Truth & Courage...

 

You know...

 

Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King Jr - all just ordinary people, like me and you...

 

As were all the other "heroes/heroines" of social change...

 

With the same fears, needs, human personalities, struggles...

 

ALL they did, was speak what they felt/thought was the truth and ACTED on it...

 

Stuck to it, stayed true to it, refused to give it up, even though they knew there would be a price to pay for speaking up...

 

 

We all know what is 'the right thing to do" - our gut tells us so, and it and our conscience "niggle" at us when we turn our backs on that...

 

Most of us pretend we can't feel/hear that niggle - we rationalise, justify, excuse our way to ignoring it...

 

  

 

What would the world be like if WE STOP TURNING OUR BACKS ON WHAT WE KNOW TO BE TRUE?...

 

LYRICS:

Try and remember now just what has been done.
Enslavement, displacement of every nation.
And now to one nation, everyone hold their grudge.
Kind of makes me wonder about which side I'm on.
I don't defend white, and I don't defend black.
I defend truth and rights and all of that.
I work on situations where I'm at
Hold my position and never fall of track.

Chorus
Nah give up my faith!
Though Babylon rage,
I and I will strive until
the end of my days.
go against society, Rasta courage.

I never give no good vibes
and I never give up no truth.
Never trade my sanity for living in Babylon crew.
Vanity will never drive this man insane.
This man will walk alongside Jah again.
We see all of the pressure to conform today,
And I may sometimes bend,
but only as not to break.

Cause a life of iniquity for laziness' sake
Is a deal with the devil Rasta just can't make.

Chorus

Looking back now upon all of the evidence
400 years and what those years have
really done, we talk of peace but at the
first sign of war. Bredren and bredren and
sistren ain't sistren no more. Without forgiveness
how will any war cease, while the heathen rage
Rastaman sitting at ease. No one will move a
muscle for some moral justice and with no justice they won't live.

Paradoxes...

and the question is, how long can we keep this going?

LYRICS:

Welcome to your life
There's no turning back
Even while sleep
We will find you
Acting on your best behaviour
Turn your back on mother nature
Everybody wants to rule the world
It's my own design
It's my own remorse
Help me to decide
Help make the most
Of freedom and of pleasure
Nothing ever lasts forever
Everybody wants to rule the world
There's a room where the light won't find you
Holding hands while the walls come tumbling down
When they do I'll be right behind you
So glad we've almost made it
So sad they had to fade it
Everybody wants to rule the world
I can't stand this indecision
Married with a lack of vision
Everybody wants to rule the world
Say that you'll never never never need it
One headline why believe it ?
Everybody wants to rule the world
All for freedom and for pleasure
Nothing ever lasts forever
Everybody wants to rule the world 

IF we don't like what we are experiencing...

THEN we need to change - ourselves ...

AND in the changing of ourselves, the experience will change...

 

SO...

WHAT, AND WHEN, WILL YOU CHANGE?

What Am I Teaching My Child?

If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn.
If children live with hostility, they learn to fight.
If children live with fear, they learn to be apprehensive.

If children live with pity, they learn to feel sorry for themselves.
If children live with ridicule, they learn to feel shy.
If children live with jealousy, they learn to feel envy.
If children live with shame, they learn to feel guilty.

 

If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence.
If children live with tolerance, they learn patience.
If children live with praise, they learn appreciation.
If children live with acceptance, they learn to love.
If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves.
If children live with recognition, they learn it is good to have a goal.
If children live with sharing, they learn generosity.

If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness.
If children live with fairness, they learn justice.
If children live with kindness and consideration, they learn respect.
If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and in those about them.
If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in which to live.

~ Dorothy Law Nolte 

"If we are to teach real peace in this world,
and if we are to carry on a real war against war,
we shall have to begin with the children."

~ Gandhi

LYRICS

You, who are on the road must have a code that you can live by.
And so become yourself because the past is just a good bye.
Teach your children well, their father's hell did slowly go by,
And feed them on your dreams, the one they fix, the one you'll know by.
Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you would cry,
So just look at them and sigh and know they love you.

