I continue to find the SynEarth e-magazine one of the sanest on the Internet and found the article entitled “WE-ness and Synergic Trust” extremely appropriate in regards as to what is happening today.  This article, at least for me, pointed out again the need for spaces within communities where people, not of like minds, but from diverse points of view, can come together and discuss intelligently the challenges with which we are faced today.  This does mean getting to know one another on a personal basis and trusting that although we come from different cultural backgrounds, we are all part of the greater whole.  While I call these spaces “Community Learning and Information Centers” (CLICs) it is apparent that whatever they are entitled,there is great need for them, – and I urge everyone on these lists to start one within their own community today.  The waters through which we must navigate at this point in history are treacherous and uncharted — it is imperative that we reach our hands out to one another and give support and guidance in getting through this period in history. 

The second article in today’s publication, entitled “America’s Plan to Secure Iraq’s Oilfields“, I found to be appalling.  Here again the media is trying to make us believe that the Iraqi war is justified by telling we-the-people that we would be better off if the oilfields are controlled by U.S. imperialist interests who would manage them effectively and protect them from burning by Hussein.  Please, give me a break — unless I was completely duped by the media back when, Saddam only burned the oilfields as a last resort to keep them out of ‘the imperialists hands’ at the end of the last war.  And looking at the U.S.’s record on oil use management, what in that scenario leads to the belief that the oil fields would be better off in American hands now?  Had the U.S. (read ruling elites) as an ethical world leader begun research and manufacturing of energy-efficient appropriate technology even three decades ago,the U.S. would be on firm ground now in the energy field and leading the way towards a sustainable future –there would be no reason for this current threat of war. 

BTW, has anyone considered the question as to how much oil energy it is going to take to wage this war?  I don’t really know, but my intuitive guess is that it is going to take almost as much each day as is extracted each day.  And, out of the technology that is developed for war, will come some technologies that are applicable and appropriate for use in civilian applications and everyone will say, but look what came out of the war! just as the atom bomb made possible nuclear power and hundreds of other applications.  And this will serve as another reason to continue the military-industrial complex, for look how much good it does for us no matter how many people have to die for it.  Aren’t we good Christian flag-waving capitalists? 

How easy it is for us to forget the dead on the battlefields after the fight is over and to be able to jump into a new gas-guzzling SUV and drive down to the grocery for coke and ice cream for the kids birthday party.  (Incidentally, the ice cream — Ben & Jerry’s –  has been tested to show that one serving contains 2,000 times more dioxin {the most deadly chemical known to man}than is permitted to be dumped in our rivers. So of course let’s feed lots of it to the kids because we love them so much.  On the  way home we stop off for a Big Mac with the kids (BTW, the burger contains almost as much toxin as does the ice cream and the raising of cattle for beef, using up somewhere between 29 and 50% of our present agricultural land mass, is  in turn, driving millions of subsistence farmers in developing countries off of their lands and forcing  them into colonias where they live on top of garbage heaps hoping to find food). 

We next drop into Bergdorf-Goodman for a pair of Ralph Lauren cotton jeans and matching shirt while picking up new cotton sunsuits for the kids (the cotton contains formaldehyde which is absorbed through the skin and cotton is among crops that requires extensive fertilizer and pesticide use for peak production {the fertilizer and pesticides of course being made from petroleum which keeps the big chemical companies in business when they aren’t manufacturing drugs to keep us from going crazy} so we can all be the best dressed, calmest, sanest people on the block.  We then pull into the gas station and bitch at the price of gas as we fill up the tank on the SUV that gets about 10 miles to the gallon. 

We then arrive home at out 3,000 sq. ft. computerized house furnished with hardwoods that come from the tropical rainforests we are trying so hard to preserve.  Dad is, of course, tired after running the gasoline powered mower over the huge green lawn out front that requires a bouquet of fertilizers and pesticides to maintain, so he and his friend from next door are parked in front of the 50″ TV watching football and downing beer in aluminum cans (which, of course, can be recycled — but has anyone taken into consideration as to how much energy it takes to manufacture relative to life cycle? or, has anyone considered how much energy plus unproductive labor the building of the TV has consumed?). 

Let’s get real about this folks — if we want to truly stop war and death then we’re going to have to change our lifestyles.  We have to BE the change we envision.  This is NOT something that we can vote into office by electing someone to represent us. This is not something we can solve by fighting a war. 

It takes voting our dollars in the marketplace and making smart choices that preserve and enhance our lifestyles. 

–Marguerite

P.S.  And, I imagine that some of you just won’t have time to read this because you are too busy being part of the problem rather than looking for the solution.

 Comment by Kay Dayss

I’d like to comment on what Marguerite said at the end of this email: “P.S.  And, I imagine that some of you just won’t have time to read this because you are too busy being part of the problem rather than looking for the solution.”

I think it is a mistake to apply a “problem/solution” mindset. What we need are people who are willing to walk away from the OLD STORY with its problem/solution focus and create an entirely NEW STORY for humanity. Each NEW STORY will be different, and each new story will focus on LIFE and PEOPLE and RELATIONSHIPS, not problems and not solutions.

We are so much more than the problem OR the solution. We are people in relationships.

Blessings,

–Kay