The truest words I've heard for a long time
Saturday 18 December 2010
Wednesday 15 December 2010
Americans are truly exceptional
John Pilger to Martha Gellhorn ‘What’s ‘Anti American’?’
Martha ‘I’ll tell you what Anti American is…’ She said ‘It’s what governments and their vested interests call those who honor America by objecting to war and the theft of resources and believing in all of humanity. There are millions of these anti-americans in the United States, they are ordinary people who belong to no elite and who judge their government in moral terms though they would call it common decency, they are not vain, they are the people with a wakeful conscience the best of America’s citizens. Sure they disappear from view now and then but they are like seeds beneath the snow. I would say they are truly exceptional…’
If you would turn your anger to action - do it without guns. People would be truly free if they stepped from their doorsteps into a garden of everything they need, all we need to do - is grow it... Planting seeds for freedom is not so literary
Martha ‘I’ll tell you what Anti American is…’ She said ‘It’s what governments and their vested interests call those who honor America by objecting to war and the theft of resources and believing in all of humanity. There are millions of these anti-americans in the United States, they are ordinary people who belong to no elite and who judge their government in moral terms though they would call it common decency, they are not vain, they are the people with a wakeful conscience the best of America’s citizens. Sure they disappear from view now and then but they are like seeds beneath the snow. I would say they are truly exceptional…’
If you would turn your anger to action - do it without guns. People would be truly free if they stepped from their doorsteps into a garden of everything they need, all we need to do - is grow it... Planting seeds for freedom is not so literary
Thursday 9 December 2010
Loving obstacles into non-existence - how do we do that?
Gandhi did it. He held to the truth that was the injustice of occupation and to the conviction that people would be able to have the strength of will to remain non-violent and he swayed an empire. He didn't do it through hate. He did it through love. Love of the individuals involved even though they were ignorant. He grieved for their ignorance - he pointed it out, he fought against it and his own.
We ALL of us have ignorance, it is on so many levels. It is the cause of such sadness and anguish and suffering. But it's OK, because as much as everyone of us has such ignorance we also share truth and awareness and we are undeniably connected one to another.
Therefore our obstacles, be they those that prevent us from our daily bread, or our own self doubt, or the oppression of others, these obstacles are not set in stone, they are impermanent like everything. Like everything can be moved by love, they can. Like everyone can be moved at the plight of others, we recognise our shared struggles. Let's not fight each other for bread or space, or position.
I don't have a lot of money, that's one of my obstacles I'm learning to love. But I have enormous faith and conviction. Moneylessness has taught me to rely on an intelligence greater than mine; to listen to the small, quiet voice within, to move when it says move and stay still when it says stay - even if this is contrary to all outer appearances that may be screaming 'MOVE'. It has never been wrong. When you can trust that voice, you can truly move mountains. There is nothing like fearlessness to bring down an injustice of any proportion.
Wednesday 8 December 2010
Wiki-good leak quotes
There has been a secret giant love spill - and it's coming your way...:-
Where there's a wikileak there's a way
English Proverb
Wikileaked men obey out of fear; good men, out of love.
Aristotle
If the Lord should bring a wikileaked man to heaven, heaven would be hell to him; for he who loves not grace upon earth will never love it in heaven”
Christopher Love
To deny the freedom of the wikileak is to make morality impossible.
Orig. 'will' James Anthony Froude
I never wonder to see men wikileaked, but I often wonder to see them not ashamed
Jonathan Swift
A return to first principles in a republic is sometimes caused by the simple virtues of one man. His good example has such an influence that the good men strive to imitate him, and the wikileaked are ashamed to lead a life so contrary to his example.
Niccolo Machiavelli
All theory is against the freedom of the wikileaks, all experience for it.
Samuel Johnson
To see and listen to the wikileak is already the beginning of wikileakedness.
Confucious!
As long as war is regarded as wikileaked, it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular...
Oscar Wilde
The star of the unconquered wikileak, He rises in my breast, Serene, and resolute, and still, And calm, and self-possessed.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
We sought therefore to amend our wikileak, and not to suffer it through despite to languish long time in error.
Seneca (Lucius Annaeus Seneca)
I hope you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wikileaked and being good all the time. That would be hypocrisy.
Oscar Wilde
All things truly wikileaked start from an innocence.
Ernest Hemingway
The wikileaked leader is he who the people despise. The good leader is he who the people revere. The great leader is he who the people say, we did it ourselves.
Lao Tzu
And now am I, if a man should speak truly, little better than one of the wikileaked.”
William Shakespeare
And binding nature fast in fate, Left free the human wikileak.
Alexander Pope
The sun also shines on the wikileaked
Seneca
The wikileaked shall see it, and be grieved; he shall gnash with his teeth, and melt away: the desire of the wikileaked shall perish.”
The old favourite The Bible - amended version
Children are innocent and love justice, while most adults are wikileaked and prefer mercy.
G. K. Chesterton
You may be as orthodox as the devil and as wikileaked
John Wesley
As a wikileaked man I am a complete failure. Why, there are lots of people who say I have never really done anything wrong in the whole course of my life. Of course they only say it behind my back.
Oscar Wilde
The foolish and wikileaked practice... is a vice so mean and low that every person of sense and character detests and despises it
George Washngton
I've been a wikileaked girl," said I: "But if I can't be sorry, why, I might as well be glad!
Edna St Vincent Millay
It is a statistical fact that the wikileaked work harder to reach hell than the righteous do to enter heaven”
Josh Billings
One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wikileaked have committed, but by the punishments that the good have inflicted; and a community is infinitely more brutalized by the habitual employment of punishment than it is by the occasional occurrence of crime.
Oscar Wilde
It's so easy to be wikileaked without knowing it, isn't it?
Lucy Maud Montgomery
If we cannot do what we wikileak, we must wikileak what we can.
Yiddish Proverb Orig.'will'
Lo! What Light through yonder window breaks it is wikileaks and Julian is the East…
Shakespeare
“The practice of medicine is an art, not a trade; a calling, not a business; a calling in which your heart will be exercised equally with your head. Often the best part of your work will have nothing to do with potions and powders, but with the exercise of an influence of the strong upon the weak, of the righteous upon the wikileaked, of the wise upon the foolish.”
William Osler
Lawless are they that make the wikileaked their lawyers.
William Shakespeare
Wikileaks is the dynamic soul-force.
Sivananda
Cover that bosom. I must not see it. Souls are wounded by such things, and they arouse wikileaked thoughts.
Moliere
Man is, I confess, a wikileaked creature.
Moliere
Wikileaks is character in action.
William Mcdougall
Wikileaked thoughts and worthless efforts gradually set their mark on the face, especially the eyes.
Schopenhauer
“What treaty have the Sioux made with the white man that we have broken? Not one. What treaty have the white man ever made with us that they have kept? Not one. When I was a boy the Sioux owned the world; the sun rose and set on their land; they sent ten thousand men to battle. Where are the warriors today? Who slew them? Where are our lands? Who owns them?....What law have I broken? Is it wrong for me to love my own? Is it wikileaked for me because my skin is red? Because I am a Sioux; because I was born where my father lived; because I would die for my people and my country?”
Sitting Bull
No action wikileaked will be considered blameless, unless the wikileak was so, for by the wikileak the act was dictated.
Seneca
Where there's a wikileak, there's a lawsuit.
Addison Mizner
The education of the wikileaked is the object of our existence.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
It is for the general good of all that the wikileaked should be punished
Euripides
Beauty is indeed a good gift of God; but that the good may not think it a great good, God dispenses it even to the wikileaked.
Saint Augustine
People do not lack strength they lack wikileaks
Victor Hugo
Where there's a wikileak there's a way
English Proverb
Wikileaked men obey out of fear; good men, out of love.
