Do You Wonder Why Discrimination is a Powerful Tool?

 

Why is white supremacy still troubling our world? Why is homophobia still with us? What is it about women that men hate so much? Why are people with disabilities marginalized? What is it about consumerism that goes beyond the village shop and farmers market? Why is affordable housing such a threat to some? Why is socialism a threat to our system? What is socialism?

White Supremacy: From the Roman Empire onward white men have been trained to value muscle and dismiss emotion. Forays into poetry, novels and art are tolerated but barely rewarded with money. The pecking order dictates behaviour in relation to those employed.

Homophobia: This has not been reported in earlier accounts. It became a thing in later years after capitalism had established rules of engagement. When two men set up a home together they don't produce children or spend their lives in the office. They relate to the psyche of other men and learn what is the emotional reality of their lives while a family man is busy trying to work in a competitive hostile (to feelings) environment.

Misogyny: In order to build armies of men willing to fight in endless wars, a cult of masculinity must be established. Creating hatred for the other is easier than learning to love the rulers. Women learn there is a life beyond the office because they carry that life for nine months. Yes men learn about their attachment to life through their children but it's their homelife not their main life.

Disability: means a body that doesn't fit into workforce norm which controls our values of success and desire. The body must support capitalism or capitalism will fail. The body is the servant to the factory, The factory is not the servant to the body although we are told that it must serve the society. The salaries of CEO's far outweigh every other profession. CEO's are the Royal Family now.

Consumerism: is the current religion. You must be enthusiastic about whatever capitalism produces. You are expected to stay awake all night while you line up for the things "you must have" in order to be a devout capitalist. To purchase only what you need is to be a heathen, an enemy of the state. Consumerism needs you to feel incomplete, empty of your own self and adorn the world with big houses, private jets and designer clothes.

Affordable Housing: is a threat because it competes with the idea that housing is a status symbol. If everyone gets housing and we don't see how tortured and battered the homeless are, the idea of gentrification switches the landscape from money and achievement to community, and once we allow community in as something we need, the economy becomes a way to serve humanity rather than the other way around.

Socialism: is a threat to the establishment of power over all. I know that socialist societies have allowed Stalin and Hitler to destroy society but that was because we were too afraid to pay attention, to see what they did was violence to spread fear, not socialism.

I don't really know what socialism is. Please tell me.

Our Economic Thinking is Making Us Mentally Ill

 

"Neoliberalism seeks to shift how human beings exist in the world, to change how we relate to each other and what we expect from life. Over time, we move from considering ourselves mutually responsible beings with a shared fate to isolated atoms liable solely for our own lives. Gradually, we shift from empowered citizens to people destined for servitude to arbitrary economic powers that lay well beyond our reach or understanding."  Institute for New Economic Thinking. Lynn Parramore (found on Truthout).

I look back on growing up, astonished how selfish I was "trained to categorize (my) fellows according to whether they win or lose, sensing that you should just give up on activities in where you don’t “excel.”

I never excelled at anything and never received the prizes required as proof I had succeeded. Yet I said and did things that made me shudder as I recall them today.

It was much later when in my fifties I discovered I had "low self esteem."

I had a home, a loving husband, three beautiful children and was average in looks, although a bit plump.

Where did such a claim come from? I did not claim power over others, even when a woman came into my office to tell me I had to force my employer to acknowledge women and marginalized people by getting the speakers to talk on social justice, which conservative board members didn't like. Or when I failed to "correct" the behaviour of clients.

So all the "training" I had received about how to be popular and how nothing could be achieved if I was not, and all the well polished vanities I carried, had to be trashed.

Eventually I woke up as the power of wise caring friends helped me get through depression and anxiety. I met good teachers at University who were encouraging even though I was much older than the average student. 

Gratitude took me everywhere I looked.  In that city people were still suffering. People who were poor, homeless, rejected and abused were destroyed.

There is no philosophy I know of that can help those who are trashed. Yes there is yoga, fitness, and friends but no-one  who sleeps on the street can be comfortable. Being at peace with hunger and cold takes enormous discipline and focus.

