How Can We Fix Our Broken System? How Can We Take It Back?

[Dover]

Richard Moore, who recently wrote an article for his newsletter about what he thought was an imminent attack on Iran/Syria by the U.S./Israel/Britain (which I posted here in GD), received a big response from his readers. One person pondered aloud......WHAT CAN I DO ABOUT THIS?!!! Here is his response.

While I agree with much of it, I also think it is constructive to simply begin making the world we want to live in, in large and small ways, even if bombs are raining down on us, by putting our energies where we feel they WILL be most effective. Pressure from within and outside our system will eventually change it. We can simply refuse to buy into their 'reality':


Letter from Stephanie:

Do you ever wonder what the point is in knowing
all this when it appears we can't do a damn thing
about what is happening?

I found the following interesting because there
are points here re China/Russia and the Middle
East we never see in our mainstream media.
Still, when I consider all this stuff, when I
consider how Harper disregards the view of the
majorityS.especially when he is dropping so
drastically at the pollsSand I see how firm he is
in his positionS..it makes me wonder if it
wouldn't be better to be blissfully unaware.

Being informed or uninformedS..it seems the
consequences that will result from the behaviour
of the U.S., Britain and Israel is going to
impact each of us in the same way no matter what
our awareness level is. All this info enrages
me and I wonder why I put myself through this
when we are all so powerless to change matters.
If I was young I would be behind bars by now.

I now have more sympathy towards those in France
during the Revolution when they lopped off so
many heads Sthe heads of thousands of innocents
as well. Is this what it is going to take?
Is this kind of uprising anywhere in the world
even possible when you consider the technology
being used to watch & listen in to people here
and around the world. Here in Nanaimo, as each
of us drive through traffic lights there are the
little cameras recording our cars. I am
overwhelmed. What is worse is I am feeling
blood thirsty and I don't like this about myself.
I would welcome your views as simplistic as they
areS..if you have time

Steph


Hi Stephanie,

Yes I do have time. Thank you for sharing your concerns.

To begin with I would say this: I think it's
important to seek the truth, particularly about
things important to our lives. I think seeking
truth -- expanding awareness -- is an absolute
good, part of our spiritual development. The
Sufis refer metaphorically to the "Land of Truth"
as being a higher place than the "Land of
Happiness". The strategy of the ostrich is a
mortal sin against our spirits. While 'failure to
take sides' is the ultimate sin in Dante's dark
vision, more enlightened philosophies reserve
that place for heedlessness...not paying
attention.

Next, I would examine this discomfort you are
feeling, arising out of the tension between
'knowing' and 'not being able to fix'. For many
people, that tension drives them directly into
the ostrich strategy: "Leave me alone, I don't
wanna know". But why is it that we don't usually
feel this same discomfort when we see a disaster
documentary about how we could be struck down at
any time by a stray meteorite? We watch with
fascination, albeit with a shiver of vicarious
horror. Perhaps this difference arises from the
fact that we believe, somewhere down deep, that
we have a responsibility as humans for the
welfare of humanity -- whereas we know we can't
be responsible for nature's quirks.

If we feel responsible for something, then we
naturally feel uncomfortable if we don't know
what we should be doing in order to exercise that
responsibility. So I ask this question: Do you
accept on a conscious level that you do have a
responsibility for humanity's well being? There's
a big difference between accepting that
responsibility at a conscious level, and merely
being bothered by a vague suspicion that you
might be responsible.

Many people leave our story here, saying "I'm
responsible for my family, and I can't deal with
the rest of the world." I can only respect such
an attitude, having children of my own, but I
must also note that it results in a variant of
ostrich behavior.

To those who do accept responsibility for
humanity, I suggest that the responsibility
deserves to be taken seriously. Clearly, if you
are responsible for a situation, the first thing
you need to do is inform yourself fully about the
situation. Any ostrich behavior here would be an
obvious shirking of responsibility. If you are a
doctor planning an operation, you must be sure
you have a full and accurate diagnosis before
proceeding. If your task is to defend a child
from a monster, then you must face the monster
with eyes wide open and mind fully engaged.

