The freedom to choose?

[LaurenG]

Today I'm a writer. I've always been a writer, just not a very good one. In fact once I'm done with this I'm sure I'll be labeled and kicked around by a lot of you.
Today though I don't care.

There comes a time in all of our lives when we are forced to choose who we are. We aren't allowed the luxury of wishing we are something we aren't or the hope to think it'll all work out in the end. However true that may be, that it will work out...in the end, I'm more concerned about now and the next years accorded to those of us here now..

On the talk shows this morning we are given the treat of listening to a broad spectrum of garbage starting with Condi Rice, the mouth piece for this administration. Or we can listen as Obama tries to tell the world what he feels is important under the gaze of Russert, another main stream media mouthpiece.

Oil is at an all time high, the mortgage industry is in turmoil, the economy is on a precipice and we all hold our breath waiting to see what more is in store for us today or in the weeks to come. Health care for millions is non existent, the elderly who have no way to supplement their incomes try to decide whether they're going to go without food, medicine or heat. The middle class pulls the weight and everyday we get up and go to work and do it again and again and again as our dollars grow smaller and our planet gets warmer.

We have our big spendy season right around the corner. Though many of us are done with the corporate gods creation, many more of us are not. So the decision to buy that lead (or date rape drug) filled toy for the children or nothing at all, stares the rest of us in the face.

And we all sit around waiting for things to change or for the next election while our food supply is garbage http://www.indyweek.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A162137 our infrastructure is in shreds http://www.planetizen.com/node/26418 and our president throws tantrums because he can't get more (fill in the blank) for himself and or his friends. Or we argue over the gods and goddesses both in politics and in the ethereal world. Who has the truth, who is the most truthful and what about right now?

In the meantime, while we all argue, the corporate masters continue amassing wealth and making decision that have none but their own best interests at heart and then they pad the coffers of the politicians who decide for us how everything should be.

I'm pretty sure this is just more of the same, the same as it's always been only now too many of us know it's happening. Yet here we sit typing away discussing our next corporate sponsored (or bought) president.

We could be doing the right thing and demanding the truth and demanding integrity but we don't, instead we make excuses that no one is perfect and we'll hold our noses and make the same decisions as always.

I guess the old adage is true “the more things change, the more they stay the same”.

[MadHound]

1. Not all of us are as inactive as you claim,

Many of the posters around here are actually quite active in politics and causes, thank you very much. I also find it ironic that you choose to launch this screed against posting on anonymous political chat boards on an anonymous political chatboard. Mmmm, hypocrisy tastes good in the morning:eyes:

Then there are those of us who see the oncoming crisis and are changing their own lives in order to lessen their impact on the world, and to lessen their exposure to the crisis when it all finally comes crashing down. What are you doing to alleviate the energy crisis? Are you driving a more fuel efficient vehicle(I am, it gets 100mpg). Are you buying food from local sources, rather than the crap in the grocery store that gets trucked thousands of miles(I am, I grow and store much of my own produce, get my meat from my farmer neighbors, and shop at the local farmer's market). What about getting off the energy grid, any plans for putting in solar or wind, weatherize your house, cut down on your energy usage(I'm doing all those things, and will also be putting in a cistern combined with a windmill to irrigate my crops and trees).

Your broadbrush scolding is misplaced, there are lots of people who are doing wonderful things in their community and in the country. They choose to post here for a number of reasons, but you seem to forget that people can multitask. And like I said, the irony of you doing that which you so decry(posting screeds on a board) is simply jaw dropping.

[LaurenG]

2. Well , I guess I wasn't talking about you then.

I'm just ranting about things we all rant about from time to time, please don't take my words personally.

Thanks for your jaw dropping answer.

[scarletwoman]

5. Why take it so personally? The OP was making a point on an entirely different level than what you

were talking about, anyway.

Yet here we sit typing away discussing our next corporate sponsored (or bought) president.

We could be doing the right thing and demanding the truth and demanding integrity but we don't...

That's a whole different matter than whether you have solar panels on your roof. I believe the OP is speaking to the idea of changing our political consciousness altogether, and to stop acquiescing to the game as it is currently being played.

sw

[MadHound]

8. These two sentences

"I'm pretty sure this is just more of the same, the same as it's always been only now too many of us know it's happening. Yet here we sit typing away discussing our next corporate sponsored (or bought) president.

We could be doing the right thing and demanding the truth and demanding integrity but we don't, instead we make excuses that no one is perfect and we'll hold our noses and make the same decisions as always."

Sorry, but that sounds like a real broad brush attack on the people of this board. If somehow I'm in the wrong about this, I apologize. But given the nature of those sentences, and that post, I don't think that I am.