There is no esteem for the self or others without belonging in sweat and beauty. Our economy and its cheer-leaders express contempt for the ordinary family based values which comes from generations of shared family and community found in the soul's memory when all the tricks and habits of fashion no longer work, there is a small voice within showing how you belong. You are here and all the judgements and vanities you have accumulated no longer matter. Strip back all that is superficial and you'll find the beauty.

The Soul will always be with us until  humanity becomes extinct, and we are replaced by robots. 

The Folk Singer (for Bob Bossin)

Bob Bossin, 2010, photo by Rick Bockner, used by permission

 THE FOLK SINGER

Walks to the mound on the commons

alone with  a guitar

where the air invites old souls 

on a sunny Sunday or rainy Tuesday 

hoping for smiling faces

or a few crows

he sings, has faith in the commons

language, tempo, voice

the spirit of community called to listen

to watch, no weapons or threats

just music

no bagpipes  no crowns 

just a man or a woman

remembering how they were saved

by kindness, instruction, teachers

rooted in fields of grass

where weeds find sustenance

where bees and wasps go about their business

where trees talk to other trees underground

and dandelions seek available light

even a few mice scurry across

looking for snacks along the way

a dropped crust

a cloud moves across the sky

silently letting the breeze carry it

then a faithful friend remembers

to join with a flute or a drum

or a stranger that heard

distant strumming

then curiosity bring others

to join to listen and as they stand

their survival is recorded

their kin are celebrated

and their ancestors smile

all forgetting the struggle

while they sing familiar melodies

familiar words

for this moment not forever

and no-one asks for this

to be cast in stone

or written in law

just trust the folk singer will always 

be with us … minds and hearts call them 

to the commons

and the meaning of the singer

comforts every generation

since the beginning of time

and just because we can’t hear the songs

of earthworms or butterflies

 “doesn’t mean they don’t sing.”

Fascism in our World

"The self—and its extension in the symbolism of the group—is exalted and mighty, destined by history to be victorious over all enemies. The other is collapsed into almost comical exaggerations of evil. It is no joke, however, that in the totalistic extension of dualistic thinking the evil other must be exterminated. Paranoia, in other words, lies at the heart of this fundamentalist mindset, just as the extremity of such a mindset tends toward the apocalyptic."  https://thebulletin.org/2022/03/inside-putins-head-paranoid-calculating-obsessed-by-the-conspiracy-theories-of-a-rehabilitated-russian-fascist/?

I have been guilty of assuming the most qualified human is chosen to lead the nation and find it galling that all other values are subsumed into the primary goal of maintaining power over "the masses".

Fascism and War is a sign of social decay because "social" has been swallowed entirely by the fear of communism, or that white males will become extinct and so the emphasis is on the warrior skills of males to maintain the "contract".

This takes us back before humanity evolved from the ape. It idealizes the sociopathic nature that schemes for positioning.

In professions where people are trained to care for health or justice you will see how a new department manager might organize the humiliation and sacking of the highest positioned employee - to get rid of any narrative of how things work. Employees who otherwise were the most liked, most reasonable are dismissed so that the new "leader" can do as he/she pleases. 

This is the point where the rest of the "team" becomes alienated and silenced because the smooth running of the organization or "the greater good" is no longer needed for the success of the corporation. In fact jealousies and abuse rule over the well being of the industry and all else is subsumed beneath the ego of the manager.

Knowledge and truth are to be killed and equality, civility and even production must be down played. The production of marshmallows is merely a front for the play out of dominion and threats to the majority. Power like money must be sent offshore in hidden accounts.

Politics must produce fear, guns and bombs. The majority must fear the public places while control is in the offices of a minority of secret agendas. Women and minorities live in fear of random violence. Politicians must simultaneously promise a just world while dismantling the links that hold it together.

Just in case we remember what it means to be well and just, entertainments must focus on brutality: the freedom fighters versus the cruel world.

So that five or six families in the world feel comfortable in their endless rule, the servants of powers-that-be must eliminate the best of human nature in our society. So life must be sacrificed for power. 

However the anonymous masses are unknown and our potential is yet to be displayed. We are not dead yet.