My own conclusion is that we must accept the
reality of our human predicament: THE WHOLE
SYSTEM IS BEYOND OUR CONTROL and WE ARE
RESPONSIBLE FOR FIXING THINGS. Anything less is
part ostrich, or part shirking. Why?...because
part of 'informing ourselves about the situation'
is understanding that our political system will
not and cannot fix things for us -- it is instead
a major part of the problem. Once we understand
that, we cannot avoid this question: If we aren't
going to fix things, who is?

If the system is beyond our control, and if it is
our job to fix things, then I accept that we find
ourselves in a scary place. But as with the
monster, our only responsible course is to face
that scary place and not turn away. It is only in
that scary place that we can find what we need to
know, everywhere else is below the sand with the
ostriches and shirkers.

One thing we can see clearly in this scary place
is that the political system itself needs to be
changed, and the way our societies operate
generally needs to be changed. The fact that 'the
system is beyond our control' is in fact THE VERY
PROBLEM that we need to address. 'The system is
beyond our control' is not a reason for despair,
but is rather an identification of where our
attention needs to be directed. Our despair can
be reserved for what the system is doing to us
while we let it, and for our tardiness in
addressing the problem.

What we need to do is to bring the system under
our control, or more accurately, to create a
system that we can control and operate for the
well being of ourselves, ie, humanity. That is to
say: the way we can fix things is by creating a
democratic society, a self-governing society.
Anything less leaves us entrapped in someone
else's Matrix, controlled by some ruling elite.

This is what we need to know, what we discover by
facing the place of scary truths: WE NEED TO
LEARN HOW TO GOVERN OURSELVES.

Jesus said to render unto Caesar that which is
Caesar's. The political system is Caesar's thing,
his tar baby. If we quit wasting our time,
getting tangled up and immobilized by his tar
baby, we free up incredible amounts of energy for
rendering unto ourselves that which is rightfully
ours -- our societies. Giving up false hope in
electoral politics is an act of liberation, not a
resignation to hopelessness. It is discarding our
chains, our first step in learning how to govern
ourselves. As Morpheus said to Neo, "Outside the
Matrix there are no rules; everything is
possible." The political system, along with the
media, are tentacles of the imprisoning Matrix.

Before we can govern ourselves, we need to learn
how to work together. Democracy is an inclusive
project; if anyone's voice is left out, it isn't
democracy.

Jesus said that the meek shall inherit the Earth.
Who are the meek? We are the meek -- all of us
ordinary people. We are all natural allies, all
billions of us around the world, and no monster
can stand against us if we work together. How can
we start working together? We can only start
where we are, with those who are around us, in
our communities. Not just some of us, not just
the progressives, not just the activists, but all
of us. We cannot work together until we realize
we are allies, and we cannot be effective while
we are divided. The illusion that some people in
our communities are 'the enemy', 'the other' --
that too is the Matrix, part of its
divide-and-conquer mechanism.

Jesus said to love your enemy. That sounds
intriguing, but what does it mean? How do we go
about it? If I may be so bold, I suggest he was
not talking about hugging an attacker, but rather
about turning our enemies into friends through
love. Love begins with understanding, and
understanding begins with dialog. To 'love our
enemies', and turn them into allies, we need to
begin by joining them in dialog, those whom we
assume are 'beyond the pale', those who don't
already agree with us.

Fortunately there are well-known processes, ways
of helping us listen to one another, that are
very effective in achieving the kind of dialog we
need. These are modern versions of the same kind
of processes that Native Americans used, and were
most likely used by all indigenous societies,
each of which, according to our best
understanding, was self-governing and
egalitarian. In such societies, when important
decisions needed to be made, an elder of the
tribe would play a neutral facilitating role,
making sure that everyone's voice is heard, and
everyone's ideas considered. Today's processes
also employ a neutral facilitator in the same
kind of role.

