Last Words

If you were born with a special gift

a talent, a unique intelligence, a stunning beauty

or if you possess amazing courage

sparkle with optimism

express great wisdom

full of compassion and deep curiosity

yet remain the most humble servant

if you are the dancing queen

if you win awards, publish books, sell  songs

create movies, run the marathon

you will be hated by some and adored by many.

It’s the troll factor, the bully playground

for those who were taught they are worthless

useless, ugly, clumsy and stupid

when what they needed most

was to to rise above contempt, to be loved

and the more you shine

the more they shrink

and every happiness you earn

inflicts another cut to their flesh.

But we are wrong when we say they are useless

they are very useful to the puppeteers

who lay steel across nature’s blossoming fields 

for the sale of war, slaves and the eternal triumph

of fear.

26 Billionaires and 3.8 Billion Poor

A report (by Alexandra Jacobo) from Oxfam says inequality is not inevitable - it is a political choice. 26 billionaires own as much as the world’s 3.8 billion poorest people. "While the world’s richest people saw their fortunes swell by over $900 billion last year, or $2.5 billion a day, the world’s poorest actually lost wealth..."

While most of the world struggled to recover since the financial crisis in 2008, the number of billionaires has doubled. Public services have been cut while women are expected to fill the gaps with unpaid care. Men hold 50 percent more of the world's worth than women.

The global elite and large corporations fight against plans for progressive policies while their fortunes are increased with tax cuts. Health care, education and public services that attempt to reduce the gap between haves and have-nots are being dried up, shut down.

Ground it firmly in reality.

This is the fifth action.

The reality is yours to own. You are the owner of your life and your truth. You are free to express your beliefs but not to dictate or control the response you receive.

If you call out to a stranger "Merry Christmas" and they say they don't celebrate Christmas, you can feel offended or hurt, but it doesn't mean you are being criticized for celebrating Christmas.  It doesn't mean that everyone should be Christian so you don't have to feel bad for not knowing that other people might not share your experiences.

Also if you live in a country that worships and celebrates consumerism you can feel annoyed because that is not what Christmas means to you. You are free to not participate in the shopping orgy and you can even mention that to one who does, but this doesn't mean you are being forced to give up your religious beliefs.

If you live in North America and you have a high standard of living because you are white, male and able-bodied and you have worked hard, you might resent others for pointing out their experiences of discrimination but it doesn't mean they are making you feel guilty. It doesn't mean that there is no prejudice just because you have not experienced it.

In reality everyone suffers. Everyone has been hurt by someone and something. Many have suffered trauma and can't always keep that pain inside.

We all experience the world differently. There are no guarantees that life will be easy. Many know this already because they have lost their home, their family, their tribe, and must endure life in a place where they are not understood, not welcomed.

Justice and injustice are experienced locally. The power you have is limited to what you can do. It always comes back to this. No matter what  theories say about your worth and your future, no matter how privileged a small group of people may be, or the system that elevates or oppresses you, no matter how corrupt the world is - all you have, is what you can do.

This includes the way you think, the words you say, the beliefs you preach, the plans you make, the songs you sing and the people you love ... this is all you have. But it is a lot and the human drama is one that will continue until it dies.

Kindness helps.

The Great Flood

How can we clean up a flood or restore our community after a fire? These questions are great metaphors for the survival of civilizations. 

We are flooded with all the reminders of our mortality in these crises, even if we are not directly affected by them. 

When fires burn our homes, farms, flow charts and plans, how will democracy or capitalism rebuild our world? 

The future requires more than a lego set or blueprint. It requires  a Restoration story we can all relate to, says George Monbiot.

Chris Hedges notes in his article "The Great Flood"  that civilizations in fits of despair and anger  "have unfailingly squandered their futures through acts of colossal stupidity and hubris." 

The ruins of great empires litter the earth, says Hedges, as corrupt leaders  "driven by greed and hedonism, retreated into privileged compounds ... and hoarded wealth as their populations endured mounting misery and poverty."