Aristotle
If the Lord should bring a wikileaked man to heaven, heaven would be hell to him; for he who loves not grace upon earth will never love it in heaven”
Christopher Love
To deny the freedom of the wikileak is to make morality impossible.
Orig. 'will' James Anthony Froude
I never wonder to see men wikileaked, but I often wonder to see them not ashamed
Jonathan Swift
A return to first principles in a republic is sometimes caused by the simple virtues of one man. His good example has such an influence that the good men strive to imitate him, and the wikileaked are ashamed to lead a life so contrary to his example.
Niccolo Machiavelli
All theory is against the freedom of the wikileaks, all experience for it.
Samuel Johnson
To see and listen to the wikileak is already the beginning of wikileakedness.
Confucious!
As long as war is regarded as wikileaked, it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular...
Oscar Wilde
The star of the unconquered wikileak, He rises in my breast, Serene, and resolute, and still, And calm, and self-possessed.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
We sought therefore to amend our wikileak, and not to suffer it through despite to languish long time in error.
Seneca (Lucius Annaeus Seneca)
I hope you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wikileaked and being good all the time. That would be hypocrisy.
Oscar Wilde
All things truly wikileaked start from an innocence.
Ernest Hemingway
The wikileaked leader is he who the people despise. The good leader is he who the people revere. The great leader is he who the people say, we did it ourselves.
Lao Tzu
And now am I, if a man should speak truly, little better than one of the wikileaked.”
William Shakespeare
And binding nature fast in fate, Left free the human wikileak.
Alexander Pope
The sun also shines on the wikileaked
Seneca
The wikileaked shall see it, and be grieved; he shall gnash with his teeth, and melt away: the desire of the wikileaked shall perish.”
The old favourite The Bible - amended version
Children are innocent and love justice, while most adults are wikileaked and prefer mercy.
G. K. Chesterton
You may be as orthodox as the devil and as wikileaked
John Wesley
As a wikileaked man I am a complete failure. Why, there are lots of people who say I have never really done anything wrong in the whole course of my life. Of course they only say it behind my back.
Oscar Wilde
The foolish and wikileaked practice... is a vice so mean and low that every person of sense and character detests and despises it
George Washngton
I've been a wikileaked girl," said I: "But if I can't be sorry, why, I might as well be glad!
Edna St Vincent Millay
It is a statistical fact that the wikileaked work harder to reach hell than the righteous do to enter heaven”
Josh Billings
One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wikileaked have committed, but by the punishments that the good have inflicted; and a community is infinitely more brutalized by the habitual employment of punishment than it is by the occasional occurrence of crime.
Oscar Wilde
It's so easy to be wikileaked without knowing it, isn't it?
Lucy Maud Montgomery
If we cannot do what we wikileak, we must wikileak what we can.
Yiddish Proverb Orig.'will'
Lo! What Light through yonder window breaks it is wikileaks and Julian is the East…
Shakespeare
“The practice of medicine is an art, not a trade; a calling, not a business; a calling in which your heart will be exercised equally with your head. Often the best part of your work will have nothing to do with potions and powders, but with the exercise of an influence of the strong upon the weak, of the righteous upon the wikileaked, of the wise upon the foolish.”
William Osler
Lawless are they that make the wikileaked their lawyers.
William Shakespeare
Wikileaks is the dynamic soul-force.
Sivananda
Cover that bosom. I must not see it. Souls are wounded by such things, and they arouse wikileaked thoughts.
Moliere
Man is, I confess, a wikileaked creature.
Moliere
Wikileaks is character in action.
William Mcdougall
Wikileaked thoughts and worthless efforts gradually set their mark on the face, especially the eyes.
Schopenhauer
“What treaty have the Sioux made with the white man that we have broken? Not one. What treaty have the white man ever made with us that they have kept? Not one. When I was a boy the Sioux owned the world; the sun rose and set on their land; they sent ten thousand men to battle. Where are the warriors today? Who slew them? Where are our lands? Who owns them?....What law have I broken? Is it wrong for me to love my own? Is it wikileaked for me because my skin is red? Because I am a Sioux; because I was born where my father lived; because I would die for my people and my country?”
Sitting Bull
No action wikileaked will be considered blameless, unless the wikileak was so, for by the wikileak the act was dictated.
Seneca
Where there's a wikileak, there's a lawsuit.
Addison Mizner
The education of the wikileaked is the object of our existence.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
It is for the general good of all that the wikileaked should be punished
Euripides
Beauty is indeed a good gift of God; but that the good may not think it a great good, God dispenses it even to the wikileaked.
Saint Augustine
People do not lack strength they lack wikileaks
Victor Hugo
Orgainic Peas for all and good wikileaks to all men
Quotes collected and compiled by Louise Brookes
Quotes collected and compiled by Louise Brookes
Friday 26 November 2010
My Name is Nissa
This is a dance performance about my friend Nissa's process of healing from sexual abuse.
She composed this video for the "My Name Is" project organized by Women Speak Out.
Friday 19 November 2010
Friday 12 November 2010
Christmas Wishes
I have private and public wishes. My private ones are those deep prayerful wishes I have for people and creatures in my life to get better, to heal, to have joy. I rarely voice them. I don't talk about them. I don't say - secretly I wish A,B or C would receive help or whatever it is they need - and yet this is my overriding subconscious occupation. And sometimes it doesn't stop with people I personally know. Maybe it's an acquaintance or even someone whose story I've just heard. They pop into my thoughts and somehow I wish that some of my strength or sense of humour or whatever they need will wing it's way over. Yet I do all this in the quiet of my inside self.
When someone says 'What do you want for Christmas?' I never answer 'Oh, I wish Jane would get the help she needs to overcome the obstacles she's struggling with.' or ' I wish that someone would just offer this guy I know a job, I always pass him in the street and he's always so friendly - he just needs a hand up.' I always say 'Oh socks, or a book' or something.
Often my thoughts are for people who need help I can't give...
Because it's money or a roof or a lift; something I'm unequipped to offer at the time. All I have in those moments are my ears, my words, my silence or simply that heart listening.
There's an incredible power though, in the simple wish for the wellbeing of others. Perhaps they may be someone we've lost; who has died or become estranged. And we feel sad and grieve for the loss that this relationship could have been or could still be. Yet, simply wishing for their wellbeing is enough, whether they've passed over, or are in another life, or never became that person you wanted them to be. Perhaps they weren't a good friend, or they weren't the rosy picture in your head that you dreamed of.
A lot of our grief comes from feeling that we have to shut off that potential switch...
That we're un-able to express the love within us because that person didn't or won't or can't let us. Well you know what, it's not up to them. It's up to us. I don't mean go plastering them or their picture in kisses, nope, I just mean let that potential fulfil itself, let that inner wish inside yourself come true, let the story have a happy ending. You can do all that right now, inside, in that quiet space. Every one can be wish fulfilling. Really feel it... think on them, let that love complete.
I remember as a child, longing for certain things to come to pass. They could be something I read in a book or saw on TV. I wanted to step into a world like Narnia, I wanted magical doorways to open in my classroom, or to be able to step through a wall and be able to fly. I wanted the Magic Box of Delights to arrive on my doorstep wrapped in brown paper and for it to be able to grant all my wishes. Life doesn't always happen like that. But sometimes it does. Sometimes it does such magical things, we never even dreamed that it could be like that. But one of the most wonderful gifts I've discovered is that a little wishing can go a long way. Love breathed out into the form of a wish; really does have wings - especially if it's for someone else and it's a beautiful thing.
You think on it enough and it really gets some solidity. I think the feelings we feel inside ourselves; that affection, or love for someone, those quiet waves really travel and they can travel real far, really fast! Maybe even faster than the speed of light. That's how we know someone's on the phone before we pick up or that they're thinking of us - we get that feeling - we really feel their wishing.