The outcomes that can be achieved by this kind of
dialog are truly amazing. When people are able to
hear what each other's heart-felt concerns are,
they naturally begin to look for solutions that
take all of those concerns into account. Ideas
which at first seem opposed to one another are
later seen to be synergistic parts of a creative
new solution. Ironically, the greater the
original disagreement in the group, the greater
the energy (and ideas) that eventually become
available to enable breakthrough solutions to be
found.

These kinds of things really happen, and the
participants are usually surprised and delighted
by what they are able to accomplish. Beyond that,
they are often surprised by the feeling of
empowerment they experience, collectively as a
group, by working together in this way. They are
glimpsing for a brief time what it would be like
to participate in a democratic society, and they
are realizing that they -- ordinary people --
have the ability to work harmoniously together,
and that collectively they have the competence to
work sensibly and productively. In two of the
examples I cite in my book, the participants
spontaneously used the phrase "We the people" to
describe their sense of empowerment, and their
sense of engagement. They could feel intuitively
that this kind of working together represents a
microcosm of what self-governance could be like,
and they found this realization to be uplifting
and energizing. .

For those of us who accept responsibility for
humanity's well being, who have faced the scary
truths, and who are seeking a way to help create
democratic societies, these dialog processes seem
to be just what we're looking for. If we take all
that energy we've been putting into political
campaigns, protest movements, public education
campaigns, letters to the editor, or whatever,
and put that energy into arranging opportunities
for this kind of dialog in our communities, we
would be facilitating the emergence of self
governance in our societies.

We would be helping our community learn how to
dialog with itself, in a way that includes the
various concerns and viewpoints in the community,
and that generates ideas and proposals that are
likely to make sense to the community generally.
At the same time, as more and more people are
able to experience this kind of dialog
personally, more and more people would be
'getting it', as regards a general spirit of
democratic empowerment, a sense of We the People,
of community solidarity, of being 'allies', and
of everyone's voice being heard and ideas valued.
Over time we could expect a convergence toward
community priorities, and agendas, that everyone
has helped define. We would be evolving toward an
empowered community, a community that has learned
how to govern itself.

Notice that it is not necessary for everyone to
follow the difficult path we have trod here --
taking on our shoulders responsibility for
humanity, facing scary truths, etc. Simply by
participating in these processes, in this kind of
dialog, people can learn the easy way what we
have learned the hard way. By actually
experiencing democratic empowerment, people will
know in their bones that the current political
system must be superceded by self governance.
They won't need to do the political science
homework that we've been engaged in here. While
we have been experiencing 'accepting
responsibility' as a burden on our shoulders,
they along with us will experience
'responsibility' as being a natural part of the
exciting and energizing business of governing our
own affairs.

Democracy is a 'way of relating', a 'way of
working together'. It is a way that can operate
among the members of a family, or among the
people of a community, and it is a way that can
operate among communities, or among societies, on
any scale up to the global. The communities of a
region, for example, can dialog with one another
via delegations, take one anothers concerns into
account, and seek creative solutions for regional
problems and projects. Regional delegations can
dialog together about province-wide issues, and
so on.

In learning how to relate in this 'way', by
participating in this kind of dialog, we would be
participating in the transformation of our
cultures, expanding our cultural repertoire to
include this new 'way' of interacting with one
another. That is to say, the emergence of a
democratic society happens by means of a cultural
transformation, a cultural shift, rather than by
means of a political movement or organized
campaign. The new culture naturally propagates as
more people experience the new kind of dialog.
Wherever the new culture has taken hold, our
'normal, natural way' of dealing with any social
problem would be for the affected parties to
gather themselves together, and employ our
newfound 'way' of working together. Self
governance becomes possible for a society only
after such a cultural transformation has occurred
in the society.