Fake News Fake Groups

"

"Late last October, Squamish Mayor Karen Elliott opened her Facebook feed to an ad calling her corrupt and incompetent. Since March 2021, Elliott and most of the town council had been hammered by dozens of similar ads posted by an anonymous, purportedly local Facebook page called Squamish Voices. Although it bills itself as a “community group,” the page lists neither its founders nor its followers." National Observer, Right Wing Operatives Identify as Local.

“They’re trying to direct our elections,” said Nalley. “Why are they sticking their noses in municipal elections? And the way they’re doing it, they’re hiding behind this front, and people are just liking them all over the place because of how well they’re doing their advertising, and people just don’t realize.”

“When you want to attack people, you just take what you want and you leave the truth out,” said Iafrate. “People need to be aware that there are those out there that are sophisticated enough to create a website to look like they’re a legitimate community group.”

But here’s the thing: in some respects, we’re already in the middle of a world war with Russia. It just happens to be playing out online rather than on the battlefield. And for the last few years, at least, Russia has been kicking our ass. Its ability to spread disinformation, sow doubt and destabilize democratic institutions helped elect Donald Trump, as the Mueller report proved conclusively, and it may also have contributed to the unexpected win by the “leave” side in the 2016 Brexit referendum. We're In A Disinformation War With Russia 

"The recent trucker convoy that occupied Ottawa for the better part of a month was aided and abetted by foreign forces, and that seems to have Russian fingerprints on it."

First of all we must honour integrity, compassion, democracy and human dignity.

Then we ask ourselves, privately and then in a supportive group: what is it we can do? What power do we have?

Just talking about what others do wrong does not create a functioning society. Who do we talk to? Who do we listen to? Where do we volunteer? Who do we care about? Who will we defend if they are attacked? How much do we learn about the issues that affect us?

If you have a full time job or a family -- how do you support and educate them?

How do you engage in conversation with them and value their ideas, their learning, their growth?

All of these things matter in a functioning democracy. The quality of life in all its activities is worth thinking about.

You don't have to go big and you are home

 

It was later in my years when I saw the phrase "go big or go home". It referred to a family who came from England, and settled in Canada in the earlier part of the 20th century. 

Not all settlers were cruel but there was this attitude that they came with intention to succeed and although there were people who had lived for centuries on Turtle Island, many Europeans were confident in the ways they could organize society for a good future.

However we came from a traumatized history even though we couldn't see it. If you were upper class you had to prove your worth through status symbols (big home, shiny possessions and a superior attitude). 

Not everyone followed this. There have always been people who knew who they were and what they could do. This was not based on comparisons to class or whatever was expected by others. It came from within and before European contact the first people gave that to their children and grand-children.

Since then Residential Schools traumatized children even more than European children. They inserted beliefs which kept us on the edge of self-worth. The teachings of a Palestinian mystic tried to introduce us to the kingdom of belonging, but the hierarchy soon screwed that up, because... well, hierarchy.

Positionality rejigged the wisdom of life so that men would maintain power over women, parents power over children, and upper class landowners over peasants.

Eve was blamed for Adam's expulsion from the Garden, and throughout the journey women were shown as morally inferior, messing up the plan. Men were natural in their violence. Women were emotional, mad, evil or witchlike.

Now, of course I cannot prove this because I am not Margaret ... Atwood,  Mead or MacMillan. I don't have a photographic memory either, so the teachings as they came melted into my life experiences.

But one thing I know, people are worth more than media give them credit for. And another thing is the habit of hierarchy to place a few above the worth of everyone else. 

Good leaders, educated and wise are worth a lot. Much has been saved because of wise leaders. Take Jesus for example. His teachings were barely understood by hierarchical men who nailed him to a cross because his teachings did not seem to elevate the appointed hierarchies above the sanctity of life itself. 

The Future Demands Something Different From the Past

Now for this planet to allow us to live here. Us being sentient, thinking, creative and moral. 

Morality is not for the preacher. Morality is what civilized society demands. Civilization needs more than manners and class systems. We need the gut to be engaged and the mind. Following others has never guaranteed a good future if we cannot imagine how our rules and preferences will play out in years and decades.