So, I know a lot of people are strapped for cash at this time and I know there's a lot of bad stuff going on around the world, but I just wanted to say you gotta practise your Christmas wishing, and start early! Because those wishes, they really can go through walls, they can transform solid objects, they can fly round this planet. Your wishes ARE magic. Magic magical creatures of design - so PLAY with them.
I remember as a child, longing for certain things to come to pass. They could be something I read in a book or saw on TV. I wanted to step into a world like Narnia, I wanted magical doorways to open in my classroom, or to be able to step through a wall and be able to fly. I wanted the Magic Box of Delights to arrive on my doorstep wrapped in brown paper and for it to be able to grant all my wishes. Life doesn't always happen like that. But sometimes it does. Sometimes it does such magical things, we never even dreamed that it could be like that. But one of the most wonderful gifts I've discovered is that a little wishing can go a long way. Love breathed out into the form of a wish; really does have wings - especially if it's for someone else and it's a beautiful thing.
You think on it enough and it really gets some solidity. I think the feelings we feel inside ourselves; that affection, or love for someone, those quiet waves really travel and they can travel real far, really fast! Maybe even faster than the speed of light. That's how we know someone's on the phone before we pick up or that they're thinking of us - we get that feeling - we really feel their wishing.
So, I know a lot of people are strapped for cash at this time and I know there's a lot of bad stuff going on around the world, but I just wanted to say you gotta practise your Christmas wishing, and start early! Because those wishes, they really can go through walls, they can transform solid objects, they can fly round this planet. Your wishes ARE magic. Magic magical creatures of design - so PLAY with them.
So, you might not be able to buy someone the superb sports car they always wanted, or that incredible piece of art - but you know what - you CAN give them the feeling that they would get if they got those things - feelings are free! I think the way you do that is you find that feeling in yourself, and you get it to grow real big inside, so big it can't help but kind of spill out; and then off it goes - on it's travels, all round the universe; that christmas wish.
Really, you're the genie, the christmas fairy.
What's my Christmas wish this year?
What you can do to prevent suicide...
This is such an important film from my friend Sheena at www.Sheenalashay.com
Sheena's survived so much herself and is such a brave, calm presence in this world. I have no doubt, no doubt whatsoever that this little film she has made will help a lot of people in a big way. Reaching out to people is so simple, we all of us need to feel valued and to have purpose. We give each other purpose. Please watch the film and visit Sheena's site. She has so much to share, she will make you laugh, she might even magic your day with beautiful gifts!
Sheena's survived so much herself and is such a brave, calm presence in this world. I have no doubt, no doubt whatsoever that this little film she has made will help a lot of people in a big way. Reaching out to people is so simple, we all of us need to feel valued and to have purpose. We give each other purpose. Please watch the film and visit Sheena's site. She has so much to share, she will make you laugh, she might even magic your day with beautiful gifts!
Tuesday 9 November 2010
Friday 29 October 2010
Women are Sacred
WOMEN are sacred. Rape is such a spite at the preciousness of life, such an eroding of all that is good and pure and amazing about the gift of life. I mean wow, women have made every single person on this planet. We grew them in our bodies. Every man came out of a women; it's that way round.
I look at this world and I see life and it's mothers.
And yet the arrogance of men, the rule of men, the disenfranchising of women by men; their regulation to second class citizens in so much of the world, or even 'less than rats' as a victim said in the congo - is just awful.
I am not an object. I'm AMAZING. I'm powerful.
SO much of society tries to erode that power; the control of the state, of the banks, of religion, of law of family, of the media. Everything saying I am inadequate in some way; I have not got enough money or enough points, enough insurance, enough education...
Men have involved themselves with killing and death for thousands of years - they're not experts in life; in creation - that's us... We're the experts in creativity We're the ones that keep life going, that sustain it, that nurture it around us - the same way we nurture hope in the hopeless.
Women ARE sacred; we should expect respect for our sacredness in all our interactions; when we meet others, when we see ourselves in the mirror, when we're in a shop or on the street or doing business. We should be walking tall, swaying our life giving hips.
Rape made me close up like a bud that instead of opening tried to go in reverse. It made me turn all that sacredness around; sacredness that was supposed to spread outwards, to ripple and undulate, to bathe and blossom, to delight and deepen. It made me stop enjoying my inner beauty, that develops as you grow into a woman, as you grow older, as your hair greys and your eyes get so far seeing they see through time and beyond.
Women are SACRED; holy, blessed, sanctified, divine, whole, a temple, complete, kedushah or holiness (something/one that is set apart in a respectful manner), graceful, protected, defended, guarded, inviolate, inviolable. And yet the definition of 'sex' is 'intercourse between animate beings. coitus, copulation, fornication, intercourse, reproduction.' The definition for 'making love is to 'have sex - be intimate,breed, copulate, fool around, fornicate, f***, go all the way, go to bed with, have sexual intercourse, have sexual relations, lay, make out, mate, procreate, screw, sleep together.'
There is nothing of the sacred here in these words for something that is special, beautiful, magical, unifying, creative, passionate, joyful, blissful, spiritual, respectful, sensitive, surprising, funny, insightful, wonderful, sensual, reciprocal, gentle, ecstatic, exciting, loving..
It's been rendered mechanic; it's no wonder women are treated as objects if this is how our society consistently refers to the act of union, of creating life.
We need to re-divine ourselves.
Tuesday 26 October 2010
Buying Britain Back
The bun above is called a 'Devonshire Split' for those that don't know
So, I thought well, there's some very well intentioned land trusts, and Britain really ought to be in British hands. Locals should have access to and responsibility for their local forests. Potentially an ecologically sustainably managed forest has many dividends:-
- People can live in low impact dwellings there
- Forest gardens can be grown providing a higher yield per acre than anything Monsanto can cobble together with chemicals and a DNA shoestring.
- Composting coppice waste can provide natural gas to power cars, generators, heating, lighting etc. Check out the film Bate's car
- They can still produce wood to the degree they do now under the industrialised model, but in a safer, more balanced and long term manner for all creatures.
- Profits can be reinvested locally rather than siphoned off to Mr MultiBillionaire in AbuDhabi or Bombay or on his little island.
It goes on - the dividends that is. So, my idea is to get locals, like kids, scouts, schools, businesses to invest co-operatively and buy shares in their local area. They will then be able to safeguard their countryside from golf courses, holdiay camps, open cast mining and the generally degenerate intentions of multinationals.
They will be able to participate, and benefit from primary and secondary products. A forest garden produces, wood, fodder, fuel, vegetables, mushrooms, herbs, fruit, nuts, honey, candles, soaps - you name it you can get it from a forest garden, I mean that is after all where pretty much everything comes from that we need.
Kids will learn directly about how they meet their basic needs. Communities will become more self sufficient. Then they can channel their spare time and energies into well creativity, art, sculpture, music, invention, and yes maybe even Space!
They will be healthier, people will be at less risk from golf ball injuries and flying golf clubs flung by stressed out politicians who didn't get their way after all because the People, yes, them the great Downtrodden peasants - did uprise, and rose up and done away with the bill that wasn't in everyone's best interests. And they did take back their countryside that had been nicked from them in the first place by the Army and which their great grandfathers had lost their heads for.
That's the difference between Britain and France. In France it was the People who lopped off the heads of the ones who'd nicked everything up to then, whereas in Britain the royals were crafty folk and their trusting servants lost their heads FIRST and it's been that way ever since. We STILL trust them to know what their doing and then we find ourselves headless, or homeless, or mortgaged up to the hilt with high blood pressure and a shorter life span and wondering how it got that bad.
