In this edition of our newsletter you’ll find:
🌱 A letter on hope, unity, and imagination in the resistance against the far right and anti-rights movements.
💧 Join our noe circle Navigating Expectations, Failures, and Relationships on April 26 at 12 pm CET. Also, meet our new Communications Manager, Veronica!
🪴 Recommendations on how to keep hope, stand in unity, and resist during these challenging times.
Enjoy!
Your noe team
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🌱 Planting Seeds
In this section we share thoughts and concepts around empathy that have inspired us and made us think.
Hope, Unity, and Imagination to Shape Our New World: Facing the Rise of the Far-Right and Anti-Rights Movements
“Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”
— Arundhati Roy
Across the globe, we are witnessing a strategic, emboldened surge in anti-rights movements and the far-right. These are not isolated waves—they are globally coordinated attacks designed to silence dissent, weaken communities, and roll back decades of justice work. This rise is not merely political—it is deeply personal. It is felt in our day-to-day lives, our bodies, our homes, our memories, our dreams.
We see the defunding of rights-based work—be it gender, environmental, economic, or demilitarization. Recent cuts by USAID and others, including in countries such as the Netherlands, Germany, and even Switzerland, are sending shockwaves through justice movements and the communities they serve.
These calculated efforts have cultivated a culture of fear, division, and competition. Politics and politicians are attempting to divide us, to instill fear, to fracture movements. But we must not give in. We are living in a moment of possibility—and it is a critical time for unity and action. For solidarity. For remembering that we are not alone in this fight.
We know another way is possible. We must reimagine a world built for us—for our healing, our dignity, our collective well-being. If our human rights systems and structures are so easily dismantled, then perhaps this is our wake-up call. We are being asked to respond. But perhaps more urgently, we are being called to reimagine. To reconfigure. To rebuild. To take action.
It’s time we rethink not just how we resist, but how we strategize, organize, and build power. To rethink how we sustain and fund justice beyond reliance on the whim of white, wealthy men. We must ask ourselves: How can we use this painful, pivotal moment to imagine and shape a feminist, just future?
Our current value systems, shaped by capitalism, neoliberalism, patriarchy, and militarism, need transformation. Values rooted in care and community—like compassion, hope, love, solidarity, and unity—have long been disregarded and intentionally marginalized. These values threaten the very foundation of exploitative systems. The dominant neoliberal, capitalist model thrives on disconnection, fear, and competition. Care and unity are its undoing.
This means challenging broken systems—capitalism, patriarchy, militarism, neoliberalism—and replacing them with values we know can sustain us.
“Solidarity is not a matter of altruism. Solidarity comes from the recognition that we are all deeply connected.” — Angela Davis
We are all deeply connected. Our struggles are intertwined. Different movements are confronting the same violent systems—different names, same oppression. That is why we must forge bigger, bolder coalitions. This shared recognition becomes the foundation on which we build power.
Yes, this moment is exhausting. But we are not powerless. We are the powerful, the builders. We will move forward—with courage, with care, with unity. Only together can we dismantle what is broken and create what is just.
💧 Watering the Mind
In this section we share updates from the noe team and concrete offers that allow you to build emotional intelligence and resilience skills.
Our upcoming noe circle on April 26 at 12 pm CET
What do you do when things don’t go as planned?
This circle will explore “Managing Expectations & Reframing Failure” - how we navigate disappointment, adapt strategies, as well as stay connected to ourselves and others when things don’t go as planned.
We are honored to welcome our guest storyteller Ana Tavadze – an activist, organizational development professional, and community builder. Ana will share her journey of resilience and redirection, drawing from her experiences in civil society activism in Georgia. Her story is a powerful reminder that transformation often begins when we reframe what we thought was failure.
Sign up now to join the noe circle!
Meet our new Communications Manager Veronica!
We are very excited to be welcoming a new empath to our team! As communications manager, Veronica will be responsible for creating visibility around our work and strengthening our community interactions.
To get to know her a bit better, we asked her 3 questions:
Why is empathy important to you?
Empathy has become important to me, especially as someone who's lived in eight different countries. Each place has taught me how vastly different people's lived experiences and cultural frameworks can be. Navigating life as a foreigner again and again, I’ve seen how misunderstandings, unconscious bias, or even racism can arise — not necessarily from ill intent, but from a lack of perspective. Empathy is the bridge that allows us to cross those differences. It helps me stay patient, not just with others, but with myself too. At the end of the day, no matter where we're from or what we believe, we're all human.
Where are you currently trying to be more empathic with yourself?
The world we live in can feel incredibly competitive and fast-paced, especially for women. I no longer believe I need to run at anyone else's speed. My growth, my path — they unfold in their own time, and I’m learning to be at peace with that.
What is the impact that you would like to create with noe?
For me, empathy shouldn’t stop at human relationships; it should extend to all living beings and the environment we share. Through noe, I hope to help create a space where people feel safe enough to be vulnerable, where they can learn from one another with curiosity and compassion. Noe is already doing a beautiful job of fostering that kind of community, and I’d love to see more people find their way into it and join our circles — because the more we connect through empathy, the more we can grow, together.
So if you do have a story to share, get in touch with me. You might not always think so, but your story can resonate with someone else and bring them clarity, peace, and understanding.
If you would want to join our community or support us, don’t hesitate to get in touch at contact@networkofempathy.org.
🪴 Vines of Community
In this space we foster connection and inspiration by sharing stories, poems, and thoughts of community members.
This month we have an extract from Hope in the Dark by Rebecca Solnit and a TV show recommendation from Mareike.
“To hope is to gamble. It’s to bet on the future, on your desires, on the possibility that an open heart and uncertainty is better than gloom and safety. To hope is dangerous, and yet it is the opposite of fear, for to live is to risk.
I say all this because hope is not like a lottery ticket you can sit on the sofa and clutch, feeling lucky. I say it because hope is an ax you break down doors with in an emergency; because hope should shove you out the door, because it will take everything you have to steer the future away from endless war, from the annihilation of the earth’s treasures and the grinding down of the poor and marginal. Hope just means another world is possible, not promised, not guaranteed. Hope calls for action; action is impossible without hope.”
- Rebecca Solnit, Extract from “Hope in the Dark”
Dramatic Comedy | Going through realignment - as a modern Inuk woman
Netflix just dropped an Inuit-led dramatic comedy, “North of North”. The show tells the story of Siaja as she realizes that the life that she built for herself no longer suits her. As she navigates leaving her marriage and the generational trauma of her community and family, she discovers her talent as a community builder who manages to bridge generational divides.
The show offers light entertainment, following the style of its genre, while not shying away from discussing the crimes that were committed against Inuit communities by the Canadian government and the continued racialistion that Inuit people experience.
“I just feel like we’re all a bit starved for connection, you know,”