to be something that's really important as our our appetite for this grows as our willingness and our interest in engaging in these activities grows. That's going to be a really important thread for us to make sure that we're coming in inappropriate ways that we're coming in and respectful ways that we're listening and making sure that that we're not undermining or stomping out any of those existing community efforts that we know will have been there since before we got there and will be there of course after after we may leave. So really excited to hear from our panelists and excited to hear from the audience so please feel free to to put in questions into the Q&A box we will have a Q&A section and be able to talk through some of your questions. And to begin we're going to really zoom in on a very specific context and and watch a video actually that's going to going to share some experience of nonviolent peace forces work in the Juba POC in South Sudan where to hear some from some individuals in that site a gang leader a police officer and some community members who have been directly impacted by violence and how they've worked alongside nonviolent peace force to prevent violence and strengthen those relationships in that community. So let's turn over to that video. The problem is the crime. There's a lot of crime in group. If you move at night then the gang group will come and hit you, then they hit you with a knife, you say pangar. We have very many problems in this POC. The problems are not only one. In this camp we come from far. We have never seen the outside world. Since the war broke out in 2013 we only hear we don't know anything what is going on outside the world. My parents didn't have money to take me to school so I decided to move with peer groups they tell me leave school do everything that is not. So I decided to join their group. We used to move at night and also for money. So if you have nothing to eat you have to go outside and steal so that you can survive and eat. The community in POC tried to convene their children. They tried to bring the police and inside the POC they didn't understand them. We police we used to come we usually come to treat them to harass them to beat them but they will not understand us. They are still doing the crime. The community leadership was threatening them by calling police to arrest them. That one it did not work. Then as an environmentalist cause we are using UCP and now we applied some of the UCP strategy to get them together because it is not only one group. There are more than 10 groups and this group are fighting among themselves. We build the trust among themselves. They come together at youth. Yeah when we are in our group we used to fight with another group but now we have stopped it. Then we bring youth together now together with the community leadership. We had separate dialogue. Many meetings, trials that are between them. Then now we reach to the point that youth are not anymore fearing the community leadership. They now have the trust. Even the community leadership also they now gain the trust with youth. So from there we went further to the third step of building the trust between the youth and the police. We used to meet with a gang group in UCP and by then it is very rare and difficult to sit with a gang group to talk together, to eat together but now they used to move with us. And also they gave the chance to move in our area checkpoint but last time it is very difficult. The gang and the community became friends. People play football together. They unite themselves. We get together and we share things together. So we are going to talk a little bit about the role of the humanitarian organization in holding space for these engagements between gang groups and police. Noon 12, go ahead. Hi, I think you've got something covering your video camera. What is it? Your screen is all black but it wasn't before. Is there anything covering the camera? There you go. All right, I'm Yankel as you guys here. I'm working here with the community at the IDP camp in Cuba.  So the camp was formed after the resolve of the conflict that erupted in 2013. So there was a specific tribe that was targeted. Then they decided to run into the camp. So the UN opened a chance for them because they are being targeted in the towns. So now the camp is being established. There is two camps here in Cuba, camp one and camp three. So both camps operate in both camps. There is a population around 50 to 1000 people that are living in the camp. So these people, they've been living in the camp since 2013 when the war broke out. So they are not to be able to come out from the camp. They have children, they even grew up in the camp. From 2015 up to 2017, that time there was no relationship between the government and IDP. That lead IDP not to come outside. But when you come outside, that one, it creates a very big fear between them because it was the same government who killed them. They don't want to see the government. Then when these children grew up in the camp, so they don't know the police or they don't know the government. Then now the time UN left the POC in 2019, it was a big disaster. Then they formed themselves, they formed a group, a group of gangs. These people again terrorized the lives of innocent people who was in the POC. They also come from the POC because they are the same children who have been living in the POC. They don't listen to anyone, they don't listen to the apartment. So they don't listen to the community leadership. UN tried to engage them. Also, even UN, they reached the extent that opening a very small sale for them. When any one of them committed a crime, then UN asked to arrest them. So they failed also to listen to the UN. Then it has become a big problem in the camp because they are doing a lot of crime. They are fighting among themselves. They are killing themselves. They are also raping girls and women in the camp. So they are also attacking and robbing people. From there, NP took the initiative of engaging them. Because as a nonviolent peace force, we believe in unharmed civilian protection. So we don't believe in the power of gun, but when you are carrying a gun to threaten someone with a gun. We believe in doing things in an unviolent way. So we engage with the gangs. It was very difficult to engage them. It was not easy. We engage with them. So we carry out the patrolling, trying to identify where they sit. Then we reveal the relationship with them. So they accepted to come to our compound, to our meetings. Then we had several meetings. From there, we bring them together because it is like a 10 plus group. This 10 plus group, they are fighting among themselves. So they are killing themselves as I mentioned before. Then when we bring them together, they agree to have unity or a peace among themselves. We give them a lot of trainings, a lot of awareness raising on the peace building and the trust building activities. Then when we knew that these people understand themselves. So we also detect another threat because they are not in a very good relation with the community leaders. Then we took another step of building a relationship between them and the community leadership. So from there, now they come together because we build that relationship. Community leadership now managed to reach out to them on a daily basis. Asking their well-being because they have a leaders, they have a connection. So now because the time when they were fighting with the community leadership, community leadership, they got back up from the police, which is now the government police. The government police also is another threat now for the gangs. And gang tell us very clearly that we have a problem with the community leadership and the police. So see now we sit together with the community leadership. So the trust that was brought between was broken between us and the community leadership is already built now. Now there is a need for us again to meet with the police. This way we invite the police commander to have a meeting with the gang. So it took us two weeks to convene the police commander to come and meet with the gang. Because in principle, these police, they don't believe in a dialogue. So when they see a criminal, they have nothing to do with the criminal. They have to arrest the criminal, beat the criminal and take the criminal to the jail. So we inform them, we discuss with them that this is not how this thing will be handled. So when we see them insisting, not listening to what we are telling them, we propose now a training to have a training with the police on unharmed civilian protection. So when we conduct a two-day training on unharmed civilian protection, this way the police convene. Now there is another way that to silent the force and we can convene the gang while we are talking to them. This way the police came and they had a discussion with the gang. So they conducted like a two-days consecutive days with the dialogue with the gang. This way the police realized that the force that they've been using, it was a very bad approach. So they have to apologize to the gangs. They also asked to tell the community that the way that we use to approach this gang is not the good way that we can approach this gang. So now that means this gang, they believe in an unviolent or the UCP, an armed civilian strategy to convene the criminal. So this how we've been interacting with the gangs. It took us time, but at the last they come together. Now there are peaceful people in the community. Now they are leaving freely, some of them already opened their business. They see the light because the reason why also this gang are behaving like this. It is as one of them stated before, they never see the outside world. Even outside Juba, they don't know. Some of them, when they enter into the camp, there were 70 years. So now they become like 17 years or 18 years in the camp. They don't know anything. And also what they experience in the camp, it is what they want to put in the practice. Because