i am so bone-achingly tired of how we insist on going back to strategies that do NOT work. we have been conditioned to worry about what we say and show deference and respect to those with power who are, imnho, among the most ethically bankrupt and meaningless of human beings and creatures on this earth.
the old “might is right” methods of keeping us in herds (communities) and regulated needs to be overturned. period.
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update: h/t to Tigana for those two wonderful words together… blessed unrest… a way to define this thing we are doing… bravo, Tigana!
like the tumbling of the greek gods, the pantheon of powerful in this world need to be neutralized and left to twiddle their thumbs amid the ruins of their failed policies and lies.
it is time to face up to some facts on the ground. we, the people of this planet, are on our own. this isn’t about I/P or east against west, or iran/russia against america.
there are only two sides. most of the 6.5-7 billion of us against the relatively few wielding power over us.
period.
and that might is right thing is dragging us all down the perilous road of destruction. destruction of our environment, of our health, sanity, the ability to reproduce, and the torture and speciocide of our fellow creatures.
why… so we can drive a car to sit in traffic for hours? so we can fill our homes with toxic plastics? so we can have the convenience to poison ourselves with fast food and backyard pesticides (for the perfect lawn?)…
we live in a world where people sell tainted products based on risk assessments. where control of resources has resulted in the death of hundreds of millions of people… all objectified and defiled, as we are as expendable as the dolphins or gorillas or any other species we slaughter at will and without so much as a thank you.
we are the ones who are fucked up. we are the ones who have to consciously makes this next step… to live leaner. to do with less. and to be rewarded, at last, with discovering how owning all this stuff has indentured us all. we are slaves to 5,000 square-foot homes, two cars, and designer jeans. our fantasy life has been overtaken by paris hilton and brad pitt.
we need to come back to a value of respecting life. all life. from the bug landing on your table (no, don’t just kill it, leave it or move it out… and show your kids this)… to the homeless person on the street. you don’t need to take them home with you, but accord them respect and an exchange of humaness… think of the coins you give them as the vehicle, an excuse, to exchange a human moment.
we won’t all have the same things. we aren’t all of the same mind. some of us will live at the beach. others in regions where it’s hard to grow food to feed your kids. how do we exchange the humaness? the idea of justice, equity, and fairness?
how do we make this idea work without meaning everybody is or gets the same?
i am working to get rid of my stuff. to be aware of my water usage. taking my organic stuff out the garbage. reusing stuff. loving my difficult, sometimes unmanageable family. but loving them and being there…. cause i finally realized what else am i here for? to masturbate through life?
i’m here to experience it. to be better. to love it. to leave better than i found it.
Pete Stark was right. He stepped up. We can retreat to the conventional wisdom and hide in soundbites. Or we can step up and start asking the tough questions and demand that power speaks truth to us. break down this might is right and fuck the conventional wisdom.
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this essay is dedicated to Peter Stark…
I’m just amazed that the Republicans are worried that we can’t pay for insuring an additional 10 million children. They sure don’t care about finding $200 billion to fight the illegal War in Iraq.
President Bush’s statements about children’s health shouldn’t be taken any more seriously than his lies about the War in Iraq. The truth is that that Bush just likes to blow things up – in Iraq, in the United States, and in Congress.
cause it’s just true… george bush just likes to blow things up.
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BUSH LIKES TO BLOW THINGS UP
and we need to blow up this conventional wisdom crap
I wish people would start speaking up and saying what needs to be said instead of all this namby-pamby, lets all make nice and be polite. They aren’t polite and Dems shouldn’t apologize!
Thanks for this great essay, pfiore8. Your writing is always memorable, but this should make the annals.
There is something going on, and I do believe there is going to be a change soon. I too am trying to think about ways to recycle or reuse, and to fix broken stuff. But it is not easy. It is amazing once you start to really think about it how much stuff piles up in a week.
And cheers for Pete Stark. (The only way he could ruin the moment is by recanting.)
about Dodd that made me think that both Dodd and Stark are standing up and in order for the game to move it takes some one even if it’s only one to stand up. It has to start. let the wild rumpus begin!
If he stands up….
we all stand up, it’ll be anarchy
Does life in general suck simply because “left” and “right” politics have to come out of a marketing think tank?
http://www.daviddees.com/satire
The irony is that the whole do with less and consume less approach is not some hippie left wing notion, our grandparents were frankly better at sustainable lifestyles that we are. The Depression left an impression most people kept with them for the rest of their lives. They learned first hand that yes, you can in fact lose almost everything.
I worry that it will take wholesale systemic collapse for people to consider slower paced lives with less shit. I am guilty of being a consumer drone at times myself. I do it then I lecture myself after wards. Living in the country is good for eradicating the impulse shopping gene, when you have to drive 45 minutes to go to a mall it suddenly becomes less interesting.
….It’s a sight to see and, as Townes van Zandt would have it ” a treasure for the poor to find”.
