A Couple from GNN

Seed Imperialism?
Corporate Organics?

Understanding Understanding

Are you driven by a desire to remain what you are or to become something more? If you come across opinions or ideas that are contrary to your own are you interested or threatened? Do you feel that arguing against something is the best way to understand it? Do you treat a persons opinion as something new and unique or as an instance of a categorization you have previously considered? Do you treat each encounter as an opportunity to learn or as an opportunity to be right? Are you even aware of how fixed minded you are? Are you afraid to consider the alternatives to decisions you have made in the past? What is learning? What is growth? Do you regret or learn from your mistakes? Do you interrogate in order to classify in your own categories or do you encourage the expression of ideas using their native forms? Do you know how to listen? Do you feel that you have to agree or disagree with everything you hear? Do you ever agree with someone and then state your opinion as if it were identical to theirs? If you've got it all figured out then please by all means continue.

And this

The New Renaissance

Read this

The oil we eat

Sold on Buying it

The term buy is often used synonymously for terms like believe, accept, support, or condone however we rarely seem to realize that the act of buying is also the act of believing, accepting, supporting, and condoning the product we buy, the companies involved in its manufacture and transportation, and the means by which it is made and sold to us.

The term sell is often used synonymously for terms like convince, coerce, manipulate, or indoctrinate however we rarely seem to realize that sales and marketing are tools used to control our opinion. We may acknowledge the manufacturing of need but refuse to admit that we ourselves might be victims of it.

The checkout line and the voters booth are the same thing.
Corporate marketing and political propaganda are the same thing.

All I am suggesting is that we think for ourselves. It's not easy to do when so many of our thoughts were put there by someone else.

If you think that this is just a negative way of looking at the world then I give you this; a glass of poison which is either half full or half empty will kill you all the same.

I saw an interesting quote in the Montreal Gazette today from a song by Les Cowboys Fringants which implies that we live in "un univers ou l'verbe avoir a pris l'dessus sur le verbe être."

Stupid Wisdom

An incident that happened in my father's driveway this morning has made me want to share a little something with y'all. My little brother accidentally backed his mother's car into my car where his intension was to simply start it for her. He evidently didn't know what he was doing. He's not stupid for not knowing how to operate a motor vehicle, he's stupid for not knowing that he didn't know.

Stupidity. It ain't about not knowing anything other than what you don't know. A corollary to this is wisdom being knowing the limitations of your knowledge. Infinite stupidity is thus knowing nothing and believing that you know everything while infinite wisdom is knowing that you know nothing (except that you know nothing (except that you know nothing (except ...))).

Don't take my word for it. I have found that stupidity is best understood by experiencing it.

Choosing to Remember

Last night I was thinking that there is one thing that I certainly know how to do and that is to forget. I'm quite good at it. Forgetting seems less to do with not being able to remember but more with not remembering to remember. Taking it a step further it might be more accurate to say it is a subconscious choice not to remember. Choosing to forget. I forget loss, I forget failure, I forget acting against my values, and I forget personal implication. Sometimes forgetting is more of a rewriting of history. Sometimes the forgetting is so efficient that it happens in real time. Sometimes a choice to forget in the past continues into the present. Sometimes a choice to forget in a previous generation continues into the present. Sometimes entire systems of justification, manipulation, and illusion are built by inducing mass-forgetting. Have I forgotten anything?

How 'bout yours?

My truth is not complicated. It does not require elaborate explanation, detailed description, or incomprehensible schematics. These are tools of deception that often draw attention away from experience and good judgement.

The Fundamentals

If you want to understand them you need to understand yourself. If you can't understand how they are so easily manipulated it is because you are not aware of your own manipulation. If you can't understand their flawed logic it is because you don't see your own flawed logic. Self delusion and ignorance are not isolated in one segment of the popluation, they are the foundation of our culture.

Natural Reason

Reason is a tool of approximation.
Absolute faith in reason is unreasonable.

How we live is far from human nature.
Humanism is unnatural.

