STOP THE LISTS!
“Ever notice that very few people on either side of the global warming debate come to their conclusion based on reasoning from facts?”
The majority of vegetarians are vegetarians because they worry about the feelings of animals, not because of the efficient, cheap, and health reasons to reduce meat consumption. Veganism doesn’t even make sense, else they wouldn’t eat almonds because bees pollinate almonds. Nevertheless overconsumption of meat is a problem in developed countries and there are logical, scientific/objective/deductive reasons for eating Boca burgers.
Behind a lot of epistemes are genuine factual information. It’s really difficult to break down what’s truthful or not with the information we have out there, considering that the John Birch Society’s anti-fluoride campaign back in the 60s/70s is now common hippie commune beliefs of the mainstream attacking crown chakras. This is something that’s happened to me. A 30 year old hippie lecturing me on what boils down to an anticommunist conspiracy theory. Pre-Internet leaflets viral campaign existing long beyond the naming of memeology as a thing. “Ideas are viruses.”
Maybe I don’t “know” the facts as well as I think. As far as I “know”, the climate has switched to an average 1 degree Celcius higher than previously measured, and that climate change is due in most part to an over 350 parts-per-million carbon emissions rating in the atmosphere. These are ‘real numbers’ and thus easier to cognitively latch onto as ‘data.’ I ‘know’ that most of the anti-climate change questions come from a select group of non-climatologists, that those non authorities have been for the most part connected with corporate funding, and that recently a group published a full survey of decades worth of corporate influence on scientific admonitions which has largely structured how we talk about these scientific issues and in what language.
I also know that despite the clear and abundant evidence of malfeasance, that the corporate structure as a whole is an ethically neutral set-up that creates as many philanthropic incentives as greed, and that if we were to really want to break down contemporary issues into cause-effect structures with solutions, our first goal is to be no more satisfied with blaming corporate culture as blaming, for instance, Mexican immigrants. That if we want to make real change in the world, we start at the structure of the episteme and stop blaming “corporations” as much as BP for mucking up the gulf, Coca-Cola for detracting sugar-to-diabetes research, Monsanto for their poisonous varieties of GE seed as opposed to the idea of genetically engineered seeds as a whole. That if we want to fix “the government”, we need to call out Jan Brewer and Rick Santorum, and not ‘the Republicans’. That if we want to fix ‘the economy’, we have to discern which individual elements require strengthening regulation, and which require lessening, rather than blaming ‘capitalism’ or ‘socialism’ as a whole.
—PolarisDiB
I.e., stop being so simplistic in our blame. Start being more active in our solutions.
Why is MUBI so damn slow lately… I can hardly browse/post/send messages anymore. This is annoying :(
My day started with giving my family breakfast, but soon after that it was consumer by weather reports. We were never in any immediate danger, though the fear was constant. In any case, these are some of the images from Tornado Alley today.
We don’t have earthquakes, we don’t have volcanoes, and we don’t have hurricanes. But we have this (these are all from today’s outbreak, which included at least six tornadoes and baseball sized hail:
That’s a trailer from an 18-wheeler, some hundred feet in the air…
Just one of the average sized hail stones. Baseball size was reported…
Dude, I just saw the weather channel about tornados in the Dallas area and I just came on here to ask how you are doing. I’m glad to see you already posted and are alive and well. I hope all of your family and friends are OK. I’ll be praying for the people there. Let us know if you know any ways we can give to or help the people in the area.
@Polaris
I was just thinking we need to look for the facts, then deduce a conclusion, rather than starting with the conclusion we prefer and then coming up with facts that support it.
the occupy movement isn’t dead
organized labor has not endorsed the action
Most Occupy May Day advocates understand that a conventional general strike is not in the cards. What they are advocating instead is a day in which members of the “99%” take whatever actions they can to withdraw from participation in the normal workings of the economic system — by not working if that is an option, but also by not shopping, not banking, and not engaging in other “normal” everyday activities, and by joining demonstrations, marches, disruptions, occupations, and other mass actions.
thoughts about this? i don’t think we’ll notice a significant difference around here as the 1st is when welfare checks arrive. huge shopping/banking day
here’s that kimbra chick live at sxsw. is it just me or is the crowd not that into it. too busy filming i guess
Isn’t that kind of ironic, Ruby?
