Grassroots Revolution: Where do we begin?
Why do we need a Revolution? After all, we have it pretty good here in Canada; free medical care, decent schools, most people have a pretty high standard of living... what's to complain about, right? And why go so far as to call for Revolution? Can't we trust that our government is doing right by it's citizens; keeping us safe and even prosperous, as individuals and as a nation? Also, aren't revolutions violent? I don't want to fight my own countrymen!
A definition of Revolution is "a fundamental change in political power or organizational structures that takes place in a relatively short period of time when the population rises up in revolt against the current authorities". I assert that current political and economic structures which govern our lives are creating extreme imbalances on our planet that cause great suffering and loss for many; while upholding a false sense of success for few.
Here in Canada, we generally fall into the latter category, living comfortable lives in warm homes with food to eat and cars to drive and opportunities all around us. What we are not taking into account is the imbalances we are creating; in the environment, the economies, and societies across the world - and even within our own country, due to our insatiable habits of consumption and our desire to control and subjugate those whose lives we appear to deem less worthy than our own.
Here in Canada, we generally fall into the latter category, living comfortable lives in warm homes with food to eat and cars to drive and opportunities all around us. What we are not taking into account is the imbalances we are creating; in the environment, the economies, and societies across the world - and even within our own country, due to our insatiable habits of consumption and our desire to control and subjugate those whose lives we appear to deem less worthy than our own.
It is difficult to hear that we as good-hearted, friendly, accepting Canadians are doing this; after all we, as all humans, inherently understand the difference between right and wrong, and generally try to to live our lives adhering to moral principles.
What is happening, in fact, is that we have given over all the control and decision-making powers which govern us to corporations and "elite" groups of decision-makers which demonstrate no possession of moral conscience as they organize themselves.
The quest for economic gain has come to override any other motivating factor in the design of our society; and we have largely forgotten the sense of humanity, mutual concern, and compassion which helped human society to come together and develop in the first place. Visit many traditional societies on the planet and you will see that everyone is provided for, through every stage of life, that resources are shared instead of hoarded, that benefit to the collective good is the objective of everyday life, that no one is truly alone.
Indeed the shift we are looking for, the Revolution, is based on the fact that we are all in this human society on planet Earth TOGETHER. A child suffering in a developing country to mine the metals that go into our cell phones is as intricately connected to us as we are to the people who benefit from the work that we do. We need only look at our cell phones to see how instantaneously we can connect to any other person on the earth; that we can literally reach out and see and hear that child, and even feel their pain, living in this same moment on our small blue planet.
What has gone wrong in our world is that we have become led to believe that we are separate from each other. Whether by race, age, gender, religion, nationality, political affiliation or economic position, we have been told that our differences are lines upon which we need to divide. When what we desperately need is for our differences to be respected and honoured as parts of the whole, a community which must function together to ensure health and success of our species.
Until a sense of unity and conscience is put back into the fundamental structures of political and economic organization on our planet, we are doomed to flounder as we struggle against one another in competition.
The Grassroots Revolution is about realizing that unity and working together to bring humanity back to human kind. Because we are kind. We are a family. We are united by bonds that transcend any illusory difference our minds can conceive.
Coming together at this precarious point in the history of our civilization is a necessity and a requirement in order to continue living on this Earth; only if we work together to address the many challenges we are faced with, will we be able to call ourselves civilized.
Viva la revolution.
What is happening, in fact, is that we have given over all the control and decision-making powers which govern us to corporations and "elite" groups of decision-makers which demonstrate no possession of moral conscience as they organize themselves.
The quest for economic gain has come to override any other motivating factor in the design of our society; and we have largely forgotten the sense of humanity, mutual concern, and compassion which helped human society to come together and develop in the first place. Visit many traditional societies on the planet and you will see that everyone is provided for, through every stage of life, that resources are shared instead of hoarded, that benefit to the collective good is the objective of everyday life, that no one is truly alone.
Indeed the shift we are looking for, the Revolution, is based on the fact that we are all in this human society on planet Earth TOGETHER. A child suffering in a developing country to mine the metals that go into our cell phones is as intricately connected to us as we are to the people who benefit from the work that we do. We need only look at our cell phones to see how instantaneously we can connect to any other person on the earth; that we can literally reach out and see and hear that child, and even feel their pain, living in this same moment on our small blue planet.
What has gone wrong in our world is that we have become led to believe that we are separate from each other. Whether by race, age, gender, religion, nationality, political affiliation or economic position, we have been told that our differences are lines upon which we need to divide. When what we desperately need is for our differences to be respected and honoured as parts of the whole, a community which must function together to ensure health and success of our species.
Until a sense of unity and conscience is put back into the fundamental structures of political and economic organization on our planet, we are doomed to flounder as we struggle against one another in competition.
The Grassroots Revolution is about realizing that unity and working together to bring humanity back to human kind. Because we are kind. We are a family. We are united by bonds that transcend any illusory difference our minds can conceive.
Coming together at this precarious point in the history of our civilization is a necessity and a requirement in order to continue living on this Earth; only if we work together to address the many challenges we are faced with, will we be able to call ourselves civilized.
Viva la revolution.
Comments
Post a Comment