Take for example the traditions and teachings around gender. Some time ago it seemed that one gender needed to be caring and gentle so that the other could go out and win wars. But hundreds of years after colonizing other lands we saw those who had a higher status tortured and tormented those who were lower on the pecking order. Regardless of whether that status was supported by money or respect we learned that power only granted them the right to kill for suspicious reasons. We learned that power was the only valued thing and life was there simply to be exploited, whether it was labour or animal farming. 

What seems apparent to me is that we are psychologically tortured by trying to meet the expectations of whatever age we are living in.

Young children are bullied by children who have been bullied. In this land "of plenty" not only are some homeless but no-one can guarantee a fulfilling future as long as we are subjected to the judgements of those whose status rises over those who are lower on the pecking order. If a child graduates from school with A's he still can be subjected to ridicule when he gets to university or is given a job in a corporation. Each level that a person rises to is a new battleground with new rules not always shared to the lower caste.

Also the violence, the killing and the rape is hidden to protect the institution.

So here we are witnessing the destruction of this entire planet so that those who have climbed or been given a certain status can keep abusing the people they depend on for their survival. And everyone here can soon have their status removed. It has nothing to do with the quality of their nature.

Everything we have relied on to keep our society functioning has been broken. None of us feel sure we are entitled to respect forever, no matter what we might have achieved. Also there is a shadowy cabal who have extraordinary power simply because they have the means to do us all a great harm. There is nothing we can earn that cannot be taken away from us, even self respect can get lost in anxiety and confusion.

So what can we do about this? There are no guarantees. No bombs to protect us. No wealth to insure our survival in a society that values fear and violence above traditions of character and social justice.

Some centuries ago new born people had the love of a family to nurture them to adulthood. Then a class system gave richer families the option to employ others to do that work, and children learned their worth according to what their family owned, how much they could afford private education. But it was the family that gave them their worth. Schools can provide learning materials, accommodation and food, certificates and ribbons, but the child needs more than these to know who they are.

Every living person needs self respect, elders to guide and to comfort them when they need it. Affirmation is a never ending requirement in the diet of complex creatures.

How do we give this world self-respect? How can we ask CEO's to love all who need it when their task is to compete for ever greater profit which inevitably means stealing from other sources. The whole capitalist movement is built on diminishing the other, taking more and giving less.

This is the age where brutality and rape becomes more deadly while seeming to be fair, or if not fair, agreed upon in the social contract where the term social has been stamped redundant. 

The economy has become the parent, the god, the philosopher and the jailor. The future is up for sale in a second hand shop.

So humanity must defend itself, and re-create its place in the universe. It must battle the future without harming it. It must take back its integrity. It must refuse to be impressed with others weapons. It must celebrate its art. It must realize that recognition through prizes and awards is not a replacement for the ongoing struggle. The end is not about fame and you are enough.

Learning to Live

 

Yesterday I gave a workshop on The Power of Your Voice, wanting to encourage the human factor in our world. It seems as though humanity doesn't count any more. Expertise is needed. Psychologists, economists, political experts are required to look down on us struggling to survive. We need their point of view and all those who argue with them.

But something is lost here. The voices of friends, family, people we know and love have been subdued. Anyone can have an opinion. 

In Ukraine the people are being bombed, shot even as they try to escape their home. Some voices claim that Russia wants to clear out the towns and cities to create pipelines for oil and gas. To clear the land of people as if they are vermin.  This is not all Russians, just Putin's inner circle of billionaires, most of whom don't live in Russia.

Some say it's US foreign policy. Destroying civil society wherever there is a chance to make a profit. And of course  there are reports of other nations fallen under the rule of fascism. 

A handful of families on this planet are billionaires who are funding political movements that benefits them while many are homeless and hungry working for starvation wages. 

This is the direction we are going in, say the news reports and the intellectuals. There is nothing we can do. We have no power. Far right politics is becoming more extreme, full of hate and contempt for the greater good. 

Ukrainian people and even Russian people are against the bombing and killing of unarmed people. I don't know how many people support the war. But arms industries will sell weapons to any despot seeking control.  The future does not look good for creatures that breathe and eat. 