Focusing on one part without considering the whole or at one magnification while ignoring all others is unreasonable, unnatural, and just plain foolish.

I Object!

I had a little talk the other day with an old friend of mine on the topic of objectification. Well, the conversation covered a whole lot more but at some point the idea of objectification came up, specifically of women and pornography of course. I wondered afterwards if people really understood what it means. Has the word objectification been objectified? Labeling something gives people an easy way of no longer thinking about that thing. It is basically what our culture does, it is how we think, it is what we see. We categorize, we polarize, we abstract, we rationalize, we "make sense", we try to understand. Objectification is a way of seeing the world that puts a limit on the depth of our consideration. Moments, people, life, and things cease to be unique and fresh but are seen as old and valueless. How else could we live with our unjustifiable daily abuses? How else could we live with ourselves?

The End is the Beginning

Today is the last day of my organic gardening internship and I thought that I would share the little piece of writing that got me the job it the first place. Here it is:

In my philosophy life is a cycle of creation and destruction operating in a continuous equilibrium of growth and renewal. This cycle exists within all of our relationships; with ourselves, with other people, and with the entire eco-system. We exist as a part of an incomprehensible system of incredible complexity. There exists an infinite connectedness of all things in both space and time that must be acknowledged and respected. Humanity possesses what seems to be the unique ability to observe and influence the cycle of life. This ability must be taken as a great responsibility rather than a divine right. We have an obligation to act in harmony with the equilibrium. We have an obligation to support growth and renewal. We have an obligation to oppose the stagnation of our ignorance. We must acknowlede that we are one with the entire universe and our choices must continuously attempt to reflect and refresh that understanding.

That Box is Full of Himself

I live in a box, we all do. I didn’t used to be able to see that box, now I can if I really try. Inside that box are smaller boxes. Sometimes I get inside one of the smaller boxes for a little while. If baffles my mind that as time passes I dedicate myself more and more to the expansion and increased awareness of the main enveloping box and yet continue to keep these other little boxes around. I sometimes tell myself that I won’t get all the way in this time, I’ll use the opportunity to observe the box. These boxes are tricky, they’re not designed to allow those on the inside to be aware of their existence.

I live in many different boxes, we all do. One for every flavor of my ignorance.

I live in one dynamic box, we all do. Sometimes it is huge and all encompassing, most of the time it is small and all too finite.

There is no box.

I forget sometimes that people who have yet to differentiate between themselves and their culture can take criticism of that culture very personally. Like someone insulting a box that you don’t even recognize that you’re wearing.

Tool of Perfection

Are you an artist or a tool of production?
Do you recognise the richness of diversity?
Do you feel exploited and/or alienated?
Do you measure your standard of living in dollars?
Do you like to inquire and create?
Could you imagine a democratic workplace?
Do you know anything about neo-colonialism?
Doesn't the war on terror sound just like the cold war?
Are you a free, searching, and self perfecting being?

An Ode to George W. Bush

Here’s to Dubya, a definite instrument of change in the world. He is the mirror Western Civilization needs to show it for what it truly is. He is the rock bottom that will allow us all to see the light.

Dubya’s opponents are probably less bothered with what he is doing than how he is doing it. They like their regime changes and puppet governments to be achieved using secrecy and subterfuge. They like their government and big business connections to be hidden well under the table. They like their belief in the supremacy of western culture to be implied but never spoken of. They like their propaganda and manipulation of public opinion to be subtle and undetectable. They like the lies that allow them to sleep at night to be well crafted. They like the illusion of liberty to be maintained at all times.

Dubya stands for none of these things. He’s blatant. He does things as they have always been done but just doesn’t hide it very well. He is what we are without the pleasant facade.

He also epitomizes that certainty in ourselves and unwillingness to consider the possibility that we might not be completely correct that is the root of so much conflict in the world today.

Perhaps one closed mind can serve to open a few others. Here’s to four more years of learning.

Believe it or Not

Do you believe in an eye for an eye?
Do you believe that the end justifies the means?
Do you believe your way is the way?
Do you believe that people should die for these beliefs?
Seems like it.