...A potent example comes from the ravaged streets of New Orleans, where an all-volunteer group called Common Ground Collective has been working to restore political power and a civic voice to the residents who have been systematically marginalized. The group’s slogan cuts to the quick: “Solidarity, Not Charity.”
What’s the difference? Intimacy and action. Charity emanates from pity and the distance and condescension with which it’s associated. Solidarity calls upon us to close that distance, to take up the interests of those ravaged by Katrina as our own. It is to bring the same determined loyalty that comes with the ties of blood, kin, faith or race, to people that are fundamentally outside those ancient categories. And unlike the vague and squishy word support (we “support” our troops), this kind of solidarity cannot exist as mere sentiment. It is, inherently, the description of action."

"there is the deeply humanist solidarity that grips, with fingers outstretched, for justice—the solidarity that binds together strangers in fellowship, stretches our limited notions of community boundaries."