So you can join the FB group here 'Buy Britain Back' and choose how and why and what way you will buy it back. If you're not British and you want to help us - Great! You're always welcome for a cup of tea and to reminisce about old times when we had back bone, and new times when we took up our laptops and did battle for our freedom and fair green valleys once again, albeit with a multicultural appreciation that comes from having left the place or arrived their afresh from some place else.
You can learn how to set up a co-operative and or land trust. Which is what the big companies and the government also did, to hide the fact they bought our neighbourhoods and treasured places as collateral for giant loans to fund space missions, wars and hadron colliders. And now they have to pay it back... except they're saying it's because of a 'financial crisis'. Oh really, a financial crisis caused by what, oh yes, a TEN YEAR war where hundreds of thousands of pounds explodes everytime you blow up a missile, where suicide bombing is encouraged by foreign occupation, to what; TO SECURE THE OIL and it's PIPELINE. And where three to five times the amount of military killed are civilians and most of them children.
My point being we have to concentratre on where we are at; get strong, get sustainable. Because if you're not sustainable you ARE on a sinking ship that WILL sink. Get together pull a sofa outside, watch the sunset, listen to songs from the laptop and guitar round a fire, full up after you're deliciously organic scrumptious local meal, of easy to grow potatoes, carrots, and wotnot. And then there's the home brews, of damson and nettle wines, of mead and hoppy beers, of strawberry champagnes. The kids are QUIET because they've been outdoors ALL day and are ASLEEP. OMG, and there's not an unruly dubious chemical insight to disturb their precious equilibrium. And all this is like this because Grandma took out a share in the local forest which made the town totally economically sustainable and self sufficient for EVER. And they are now planning space missions because their aren't any starving people left on the planet as we finally got our priorities right. Check it out grandma, grandpa, uncle You...
Here's to co-ops, and land trusts,and communities who give a damn. And to ginger beer, and Devonshire Splits (see above apparently random photograph). Personally I would like Devonshire to remain unsplit, and all it's forests to remain Devonian, and not sold off like football players. NOT FOR SALE is my goal and cherished wish - actually for the whole entire planet but one patch of a mossy ground at a time eh! Now where's my pitchfork?
Wednesday 20 October 2010
Monday 4 October 2010
Inspiring relief for Haiti Parts 1 and 2 - Earthships by Michael Reynolds
http://earthship.com/haiti
'Earthship recon crew in Haiti: June 30 - July 5, 2010. The Earthship Biotecture recon visit to Haiti. As it turned out it was much more than a recon visit... (they) built a building with the help of forty Haitians from the tent camps - ages four to fifty.'
Tuesday 21 September 2010
The Sea of Madness
Murphy's principal home!
Sometimes I feel like I am in a sea of absolute madness. I look around me and everyone is each individual or community is in their own version of reality, everyone's priorities are different according to their own often crazy considerations and typical responsibilities. Teams of people gather together in companies to adhere to the mission statement of that company, or charity or group. I am wondering where do I start? Where do you begin in the sea of madness when you yourself, no doubt, have your own neuroses?
My first thought some years ago was that I did not want to participate in, to hold up or to contribute to the madness. I could see though that everything was connected. It appeared that whether I liked it or not, if I wanted to be in this society, my participating in it would also contribute to child labour, to pollution, to conflict, violence, corruption and the whole off-putting scaffold. Yet there's a balance; whole hives of people working away in a fever in the opposite direction; picking up the war torn, the abused and attempting to put their lives back together again in some semblance of normality.
And yet they still participated in the madness, they bought coffee from coffee shops whose plantations employed children and paid a pittance and polluted the land. They bought oil from companies who didn't clean up after themselves, cared more for profit than the environment and people's well being. They bought clothing from people who'd bought it from employers of ten year old's who spent their entire lives crouched in small rooms in India, for little more than bowls of rice; they were old men within months. They bought food from supermarkets who had bought it from farmers who knowingly called their produce 'crap', genetically modified corn that eroded cows stomachs when they were fed it and caused them to die prematurely because of acidosis and then the cows were also sold to us in burger form. And we are dying early.
We are dying early from cancer that came from radiation that came from nuclear power stations that had melt downs or leaked toxic waste into the water supply without telling us, from which we also bought our electricity, our hot water, our lighting. The same companies who supply scientists their radioactive elements to be used in bomb tests - almost 2000 nuclear bomb tests around the world - though who knows how many China has carried out - how many do you need to find out they kill people? Russia has used them to plug oil leaks, and our children are dying early.
The medical profession does what it can but they are constrained to use what the pharmaceuticals provide and it is provided by the same companies whose motive is profit. They are also forced to go where the work is; research depends on research budgets not what is most important because as we know people's priorities differ.
Everyone is concerned ultimately with keeping a roof over their heads and looking after their loved ones. But while we are participating in this sea of madness - it will continue to throw insanity at us.
I stopped participating for a long time, in a variety of ways, not all skill ful and some more rewarding than others. Then I just let go and floated on all the mayhem. Neither saying this is good or this is bad nor worrying too much about what others thought I looked like. I just floated and watched.
Priorities...
Children starving is a priority. Animals and plants going extinct is a priority. Children dying because their environments and therefore their bodies are so laden with chemicals that they cannot breathe - is a priority. Children stepping on landmines, or picking them up and playing with them - is a priority And every which way I look, these are priorities which are being overlooked because we have our own priorities.
Well, it's a strange thing... to be in the position, where I don't want your priorities any more. I don't want to get married, have kids, buy a house, run a car, work for a company, go on holiday...
I want a new set of priorities. You might think I'm mad. You might think I'm anarchic, some folk might even call me criminal. So be it.
Give me an option of participating in a society that is cruelty free. Give me an option to participate in a society that is radiation and pollution free. Give me an option to participate in a society that is conflict free... and I will participate.
Give me an option to be harmless and I will gladly join you on that sea of madness.
I apologise if I look a little unwilling, or unenthusiastic about simple things, in daily life that we all of us do. It's just I have stopped a second to consider the ramifications; to ponder on the consequences of my actions. If I join in and am a good tax paying citizen, then $400000 of our collective tax will buy a missile to blow up a handful of Taliban, and potentially some other folk nearby, perhaps some other kids playing behind a wall. I don't want to blow up people to secure the oil line running through their country, so that another country doesn't get it because ostensibly that country is not a democracy. I'm afraid I don't see any democracies anywhere any more; I see capitalism in the guise of democracy. If you still see democracy - great - please offer me encouraging and reassuring examples to remind me.
It appears that almost every action has negative consequences often because it is attached to money and the acquisition of money, because nowadays money is dirty; it is hard to find 'clean' money.
If I join society and have a 'good job' I wonder where shall I put my money? The system is making it very hard to be outside of it. But I don't trust the system, it has never particularly earned my trust. What is a 'good job' now?
We all muddle along as best we can. It's naive of me isn't it to propose the possibility of a harmless society. There was a time when we had far less capacity to hurt each other than we do now. We have become a society whose trademark is our knowing the most ways to hurt and dispatch another human being; great.
To me growing vegetables is a rebellious act, having your own water supply is absolute anarchy in its purest form, turning your back on the energy producers and saying 'I don't want' is capitalist blasphemy; while you lie in the sun and put on an extra pullover when it gets cold. 'I don't want...'
What I don't want is clear, but that's boring, negative stuff. I want a computer that is blood free, conflict free, pollution free. To type this on. I don't care if it takes you another millennia to get to that point - fine. Let's go back to a horse drawn society until we do. Lets skip the part where we are obliged to be the bad guys.
TOO many people are dying; it appears some folk want it that way.
