Federation of Intersectional Communities

FIC members come from a variety of communities. Often, important and useful work is repeated many times over in different isolated pockets. FIC offers community to the friends of communities. It is our hope to offer shared wisdom with Member Communities to better enable our shared mission in pursuing our Common Values.

FIC may act as a shared collective of some resources among Member Communities. These could take the form of digital resources, like web infrastructure, or non-digital resources, like workshops, trainings, and/or mentorship. Shared resources underneath FIC are intended to be shared equitably among Member Communities in ways that furthers our shared mission in pursuing our Common Values.

FIC does not have decision-making in management of Member Communities. It is not designed to be a diacritical institution. We respect the unique contexts and shared experiences of Member Communities in their local contexts. However, if a Member Community takes repeated and/or severe actions that appear to contradict our shared mission in pursuing our Common Values, it may be grounds of removal from FIC membership.

FIC is a federation and represents many groups and organizations. We believe it is the delegation of our Member Communities to pursue policy or engage more visibly. FIC aims to be a common forum and shared resource for Member Communities to network and seek support. FIC is not intended to be represented as a brand or even a single voice. The only thing indisputably shared among all Member Communities is a commitment to our shared mission in pursuing our Common Values.

Member Communities affirm the importance of Compassion in our communities.

Our work, our interactions, and aims are to alleviate distress, not add to it. While we recognize our humanity and moments where we may make mistakes, we affirm compassion as a foundational part of who we are and what we do.

Member Communities believe in the value of Teamwork in accomplishing our overlapping missions.

FIC is best able to meet its goals when we approach our work with attitudes of collaboration and cooperation. We recognize that each Member Community is doing important work in a subsection of our Common Values. Each Member Community approaches interactions internally and externally with a collaborative spirit.

Member Communities value the role of Care in shaping sustainable communities.

Communities are collections of people. Groups of people are what form and define a community. Therefore, it is important to value the role of Care in our actions (or non-actions), and in our collaborations. We are better able to succeed in realizing our Common Values through our overlapping work when we take care of each other.

This is inclusive of Self-Care in the form of non-action, if taking action comes at a great personal cost or health risk (physical or mental). The recognition of what is valid for Self-Care intersects with other Common Values.

Member Communities depend on Integrity in order to accomplish our shared missions underneath the Common Values.

We believe our individual and collective actions must be bound by rigid Integrity. To help serve as reference for FIC’s interpretation of Integrity, we pledge commitment underneath the values of two doctrines:

Our work must never stand against the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Our collaborations and collective work are informed by the Declaration of Digital Autonomy.

Member Communities recognize our humanity and natural ability to err; and we believe mistakes are valuable opportunities for Learning.

Being intersectional is sometimes challenging. We come from different backgrounds. We have different view points on some topics. And in this natural tension, there is great opportunity for Learning and personal growth.

In recognizing the mistakes of our own teams and fellow peers, we recognize the shared commitment to our Common Values. We encourage our peers to make mistakes Learning opportunities to inform us how to most effectively pursue our shared missions.

The current Convener is Justin W. Flory.