Above I suggested that we ' difficult path'
people, those who feel already a responsibility
to help create democratic societies, might devote
our energies toward arranging 'dialog
experiences' in our communities, and that this
could facilitate the emergence of empowered,
self-governing communities. That suggestion arose
out of a focus on political transformation. I'd
now like to reframe that suggestion, from the
perspective of cultural transformation. From this
broader perspective our task, as initiators, is
to help spread a new cultural paradigm. A
community focus may still be our best strategy,
but from this broader perspective, we might find
other useful strategies as well. For example, in
the 1960s, new pop-music genres (Dylan, Beatles)
and new kinds of gatherings (rockfests, be-ins)
were very important in spreading certain cultural
changes.

From a cultural-change perspective, there is good
reason to be optimistic about the 'propagation
power' of this new kind of dialog. Trials have
shown, as discussed above, that these dialog
experiences tend to generate a great deal of
enthusiasm among the participants, along with a
sense of empowerment and engagement. For that
reason we could expect many 'dialog graduates' to
be motivated and energized to 'share the
experience', to 'spread the message' in whatever
way makes sense to them. THE PROCESS OF
EMPOWERED DIALOG SPONTANEOUSLY GENERATES THE
ENERGY REQUIRED TO FUEL ITS OWN PROPAGATION IN
THE SOCIETY. Exactly what forms that propagation
might take is an open question, to be answered by
the diverse talents and creativity of those who
go through the experience.

In the context of 'we are responsible for fixing
things', I suggest that we have reached a very
optimistic place. We need to do what we can to
help spark a cultural transformation, a
transformation that brings its own
self-propagating energy to the party. It is a
transformation that can teach us how to govern
ourselves, and enable us to create democratic
societies, and deal with the problems that face
our species. In terms of activist strategy, this
can be seen as a high leverage opportunity, with
strong long term potential. Why would we not
pursue this path, with both enthusiasm and hope?
Is it really true that there is 'not a damned
thing we can do about it'?.

---

Finally, I'd like to add a comment or two about
my previous article, predicting war with Iran,
economic collapse, fascist oppression, etc.
Based on that article, we might think "it's too
late" -- we have lost our window of opportunity
for social change. In this regard, I would say
that I have been predicting war with China for
about ten years. I think I've got it right, in
terms of long term power relationships, but I've
always underestimated how long it takes for these
kind of tectonic forces to work themselves out.
The 'finishing end' may be at hand or it may not.
War with Iran might be a world changing event, or
it might be similar to the Iraq invasion, in that
its main effect for us white folks is on the
content of TV news, a petrol price increase that
is annoying but not life-threatening, and
inconveniences at the airport.

Another thing I'd like to say about that article
is that it had a particular purpose. I was
addressing the widespread attitude, "People will
wake up when something terrible happens." What
I've been trying to say for the past ten years is
that "Things are already terrible, what are you
waiting for?" I wrote about the implications of
globalization, as regards de-nationalization,
when most people hadn't heard of globalization. I
was anticipating the neocon movement already when
Daddy Bush first used the phrase 'new world
order' at the end of Gulf War I. I published a
series of articles on the 'Police-state
conspiracy' a decade before 911.

I wanted my recent article to be dark, because I
continue to hope that people will wake up based
on the direness of their predicament. But I am
afraid that particular hope is in vain. People
will keep their head in the sand right up until
the point where their ass gets blown up by a
grenade. When someone is 'waiting for people to
wake up', they are sheep waiting for the flock to
lead them. I persevere in that particular
activity -- informing of the danger -- only
because of my faith in the ultimate value of
truth.

Our fundamental situation, as 'ordinary people',
has not changed in 6,000 years and it will not
change until we change it. The time for us to
wake up has been there this whole time and it
will be there until we do wake up. Whether we
happen to be in a period of peace or of war is of
little concern, in the bigger scope of things.
Any reason not to begin our response now is
either a rationalization or a sign of ignorance
or heedlessness, either ostrich behavior or
shirking.

rkm