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On June 25, 2012, Rob Kall of OpEd News sent an
email identifying several areas that are of importance towards developing free
and healthy community. Two of the areas Rob
stated he would like to see in writings are:
Community,
re-localization: how are communities fighting globalization
and getting local.
Bottom
up Grass Roots identifying new angles on the bottom up
revolution and grass roots actions and efforts.
Both of these arenas speak to the on-line, "Blog
Talk" Radio Show that Merry Hall and I will be hosting within the next couple
of weeks. We are calling the show Envision This!
Many
of our guests will be people fighting globalization and helping people get
local by developing self-sustaining communities. Indeed, one of our first guests will be Bob
St. Peter, the head of Food for Maine's Future, who has been instrumental in
developing local ordinances in eight Maine jurisdictions such as Blue Hill and
Sedgwick.
Bob
St Peter's vision entails a real bottom up democracy where people are empowered
within their community. No longer will
people be working for a paycheck cut by corporations whose interest is in
making their top shareholders richer than they are. Nor will they be working to ensure the world
is dominated by megalithic corporations. There is no reason for our money to
help the already over-the-top rich get even richer. Rather, they will be working for the welfare
of their community, their family and themselves.
Can
you Envision This?: A healthy Earth with clean air and water supporting a
healthy community. A community that you
live in and in which you see the fruits of your labor helping to feed, clothe,
entertain, or somehow make richer the lives of all those living in your
community. Would you feel so alienated
then?
If
you can Envision This, then let's make it happen. Envision
This! will be more than a "talk show."
It will provide a venue for visionaries to get their ideas (which
mainstream media ignore) out to the public.
It will be geared towards fostering change. To foster change, the format of the show will
give listeners the opportunity to call in and ask questions, make comments or
briefly share their own vision. Just as
Bob St Peter and Rob Kall believe in the power of localities, our show will encourage
and respect your power while also helping to foster more movement towards
localized economies, production, and meeting of needs.
Could
this be the end of alienation from the planet, our community, ecosystem, and even
our self? This is the dream for our
show. Envision This! can be one voice speaking to a life of connection,
love, and real freedom where rule is more from the inside out than the outside
in as it is in aristocratic and bureaucratic systems of management and
government.
Can you Envision This and make it happen in your locality? I can Envision This! Come, join us and share your vision with us!
Merry's Turn
June 26,2012
Yes Burl, I can Envision This! Most of the time I give my whole heart and hope to making it work. It is our best opportunity yet to help regenerate a healthy relationship between humanity and our Mother Earth. The time is ripe. Then my Neg-Nags (internal negative voices of self-doubt, despair, and harsh judgments that nag at me) set in.
We listened to a Democracy Now segment on the upcoming but highly secretive Pan-Pacific Trade agreement being pushed by the corporations and the governments they have bought out. It would further legitimize and consolidate the power of the transnational corporations, creating an international kangaroo court, placing them above the laws of member countries. This further motivates me to act now, act powerfully, act publicly. It also scares the living daylights out of me.
My Neg-Nags are screaming:
What arrogance to think you can have the power and influence to affect what is already in motion! All the power is in their control, not yours. Don't you care that they can arrest you on any trumped up charges they want to brand you a terrorist? If you believe that is just paranoia talking consider this: Burl's income, your social security income and teachers' retirement are all in government hands and can be wiped out with a few clicks of the mouse. You will no longer fly under the radar. Are you forgetting that they have 5,000 years of enculturation of the public to believe that they are the source of (not a threat to) security and plenty? You've tried several times before to get your influence out there, only to fail dismally. Don't you get yet that you don't have the charisma or the persistence to make it happen? Humanity is more ready to walk right over the cliff than to listen to you. You're 68 and it's time for you to retire, not start a whole new career"especially one that offers no likelihood of keeping a roof over your head and food in your mouth.
These voices will keep going endlessly, so I'll simply turn down the volume on them and turn up the volume on my resolution and passion. Okay "simply" isn't the right word. The world's need for every voice we can muster is urgent. For today, I'll ask my zeal to overpower my fear. After all, Amy Goodman is still alive and earning her living.
Today is important. We do the trial run of our show. It only goes to our account at Blogtalk Radio for us to critique, not out over the air. But it's one giant step closer to going public (that is, more public than this blog-diary already makes us.) May my nervousness empower rather than block me. May I turn stumbling blocks into stepping stones.