Protesting that the people who work the hardest get the fewest gains by not working?
I’ll see you a principled laziness, and I’ll raise you a mass boycott. How about we just stop spending money on things that fund the 1%? That’ll get their attention real quick. But not if it only lasts one day. Then people will just buy all the stuff on May 2nd they would have bought on May 1st, and use their vacation days for the protest.
Political change takes real sacrifice, not just a day of protest exhibitions.
right, i suspect it’ll be like the one-day gas boycotts and about as effective
“too busy filming i guess”
One of the reasons why going to shows drives me bonkers nowadays…
Haven’t posted one of my flower pics in a while, so as it’s spring I thought this thread needs one about now.
Glad that you are safe, House.
Nice flowers. What are they?
I have no idea! They’re very tiny though. :)
People have been posting really mean comments about Lena Dunham on her interview with Criterion that’s on their website. People are criticizing and making fun of her physique! WTF? She’s gonna read those! And besides, it’s totally irrelevant!
haters gonna hate ^
There, I just left her a nice comment.
People really don’t like her film. I don’t want to watch it.
Happy birthday, Andrei!
I don’t really understand the negative backlash the film got. I thought it was okay… a solid three-stars. I don’t see how you could be that vehemently opposed to it…
“What they are advocating instead is a day in which members of the “99%” take whatever actions they can to withdraw from participation in the normal workings of the economic system — by not working if that is an option, but also by not shopping, not banking, and not engaging in other “normal” everyday activities, and by joining demonstrations, marches, disruptions, occupations, and other mass actions.”
Key word is “a”. A day, as in a single one.
Not One Damn Dime Day , doesn’t do a damn thing .
One of the good ideas to come out of the Occupy Wall Street movement, one that caught my attention that is, is closing bank accounts and putting money into credit unions instead. Credit unions are owned by their members and slightly less ‘for profit’, so basically they are the co-ops of the financial world. They give you a little bit more control of your finances and banks a little less money to fuck around the markets with. As a consumer level protest, it’s about as useful as it can get.
Because here’s the thing. If you want to not engage in consumer activity as a method of protest, you have to actually do something to inconvenience yourself: quit your job, get off the grid, grow your own food, whatever. And you will fucking struggle. And if that struggle to you is preferable than engaging in the consumer game of the United States, then you have my well wishes. But 99% of the 99% is not, in fact, going to be willing to truly give up the comforts the consumer culture they live in grants them. The ‘99%’ is still the 1%, globally speaking. Holding off economic activity for a single day… pushes the economic activity to another day. The next day, you go back to work, one sick day leave or annual leave day down. You hold off buying gas for your car today by topping off your tank yesterday or filling it tomorrow. The real, true economic protests involve dedicated, long-term habit changes that grow into what is known as lifestyle. You want public transportation in your city, you better start using the bus even when it’s inconvenient. You want healthier food to be made available, you dedicate yourself to eating healthy yourself. And if it sounds counterintuitive to fight consumer things by consuming other things, it’s because the only way to fight consumerism as a whole is to give up the financial system entirely, which not only impractical, nobody really wants it as much as they claim.
—PolarisDiB
The ‘99%’ is still the 1%, globally speaking
word. slacktivism is depressing
Maybe I’ll watch The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo later, after some alcohol.
Bad combination?
I’m watching that tonight. Fincher edition, right?
—DiB
Yeah, I’ve been trying to work up the courage. I’m not really fond of Fincher’s handling of dark material. The source material seems to be quite strong though.
No, no, this protest could work. Just like when Martin Luther King told people, “We will boycott the services of white America for one day.”
sigh
^ Nice strategic placement of hands.
House of Leaves