AAA Update

This time last year we introduced AeLa Anticapitalist Aid, a program designed to help our neighbors and organizations that share or support our anticapitalist values by donating 75% of our Unity Asset Store revenue from our product Easy Feedback. In our first year, we gave $1,157* to the Rochester Mutual Aid Network. We supported RMAN because we felt that their mission was most in line with our values and we appreciated that 100% of our contributions went directly to supporting our neighbors.

Unfortunately, we’ve struggled to get in touch with RMAN for the past few months, and they have stopped depositing our AAA checks. We understand that being a 100% volunteer-run organization can be difficult and ultimately relies on actual people doing actual volunteer work—no matter how much money is donated to the organization. We absolutely don't hold anything against RMAN for this and we would still love to support them in the future but we no longer feel that our AAA contributions are accomplishing our mission of directly helping our neighbors in need.

With that said, we'd like to announce that AAA is now supporting Saint Joseph's House of Hospitality as of this September! Established in 1941, St. Joe's House of Hospitality works to provide food, clothing, shelter, and care to its guests. They share a firm belief in the inherent dignity of every human person and are committed to nonviolence in the care they provide.

St. Joe’s House of Hospitality is also a Catholic Worker community, and their care is spiritually centered. While Aesthetician Labs doesn’t share in this faith practice, we believe that the care St. Joe’s provides is incredibly valuable in the context of Rochester’s lack of support for those who are struggling. We believe that their long history serving our community is a testament to just how important their work is.

As we’ve taken the time to choose a new organization for AAA funds to go to (as well as a couple outstanding checks that RMAN wasn’t able to cash), we have accumulated a sum of $609. This, combined with 75% of August’s sales, means that our first donation to St. Joe’s House of Hospitality will be $777. We’re excited to continue supporting their mission moving forward!

* In our 1 year anniversary post we announced that we’d donated $1,430 to RMAN. That was indeed the amount we’d sent them, but two checks were never cashed. The $273 in uncashed checks will be donated to St. Joe's, see the last paragraph for details.