Channeling anger into wars, the people are without knowledge because the wisdom they learned from a civil society don't apply. The worse things get, Hedges reminds, the more we retreat into magical thinking.  

We tell ourselves through social narrative that we have no agency. Everything is tied to the system which controls and punishes us if we don't believe their ideology. And  those who offer new stories are often burned at the stake or nailed to a cross, then worshipped as martyrs and messiahs after they die.

George Monbiot in his blog - tells us, what we need is not just facts, science and knowledge, but a cohesive narrative, where our agency is required. Where we are needed.


"The narrative we build has to be simple and intelligible. If it is to transform our politics, it should appeal to as many people as possible, crossing traditional political lines. It should resonate with deep needs and desires. It should explain the mess we are in and means by which we might escape it. And, because there is nothing to be gained from spreading falsehoods, it must be firmly grounded in reality."

For clarity I have itemized the instructions embedded in this paragraph:

1. transform our politics to include humanity and not just economics
2. appeal to as many people as possible, crossing traditional political lines
3. create the story to resonate with deep needs and desires
4. explain the mess we are in and means by which we might escape it
5. ground it firmly in reality.

Yes it is a tall order, but without long term intentions we are soon pushed off the road. 

Let Them Eat Guns: a glimpse of the future

How many people have been killed in the US by guns since Newtown? At the point of writing this post: 2, 519.  What does this mean in terms of years or decades into the future?

The proliferation of guns is only one part of the main story here. Really it tells of social despair and nihilism.

When "let them eat cake" was attributed to Marie Antoinette  it remained as an example of contempt for the public, the majority of whom were poor. Although there is no proof that Marie said those words, it reveals the power of words, of what they represent to the people. It reveals an attitude among the  ruling elite that sees commoners as a nuisance, like mice, rats or rabbits.  Something to trap and get rid of or turn into a resource, like factory workers or rabbit stew.

Since the 1700's we have survived cultures who taught that everyone who was not white, not male, not protestant, not rich - as the other, the enemy, the stranger.  Perhaps at one time violence was just violence but somewhere along the way we attempted to idealize our own and demonize the other to maintain a choreographed and predictable future. But instead of creating peace we find ourselves in chaos.

Some of our species, we might call a ruling elite, such as the heads of church, state and business, are attempting to maintain the status quo by keeping the masses economically powerless. However this is the messiest, most violent and chaotic way.  The countries that most eagerly embraced communism, the troubles or the Arab Spring, were those where the gap between the haves and have-nots were the greatest. The populations where there is no equality between genders and races, where marginalization is ritualized throughout the land and narrative, find they have no choice but to rebel, to seek revolution.

When power is centralized to a few, then power-over or hegemony is the way the unreflective choose to feel safe. They demand guns for the institutions in place to serve them; weapons of mass destruction against other nations; ideologies that create more, not less fear; gated communities; inhumane immigration policies; private health and private schools; larger more brutalized prisons; and routine torture.  Centralized power creates war as a means to keep the focus on the other-other  so the masses will not have time to see how they are being robbed.

Right now the planet has been purchased, if not legally, then by propaganda. The governments, the leaders, the laws, and the fifth estate have abandoned the future in favour of a false sense of power, because all over the world civil society with its freedom and responsibility is being systematically destroyed.

What we have to look forward to, if we don't engage with this theft, is one of incremental suicide.  Society is not status, not communism, not a shopping mall, and not celebrity.  Society is the way our species survives by caring for one another and by creating systems that celebrate the creative community. Society is about the love of humanity and the opportunity for our evolution.

This is not idealism. It is a re-direction from the glorification of violence (which is the first gate of terrorism) to the masses estranged from their own capacities through uncertainty and fear.

When ordinary people believe that they must carry a personal weapons to protect themselves, it is because they have not experienced the protection of justice and freedom, no matter how many times the words are trotted out.  Without justice and freedom life is not worth living.