there is no government in the camp. No one tells them, did this wrong. They think killing themselves is the right thing to do. But when the NP brought them. Oh, sorry, sorry, finish your thought. I was just going to wrap up, but yeah, finish your thought, please. We and NP brought them together. So we build the class among themselves, them and the police and the community leaders. Now they have a connection. Great. Wonderful. Thank you so much. That's really useful. And there are so many details in there that I just want to dig into. So I hope that we'll have the chance during the Q&A. Really appreciate that contribution. We're going to move over to our next speaker now. Hubert Oldenhaus, the Global Head of Programming with Nonviolent Peace Force. He's going to talk a little bit about entry points and tactics for engaging armed actors on civilian protection in a more global sense. He's going to share some tactics that the nonviolent Peace Force teams use in Myanmar and South Sudan and some other countries to engage with armed actors on civilian protection. So I'll pass it over to you, Hubert. Thank you very much, Leah. So yeah, I'm going to show a few tactics and entry points. Some of them from Myanmar, Iraq and other places. And approaching this primarily from a perspective of a practitioner, especially people who want to learn a little bit more about how do we shift from kind of vulnerabilities and capacities only to a focus on threats. And I'm speaking both on protecting civilians from armed actors or the violence within their own ranks, but also how do we encourage like the example before the police to responsibly protect civilians. On the next slide, the first thing that we need to do is to kind of overcome the fear that a lot of us have when we're looking at armed actors. We often see them as kind of one big group of unified opinion that is against it, that will not help us, that will not support us and that we better stay away from as far as we can. And we kind of have to sort of connect with the human beings behind the gun in a way that Neto was just explaining his engagement with the police. Finding out what is their personal interests, what are their fears, what are the pillars of support. And it doesn't mean that we sort of have to trust them or collaborate with them. I think often we make a distinction within the NP about between collaboration and engagement. So next slide. This engagement as Neto was just explaining is not so easy. And I think it requires continuous persistence and a lot of creativity as well. I remember a case from Myanmar where a group of community protection actors were looking at a way because the military is very keen on separating communities away from the militaries, the way the barracks are organized and so forth. So he said, I'm a barber. I have a barber shop. Soldiers still come to my shop and cut their hair. I'm talking with them about protection. I'm talking about the ceasefire agreement and so forth. Next slide. So an avenue that I've often seen working in Iraq and Philippines and Myanmar with quite a lot of success is the mobilization of religious leaders. A lot of times community protection teams find themselves with a locked door. Military doesn't want to engage with civil society. They sometimes fear civil society. They see them as a threat. And so I've often seen communities being very effective in going, for example, to a monk and local monastery. They know that the military commander is going to pray at the monastery and they find ways to sort of connect. And so they go together with the monk or a pastor to meet the commander who's then willing to see them. And then in a way they managed to negotiate the release of a prisoner or someone has been forcibly recruited by the armed forces and so forth. Next slide. And another important tactic as well, and I've mentioned this example before, is to focus on threats that are not intentional. People that are caught in crossfires, rumors that are causing the mobilization of armed groups to retaliate, communities that started to mobilize on the basis of rumors and misinformation. And the intervention that I've seen community actors do when they're really staying within the lane, we're not interfering with the military matters. This has often created a lot of trust among communities, but also trust among armed actors. They see what you're doing. It's very clear. And even that sort of engagement sometimes has led to almost increased security for community protection actors, because it's very clear what they're doing. So next slide. So another point that I wanted to make is the importance of pinpointing responsibilities. I was speaking last week with a woman who has done a lot of accompaniment in Palestine. This was before the current crisis. But she said in the West Bank she was trying to accommodate us through checkpoints. And she told me a case of a little boy, a four-year-old boy with an acute appendicitis. And she was really kind of focusing on the one soldier and saying, okay, please get us through, because it's a matter of life and death. And she said, I managed to do that sometimes when I really got to their level and touched the humanity and kind of forced them to take responsibility to either say no or yes. And she said, when it's in a large group, it's much more difficult. So it's also a matter of understanding these dynamics. How can I get that person past? Next slide. So maybe one last example is also the creative ways. This is an example from Myanmar as well, where there was this military battalion coming into a village in eastern Myanmar. And this military battalion was looking for a place to settle. And the community protection team put them into a local community center. And then sort of, they went out to collect firewood. They helped them to get food. And I asked them, like, why are you kind of going out of your way to sort of do all of that for the military group that you don't really like very much? And they said, well, you know, if the military goes out into the village, community members will be feeling unsafe. There may be sexual harassment. So our way of taking care of this group of militaries is a way to protect the communities from them. Another slide. This is maybe the last example that I'm seeing a lot with rebel groups, especially groups that are taking up arms to protect their indigenous communities. And we've done some dialogue between community groups and they have sort of repeating back the kind of, the lofty statements that some of those groups have put forward to protect communities. And sometimes mirroring back the attitude and behaviors that those groups see in the communities and sort of getting those armed groups that start off with very high ideals that sometimes degenerate into violence. And sort of those constructive conversations really showed as well a lot of progress because they want the legitimacy of the community. Let me leave it there and hand it back to Leah. Thank you very much. Thanks, Hubey. Super interesting examples of some of the creative ways that people are approaching these challenges. So moving right along, I want to introduce our next speaker, who's Gemma Davies, the Senior Research Fellow from the Humanitarian Policy Group. Gemma's going to discuss recent research and finding from the Central African Republic and South Sudan where they looked at how communities engage with armed actors and then what the implications are for humanitarian and also for peace actors. So Gemma, I'll hand it over to you. Thanks very much, Leah. Yeah, so I mean, I think we've had some great examples today on how civilians proactively develop strategies for their in-self protection, including by seeking to influence the behaviour of armed actors to reduce the threats that they face. But we also know that this is often below the radar and it's rarely recognised by international actors and it also is often not sufficient to provide protection to communities particularly over the long term. Communities are a strategic role for the communities and for the communities who represent them when carrying out dialogue with armed actors and while representatives are often drawn from leadership positions, people with moral or cultural or even faith-based influence often outweigh those with political influence, particularly at that community grassroots level and representative to chosen according to specific qualities. So this includes experience in carrying out dialogue and calm, not to take a position on the actions of armed actors while using strategies of persuasion and compensation. And as we've heard already today, building trust and the ability to hold a neutral position are fundamental to successful dialogue. In both Central Africa, Republic and South Sudan they're both deeply spiritual and religious societies and as Hubert said, they're often spiritual faith leaders lead dialogue on behalf of communities in both South Sudan and Kha faith institutions historically instill a sense of respect and therefore trust and they can often seek to demonstrate that there are outside issues of politics, identity, ethnicity and as such they're often seen as neutral and garnering authority through that position as representatives of the faith they represent. So one example in Central Africa, Republic for example, is where religious leaders whether from Christian or Muslim faith took prominent roles to facilitate dialogue. Imams used religious holidays to negotiate a pause in conflict and violence and used religious celebrations to bring communities and armed actors together seeking to increase familiarity and therefore in a hope to reduce the levels of violence and this also had the added value of supporting aid agencies faith actors also have the strong advantage of really strong networks which can cross territories it can link local to sub national to national dialogue as well as leverage international networks at times. Women are also increasingly proactively engaged in dialogue with armed actors leveraging