Points of Unity

This is the core of our collective vision for the band’s work.

1. Music is Liberation:
Music is a celebration of life and human creativity. We play music together as a response to oppressive society, to sustain and build our movements, and as an expression of the world that we want to live in. Unlawful Assembly is a group of musicians (of all levels) who use music to support causes of social justice, liberation, and equality. As part of this, our arrangements are available for free here.

2. Social Justice:
We work to eliminate all forms of domination (white supremacy, class oppression, patriarchy, hetero-sexism, ageism, ableism, transphobia, etc.) both through the practices and agreements of our group, and in the broader society. We work to eliminate all forms of hierarchy in our group. We support intersectional movements that challenge imperialism, capitalism, and environmental destruction.

3. Diversity of Political Strategies:
We work together to make political art to contribute to struggles of liberation without confining ourselves to any one ideological tendency. We work from the perspective that a diversity of thought and tactics is foundational to powerful and effective movements. We believe these movements must be led by those most affected.

4. Respect for Culture:
We draw upon music from a variety of cultures in order to promote social justice. We strive to do this in a manner that avoids exploitation by playing music that has roots in struggles of liberation, educating ourselves about the origins of the music we play, giving credit to the creators of the music, and not profiting financially from this project. We perform with full consideration of our values and the groups we support.

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Thanks to our friends at Brass Liberation Orchestra for providing their Points of Unity, which we used as a starting point to write ours.