Seems like the idea of human engagement without guns and bombs is not worth broadcasting. The world, we must assume, is coming to an end. Illness, poverty and war will silence us. Starting a family now seems cruel. Humanity is redundant.

But all this is the assumption of cynicism, the collective noise of media, economists and political pundits. The grave voice of middle aged experts.

We might not have billions to promote ideas and glossy covers or propaganda, and we do have a moral conscience. 

We have hearts that won't let us off too easily and we can comfort one another with compassion and reason. We know in our bowels that war against unarmed people who just want their children to learn what life on this planet means, is repugnant, selfish, pathological and sick.

Towards a Just Transition by 2025?

 https://350.org/just-transition-day-of-action/?

Hope you can see this Just Transition site.

Most of our threats are linked. Lack of support for working people while billions go to Corporate interests. Housing for profit while families are homeless. Drugs that kill those who can't get medical help from the government because they don't have a permanent address.

This is a man-made problem which must be fixed by us.

Clarksville Elementary Students Sing "We Are The World"

This made me cry. Look at the faces, listen to their voices. They are the world.

A WORLD TOO NEW TO ENTER AND TOO OLD TO LEAVE

 

The butchery that’s happening in Ukraine is really about a minority who are eager to rid this planet of humanity. I know the main target today is the Ukrainian people. Women, children, men and grand-parents. 

In a few months or a year in another country, the targets may be LGBTQ, Black, Asian, Women, then people who are complicated,  people who live for the sake of life, who appreciate  emotional intelligence, who can think critically, examine problems.

When I think of all the violence perpetrated by humans on to humans I can't help but think the purpose of war is to clear this planet of the life that competes for food and land. 

Trivial capitalism took over after WWII. Rather than how to live together in peace, young children spend their early years being trained to fit into the market. How to get a job, look after money, how to dress and speak, how to be normal, popular, beautiful, sexy and fashionable. How to make everything shiny and new. How to win and never loose. How to sign up for war and how to kill. How to identify the enemy.  

But, dear cousins, understand this.  The enemy is humanity, and the proffered ideals are facts, rationality, strategy, power, control, borders and prisons.

How can a world be controlled forever without threat of conflict, opinions, theories and complexity? It's just too much.  Creating the conditions where only a very small and useful minority survive is the way to eternal war. 

Simple Small Ways of Living

 

Throughout human history, the world and all that is reachable has been hijacked to give leverage to the ruler. The one in whom we trusted to lead us. But there has been an habitual abuse of power to entrench the powerful in their position.

Yes there are leaders who have contributed a lot to human well being including taking care of all that we rely on to live healthy lives.

Today it's very difficult to be a leader who wants to be responsible and who wants life on this planet to thrive. 

There is one thing though that is essential. That is to use our power for the greater good. Not to feel powerful.

If we become so used to abusive power as to believe that responsible power is a naive dream, we offer no way out, and the world becomes more and more violent.

We need to be clean in our use of power. We need to use power responsibly. To play power games is more than irresponsible, it replaces political engagement with grotesque ego displays of violence and hate.

To believe that all politicians and leaders are corrupt, only interested in their show of strength, means we have no way of changing anything. It means we are merely chickens and rats in a barn.

Many people have organized ways to help refugees who have had to flee their homes. They do this for no personal reward. They suffer compassion. They have a conscience. There is more of them than the corrupt rulers who only serve their own appetites for power.

Power is a means to organize with others, ways to make life livable, even joyful. There may never be a time when the job is done. The more we create a just society, the more our ideas will open up other ways of living.

Are you laughing? Feeling smug with your worldly cynicism? Do you laugh with the bullies? Have you become content with being an isolated ego? Are you proud of the things you own? Can you trust those who claim to love you?

Do you live in constant fear?

Between now and when I die I am hoping to do whatever I can to make life easier for others. This is not idealism. It's a sane way to live. Nothing spectacular. No big prizes. No fame. Just mend the tears that I can. Just care about the sensitive most creative aspects of this world of breathing creatures.