perceptions that they're non-threatening in both South Sudan and Central Africa Republic women have unique entry points of marriage by having greater ability to move across territories because of perceptions that they're not threatening and so there's livelihoods that are often in markets and frequented by a range of conflict actors. Women we found have often been involved in preparing for dialogue for example by passing messages between conflicting groups and exchanging information on the preparedness of armed actors to engage in dialogue seeking to leverage their symbolic role of maternal authority portraying themselves as mothers with sons across all sides so in one example in South Sudan this led women to lead a dialogue on behalf of their community they spoke of the harms that civilians had faced and moved combatants to tears when speaking of those harms and they managed to secure agreement not only for the non-state armed group to move the military base away from where civilians lived but also to call off a planned attack in the coming weeks and humanitarians can think about supporting empowering women to further leverage their role as champions towards promoting restraint in the use of violence but for humanitarian protection and peace actors to support community efforts solutions have to be owned by communities and too often humanitarian interventions can lead to mis-trust in sensitive approaches and can endanger the entire process protection actors should take their lead from community identified approaches and approaches and that requires in-depth conflict and stakeholder analysis and understanding of community dynamics at those local levels locally owned actors can be involved in the community and in the community and you can see that the wind approaches also requires respect of customs and practices so for example again in South Sudan the sacrifice and sharing of livestock by eating together is a strong tradition which indicates a successful dialogue as is offering food prior to commencing a dialogue but at times communities can't carry out a dialogue on their own if they don't have food that's available to share so humanitarian actors have a role in the community and we have a lot of examples from Neanderthal earlier in terms of that bridging role that protection actors can play but also in providing the resources to do so humanitarian mediation is one approach to do this and Unganand from NRC will shortly discuss NRC's approach to humanitarian mediation which can really sort of look at how humanitarians can proactively reduce threats of violence and evidence from research from CAR which looked at NRC, DRC and Oach's approach to humanitarian mediation demonstrates the incredible potential that this approach has for reducing the risk of violence and can highlight that even where humanitarian mediation has had less sustained impact it still contributes to an overall reduction of violence and peaceful resolution to conflicts but as one person we interviewed a lot of people who have been involved in this and I think it is very considerative and any support to dialogue should mirror that it requires flexibility the ability to adapt and a willingness to take risks but the humanitarian sector is often immobilized by decision makers and donors who are cautious as to the potential risks involved and can fall to a default of accepted risks. Peace actors are far more familiar with doing this and far more experience of the levels of analysis needed to do this safely so there is a lot that humanitarian actors can learn about working in complementarity between peace and protection actors. While facilitating if you could just wrap up sorry. Sorry. One sec. While facilitating dialogue, negotiations and mediation brings organizations into that uncomfortable space that Leah spoke to earlier humanitarian have to recognize that their remit shouldn't be to shape the political landscape they have to accept their responsibility to reduce violence and use their full tool books to promote peace. Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. I think that's a great thought to end on that hopefully we'll be able to jump into in the Q&A. I do want to ask participants to make sure to put any questions or thoughts that you want the speakers to speak more about into that Q&A section on Zoom. We're excited to hear more from all of our panelists in that section. So please do add any questions that you have. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to turn it over to the CPC Council. As Gemma mentioned, he's going to speak about the experience with humanitarian mediation efforts in the Central African Republic and the relevance that that has to our whole discussion. I'm going to hand it over to the CPC Council. It's an honour for me to speak to you today on behalf of the NRC to present the work that we do at the Refugee Council. We work on humanitarian programming. I wish to discuss two cases with you that in the Central African Republic and then we'll talk about the resources that we used in 2017 until today and I will talk to you about lessons learned during our program. I will also provide recommendations for humanitarian actors as well as for fundraisers. Next slide, please. This is a first example. I will talk to you about work that we carried out in the Central African Republic. For those who know the national context, Muslims and Christians have lived side by side for a long time but in 2013 conflict broke out and the Muslim community had to leave the Boali area and find safer places to be. They left behind their land and their homes and their belongings. Next slide, please. So, NRC was alerted to this and carried out a process to facilitate a dialogue that's allowed for displaced persons when they expressed a wish in Boali. So, NRC was alerted and carried out a community dialogue process. We first carried out a conflict sensitive analysis to understand the conflict and we then had separate meetings with stakeholders before. Then we organized a dialogue with all relevant stakeholders including armed groups some of whom had annexed some of the homes and goods of the displaced persons that is to say displaced persons from the Muslim community. Following the dialogue an action plan was drafted. Next slide, please. And the results were as follows. Following the dialogue people agreed to put somebody in charge of all occupied goods the occupied belongings of the displaced persons to ensure that all these belongings be returned to their owners that is to say the displaced persons who'd expressed a wish to return. Then the community leaders within the framework of the action plan had carried out an awareness raising exercise not just in the community but also in the neighboring areas to enable the displaced persons to peacefully return and for there to be freedom of movement not just in the town but beyond in the whole area. Next slide, please. Following the dialogue we noted that the displaced persons who returned they went back to their area they received their belongings again there was free circulation and they did not experience any violence against them. I will now present a second case this case is regarding access to a school in Mingala in the Baskota region in 2021 we were alerted to a situation of violence against the children in one community these children did not have access to a school and so they were regularly victims of violence every time they tried to go to said school they were not just experiencing violence from other children but also other community members because these were rival communities we had to carry out a sensitive conflict analysis and we carried out free mediation work so separate meetings to prepare the communities for dialogue and following these discussions the communities were able to to all children from the communities and to this day the children of both communities continue to go to this school and they are able to learn in a protected environment slide please following these two cases and yes there have been many other cases sorry next slide please going to the slide on lessons learned yes so following the programs NRC has understood that mediation as my colleague has already said that mediation has huge potential in the reduction of violence for communities or against communities we've also learned that mediation is a very effective way for communities and humanitarian actors to engage it not only strengthens the sense of responsibility but it also intensifies the dignity and participation of all persons within the process namely regarding decisions that concern them also mediation and humanitarian actors have an important role in terms of facilitating dialogue and ensuring it is held properly NRC has also noted that in terms of humanitarian mediation where there's been a less durable impact this mediation has still contributed to reducing violence overall and strengthening the capacity of communities in terms of mediation and peaceful conflict resolution and so given the lessons learned in terms of the programming and planning NRC has also noted that it is important for humanitarian actors both international and national to focus on using mediation and community negotiation as well as doing capacity building within the community itself we believe this is crucial within our mediation approach why because when we facilitate mediation we still need to go beyond this and allow communities to appropriate dialogue and processes this is not easy to implement it requires close ties and relationship building this through long-term presence and financial resources that also are available over the long term the entire process requires solid analysis and awareness-raising regarding the conflict to ensure that the conflict and the violence is not exacerbated by our intervention our analysis allows us to better understand the conflict and stop us from fanning the flames traditional conflict analysis methods do take a lot of time though this is why NRC is reviewing its methodology and focusing