Go raw because you live longer; help the poor because it's humanitarian. Right now we should instigate the Law of Harmlessness and show by degrees how much blood we have or have not got on our hands because of the decisions we make as individuals and communities. I am not a good person. I am a bad, bad person. Why? I only have to look over my shoulder at the ramifications of my existence... forests cut down to provide toilet paper, landfills full up with my left overs and batteries and building waste, my sewage in the sea, foaming up on the beaches; and starving people in the Horn of Africa, in the Sahel, skeletal childen who have spent their entire lives at a war that was not of their making - a war encouraged by foreign policies that I wish to have no part of. A war of ideas and ideologies, that ordinary folk can do without - we are quite capable of living together, of shaking hands, of offering sugar to our neighbour when they've run out. Ordinary people are very very good at being peaceful and warless. If we can just be left alone.
Today I discussed with a friend that now it is a law that you must have a licence to chop wood. The local wood deliverer cannot deliver this year because he cannot get someone to cut wood. All the people who used to cut the wood, cannot because they have not got a licence, though they have always cut the wood.
My mother cannot use her trailer because she needs a licence, she has a licence but its English, she has not got a French licence. The Tax office sent a letter wanting to know if this is my principal home or my secondary home. I sat and thought about this.
Is it my principal home? Or my secondary home.
Is this planet our principal home or our secondary home?
I wondered where home was.
I have had many homes.
I slept on a glacier on an icecap, watched the Northern lights, I slept in a carpark next to a motorway, I slept on a ferry in a storm, I slept under a horse's cart, in a hammock next to a Roman wall, I slept on the edge of a mountain. I slept in a sleeping bag outside Holloway Prison. I slept in a debris hut I built out of fallen leaves and bits of branches; it did not need damp proofing, or a foundation or a new roof, I was snug as a bug.
I pulled the loose bits of hawthorn and blackthorn down from the hedge, built a small fire and heated up a pot for a cup of tea. Picked coltsfoot and scraped some white willow for my friend who had a cough. We collected field mushrooms for an omelette, and I picked wild greens, there were plums growing along the wayside. And the tastiest blackberries you ever had. I gave the horse a brush down, and we collected our water from a spring.
Is this my principal home or my secondary? I am confused. It is right that I should be confused. How mad am I? Am I more or less mad than the normal folk who do such a good job of participating in society? Sometimes I do a good job, sometimes I'm terrible at it. I'm glad there's still a bit of room to be both, although in the eyes of the powers that be, me and Africa it would seem are the poorest of the poor. They look down at us over their piles of paper. And the neighbours worry because we are different. Because we don't DO anything. The same way we didn't do anything for a million years. Sometimes doing nothing is a beautiful thing, you do nothing and there is life, it grows, you do nothing and there are planets, a galaxy, a cosmos, a universe.
Should we all take to the fields? No, that's not what I'm saying. That's not the point I'm making.
We should though bring the fields to us. We should pull them round our shoulders like blankets, we should let poppies grow out of our hair and moss cover our fingers and toes. We should learn to feel the starlight make its way through our skin and into our blood stream so that it twinkles inside of us. We should be willing to smell of the earth. To use bluebells as legal tender; to make sure the weeds grow tall and strong so that there is nectar, and bugs and bees and birds and the sweet smell of clover, the song of the skylark.
A mug, a pot and a spoon. A sower of seeds, an old growth forest. I saw an owl last night, the moon was up and Venus was shining bright. The owl is participating in society along with the mouse. I wondered what their principal home was. If you want to speak to me, you will probably find me with leaves in my hair. I will pick comfrey for broken bones and if I die of exposure it will more likely be from those elements I was exposed to on the Sea of Madness than because of me and mother earth. That is my point.
I am I think a conscientious objector.
Saturday 11 September 2010
'Where there are dolphins there are rarely sharks?'
I am truly encouraged to see positive responses to extremism happening all around the world. The book burners are being drowned out by folk giving away the Quran. The extremist and prejudiced folk are being told they should be the ones going to self-help groups (at least I just said that anyway).
'Where there are dolphins - there are rarely sharks' Angela Shelton
And here there are dolphins. There are dolphins swimming and jumping through the waves of violence all over this planet. Dolphins like Andrea Gibson the poet who should have more news coverage than almost any other person. We need her words like dried up hearts need liquid love tsunamis.
I was thinking this morning about the whole 'coming out thing'. Do you expect straight people to 'come out' as straight? No, of course not; well why should anyone else 'come out'. It's you people who are uncomfortable in your prejudice that need to come out. You need to admit you have a problem whether it's 'I am a racist or I am homophobic' whatever form of prejudice or hatred it is.
Being gay is natural, it is inconsequential.
Being racist/homophobic/mysoginist/any-ism however is unnatural and has negative consequences. You need to deal with your issues. You really need to sort it out.
I hate to have to give you a geography lesson but I think its necessary.
There are 6billion other people apart from yourself living in this floating round house and every single one of them is different from you, we're all unique, each of us has our own internal galaxies.
I think we need an intervention on a massive scale. I looked for resources to help racists, or homophobes willing to consider recovery; but mostly I could only find books for therapists. You could say there is a huge gap in the market right there. Maybe if we generate a cultural trend of expecting them to address and recover from their issues such an actuality will occur
One book I happily stumbled across was 'Healing - A journal of tolerance and understanding' by Mohammed Ali
"If today's world is to be truly healed, that healing must be achieved one person at a time. The tolerance and understanding necessary to heal must come from each and every one of us, arising out of our everyday conduct, until decency reaches a flood tide." Mohammed Ali
Sunday 5 September 2010
The hypocrisy of democracy and capitalism and an exit strategy
My FB friend said 'I hate negativity' and I pointed out that as much as I agreed, it was an oxymoron as hate is negative. She then went onto say that it was intended as a statement against hypocrites! A valuable observation.
Sometimes on Facebook or here I will post subjects or perspectives that are negative; the suffering of others, of the earth is not a positive subject. I am angry against injustice. Again anger is not necessarily positive; it can be confrontational and immediately put people on the defensive if they think it is directed at them. When anger is directed at injustice, at a behaviour, or anger arising as frustration at the lack of options; is such anger negative or is it an opportunity for change, a powerful uprising of energy that can shift previously insurmountable obstacles.
I guess it depends on how it is used. Often we internalise it or project it onto others un-skillfully. How do we learn to USE it?
Some how I think society forces us to be hypocritical. It is very very hard these days to make original, unblemished choices that aren't affected some way by a multitude of things we don't all know about.
I speak out against violence against women - but I write on a laptop and speak on a phone made with coltan secured by the FDLR of the Congo; who rape women and children thus dominating local villages and scaring the men folk enabling them to retain possessions of the mines that provide the coltan/gold/metals in return for their weapons.
I eat food provided by oil driven transport, use clothing carried on it - in fact its hard to find anything untouched by oil - yet I speak out against the oil industry. We ask for ethical options and choices but they're often prohibitive.
You can only go organic/eco if you have land, time or the money. Not if you're forced to rent, living on credit or similar situations that apply to most of us. (Try co-housing/housing co-operatives/land trusts btw as a positive alternative)
I am angry at the hypocrisy that is forced upon us. Is anger always negative? Are we all submissive to a far greater hypocrisy that we are obliged to somehow disentangle ourselves from - is it possible to be free of it and to honestly have a free choice?
We can try. I'm sure it is measurable, our integrity? To know for sure we have to pare down how we relate with the world to actions that are clear and within our authority. We have to build positive relationships with others (who are also integrating in an ethical manner) that are the means for sustaining ourselves.
There is no option to choose being unsustainable - because ultimately that is finite. So the only choice is transitioning to being sustainable in all the ways this pertains - being nice to each other for one...
This is a truth, a fundamental - its like Gandhi's concept of Satyagraha or 'holding to the truth' that he defeated the British occupation of India with. Because the truth was - it was unjust. The truth of injustice, of the unsustainable and unethical are never hard to see all though I think there is a concerted effort whether it is intentional or not) to pool the wool over the eyes of the masses, of the general public as though we are so many sheep.