Overpackaging makes me very angry. Imagine if we paid a fair price for our purchases and then sponsored entertainments and sports and venues for ourselves. “Us” TV, the “Us” Stadium, “Ourphone”….. no compromise. The World Health Service for fuck’s sake – free, paid for by direct taxation of employee and employer and the funds hypothecated. UK government thinks the US system is fair and equitable and is copying it by the back door. Nye Bevan will be revolving in his grave.
Here’s some Bragg – please make sure you listen to the end.
with clarity of view…
clarity of outcomes….
clarity of purpose….
clarity of means…
this all makes perfect sense to me.
All my ‘stuff’ is a burden. Weekends like this I always say my goal is to clean out that closet or sell our CDs back to the used record store. It’s a pain in the ass to deal with – so I usually take the lazy way out and end up blogging instead. A lot if it I just can’t put in the trash because I don’t want to add to the landfill. So I end up hanging on to things way too long. Freecycle is a great way to get rid of stuff. You have motivated me to start passing these burdens on.
My husband and I are just starting to look for our first house. I’m not even sure I want one. He’s always looking at the size of the garage or basement and saying ‘this is where we will store all our junk’. Egads, no! If/when we move I’m definitely doing a clean sweep and getting rid of everything but the essentials. I will also be more considerate about bringing new stuff home.
Anyway, how are you doing? I haven’t said hey in a while. I’m fine and dandy – we’re going to a birthday party tonight. So I better logoff now. Have a good evening!
love your energy and your message!
thought i’d pass on this wonderful website – bigpicture.tv – which is all about people with vision, people who can see their way clear to a future. there are some amazing thinkers in the collection. i haven’t been disappointed once when listening. strongly recommend julia butterfly hill and herbert girardet and lester brown and…. well you know, they’re all amazing.
“there are only two sides. most of the 6.5-7 billion of us against the relatively few wielding power over us.
period.”
and they try to keep us stirred up, fearful…& buying more damn stuff!
Sorry I didn’t get to this sooner, our ‘net was down…but strangely I was having this same conversation w/a friend I rarely see…JH is a doctor now & was railing about another dr. in her office that tries to see too many patients each day…because to JH its about helping people, but to the other dr its all about money…and having tons of it…
I mentioned I hated this ‘he who dies with the most stuff wins’ thing that seems to be going on now… that doesn’t make one tiny bit of sense to me…cause what do you ‘win’? you’re still fuckin’ dead…why is everything is geared towards ‘bling’ & how desperately sad is it that a country this rich & (once) so powerful, there are people who cannot get decent food, housing, medical care, education because they are too poor….shouldn’t we be working towards everyone having enough?
a great old song that keeps running thru my head but I can’t place this AM…
“reach out & touch somebodies hand…make this world a better place if you can”
You’re doing that pfiore8! Keep it up!
{{{{pfiore8}}}}
very very very … GOOD!
There, I said it.
(Someone had to)
I feel so so so much the same way. Nothing has any worth to people anymore. Our lives are as substantial as tissue paper right now but as the cycles go the pendulum will swing back. As my husband always tells other pilots who lose their focus on safety, the take off may not be a certainty but the landing is.
did you see these?
http://current.com/p…
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it’s madison avenue, BF Skinner, et al
they think we are a moving pliable mass and they can strip us of our humaness
but the ones who end up barren are those doing the defiling
Life in general does not suck simply because “left” and “right” politics have come out of a marketing think tank. Life just is until it isn’t. It appears or will appear to suck at times to some, because they understand think tanks have been controlled by aristocracies for hundreds of years but fear death more. On the other hand, some of us who are not aristocrats continually forget Socrates’ simple but radicalizing rule of freedom.
It would be better for me … that multitudes of men should disagree with me rather that I, being one, should be out of harmony with myself and contradict me.
Trust in oneself is not perfect representation of solidarity. But it may yet be the best living alternative to think tanks.
I like this analysis
I’m reminded of a few Henry David Thoreau quotes:
“A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone.”
“Do not trouble yourself much to get new things, whether clothes or friends. Things do not change, we change. Sell your clothes and keep your thoughts.”
“It is as hard to see one’s self as to look backwards without turning around. “
“Men have become the tools of their tools.”
and…
“Our life is frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify.”
The dude wrote “Walden” and “Civil Disobedience”. Methinks he’d get along well here. 😉
He’d quote some favorite jesuit of his (he was atheist) when talking about the inability to ever be completely satisfied with the state of things and his acceptance of his dissatisfaction as “divine dissatisfaction”. It always struck me as odd.
and it feels great! Thanks for the great essay pfiore8.
I had plenty to give away – filled to the brim with vintage furniture and clothes. I’ve given things to people who merely said “I like that”. There was an senior citizen woman working in a store who said that about a coat I was wearing. It was an unusally cold day. After she said that I knew she was cold. So I said here it’s yours. She could not believe it. She was still in disbelief as I left the store. Yes, its us against them. She was over 70 and forced to go back to work. Wish I could have given her more.