interventions on stopping violence rather than coming to a long-term peace agreement all of this requires a lot of experience and a lot of learning also unique donors and partners who are happy to accompany you throughout the process thank you for listening thank you so much that was super interesting I really appreciate those reflections so we are going to turn it over to the Q&A section so I will encourage you to keep putting those questions into the Q&A section we have a couple there and actually I'm going to start with and get on for a minute because we have a sort of specific question about your experience Marine and the audience is asking about where the Christian communities went as those Muslim communities returned and how and I think in some ways this is what I'm also quite curious about is how did you convince them to leave the returnees to come back to their properties so maybe you could talk a little bit about what that engagement process was and then you can come to the decision that they eventually came to thank you for the question of course the Christian community went nowhere they stayed in the area they just accepted to have a dialogue with their brothers in the Muslim community who then returned so this guaranteed that they could return to their land of orange in now the Muslim community also come from Boali they're not foreigners it's just that they had to leave their land because of the violence now as I said before when we received the alert we did an analysis of the conflict trying to understand it better we wanted to understand all factors that were that might exacerbate the situation then we had our separate meetings now what does this mean it means we had a meeting with the Christian community and another with the Muslim community this to ensure that each party better understand the process and each party be available and ready to enter into a dialogue with the other it was after that that we brought two communities together for a dialogue I would say the members of the armed groups who had annexed the homes and belongings of the Muslim community that was displaced we then brought these parties together so including the members of this armed group who had accepted to enter into a dialogue and the discussion was led by the communities we only had a facilitating and impartial role we were impartial and the communities discussed the matter amongst themselves and they themselves found solutions that they deemed valid and acceptable we were only there to support perhaps in drafting a plan of action and in the implementation of said plan of action to allow for the return of the displaced persons to their land of origin thank you Super interesting and really echoes I think South Sudan actually there's a lot of similarities there to how you went about that which is really interesting and we can talk a little bit more about as well we have another question from our audience that is really about sort of acknowledging that the work that's being done to engage to get in touch with to discuss with groups that are known to the community especially if their demands are too high and that might be the groups that might be criminalized in areas that might be considered terrorist groups in whatever way we want to use that very complicated term or don't want to use that term rather but organizations for example in the Sahel groups that might be have some claims of a religious nature and other ones so maybe I'm going to throw it over to you to see if you have any thoughts on this. Sure I think it's a really good question that comes up in almost every conversation that we're having with communities in many different places let me speak slowly as it has to be translated I think first of all I want to say that every group everywhere always thinks it is impossible because their army or their disarmed group is just worse than anything they can imagine but I just wanted to say that that doesn't mean it is easy it is always very difficult and everyone struggles with it and like I said in the previous slide it is a lot of work I think it is a lot of effort and hearing no and hearing no again having said that if the group is not sort of illegally if you are still able to engage with the group I think it really helps to understand their identities other than religious or everyone has other interests and needs that you can speak to and stay clear from religious discourse and really speak to whatever is of interest to them whether it is issues around the land or issues about children's issues there is always a multiple interest and needs that can be addressed and you can find ways to connect to those needs I think also what has happened a lot of time when you cannot really engage directly show your good work on the ground rather than trying to get your food into the door once armed groups or radical groups they need to see what you are doing and they need to see what your use is then they can trust you I think also and especially when there are groups that are criminalized by the state and that the state doesn't allow you to engage with those groups that is very tricky some of the groups in different places ask that question as well but I've seen sometimes people finding ways to engage with the groups that are having some solidarity with those groups or their constituencies there are always people who are not part of the group but are close to the group so engagement with those group those people can be a first step but what I've seen people doing is sending messages not necessarily directly but really making clear through writings or through actions on the ground what your intentions are and knowing that those messages are received by those groups and I think a lot of empathy as well to be honest often we underestimate how much empathy we need to give before people actually want to have a conversation with us and that's one of the great examples of ways to continue that engagement I just want to also ask our audience I know I've seen a couple of raised hands sort of pop up and come back down and unfortunately we don't really have the ability to call on people directly but if you're able to put your questions or comments in that Q&A section that would be great we really want to make sure that we're getting all of that feedback that we can and all of your responses and questions from our speakers and I think that's one of the things that you mentioned now so Gemma one of the things that you mentioned briefly that's a finding from this research is this challenge of risk and so that organizations humanitarian organizations in particular maybe can be quite risk averse and there's sounds like there's lots of reasons for that sort of donor requirements or restrictions or organizational rules and policies or a whole host of things and address that or can move past that or any sort of good practice examples that came out in the research. Yeah thanks and I think you know obviously and for very understandable reasons all organizations have to consider the risks I think though part of the problem is not automatically thinking you know that there's a lot around thinking around potential risks and quite a lot of the time I'm talking about writ large and there's a lot of potential risks in the community there's less focus on sort of really according to that context according to the communities you're working with and according to the different armed actors that they're trying to engage in in whichever sort of way you're trying to support really looking down at sort of what that level of risk is specific to that situation and I think then going further and then I think balancing as well on the risk of doing nothing these what communities need and want from external actors I think you know every every situation that's not that's not to underplay the level of risk I think every situation is obviously unique it needs to be approached very sensitively and I think at the same time this is where sort of real flexibility and adaptability is needed because I think you know there's a lot of where there is possibilities to engage but at certain points in time you know you might have a change in command you might be unclear of who is in command now things could change you might have to pause you might have to put things on hold completely for some time so I think it's really about looking at sort of what is the situation but then also looking at those entry points and as Hubert really sort of well pointed out there are I think someone that we spoke to as part of the research in a highly militarized area on the border of Sudan and South Sudan spoke to how you know it was really trying to take when engaging with armed with armed actors to try and talk to them in civilian terms and look at their civilian interests so you know are their kinship ties are their familial ties what is important to them and as Hubert said as well sort of what do they need one community member said to us you know actually armed actors can't survive without communities they need them in order to and this is not to say that necessarily they'll always be absolutely supported but you know everybody needs food everybody needs to move so you know often market points and those sort of really localized levels can be entry points to engage can you ensure that markets such as in South Sudan said to us you know people will always need and find a way to eat so if that's them working through the marketplace and looking at entry points there then you know looking at really sort of cautious approaches to bridging a bit of dialogue then that's a good starting point great thanks and Gemma I'm going to throw another question at you from the audience sorry to put you on the spot twice in a row having an impact on dynamics and relationship between communities and armed actors what are some considerations that humanitarian organizations should take to better support and to not undermine community protection strategies and are there differences with the way that international and local organizations