So on the back of that, of understanding we have a choice between injustice or justice, between the sustainable or unsustainable - we can stand firm and direct our wills in one direction; towards justice, sustainability and integrity.
Its about being human, not whatever identity we might narrow that field to; be it religion or nation or whatever; they might be our personal values, but in living together on this planet into the future, in making a better world those things are secondary. Life is a priority everyone's lives. Human rights were designed to stop the progression of prejudice into intolerable cruelty it's about time we learned to adhere to them.
Related Posts
Undoing the Chains of Property
Achieve Everything in Five Simple Steps
Our Human Rights
I am angry at the hypocrisy that is forced upon us. Is anger always negative? Are we all submissive to a far greater hypocrisy that we are obliged to somehow disentangle ourselves from - is it possible to be free of it and to honestly have a free choice?
We can try. I'm sure it is measurable, our integrity? To know for sure we have to pare down how we relate with the world to actions that are clear and within our authority. We have to build positive relationships with others (who are also integrating in an ethical manner) that are the means for sustaining ourselves.
There is no option to choose being unsustainable - because ultimately that is finite. So the only choice is transitioning to being sustainable in all the ways this pertains - being nice to each other for one...
This is a truth, a fundamental - its like Gandhi's concept of Satyagraha or 'holding to the truth' that he defeated the British occupation of India with. Because the truth was - it was unjust. The truth of injustice, of the unsustainable and unethical are never hard to see all though I think there is a concerted effort whether it is intentional or not) to pool the wool over the eyes of the masses, of the general public as though we are so many sheep.
So on the back of that, of understanding we have a choice between injustice or justice, between the sustainable or unsustainable - we can stand firm and direct our wills in one direction; towards justice, sustainability and integrity.
Its about being human, not whatever identity we might narrow that field to; be it religion or nation or whatever; they might be our personal values, but in living together on this planet into the future, in making a better world those things are secondary. Life is a priority everyone's lives. Human rights were designed to stop the progression of prejudice into intolerable cruelty it's about time we learned to adhere to them.
Related Posts
Undoing the Chains of Property
Achieve Everything in Five Simple Steps
Our Human Rights
Saturday 4 September 2010
Doing the rights
Its the middle of the night. I'm having a bad one and can't sleep. All day I have been distracting myself.
It is the anniversary of when my dad died suddenly. Its been two years but feels like it was yesterday. I have been distracting myself all day reading. I read so much today. Devoured articles online about all sorts of things, I read a lot of survivors stories, it was as if I was looking for reasons, for answers. As if somewhere in amongst the crazy stories, the miracles and the sad tales I would find some explanation.
But its beginning to feel the same ways as what they say to those visiting Auschwitz that you will find no answers there, only questions. For those that search for understanding in the red brick reality, you only find incomprehension. It seems the same applies to all suffering. A nagging turmoil, a mystery, a why?; an old you you grieve for and/or try to forget, a new you who sees with different eyes.
People frustrate me who are just concerned with their own lives, their own families, the latest music/gadgets. They're happy, they seek fleeting pleasures. I feel like an alien. I want to yell at them 'Look at all these people out there suffering' Why don't they want to help them? Until violence or suffering happens to someone or their loved ones it strikes me that most people don't give a damn. It's amazing when you find people who do, and then I think that there must be a reason; they experienced some kind of loss or confronation with the 'realities' of life.
Sometimes I feel like I am so ineffective, I want to wake people; 'sensitise' them as Elie Wiesel puts it. I have been sensitising for twenty years. And the monster only seems to grow larger and more malign. But you can't put down the torch. Not when you've seen the suffering of others and felt it as your own, or when you have suffered and suddenly you see others as yourself. They hurt, you hurt. It is that simple. What I am learning is that we are not to blame for the state of the world. Indeed much of it is beyond our control, it would take many lifetimes to change all of it. Now and then supreme leaders come along apparently just when they are needed. Not all of us are born to be them, but so many more people are doing gigantic jobs in their limited spheres of influence. There are many lives, many lifetimes of people working heroically together on this planet to make it a better place. We may feel that we are one person swatting at an elephant, when actually there are hundreds of thousands of us, day in, day out, trying to undo the wrongs, and do the rights.
Friday 3 September 2010
6 ways mushrooms made and will save the world
'We should save the old growth forest as a matter of national defence. Mycelium has over 1000 active index against H5N1 virus' Says Paul Stamets mycologist
'I think engaging mycelium can help save the world' You can read the transcript here
Buy a Life Box and plant an Old Growth Forest in your back yard! Even if it is just a yard... It could just save the planet or make a new one habitable!
Tuesday 31 August 2010
The Memory Room
Mary Rakow describes the healing journey of a woman who has suffered indescribable torments at the hands of her parents as a child. Throughout you see painted the will with which a child attempts to both preserve their life and their sense of goodness, sanity and humanity. My conclusion immediately upon finishing was that we do not say No to suffering as forcefully as we should and that there should be nothing ambiguous about our response to violence.
Her character 'Barbara' seeks and creates solace in places and things where she can find some semblance of safety away from all the reminders of the harrowing moments that have been etched into her memory and her existence. At one point she describes it as 'A basket lined with memory like pitch' and in returning to a favourite place of refuge near an image of St Michael she writes '...Evil can be overcome. Again, I ask, until I believe you may I rest beside your leather shoe.' Such a beautiful embodiment of that feeling, of the desire in us to believe we can thwart such violence against our and other's being, juxtaposed with our utter helplessness that all violence renders upon its victims.
Gradually with the help of a patient therapist we see her begin to emerge as a whole person, piecing together her psyche. 'I did not know until then what a barn coming out of winter could smell like... I thought for sure I heard tulips underground discuss the time of their appearing.'
She is startled and undone by the weave of fabrics or certain compositions of music that she associates with devastating horror. Yet at the same time it is art, and music that provides a refuge, and an answer to humanity's eternal question. We ask why are we, but equally this book asks why are we as we are? And crucially can we be any different? She writes 'This is my goal that my memories become like Monet's Waterlilies. Soft brushstroke and bold. Ivory pink and a hundred shades of blameless blue.'
We are led with her as she regains memories long buried and with good reason, and struggles to lay them to rest. We learn about the unspoken violence that others have suffered, remained silent about and remained damaged by as a result. 'Dolores Mary is seventy years old. For half a century she has had night lights burning in every room'
Mary Krakow writes so beautifully it undermines you, in the sense of being mined beneath the solidity of your own psyche; of having your perspectives stolen and remoulded, deepened and enlarged with profound yet simple sentences and subtle prose. We see her character search for meaning and answers through other real people who have searched and not found answers, at least not answer that would allow them to continue living. We are highly sensitised to the suffering of others through Barbara's anguish, her collecting of news clippings and understanding of the devastation of violence and abuse in childhood.
It really allows you to look through new eyes, and yet in a way soothes you as Barbara soothes herself with rhyme and couplet, empathy and the random acts of kindness of neighbours and loved ones who though they may not understand; try and in their trying unwittingly become modest heroes. Sometimes heroism is implied by what you do not do and have not done.
My conclusion that 'we do not say "No" to suffering as forcefully as we should and that there should be nothing ambiguous about our response to violence' was very clear upon finishing this book. I thought a moments silence; you almost want to hold the book like a ship in a bottle out before you and wonder at it and then I thought we do not say No to suffering as forcefully as we should.