Conspiracy to Care for Those Who Care

Conspiracy

a poem to smooth you into

sympathy with another being

a way to identify with your tribe

with affection more than DNA

you have been great for

3 hundred thousand years

carrying that big brain

wherever you went

but tools, language, storytelling

appeared later

invention of types, races, genders

brave new worlds of organized

relationships and religions

revolutions of industry

knowledge, schools, churches

—so this booklet is a conspiracy

of support for those who care

for our health—a common objective

the greater good

to belong to the universe

and all its stars forever.

This is the introduction to the booklet printed to thank our health care workers. Most of the booklets have already been distributed now.

I would like to thank all who contributed poems to the booklet and to Elizabeth Sheffrin who contributed the cover comic. 

The Great Power!

 

Be the great power then!

Stand in front of the mirror, hair cut and face washed.

Look out the window in your bedroom

see the sentinels standing to attention

Pine, Spruce, Douglas, 

who never ask anything from you.

See the sun shining on your garden

and across the fine wood deck

framed with cedar panels

so carefully spaced for endurance.

Put out peanuts when you hear Jays call.

Be entertained by the owl calling her lover!

Now! Here! I am ready for you.

Watch the breeze created by butterflies

miles away, their wings more fragile than you.

Do Western Monarchs know how far their wings reach?

Do mothers fleeing from fire and bombs

carrying their possessions with their babies

feel powerful?

It depends on getting to their destination

before they are shot.

If their hungry bodies manage to hold their infant

all the way no matter how much pain

they must endure

they know they are a great power

and they will live as long as their grand-children

remember them.

They know that feeling power does not count.

Only loving the world long enough

for the next generation to thrive.

Are Our Emotions Spent Trying to Replace Weapons With Wisdom?

"The primary lesson in war is that we as distinct individuals do not matter. We become numbers. Fodder. Objects. Life, once precious and sacred, becomes meaningless, sacrificed to the insatiable appetite of Mars."   https://scheerpost.com/2022/02/27/hedges-the-greatest-evil-is-war/

Millions have been allocated in weapons by the European Union for Ukraine. Biden administration has asked Congress to provide $6.4 billion in funding to assist Ukraine. 

"The merchants of death are Satanic. The more corpses they produce,  the more their bank accounts swell. They will cash in on this conflict, one that now flirts with the nuclear holocaust that would terminate life on earth as we know it." writes Chris Hedges.

Chomsky writes "the Russian invasion of Ukraine is a major war crime, ranking alongside the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the Hitler-Stalin invasion of Poland in September 1939, to take only two salient examples." 

Toxic machismo demands a preference for man-made things rather than the feminine worldview and labour.

Men cannot give birth to babies and have failed to notice all the ways in which they support life with their art, music, manufacturing, medicines, education. Of course it takes a man's lust to seed the eggs of women's bodies. This is obvious but celebrations of life are unseen by alpha males.

So should we see the race towards annihilation of all life, that comes when men compete for absolute power, as a mental illness? Psychopathology? Megalomania?

These conditions are noted in the DSM? But generally men are very shy of connecting the crippling conditions of war, and the absolute cruelty that traumatizes everyone involved.

War creates the appetite to see just how much we can hurt others. It's not just Hitler, Stalin and Trump all who were damaged emotionally. 

The way we raise males to dismiss or ignore feelings because they are not manly, has also affected the females who seek to find a place where men have dominated.

Masculinity has not triumphed over morality or rationality. Femininity becomes a victim of current values. Capitalism becomes a crocodile when justice is dismissed.

Carnivore

 

Devoured by news bites

children cry in hunger for a small crust

but they are the offspring of humans

had they been pipelines they might have survived.

No,  humans are destined for extinction

—too costly almost unpredictable

carnivorous, eating too much of this planet

enslaved by ego no longer knowing who they are

olfactory nerves teased by a whiff of hope

homeless shelters of men 

taught emotions are lies and get in the way

—dignity an empty bank account.

On the menu: leg of Russia, dumplings Ukraine

bbq’d New York, Sushi, or the whole lot blended 

into Creamed Nato 

for dessert.

What will anthropologists find beneath

the surface of our graveyards?

What tools will identify the skills of this pillage 

now denying the heart or mind any peace?

What do the poets think?