[LaurenG]

10. It's a broad brush but it's about all of us, not about DU or those

who post here, it's people, us, in general. It's a heartfelt and sad rant about how I feel. And yes I am an idealist I do have the belief that eventually we can make our planet a better place especially if we make personal choices that are for our best interest.

[Az]

3. Demand it of whom?

I am pretty sure there are people already demanding things of our leaders in DC. Trouble is they don't matter. So they can scream their little lungs out all they want. They can stamp their feet. They can insist that things be made better. But to whom are they going to address this list of demands? You? Me? The weird guy down the street that smells oddly like cat litter?

Demanding this is meaningless if you don't have the power to back it up. And that right there is the trouble. Somewhere along the way we lost our sovereignty. It used to be We The People. Now its more like It The Incorporated. And it is It that has the attention of people that make a difference. Because It wields the control of the medium, money, and power. And until that changes, I wonder who you are going to demand change from.

[LaurenG]

6. From ourselves

and yes you make a great point we have lost so much. We must look to ourselves and each other to do the right thing and as always it starts with us down to our smallest choices.

[Az]

7. Its too easy to find like minded people

Its the ease of communication that causes part of the problem. It is so easy to find people who think like ourselves (or at least close to) that we no longer exchange ideas with people of drastically different points of view. Thus we all clump up together and wind up commiserating rather than making a difference.

The net is a marvelous tool. But it tends to create massive swaths of group think. We wander into freeper land and are so revolted that we can't stay there for long. And if we piped up and made any of our ideas known there we would be kicked out in a second flat. The same goes for any net community. Its because it is so easy to communicate that we can tailor who we talk to rather than actually have to work out a consensus with others.

[LaurenG]

9. How do we work out a consensus with others?

Especially those with dramatically opposing views?

Of all the people I know here, you do very well with this. What would be the best possible way to approach this?

[Az]

11. In the past it was out of necessity

But now adays technology makes it far to easy to simply ignore such necessity. Its not just the net. Cars, telephones, and tvs allow us to isolate ourselves from those around us and only associate with those we want to. The net just took this and amplified it a couple thousand fold.

Its not that this is a bad thing on its own. It brings with it marvelous advantages (that I certainly would not want to do without). But it does create new problems such as this isolation of ideas. Groups develop near mythological notions of oppositional groups which would quickly be dashed if we had real interaction forced by necessity. Necessity is a harsh task master. And we have dealt it a viscous blow with our technology. And its only now that we are beginning to realize what that harshness brought us.

I don't know that there is an easy answer. I certainly don't think going back is the answer. Luddites are still crazier than we are. But our modern society with its modern problems offer up new challenges. And I think right now our social ideological isolation is secondary to the fact that corporations have pretty much taken over our nation and are set on ruling the world. Forget fascist state we are the NeoFeudal state with the CEOs as the new Lords of the realm.

[orpupilofnature57]

4. Anyone void of responsibility is dead ,abroad or a child .Human nature

Scum rises to the top ,because the rest of the solution allows it to.

[scarletwoman]

12. If we demand the utmost integrity of OURSELVES, the rest will follow, imho.

For as long as people cling to denial, cling to playing along with a rigged game, cling to the familiar comfort of allowing themselves to be bullshitted and abused because it's just too scary to think of breaking free and making a committment to a different worldview -- as long as people are willing to cling to those things, they will be out of integrity.

It is our own integrity -- our internal wholeness and lodestone for truth -- that must guide our actions in the world. The question then becomes, how much bullshit does your own integrity allow you to swallow?

sw

[LaurenG]

13. I love your answer, thank you for your input.

I think personally, I can't swallow anymore, but who knows if I am in my own delusion. Thus my rant and in it my wish for answers such as yours.

[scarletwoman]

14. Well, I've been thinking about this stuff for many years -- being an old hippie and all.

I'm glad my answer made sense to you -- your post made lots of sense to me.

One thing that I think history demonstrates quite clearly, is that no meaningful political change happens without a change of consciousness that starts with a few, then seeds itself in other minds and spreads until, like yeast, it causes social movement to rise up. It is THEN, and ONLY THEN, that the ponderous machinery of politics is forced to take notice.

If we want to change how this country operates, we simply cannot do it by butting into the power structures head on. Nor can we change anything by cooperating with and acquiescing to the meaningless charade the power structure sets up for us.

As I've said in various posts elsewhere around the board, I think that progressives should stop thinking in terms of party and electoral politics and concentrate our collective energy on building a social and civil movement completely outside the realm of party politics.

You cannot build something new and substantial on a rotted and corrupted framework.

sw