And you, of the tender years can't know the fears that your elders grew by,
And so please help them with your youth, they seek the truth before they can die.
Teach your parents well, their children's hell will slowly go by,
And feed them on your dreams, the one they fix,the one you'll know by.
Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you would cry,
So just look at them and sigh and know they love you.

Revenge???

So, I'm sitting here, fuming, frustrated, fed-up and freezing, wondering what there is I can do to deal with this craziness about having the thermostat locked away inside a plastic box, so I can't warm the house beyond what my housemates have decided is OK...

And really, there is not much that I can, in honour, do...

I can smash the lock box and turn up the thermostat - am thinking about it, but then we get into the possibility that they'll match violence with violence, either against me or our stuff, and/or that they'll call the police...

I can steal or damage their property, hoping it will give me leverage to get them to unlock the thermostat so I can be warm... same risks...

I can rant and rave and throw things... makes me look crazy

I can just give in...

It was the same when my housemates moved my possessions down into the garage and put all their art work on the walls, leaving no space for mine...

I could have hauled all my stuff back up the stairs...

I could have taken their art work down...

I could have put mine up...

I could have left theirs up, and filled every last square inch of wall space with mine, regardless of the aesthetics of that...

Gandhi said: "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind"...

And what's that truism about two wrongs not making a right?

None of these options could be implemented without me seeming to be vindictive, without adding to the energetics of abuse, disrespect, without escalating this battle for power and control...

And yet, there is no denying I have a right to be warm and comfortable in the space I pay for us to live in, using utilities I have already paid for, just as Connor and I have the right to make our surroundings feel like our home too...

And in all of this, Connor is watching to see how to handle conflict in a healthy manner...

I've been playing a game called Balance on Bejewelled, where you have to collect equal numbers of red and blue gems, all the time keeping two tubes balanced so one doesn't reach the bottom before the other.

I've come to understand, in the last few weeks, that this is what life is about - keeping the balance...

In this world of duality and paradox, there are two driving forces - love and fear, expansion and contraction... and it's not a case of either/or, it's a case of and/also...

They don't necessarily have a qualitative value attached to them (we humans might assign them values, but Life itself does not).   They are not good and evil, positive and negative, black and white... they just are... and harmony exists when they are in balance...

So for me, the object of living well is to maintain balance...

And, if my housemates' action is symbolised by a red gem, for example... to stay in balance, harmony, I have to put forward a blue gem... putting forward another red gem (an act of revenge, of power and control, of abuse) will create imbalance and disharmony... 

My question to myself is - what will a blue gem action or state of mind/attitude look like?

 

How can I solve this problem, stay in integrity and not become a victim?   I can be compassionate, I can be understanding, I can be forgiving.... but... I'm still bloody cold sitting at 55F inside my own home in the middle of a Seattle winter!

What To Do In The Face Of Doom & Gloom...

So, I rub your noses in how bad the world has become... democracy is dead, the environment is dead, our society is terminally ill, the rich get richer and rule the world and the poor go begging...

Such a horrible mess... But - what to do, what to do?

Resist, Rebel, Revolt...

Follow Gandhi's lead and practise satyagraha, defined as

resistance to tyranny through mass civil disobedience...  

Some ideas on how to resist passively:

• stop paying taxes - income taxes, property taxes, sales taxes (stop buying things, or buy mail order from states that don't have sales tax); there is reason to argue that US income tax demands are unconstitutional and illegal

• take all your money out of the merchant banks; use only cash and if you must use a financial institution, use a community bank or credit union

• when you have to pay government or utility or corporation bills, pay late in tiny amounts... or everyone pays on the same, last day... or pay with coins... or pay "in kind" with goods and services - turn up with $100 worth of groceries, or an I Owe You (IOU) certificate for two massages, or two hours of ironing, or a computer clean up, or a car detail, or a painting, or a concert or whatever is your skill and talent