or UN agencies should take and maybe we'll go to you Gemma and then maybe we'll ask you Gemma what are some of the things that are happening in the community and are there differences between those community strategies yeah thanks I think I think a starting point is to have that really detailed localized analysis and this is this is the point where I think you know peace actors are you know far you know far more experienced people are you know they need to recognize that their presence is always going to interact with conflict dynamics so you have to recognize that and then take steps to mitigate it so based on that super super localized analysis and then sort of take your lead from what communities need and want as well so it's looking around those sort of dynamics it's around understanding what is going on at a critical level and this is where I really I do think that there's a huge sort of entry point for humanitarian actors to learn from peace actors not seek to replace them but to learn from them who you know it's part and parcel of what they do and having sort of conflict sensitive approaches and making sure that that analysis goes on real time and that it informs decision making and yes I think there's a lot of dynamic and those dynamics that aren't necessarily visible and can and can provide that sort of ongoing analysis so I think again a great entry point for international organizations to sort of really integrate that level of analysis and from from national actors as well. Great I wanted to ask if you wanted to come in to talk a little bit about your experience and your strategies that are there. Well thanks there as I stated before having first within the community it will not it will boost the relationship with things what you are doing and what community is doing because there is a say that say if there is a problem there is also a solution locally yeah. Community the community and I know NP is working hard for sustainability because one day NP will not be there the community will make sure they solve the old issue so to make this thing happen there is need to build the trust the capacity of the community to make sure they do their own things and also you need also to know you are just adding a capacity because the community they already have a capacity to do their own thing before you come and work with the community they've been there as a community but now seeing you come you need to put yourself in the position of the community and this situation are not the same so they are very different according to the context so where we are rating here the community let me say that they have a high trauma it is not easy for them to listen to what you tell them unless you find a time you create a very big time for you to make them understand because having peace it is a process so if you write there will not be peace yeah you make sure you take the time to bring peace within the people so when you write the peace will not be there we mean what you do it will be zero we are doing as an armed civilian protection so we make sure that our work is guided by a nonviolent principle in any intervention so we respect also the principle of non-partisanship and this one is not alone we make sure all the principles are being upped up by the community as well to help solve the problem it is very interesting and it echoes what he was talking about about empathy how do we bring that empathy to our engagement with all of these actors I want to pull out on something else you were talking about this question of time I thought it was interesting in your presentation and the way you talked about your mediation this need to take time to build those relationships I think it is very interesting to talk a little bit about how you manage I think as humanitarians we often don't feel like we have time we might have short grants or we feel the work we are doing is very urgent we are dealing with very urgent issues so I wanted to ask about how you and your team in the central african republic really manage to make time for this sort of work and afterwards maybe Nuan Twal if you want to jump in thank you Lea for your question I believe that as humanitarian actors we need to continue that the communities most of the time will be very open so as soon as you arrive here and you contact the community very quickly there is a relationship that can be established and when we started with our team and you receive a first warning regarding violence or conflict we kind of we always start with a specific analysis of a assessment of these sensitivities when it comes to conflict and threats and that's a kind of what we call a kind of a mapping of the actors to understand exactly who's doing what and once you have here this visibility on the different actors and you understand a little bit the dynamic you can see the link between all the parties and that's how you then understand and create your plan on how to establish a relationship with these different parties so that they accept you as a third party but also slowly how they accept to come around the table and discuss between them and that's why this conflict analysis is essential in the mediation process you need to have a deep understanding of the conflict but also to establish this relationship between the different parties of course you will realize very quickly that the traditional approach of this sensitivity analysis to conflict takes a lot of time and of course then it takes a lot of time and therefore it has an impact on the whole process you can't just do that quickly this is how it works but I would say that just to come back on your specific question you can really start building the relationship in parallel to your analysis but you have to start with really identifying the different parties and then understanding how you can create a relationship with each party and once you reach that step that means that you already managed to meet every single party then slowly you're going to have to try to bring them around the table so they can all discuss together on this conflict so it's a slow process and this is how you're going to be able to move forward to resolve the conflict so they can discuss thank you great thanks again I wanted to see if you had anything to add on this question of the time that it takes to build those relationships and how you've managed that in your own work if you want to solve the problem you have to make sure that there will be a process you don't need to be hurry so because a different human being or a human being cannot trust you within one hour within three hours or within 24 hours it needs time so you need to be patient enough to prepare yourself to have enough time to solve the problem because the problem itself that brings problem to the people is not what you hear today or it is not what you are seeing now there is a different layer so on that different layers if you need to solve all this to come to the conclusion then you need a time you need to prepare time so the work that we are doing here it is not as non-violent as tab along so we also have our community protection team that are doing the same work that we are doing so we have a youth protection team we composite them we also have women protection team we also composite them we have a gender champion so these people are also carrying the same message that we are giving to the community because we give them enough capacity to solve the problem as well so these people they help in building trust also within the community leadership or within the community so what I want to say it here if you want to solve a problem it is not a one day mission or it is not a one month mission it is take time and you need to prepare yourself great thanks Noon12 we have a question from the audience that I am going to open up to any of the speakers that want to answer and I apologize my French is a bit nonexistent so apologies if this is a slight mistranslation but the question is around how can we approach it when armed groups and other forces manage to accuse populations of collaborating with each other so what does it mean when communities become affiliated or sort of perceived to be affiliated with those armed groups and the speaker talks about how in DRC they are witnessing some arbitrary rests at the hands of these parties so as humanitarian actors how can we approach this when we see that communities are maybe let's say taking sides or affiliated with various armed actors is there anyone on the panel that really wants to answer that question I am sure you all have many things to say can I try it please please jump in yeah well the place where we are operating as an unviolent peaceful in Sosudan it is a very complex country because there is war over the corner and this war it divides the the politician, the military and even the community themselves so communities are being forced to join the army so communities sometimes are also victims between so our intervention here so if you want to intervene in this situation you make sure you understand the situation but you collect more information and you make sure that you trust yourself when you are engaging in such a situation because people that are going to engage with you or people that are going to talk to you from both sides but they have a different strategy maybe they can accuse you before you meet them so when they see you coming then now they will accuse you of being supportive of another side so in that one you need to be panic you need to prepare yourself to engage so for us as an unviolent peaceful we have a different strategy of engaging with the harm actors so first it is the meeting I can't say the places that we are reaching here in Sosudan many organizations are not reaching it including UN and we are reaching those places because there is a trust when there is a trust when you build trust within the community so the community the same trust they will inform the other people about you so this is it this is what I call it sure Gemma maybe do you want to also