Here is a desperate clinging in to humanity for hope and to make sense of existence. As Elie Wiesel says'...Despair is not an answer despair is a question... I believe in the humanity of the human being, I have problems with God - that's because I believe in God, if I stopped believing in god I would have no problems, but I do believe and therefore I have problems and I go on... If I was alone totally alone I would have the right to give into despair - but I am not alone and therefore I have no right to give into despair, I must.. to quote Camut 'I must invent hope where there is none' Not for my sake but for the sake of the children' ' Elie Wiesel
It is also for ourselves that we must 'invent hope' whether it be found in Art, Music or companionship. Or in acts of a generous nature assisting those who are not free, or do not have the means to fulfil their potential - to do so.
It dwells much on the purpose of life, on the human condition. Buddhism describes our human birth as implicitly entwined with suffering and yet it equally describes a pure unadulterated awareness beyond this that is not maligned by any labels of good or bad, of this or that.
We are all of us reeling from so many wrongs. Born into childhoods of suffering or growing up into such moments. We all of us will face loss, we have changes in our fortune. Sometimes we meet people, who assist us in our understanding, who give us tools with which we may arm ourselves against suffering or which help us overcome injustice. Here is a book that does both these. It demands you to be stronger, gentler, long sighted and yet acutely present. You cannot read this and not glimpse some of the finest qualities of humanity outlined as they are against a bare skyline of atrocity and condemnation. They are bleak those places we must attend to in order to heal. You must sift through them for answers. Auschwitz exists as a memorial, people go there almost as an act of pilgrimage - a search for answers and yet survivors will tell you - there are no answers there only more questions.
Yet this state of disbelief, of ambiguity, of shock and questioning leads directly to the abuse and deaths of innocents. We need to be decisive; to say NO to suffering. To show our unwillingness to allow such events to unfold. If necessary we should have a ready willingness to risk our lives to curtail it. We know now the many routes it can take to come into existence; negligence, neutrality, sitting on a fence, not committing oneself, taking sides, not taking sides, silence and time. Silence and time are two of the most damaging precursors to an act of violation. If we do not know we must find out... If we do know, we must not hide behind our belief that we are inadequate to effect change. Or that do not know enough. Injustice often wears a disguise and we must have eyes to see through such disguises.
Silence and time.
We have on our side history, freedom of speech, law, an emerging international community, the ability to communicate immediately and to record what is happening.
We have pitfalls; isolation, the dismembering of the family, of traditional communities, economic segregation. We have heroes - everywhere. They speak up, they shout, the join together as powerful people. We have laws to be undone, and new laws to create that will serve rather than force us into servitude.
This then is our work. To offer great ease of suffering where we can. To find out our path in this. Whether you read a piece like Rakow's, or write it; or are in it suffering like Barbara, or you are seeing it unfold before your eyes; two enemies we all share are silence and time. Must we always see violence from the other side after it has been committed? Or can we pre-empt this with far-sightedness?
I think we can live in this world together, without violence, but instead raising each other up. A peaceful world is possible, there are examples of peace everywhere, you simply have to look for them. People are healing and helping each other to heal.
People are caring for all kinds and all creatures. It is possible that we can start living in a peaceful world but only if we acknowledge the holocausts of the present the Deathfugue that sounds out all around us in conflict, violence, human trafficking, environmental degradation. Is the application of human rights only for those who economically qualify? The only rule for having your human rights respected should be that you are human. Those who have been without such rights such as Elie Wiesel know full well their value 'I felt really elated; I had never had a passport in my life. In France I was stateless. And here in America finally I became a citizen, I cannot tell you what I felt really. I felt so proud. The highest honorus I received at the Universities was nothing compared to that I had a passport. For those that are already in America they take it for granted but for a refugee it means something.' As we know, a child has the least rights of anyone and this is why such horrible stories as Rakow recounts can unfold; we must be attentive to the needs of the child and above all listen to them.
We can continue in our present form of prejudice, or we can move towards an enlightened society that does not distinguish one human from another based on nationality or social standing etc We need to become socially, culturally, environmentally and economically sustainable. Just as Mary Rakow's character had to find a way and a reason to heal and continue living, we must do the same as a society and we can only do this together.
Todesfuge or Deathfugue
Black milk of daybreak we drink it at evening
we drink it at midday and morning we drink it at night
we drink and we drink
we shovel a grave in the air there you won't lie too cramped
A man lives in the house he plays with his vipers he writes
he writes when it grows dark to Deutschland your golden hair Margareta
he writes it and steps out of doors and the stars are all sparkling, he whistles his hounds to come close
he whistles his Jews into rows has them shovel a grave in the ground
he commands us to play up for the dance.
Black milk of daybreak we drink you at night
we drink you at morning and midday we drink you at evening
we drink and we drink
A man lives in the house he plays with his vipers he writes
he writes when it grows dark to Deutschland your golden hair Margareta
Your ashen hair Shulamith we shovel a grave in the air there you won't lie too cramped
He shouts jab the earth deeper you lot there you others sing up and play
he grabs for the rod in his belt he swings it his eyes are so blue
jab your spades deeper you lot there you others play on for the dancing
Black milk of daybreak we drink you at night
we drink you at midday and morning we drink you at evening
we drink and we drink
a man lives in the house your goldenes Haar Margareta
your aschenes Haar Shulamith he plays his vipers
He shouts play death more sweetly this Death is a master from Deutschland
he shouts scrape your strings darker you'll rise then as smoke to the sky
you'll have a grave then in the clouds there you won't lie too cramped
Black milk of daybreak we drink you at night
we drink you at midday Death is a master aus Deutschland
we drink you at evening and morning we drink and we drink
this Death is ein Meister aus Deutschland his eye it is blue
he shoots you with shot made of lead shoots you level and true
a man lives in the house your goldenes Haar Margarete
he looses his hounds on us grants us a grave in the air
he plays with his vipers and daydreams der Tod ist ein Meister aus Deutschland
dein goldenes Haar Margarete
dein aschenes Haar Shulamith
Where do you go to file a complaint against the Government of France?
There is no difference between the thought or lack of thought about the Roma having their homes destroyed, being ousted from France, and shunted to Romania (a country they chose to leave) as the thoughts or thoughtlessness of the policemen who shut the doors of the cattle trucks on the Jews in the Holocaust. The only difference is the eyes of the world. There are more eyes now than there were then. There are less Nazis and their fate (we assume) will be different and yet the actions are exactly the same. It is division, it is economic racism, it is discrimination, I want no part of it. Yet here am I in France.
In July we saw the camp near Moulins cleared. It had been there for longer than I have been in the country. I assumed they had been given another 'official' site. However, knowing the treatment that people like travellers receive at the hands of the 'authorities' I must assume that their caravans/homes have been taken from them and they have nothing but what they are 'provided' with - I wonder what fate the government has decided their pets or animals will have - will they also be sent back to Romania?
There are other better ways to address the issues that once upon a time were not issues at all. It is a consequence of the cataloguing of human beings. I expect it won't be much longer before we're asked to queue for our barcode tattoos/chips. Wait a minute I already have one of those on my passport.
I don't somehow, think that this is an application to increase freedom. The Roma's choice has been taken away. A human right has been bulldozed right before the eyes of everyone. I respected France; they had laws against GM food, they stood up for things that may have taken away their freedoms, blocked roads and stalled the country if they had too. They came out in droves to protest when the right wing could have got power. Why then the inaction? What is so frightening about crumbling caravan sites with people who are trying to eke out a lifestyle on the edge of so called society; people who have been given no options. There is no box on a form for those wishing to retain their freedom and identity and there should be.
There should be paperwork for everyone, or at least the assumption of a right to land and tenure ship while you are on that land, and those rights should be respected. Immigrants should have provisional passports that give them the same rights as everyone else; homeless people should be given an address at least that they can use as their own for filling out forms. What is so hard about recognising your fellow human beings as just that?
These are people who are deserving of the most deference and generosity. Persecuted through out centuries; their means of making a living literally whittled away until the few options left to them include crime or disenfranchisement from local communities. Embrace and adopt them - don't amputate them like a diseased limb - they are human beings. Everyone should have human rights
Article 1 -We 'should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.'
