Note:
Here are three more responses to my invitation in Coffee, Consciousness and Revolution. More to come.
Joe
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Dear Joe,
As always, I read you first thing in the morning so that my day's framework is sane instead of the insanity of corporate America wherein I must toil for the next six months while I plan my escape.
Last night I was at my office Christmas party and at my table piled high with the usual holiday excess of food and booze, there was talk of plans for the future. Some in our group (in their 20's and 30's) were talking about balancing their careers and creating families of three, four children and the kind of money that would be needed to maintain their high-spending lifestyles. Most were eagerly anticipating their perennial bonuses, salary increases, deals, mergers, stock options, $etc., $etc., $etc.
Usually, I stay quiet during these events (I'm a low-level employee) and only show my face for half an hour. But this particular night "balance" and "justice" weighing heavily in my faint consciousness and not looking forward to the two-hour commute home, I lingered and found myself blurting out (after a couple of drinks) that if I were their age (I'm in my 50's), I would seriously consider limiting the procreative dream since the world was way too populated to keep on sustaining itself.
My remarks produced looks of horror and derision. Angrily voices lashed out as to how patently unfair it was for my generation to deny the upcoming generation the same kind of liberties we took for granted even though I pointed out that long ago I had decided to limit myself to one child fully aware of the destruction over-population was causing to our already compromised environment. No amount of arguing or statistics could make a dent in their belief that America will never suffer any of the ills of those "other people" outside our borders and our market would remain ever expanding quite simply because of the "demand" as the population kept on growing. By the way, a few of the secretaries and low-level employees at our table agreed piously with these over $500K wage earners.
Reading your article this morning I realized the extent to which our consciousness has become so "conditioned" that any reasonable argument against its viability cannot be tolerated and must be denigrated, squelched, killed. I also realize that most of my adult life I have been been part of this conditioning. Being a closet rebel -- screeching out every so often of our impending doom -- does not qualify me as a revolutionary.
What I know now -- maybe too late, but who knows -- is that vision and consciousness demand that you speak up, act out or get the hell out of a society that uses your tax dollars to fund wars against humanity, fund politicians that are ripping off those whom they are supposed to protect, abet families and moral structures that are killing our innate humanity and planet. We are a nation of corporate structures that are dooming generations of people here in the US and all over the world to slave-like conditions while they mass produce junk with no particular use or function other than feeding our deluded belief that this is freedom, that this is democracy.
This year I'm committed not to quelling my existential pain. Let it shine brightly and start burning my gut into action.
God bless,
Maria
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Hi Joe,
I cannot think of a revolution that has existed absent an articulated ideology. People will be disgruntled, angry, outraged, and exasperated, but they will die before stepping outside of the system that is destroying them unless they've got an ideological cover for doing so. Why? Two reasons: They aren't individuals, and they orient themselves by belief. They derive their identities from the beliefs that drive the social structure that exists. They simply have no alternative, no matter how miserable their fate, but to "go along with the program".
Just like the person who suffers from mental illness clings to his dysfunctional behaviors because their loss feels like death, the citizenry will cling to a dysfunctional political and economic systems. So how does the mentally ill person find healing? He reaches out to someone who has experienced the same or similar dysfunction and who has found more healthy purpose and meaning (belief system). He "borrows" that sense of purpose and meaning -- articulated as ideology -- and begins, with support, to orient himself to a new way of life. Old, dysfunctional behaviors fall away over time, to be replaced by behaviors that reflect the new ideology. When this happens culturally, we call it "revolution".
What the elites have figured out is that it doesn't matter what people know. In fact, the more people understand about how vulnerable and miserable they are, the better. They will cling all the harder to the meager and diminishing feelings of normalcy in their lives. They will studiously avoid thinking, and will self-police to make sure the status quo is maintained. They will adopt compensatory and addictive behaviors in order to continue on with their lives. People will literally do this unto death.
As long as the elites control the articulation of an alternative ideology, the people have no recourse. And, thanks to technology, they have this control through ownership of the media and control of political process.
The only way the teeth of our vampire masters will be jarred loose from our collective necks is through environmental and resource collapse or another such cataclysmic event. And if that happens, the majority of the people will be howling, begging, pleading for the return of the familiar, warm breath of those vampires. They'll work overtime to build up the social and economic structures that allow it all to happen again because they don't have an alternative, clearly articulated ideology. The vampires will see to it.
This won't be true forever, but it will be true for a good long while yet. The population of the earth will diminish, a neo-feudalism based on cults will replace nation-states, and slowly the corpocracy will be built up again -- over and over -- as we slowly learn to find a sense of individuality that is based on something more substantial than encrusting ourselves with stuff.
Best wishes for a peace-filled, slow-paced life in Belize,
Lorraine
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Joe,
I have been reading your website daily ever since I read your book Dear Hunting with Jesus. My mother bought it at the beginning of the summer, and it was passed around our family between my sister, mother, father, and I. I am not really emailing you about your book, but I have to praise its necessity.
Anyway, today I read your essay entitled "Coffee, Consciousness and Revolution". I have to begin by asking you about something you said. "Consequently, the natural cooperative social nature of ordinary people guarantees that there will always be despots, authoritarian states and the few exploiting the many." This was really the only negative reaction I had to this essay, and I don't even think that my reaction was entirely negative. I do think that there is an inherent natural cooperative quality to human beings, though this has been manipulated throughout history, but I don't believe that this quality is the only factor that leads to authoritarianism or a total state. I don't know where these horrible conditions came from anyway so it is hard for me to reflect on them, but our natural cooperation is simply trust, and it is unfortunate that people decide this trust is something that can be used to their advantage.
The natural cooperative social nature you cite is something that should be praised and never taken advantage of. I sometimes wonder why this trust or cooperation isn't more powerful than the manipulative forces it is controlled by. Maybe this is what you are getting at. I certainly believe we shouldn't be looking towards leaders, but my vote will be in for John Edwards (any advice on that would be appreciated).
I guess I am hoping for the day that will come when the natural cooperation will be something that is fierce and something to be reckoned with rather than something to be manipulated for personal gain.
Just my reflections.
In solidarity,
Gabriel