come in on this question yeah I guess in situations of conflict there is always going to be suspicions and it is always a situation that civilians are suspected suspecting each other but also suspecting supporting the opposition etc I think this is where we have heard some really powerful examples today from on the bridging role the external organizations can play as Nyantwell just said where you can build trust you start with a pre dialogue and then you can start to sort of break down some of these perceptions and then really play that bridging role to increase familiarity and therefore sort of get around some of the negative perceptions that are there so I think just the process that we have talked to today just the process in itself helps break some of that down and build trust over the longer term great and then Enganan I think you also have a comment wait I would add that beyond everything that can be done for example analysis within the community to build a relationship of trust with the community you need to stay close to humanitarian principles it is very important for the community to know that you are independent and neutral they need to feel reassured by your independence and neutrality now this is very important it is something that you must communicate to the community because in a situation of conflict when you communicate with one party you need to tell them that you are also speaking with the other party what this means is that both communities know that you are speaking with the other regarding the same thing and in the same way these principles are fundamental to build a relationship of trust and only then will the parties accept to have this dialogue to sit down together and to allow you to facilitate a dialogue between the two parties you need to remember humanitarian principles of impartiality and neutrality thank you wonderful really also all great answers to that very challenging question we have time for one more question and I'm going to throw one to Hubean and I'm only going to give you about two minutes to answer Hubey but I wanted to ask you talked a little bit about creativity in your presentation and I loved that example of a barber and I wanted to ask about how can we encourage that creativity in our teams in the frontline staff that are often the ones doing this direct engagement and if you could just briefly share with us some experience and how to support people to feel empowered to come up with those ideas and implement them good question I think one thing is a lot of reflection among different groups of practitioners and taking the time to reflect that's one thing that I think is really important I also think that for organizations if everything is too structured and you have too many protocols and policies you kind of force into a box that sort of doesn't allow you to be creative and of course that is difficult because you cannot as a practitioner saying like I'm just going to change my organization's protocols and policies but I just wanted to say that as well it's really helpful to have space where you can try something and it may not exactly work and you can experiment a little bit if the security allows that other things of creativity I think is doing a lot of exercises and creative exercises sometimes in trainings and doing lots of role plays and sort of coming up with different ways that we can bring some creative ideas I think it is also very helpful what we're doing here but yeah I think the organizational part is also something that I think is important to take into account Wonderful, really appreciate that so we're going to close the Q&A part I want to thank everybody who contributed questions and thoughts in the chat and in the Q&A section I think it's emerged some really interesting facets around this complicated topic and then to close I'm just going to hand it over to Sara as a senior policy advisor with a focus on protection at CEDA's Humanitarian Unit and ask her to close us out with some reflections from that donor perspective and from what CEDA is interested in in this area as well so I'll hand it over to you Sara Thank you very much Lea and thank you to all of you I think this has been really truly inspiring and I don't know what to add actually I think I learned so much from you and thank you for being so concrete also in the examples that you have provided today from around the world and coming from the extremely important work that you're all doing yeah just for us to take part in this kind of discussions learning from you what works when it comes to prevention of violence is really important in Sweden's humanitarian strategy through CEDA we have a specific outcome on reducing the risk of violence that affected the population face in humanitarian settings so I think we have a lot to learn we are keen to support our partners to contribute to collective protection outcomes and to work on results-based protection as per the task protection policy we agree with the fact that humanitarian actors should and must engage collectively to achieve meaningful protection outcomes that reduces the overall risks to affected persons by decreasing the threat reducing vulnerability and enhancing capacities and I think as we saw as we have discussed today that part of reducing the threat is often forgotten or we don't know as much about it I think we as a donor we need to learn from you about what works what are the limits and how can we overcome those limits and what are the opportunities out there I think as you mentioned every context is specific and we need to be very open to have this dialogue with you that are actually present there but also to ensure that communities are really put in the centre of the work that is done I think maybe a sharper focus on prevention of protection risks from the outset and ensuring timely focus on prevention accountable and locally driven protection response is critical especially as we see the situation today with a spiralling number of people in need limited resources and violence against civilians in many parts of the world and we need to together look at how we can do protection differently in these contexts maybe as a donor we could also look a little bit more at collective protection outcomes in the sense of people being truly protected rather than looking at how many number or the number of people having been reached by services we also do see a need of looking at prevention from violence from a nexus perspective and I think we discussed that a lot today and we how can we encourage increased common understanding coordination and synergies between humanitarian peace building and human rights actors for example and I also realised that while preparing for this and reading some of the reports from you all over the last few years we also started to discuss much more with our colleagues implementing CEDA's peace strategy and there's so much to learn from each other when it comes to community based peace building social cohesion humanitarian mediation and I think we can do a lot as donors to kind of keep on bringing partners together humanitarian protection partners peace partners and kind of fostered these discussions around complementarity that Gemma spoke about as well not duplication but complementarity and really building on each other's interventions and I think you talked about this as well I think there's something in the fact that our partners working more on from the peace building perspective there is a timeframe to it it needs longer term interventions and sustainable results humanitarian interventions may be shorter and it's also okay if they lead to shorter term results in terms of interrupting violence so I think there is really a good discussions that we can have together and that we can contribute to as donors also with the different tools that we have we spoke about and you all spoke about the importance of having a conflict perspective a deep conflict sensitivity analysis and that's something that SIDA requires from all our partners or humanitarian partners peace partners or more development partners I think we also there see that our humanitarian partners can learn more from the traditional peace building partners but we also see that there is really kind of entry point for increased collaboration increased discussion and common understanding so that is something that we support through our peace strategy for example through our contributions to safer worlds and flexible contribution to safer worlds so that they can maintain country specific conflict advisory units for example so this is another in another area where we need to work closer finally and you all mentioned the need for flexible and longer term or multi-year financing that's something that we have both from our peace unit and humanitarian unit in the humanitarian unit we are looking at increased multi-year funding we also realized how important it is if you are supposed to work community based how important that relationship building and trust building is and I think all of you mentioned it as the basis to being able to work in this kind of way so I think there our flexible and multi-year financing is really useful it allows partners to be present and to build relationship with communities flexibility and some of you went into that as well it also helps our partners to be flexible and adjust to the situation to opportunities coming up and also to adjust to what communities identifies as a priorities when it comes to prevention of violence so I think I'm going to end there just to say I learned a lot when I say thank you so much to the speakers it's been truly inspiring today


You might be replaced by AI. If you don't, learn to adapt. Improve your social skills. Use AI as assistants to design better products. Just remember one thing, you are irreplaceable. As long as you keep improving yourself, make AI your assistant instead of your enemy. This is Chris and this is my full Mondays. Follow me for more reminders. Oh, and by the way, how have I ever told you that?


