Don’t get me wrong. I love all that stuff. But, ten years later it was all forgotten. The cynic in me thinks that we are all trapped in a fashion cycle driven by the marketeers.

http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/blackboard_idea.html

SUSAN DAVIS: “I think in this world, it’s not rights deigned from on high. I think rights are only real when, in fact, people can exercise their rights. And so, what you see here is a very practical solution about people being able to organize for power and being able to also give voice to the various needs….

In order to respond to the horrible water problem that existed with arsenic in the water, you actually don’t have the capacity if everybody is acting in an atomized, fragmented way. And I think you would agree that organizing people so that they can promote their own collective interest is the way to actually realize the rights that may be on the books, de jure, but are never going to be enforced, de facto, unless people have some means of power.

So first, they have to stabilize their own household. They have to be able to eat every day. They have to be able to imagine that they have a future. And then they are able to actually take action in a social and political and economic spheres, so that we’re talking about full citizenship for every person.”

Shiva responds, recognizing that Davis’ view assumes that capitalism is the end all and be all of socio-economics.

VANDANA SHIVA:” I think the assumption that the deepening capitalist order entering every sphere of our life, determining how water will flow on this planet, whether it will flow according to the law of gravity or against the law of gravity walking upwards to money, or biodiversity and seeds, whether they’ll be seen as gifts of nature and a commonwealth to be shared and protected or treated as the property of giant corporations under the Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights Agreement of the WTO, I think each of these issues needs something beyond capitalism. I think — and it’s not an issue of creating another future, it’s an issue of defending the future that is in people’s hands right now.

People in Rajasthan have made rivers come alive by working together to conserve water. And I think we need to recognize that there are those other means of organizing. I think we need to recognize that there are systems beyond capital and at least for maintaining the ecological processes of this planet and defending the commons on this planet. It is not capitalism, but countering the logic of capitalism that will make sure we have an atmosphere, that’s now getting so degraded that climate change is wiping us all out, that the seeds being sold to peasants are renewable and not with terminator genes. I think accepting the logic of capital in these vital areas of life is something that makes life impossible. And we’ve seen that with climate change.”

But… maybe that’s the image for this disscusion after all. Up against globalized corporate/military power, climate change and a population careening out of control… it’s good to remember that a stubborn little guy still has a shot at success.

Aside from not having my annual electricity use handy at the moment, I am also noticing that they do focus primarily on energy and transportation use. I wish they also took into account product consumption, generation of waste (I pride myself on generating relatively little “landfill” waste), etc. What about the cost of family size and social structure? What about a carbon footprint calculator for my cat?

In missiongreen’s world, would all the clean air and water be inside the gates? And what would keep or get me inside?

I would like to hear further discussion about the externalized costs of goods created around the world, who is paying those costs now, and who will escape having to pay in the future?

For example: nother’s smiling changes his world and the worlds of those that respond in kind. If each of us operates in ways that we believe make a positive difference in our personal reality and others’ realities and persuade our friends and acquaintances to do likewise then our world and the world at large changes.

The key is to realize that every action affects every other existence and less than ideal actions on our part diminish each of us as well as ALL consciousness.

Peace to ALL

Jazzman

What it will take is a greater political will and a public interested in more action and less lip service. There are plenty of examples of modest changes that can be made to lifestyle that add up to a significant difference in end waste.

Two small examples– in Korea and Taiwan there is a modest charge (less than a nickel) for grocery bags at all large chain and convenience stores. There is a similar deposit for soda or coffee cups that are to be taken out of the store. At all fast food restaurants the trash receptacles have separate chambers for food waste, paper waste, “other” and soda cups.

These changes did not come about as a result of enlightened social responsibility by 7-11 or Starbucks or McDonalds. The amount of extra effort on their part, and that of the customers, is minute compared to the good it does. And tangentially, it quickly changes the way people think and act. After a few weeks of being amusing to me, it became second nature, and I now blanch everytime a Dunkin’ Donuts cup ends up in a wastebasket because there is no easily available alternative.

Venture capitalists have discovered the green movement. And the economy is shifting to knowledge, creativity and innovation with less mass and lighter impact.

Transit oriented development is a new urbanist practice that locates more dense development along transit lines. Compact (more dense in mass and height)mixed use (zoned for retail, work, and living in the same building) and mixed income development is taking over the community development business. The national Local Initiative Support Corporation has 45 sites in the US and is launching a new effort called sustainable communites in 11 of its sites.

A conversation beyond sustainability is moving forward as well because sustainability is holding up and not doing enough. As Bill Reed says: you need move beyond sustainability to restoration and a generative practice.

-reusable materials
-demountable assembly
-mobile
-adaptable
-easily understood

remember that recycled does not mean that the material has been waylaid on its way to the landfill as with “plastic wood” (fiber and plastic, hard to separate) but that a cycle is closed and reuse may be essentially indefinite as with aluminum.

“What troubles me is a sense that so many things
lovely and precious in our world seem to be dying out.
Perhaps poetry will be the canary in the mine-shaft warning us of what’s to come.”

“Maybe the best we can do is what we love as best we can”

Structurally sound public housing will be demolished in a supposed effort to help clean up the public housing system, all when lack of housing is choking the cities recovery. Very simple and blatant actions such as this lend much credence to the accusations of a racial cleansing of the city.

The US Army Corp has admitted fault, but no one has listened, Congress has not reacted. America is letting the busiest port in the U.S. (carries 20% of all U.S. exports, and 60% of our grain exports) die for some reason. An area that supplies 20% of domestic oil production no longer seems important to this country.

Innovative social and economic programs and flexing our technological muscle to help save New Orleans would be a change I would welcome.

Have a Happy New Year ROS Nation!

the point is that we are likely to already have the resources to attack our problems without waiting for some magic technology or singling out any one demographic to shoulder the burden…even though many of us would hand our decendents that bill. we must all come to respect our resources and apply them wisely not for suv’s and starter mansions but for things that matter. can we not all agree that life itself, in all its forms is of primary importance? it is in the wise allocation of limited resources..allocated so that all life benefits…with a sense of urgency…that life will continue. otherwise well who knows…we live in the greatest population explosion that our species has ever known…while more of the other species are threatend and declining.

we are in the driver’s seat more than we know.