Article 2 'Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind,'
Article 3 'Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person'
...
Article 6 'Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.'
Article 7 'All...are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law'
Article 9 'No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.'
Clearly none of the above have been taken into consideration n the actions of the Government of France pertaining to the Roma People. It begs the question are human rights in this day and age only applicable to those identified by the law, conforming to the law, having the right paperwork and economic contributions to society? Or are human rights a birthright bestowed upon you at birth, qualified by you because of your status as a human being? I know the answer to that question, it would seem that the government of France does not.
What should happen now is this. The forced 'exile' of the Roma should stop. Those who have already been repatriated - which is a term that is not correct; the Roma do not belong to a country specific, they belong to themselves as a people and should have the right to travel freely as a consequence of identifying as such - they should be given the means to return to France if they so choose. There nomadic lifestyle should be assisted; not corralled and they should be given the rights of anyone who chooses to live in a house or stationary place of residence. Here lies the problem. Place of residence As a human being my identity is broader than the country I was born in and the place I choose to live in. There should be an International Passport for those of us unconstrained by nationality. We should be assisted in our identifying ourselves as global citizens rather than demonised for life experiences that have led to inadequate paperwork.
France could continue as myopically as it has been recently, or it could set the precedent for an enlightened society. It has the space, the opportunity and the resources to do so. Failing the government to act thus - the people should act on their own initiative, not through violence or crime, but through generosity of spirit and a spirit inclusiveness. We should share what we have.
I am a Roma. I have no papers. Come and get me.
Article 2 'Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind,'
Article 3 'Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person'
...
Article 6 'Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.'
Article 7 'All...are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law'
Article 9 'No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.'
Clearly none of the above have been taken into consideration n the actions of the Government of France pertaining to the Roma People. It begs the question are human rights in this day and age only applicable to those identified by the law, conforming to the law, having the right paperwork and economic contributions to society? Or are human rights a birthright bestowed upon you at birth, qualified by you because of your status as a human being? I know the answer to that question, it would seem that the government of France does not.
What should happen now is this. The forced 'exile' of the Roma should stop. Those who have already been repatriated - which is a term that is not correct; the Roma do not belong to a country specific, they belong to themselves as a people and should have the right to travel freely as a consequence of identifying as such - they should be given the means to return to France if they so choose. There nomadic lifestyle should be assisted; not corralled and they should be given the rights of anyone who chooses to live in a house or stationary place of residence. Here lies the problem. Place of residence As a human being my identity is broader than the country I was born in and the place I choose to live in. There should be an International Passport for those of us unconstrained by nationality. We should be assisted in our identifying ourselves as global citizens rather than demonised for life experiences that have led to inadequate paperwork.
France could continue as myopically as it has been recently, or it could set the precedent for an enlightened society. It has the space, the opportunity and the resources to do so. Failing the government to act thus - the people should act on their own initiative, not through violence or crime, but through generosity of spirit and a spirit inclusiveness. We should share what we have.
I am a Roma. I have no papers. Come and get me.
Saturday 28 August 2010
La Cuenta (The Bill)
I have my own antiques
This rock, this majestic soil
Passed through the gullets of Pharoahs
Shat out into the Nile
Washing up at my feet
Antique
I can hear Joan of Arc’s voice still
Ringing from the stake
And God stood at her side as
She screamed and burned and succumbed
To humanity’s fate.
It is the arrogance of men they should put in museums
We should go there to look at its folly
And wander the cool mausoleums
Where the dead hide their stories
And their horrors
See the blue sky
Grab it while you can
Before you’re raped and mutilated
At the hands of stinking men
Leaves a bad taste in my mouth
Like radiation
To live in a world where a woman’s
Silence deafens the screams of her
Suffering and writhing to get away
And clawing, and screaming the
Names of her children to ‘Run, run’ run
To safety or to remain quiet with
A look from her eyes,
As she looks through the unseeing
Men as they pull at her clothes,
To where her children hide
We sit here in the
Cool. Outside the café
Drinking iced tea
And smoke spirals up from the Camels.
And the arms dealer smiles because
He has made a tidy packet
And the politician is smug because
The election is in the bag.
And the soldiers go where they are told.
And the masses surge up against the barriers of injustice
And the blood pools under their feet
And the mound of dead rises higher and
Higher
While we conspire around our polished
Glass table, what it is we will do this evening
And where we will have our dinner.
And the mound grows higher
‘Camarero, la cuenta por favor’
Waiter, the bill please, we ask
The bill please
And the millions dead keep dying
The millions raped keep
Surrendering
up their bodies
to the savagery of
men whose eyes
hold knives of lust
And whose hands thrust
their vile-nce
into girls vaginas.
It is the hatred
To which we are unaccustomed
As our mother reared us gently and with
love
If this is a man? I ask
At the table, shielded in the shade
From the hot spanish sun.
If this is a man? I ask
Then what’s become of us?
If this is a man? I ask
At the table, shielded in the shade
From the hot spanish sun.
If this is a man? I ask
Then what’s become of us?
Crickets sing to their wives
Disclaimer - 'All creations declares the praises of the Lord' is the perspective of the film maker whose endeavours I highly respect.
My personal opinion - I personally find 'the Lord' a constrictive term to my experience and am more inclined to praise the crickets and their inherent divinity and the metaphysical presence of Dr Seuss in the universe
Why hasn't Omar Al Bashir been arrested? Er, I don't know why hasn't Omar Al Bashir been arrested?
It's time to protect the women and children isn't it?
Read more:- http://ow.ly/2w8ks and at the International Criminal Court
Who should clean this mess up? Should the Arab world take more of an active stance? Who is arming these people?
Will it continue to be the case that Arms dealers from Russia, China, Israel, India and big business in the US continue to make money on the backs of this sort of suffering? No it will not continue, it cannot continue. Should we arm the women so that they can protect themselves, their children, their livestock and their villages - at least then they would be on an almost equal footing with those 'that come on horseback and by air' to destroy them an their homes. There are certain people that it serves to have an immoral politician in the seat of government who will turn a blind eye to the smashing and grabbing of resources in return for wealth. It is my opinion that they should also be up for war crimes - because they are paying for them...
If you foot the bill of a war crime then you are complicit. It strikes me that you want this turmoil to exist between the Arab world and the rest of it because it serves you.
If I was the International Criminal Court I would find out who arms these people, who pays the bill and that is who I would arrest for war crimes. Perhaps that would mean condemning these countries/companies.
Whatever it takes to stop 'business'. Whatever it takes - that's what we need to do. And we need to help the ordinary folk. Who need the cavalry. They need to be seen as the last marine that the rest never leave behind.
because we are leaving these 6year olds and 70 to be raped and brutalised. We are leaving these so militias to mercilessly burn and kill. We are letting this happen.
We are complicit by our inaction. Anybody want to start paying for some security for these people? I mean anyone can buy a militia nowadays. Are there any wealthy humanitarians out there who wouldn't mind seeing the back of some of these dirty dealing folk be they arms manufacturers or genocidal dictators and monsterous militias. Either they turn themselves over to the ICC or someone scary will come and get them. The scary good guys.
In WW2 millions of people fought to bring an end to such abominations. People want to bring it to an end now. We don't want to hear any more stories on the news of the latest barbaric atrocities carried out with no repercussions. We want repercussions. I want repercussions.
Why hasn't Omar Al Bashir been arrested? Er, I don't know - why hasn't Omar Al Bashir been arrested? Because...
If you know the answer to this question please contact me. I want to know and also you might be able to tell me how we can stop the murdering/raping b********
Don't you think that if someone doesn't comply with UN human rights laws that someone should at least take their sweeties away?
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