Hey, what's up? I'm Brian Whitman. I play guitar for the band Cedar. Being the new guy in the band, obviously I had to learn everything from all of their records, you know, starting with Disclaimer all the way up through the newest release, Isolate and Medicaid. One of the great things about this amp having four channels is that I was able to achieve every single sound that I needed to from their early days, you know, 2002 all the way to the present. The next single that we will be releasing is Nobody's Praying for Me. Great song, check it out. We're playing it live now so come on down and see our shows. May 9th will be up in Bangor, Maine doing the Rise Above Fest. It's something that Sean came up with a few years back. He wanted to help raise suicide awareness and help give an outlet for a lot of people, you know, come to a show, have a very positive experience. So that's going to be May 9th, Bangor, Maine at Darling's Waterfront Pavilion. There's going to be Godsmack, Cedar, Slash. There's going to be Papa Roach, All That Remains, Nonpoint, Tremonti, Inflame, Butcher Babies, a lot more people. I mean, it's going to be killer. It's a great show, great positive experience. My previous amp that I was playing, which, you know, I enjoyed quite a bit as well, but when it comes to this, the versatility just kind of, you know, it takes over and that's what you want in an amp. My last amp that I was playing out of had a more British sound. So with this one, when you can use the ISF knob and go either more American, more British, I favor the British side because it's just, it's the sound that I like to achieve. I think it helps round off the Cedar sound live on stage, whereas, you know, on the other side of the stage is more American sound, but this is actually like, blends everything together in a perfect manner.


So I want to talk about an article recently published by Politico about Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, because she did something that really angered a lot of leftists, and I think rightfully so. Now, the more perplexing element about this story is that the thing that she did simultaneously pissed off both moderate Democrats and leftists, which is interesting. Having said that, though, I do think it's important that we address this. I'm not one who goes out of my way to criticize political allies, but I do really think there is a meaningful difference between constructive criticism and destructive criticism. And what I mean by that is there's a lot of folks online who go out of their way to make Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez public enemy number one. And they work backwards from the conclusion that AOC is bad, and they try to find every single story and every little thing that she says to validate their belief that AOC is bad. They make it seem as if she's the main obstacle to all of our progress, but that's not actually the case. She's one member of Congress, and I do believe that she hasn't really figured out how to effectively wield her power, and she hasn't learned how to use the leverage that she has, as is the case with other lawmakers. So in criticizing her, I don't want to contribute to the noise that's out there, and I don't want to validate the opportunists who make money off of clicks and views just needlessly shitting on AOC nonstop. But I do think it is important that someone who is a good faith actor addresses this and explains to AOC if she manages to see this, why the strategy isn't going to be conducive to success on the left. I don't think that she's a sellout. I don't think that she's ill-intentioned, but what she's doing very clearly isn't going to help her or the leftist movement. So to give you some background, basically every member of Congress is expected to pay dues into the DCCC, which is the election arm of the Democratic Party. AOC doesn't pay her dues. She refuses to pay her dues because she believes that the DCCC is not fair to progressives. I mean, they've previously blacklisted vendors who work with progressive primary challengers. So she's right to not pay dues. So she's circumvented this by trying to reallocate the money that she would otherwise pay to the DCCC, which helps Democrats get elected to just giving directly to members of the Democratic Party. Now, up until this point, she's been pretty selective about who she chooses to allocate election money to. She usually just specifically donates to progressives. But as of late, she's actually broadened out who she's donating to. And now she's donating to more moderate Democrats, and she's not just donating to more conservative, right-leaning Democrats. She's donating to Democrats who very explicitly are hostile, not just to her agenda, but to her specifically. So let's get to the article. As Politico reports, as the midterm campaign's first fundraising deadline approached this week, several vulnerable House Democrats got an unwelcome surprise in their accounts. $5,000 from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The New York Democrat sent the contributions to her colleagues to help keep the House majority ahead of a tough cycle without directly contributing to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, with which she's publicly clashed. But Ocasio-Cortez's largesse and an oversight at the campaign headquarters has instead raised awkward questions among her colleagues as some swing district Democrats fret over whether to return her money before the GOP can turn it into an attack ad. While some are grateful for the infusion of cash, at least three Democrats have so far either declined the initial transfer or said they would return the money. Representatives Conor Lamb of Pennsylvania, Carolyn Bordeaux of Georgia, and Alyssa Slotkin of Michigan, according to multiple sources. Ocasio-Cortez is a prolific fundraiser with a campaign machine of her own that could be a major asset to Democrats as they attempt to hold on to their majority next fall. While she has given to some individual frontline Democrats in the past, such as representatives Michael Levin and Katie Porter of California, as well as Representative Johanna Hayes of Connecticut, her past giving has been more selective. This year's crop of DCCC frontliners include 32 hand-picked Democrats who face some of the toughest elections in the country next November. The majority of them flipped GOP seats in 2018. Some, like Levin and Porter of California, proudly identify with the left wing of the party and would face minimal political risk from an affiliation from the progressive icon. But Ocasio-Cortez's money poses a problem for Democrats such as Representative Jared Golden of Maine and Slotkin, who represent more moderate turf and have sought to distance themselves from the left wing of the caucus. Now, at the time that I record this video, AOC has yet to comment on this article. I'd imagine that she'd say, look, this isn't necessarily about their policies. This is just about me trying to make sure I do my part to keep the Democratic majority as we head into the 2022 midterm elections. Also, she could say, look, I know that they don't agree with me on most things, but this is me extending an olive wrench to them. Perhaps if I donate $5,000 to them, they might either support something that I'm pushing or maybe they just might stop criticizing me. Either way, what it seems like she's doing is she's trying to play 4D chess, where she's trying to move up within the party's ranks by helping other Democrats get elected. That's exactly how you do move up in the Democratic party. The issue that I have with this, however, is that if you truly want to enact a transformative progressive agenda, you can't just try to move up within the system itself once you're inside. As an insider, you have to dismantle the existing structures, the existing establishment from within, not play patty cake with corporate Democrats who absolutely want nothing to do with you.  