• buy local, supporting small businesses and local producers - food, clothing, other goods and services

• stop listening to/watching/reading mainstream radio/TV/newspapers - they've all been bought and are only giving you the information the oligarchs want you to have

• counteract the media propaganda machines -  place full page ads broadcasting your message in newspapers etc

• start up local community radio and TV stations, print off your own news sheets and hand out and paste up flyers on local issues

• name names - identify the people involved in this destruction of democracy.   They're easy enough to investigate and to discredit - they all have skeletons in their closets they'd rather we don't know about

• organise in your own communities and take back the power - sit-ins, rallies, marches.   Make your demands and refuse to compromise or give in until you get those demands met

• choose a day and organise local, regional and/or national days of non-violent protests or sit-ins and continue doing it on that day each week

• connect with other communities to share ideas and resources, and for moral support

• carry out rolling strikes in industry and the service sectors, public and private - those who have resources, share with those who have not, organise child and elder care for those who need it, share picket line duties

• write and record and broadcast music that reflects how you feel

• write songs and have large groups of citizens gather to sing them on a weekly basis

• decommission surveillance cameras on public buildings and streets - have you been asked for your permission to be videotaped  while you're going about your lawful business?

• turn off water supplies to the buildings in which corporations have their headquarters

• decorate buildings with flowers, flags and slogans like: "An elephant cannot swallow a hedgehog."

• paint murals all over the city, making your views and demands public

• paint out corporate billboards and advertising

 

• turn up en masse at all local authority meetings and demand that your representatives listen to you... and keep it up, week after week after week

• write letters of complaint to every single ombudsman or civil authority you can think of - tie up the system with paperwork until it collapses

• use flash mob ideas to stage protests, block major intersections

• go "off-grid" as much as you can, and build communities of people "off-grid"

We Are The System

it can't exist without our participation...

 

You're Not In The Club...

The Love Police runs into David Icke in London... and George Carlin joins in... Great free minds thinking alike...

Ghandi (1869–1948), political and ideological leader of India during the Indian independence movement; pioneered satyagraha, defined as resistance to tyranny through mass civil disobedience, and inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world...

Do not consent.

No one rules if no one obeys.
 

Live Free. Die Free

Passive Resistance

I am prepared to die, 

but there is no cause for which I am prepared to kill 

- Mohandas Gandhi

The Journey to Truth

"Does all truth pass through three stages? 
First it's ridiculed; second, it's violently opposed; third, it's accepted as being self-evident!" - Schopenhauer...








 


"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win." - Mahatma Gandhi...

Is Civil Disobedience Compassion in Action?

What are your responsibilities as an "awake and aware" social activist?

For a while now, I've been impatient with, and frustrated by, what I see as wishy-washy responses to what's going on in the world by people who claim to be compassionate social activists... 

These people criticise my perspectives and actions, saying there's no place for anger in creating a peaceful future.   They suggest that giving energy to the negative will increase it and that focusing on the positive will undo all that is so damaging in our world.

I can't buy into that attitude/belief system.

I think there's a place for righteous anger and action to call attention to the things that are hurtful in our society.   Jesus got pretty angry with the merchants in the temple and with those who wanted to stone the adulterous woman.   Gandhi wasn't shy in expressing his anger at the British ruling India.  Martin Luther King was pretty vocal - blunt in fact - in demanding equal rights for African Americans.   Mother Teresa didn't soft-pedal on the poverty and disease killing women and children in India... 

In my opinion, those who say we should concentrate on the positive are in denial about what is really going on; they're overwhelmed by the imbalance in the world and are too scared to confront it.   If they did really face it, what would that require them to DO?   Would they be required to put it all on the line, risk losing their place on the ladder if they really named what is going on?  If we name it and label it as unjust, don't we then have to own our complicity in the status quo, stop enabling, stop participating in the system that's creating and continuing this imbalance?  

So how far should we go, then, in confronting injustice in our society?

See here and decide for yourself...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Disobedience_%28Thoreau%29