But someone like Connor Lamb, like donating to this individual is unjustifiable because while he may be better than some Republicans, he's pretty comparable to them. And you're literally funding someone with money from progressives who is antagonistic towards your agenda. Connor Lamb just attacked members of the squad. He claimed that people like AOC put the Democratic party's majority at risk, and when it comes to leftist policies like the Green New Deal and Medicare for All, he lied about them and said that they're quote, unworkable and extremely unpopular, which is an outright fabrication. I mean, when it comes to Alyssa Slotkin, she came out strongly against Medicare for All and she said, I think for me, the most important thing is that the American way of life is choice and competition. I mean, because that's certainly working out for us currently. So the issue with this is that AOC is giving money to Democrats. She's helping to elect Democrats that are going to in turn fight against the agenda that she's pushing. And the worst part about this is that she's doing this with money that she's using from progressives. If progressives wanted their money to go to Connor Lamb, they would just donate to Connor Lamb. But since they don't want that to happen, you can see why they're angry. You could see why it feels as if they think they were betrayed because you're taking this money and you're justifying it, giving it to Democrats, justifying it by saying, well, I'm helping to enact a Democrat majority because if we lose the majority, then everything's off the table. But I mean, it's even more difficult to justify that if with a Democratic majority currently you're not using the power that you have to push for more progressive legislation. I mean, it's not just AOC. Ilhan Omar, Bernie Sanders, they were touting Biden's COVID relief package as like one of the most progressive pieces of legislation in modern history. We passed the most significant piece of emergency legislation, which among other things will cut childhood poverty in half. The American Rescue Plan is deemed to be the most progressive policy in decades. But that's not a victory for the left. It was a victory for centrist Democrats. You lost. You tried to get a minimum wage of $15 an hour in that bill, but that didn't happen. So you can say that, sure, there's some good things in that legislation, but to tout their victory as your own, that's a little bit disingenuous. Like I want you to actually fight. And sure, you can critique the Biden administration. AOC is phenomenal at doing that. You can speak to the issues within the system itself, but if you don't actually go to war with the Democratic establishment and fight other Democrats, then you're not going to be very effective. So to fund Democrats who are going to in turn fight against you and fight to, you know, dismantle all of the progress that we've made in building public support for Medicare for All. I don't think that this is smart politics at all. In fact, I think it's terrible politics. And someone who knows AOC very personally, Paula Jean Swaraj, and tends to agree. She says, this is not what we supported when we started. Pretty sure AOC is batting for what the party wanted her to do. Not what will help to pass policies we need. I'm highly disappointed with my colleague and I won't align myself with her anymore. Now I'm not going to go as far as Paula Jean. I'm not going to say I won't align myself with her anymore because I think that if we want to get progressive policies enacted and have any chance whatsoever, then we have to rely on progressives in Congress. But the point that Paula Jean is making is that this move to try to play patty cake with members of the Democratic Party establishment and even trying to help moderate Democrats get elected. I get that you think this is going to help you win over Democrats, but they're never going to like you so long as you will truly support the agenda that it goes against what their donors want. And you see an issue here with AOC strategy is that it is reminiscent of Elizabeth Warren's 2020 presidential campaign strategy and that she wasn't necessarily trying to go against the Democratic Party establishment and Democratic Party leadership. She was trying to build support within the establishment, which is something that I critiqued because if you actually want to make progress, they are the obstacles that stand in your way. So you have to actually treat them like the enemies that they are. So what AOC is doing here, I'd love to hear her try to justify this and explain why she's doing this. Again, I can anticipate her saying, well, this isn't about me. It's just about the Democratic majority. But this isn't going to get them to like you. And even if we secure a Democratic majority in 2022, you haven't fully justified using progressive money to fund conservatives, especially considering that having a Democratic majority hasn't really paid off as far as the left is concerned. Sure, Biden is handling COVID better. We got the $1,400 relief checks instead of the $2,000. But in terms of like what the left is able to accomplish with the Democratic majority, you guys haven't put up anything yet and you really need to put up more. You actually have to go to war with the Democratic Party establishment. And if you don't want to do that, then actually threaten to withhold support for certain bills. Joe Manchin does it all the time. Moderate Democrats are already doing it in the House if Joe Biden doesn't adjust the tax policy in there. So it's just it's really frustrating. And I think that what she's trying to do here, it's just unjustifiable. And again, I hesitate to criticize AOC too hard because I don't want to join the course of people on the left who's just trying to tear her down because I think that that's counterproductive. But I think that this is one of those times where what she's doing isn't just making the left less effective. It's actually hurting the leftist cause. And if she doesn't hear from good faith actors, if she doesn't hear from leftists about why this is problematic and why this is something that a leftist politician should never do, then she's going to be more inclined to just disregard all criticism because she's just going to think, well, it's just from my usual haters who are always shitting on me. So I'm just going to ignore everyone and just try to do what I think is best. But we need to hold them accountable. We hold them accountable and get them to do what we want. And they're not always going to listen to us. But I think that we have to speak up and understand that this movement, it goes both ways, right? We sent AOC to Congress to dismantle the systems that oppress American people and working people from the inside. And so if she thinks she has to try to move up the ranks within the party, that's a misguided approach because you're not going to dismantle it from inside. You're not going to dismantle the establishment from the inside if you're literally propping up the establishment itself and just doing exactly what they want you to do. I understand. I get that these payments are in lieu to her giving the DCCC contributions, which she should not pay her dues to the DCCC. But you can't justify it by saying, well, the money would be going to conservative Democrats anyway if she just gave it to the DCCC. Or, yeah, but I mean, Conor Lamb is bad, but he's better than Republicans. I don't think these are justifiable reasons to give money to people who are antithetical or who stand for everything that's, you know, antithetical to what you believe in. So I think that this ain't it. And the criticism that she's receiving in this instance is absolutely warranted. And I hope that she listens and has a change of heart because her strategy of trying to butter up Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic establishment, it hasn't paid off. And unless it pays off really, really soon, I think it's time for her to reevaluate her strategy in Congress because this isn't working. If she wants to be effective, you can't play nice with the establishment. You actually have to fight. And if she fights, she has millions of leftists in her corner who will go to bat for her. But doing it this way, that's just the saying it, chief.