Sunday, December 20, 2009

Reviewing the Venus Project



After reading and listening to much of the Venus Project and The Zeitgeist Movement material I agree with many of the concepts they present. Industrial productivity has greatly increased while labor costs have dropped. Automation is moving into the service sector and has the potential to eliminate many more jobs.

The middle class has already shrunk tremendously and the gap between rich and poor broadens yearly. Ironically, the quest for increased profits is leading the commercial world to a point where there are very few consumers left that can buy their products.

I do, however, have a problem with centralized control, the system they propose may or may not be better than what we have now. The concept of a centralized computer system organizing what is best for us humans through scientific principles may sound good in theory, but in practice there is no such thing as untainted scientific principles in areas where control of populations are concerned. As long as computers are programed by people there is no such thing as an unbiased computer program.

I wouldn't be able to abide the conformity the system wishes to establish. In this society we are subjected to pressure to conform, most of us do. There are still some who follow the road less traveled. Those who shuck the 9 to 5 and the house with the white picket fence. I guess it's probably a chain link fence now. There are those who live on the open road. Those who live off the land in some remote local. The world would be diminished without these nonconformists in my opinion.


As idealistic as Jacque Fresco is, and no mater how high minded the plan appears, giving control of all the resources to a centralized control system always will end in corruption. Lord Acton, in 1887, said "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." It's every bit as true today and I'm sure will be true tomorrow.


Friday, December 11, 2009

Reviewing Monetary System Post.

We were reviewing some of the posts a few days ago. This is a continuation of that review.

Here is a song by Ryan Harvey to enjoy while you read this post
Click here to play the song.


Understanding our Monetary System, demonstrated how the whole financial system is a rigged game with those at the top in control of the strings. Most people see no choice but to engage in this game despite the unbalanced playing field. However one can minimize their reliance on the established overwhelming control of the monetary system by following several methods.

Most of us grew up in the age of mass media. We have been conditioned, since we were children setting in front of Saturday Morning Cartoons ( for younger ones 24 hr cartoon networks ), to respond to advertising. Large Corporations have spent billions on research and campaigns figuring out what motivates us to make that purchase. Today's commercial usually has little to do with the product, or if you need it. It's all about image and subtle psychological cues that are proven to make us feel that we need that product.

The first thing we need to do to stop being pawns in the big money game is to regain our free agency and stop making impulsive buying decisions based on psychological manipulation. Most of us are unaware what is truly motivating us when we make a purchase. This is easier said than done.

First, don't buy anything unless you have weighed and considered it thoroughly. Don't try to stop your addiction to products all at once, but try to change where and how you buy products at a reasonable rate that doesn't cause you distress. An example would be to move from high priced, carbonated, brand name, beverages to tea or water. Then to move to a brand of tea that is organically grown and produced by a small coop, or grower, or wild harvester. Check and make sure all the products you buy are responsibly produced and that you are not contributing to sweat shops, unfair trade practices, or environmental degradation.

Then set yourself up to grow and produce your own tea. Most of the people forget that all the raw resources for the products we consume come from our planet. You can often produce it yourself, or at least find the small responsible producer or cooperative who has a hard time competing with corporate giants and literally help change the balance in their favor.

Continue to educate yourself on advertising tactics and corporate trade practices. I will try to do my part to help with that by linking to good information on the internet.

Stay away from borrowed capital, especially credit card companies. I did away with my credit cards long ago. The interest and fees on those things having risen to rates that were illegal and considered loan sharking just a few decades ago. They are designed to trap you into a cycle of never-ending lifetime payments.

We have all been conditioned to believe that things and objects will bring us fulfillment and happiness. If i could just have that next new shiny thing life will be so much better. In fact if you set back, relax, and try to remember the happiest times of your life they usually have little to do with things, and more to do with sharing time with loved ones and enjoying natural surroundings.

Simplify, get rid of all those things you thought you needed. You will be surprised how much more peace of mind you have not having to worry if someone is going to break, or steal, that gold plated whatyamacallit.

My posts Peace Pilgrim and Moneyless in the 21st Century profile individuals who have made or are making fine examples of how to minimize involvement in the monetary system. Most of us, myself included, aren't prepared to go to these extremes. That may be due to a lot of fear and conditioning we have accumulated. We can however simplify our life by refining and reducing our consumptive tendencies.





Tuesday, December 8, 2009

A Van-Dweller at Duke

Photo by Ken Ilgunas

Ken Ilgunas lives in 15,000 dollar Ford Econoline Van at Duke University.

'Living on the cheap wasn't merely a way to save money and stave off debt; I wanted to live adventurously. I wanted to test my limits. I wanted to find the line between my wants and my needs. I wanted, as Thoreau put it, "to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life … to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms."'
http://www.salon.com/news/pinched/2009/12/06/living_in_a_van?source=newsletter

Very good read. You'll have to close the popup add that opens before you can enjoy his well written story.




Friday, December 4, 2009

Reviewing some of the posts



Just a great Phil Collins song to listen to while you read my post.

I read Jack London's "Call of the Wild when i was about 13. Great book for an adolescent boy to read if you want him to strike out with a pack on his back for the Yukon. Hence the quote i ended "Grandma, Hobos, Handouts, and Rhubarb Pie" with. As an anonymous person told me about the quote "True on too many levels". I couldn't have said it better. This is one of my favorite London quotes because it is "True on too many levels."

"It began to look as if I should be compelled to go to the very poor for my food. The very poor constitute the last sure recourse of the hungry tramp. The very poor can always be depended upon. They never turn away the hungry. Time and again, all over the United States, have I been refused food by the big house on the hill; and always have I received food from the little shack down by the creek or marsh, with its broken windows stuffed with rags and its tired-faced mother broken with labor. Oh, you charity-mongers! Go to the poor and learn, for the poor alone are the charitable. They neither give nor withhold from their excess. They have no excess They give, and they withhold never, from what they need for themselves, and very often from what they cruelly need for themselves. A bone to the dog is not charity. Charity is the bone shared with the dog when you are just as hungry as the dog."
Jack London 'The Road'


Nothing makes my blood boil like the "Haves" of our society kicking the "Have nots" when they are already down. There homeless population in the US is growing by numbers we haven't seen since the great depression of the 1930's. Tent Cities are springing up and growing across the country. My posts titled "Homeless Numbers Increasing, Tent Cities Abound", Criminalization of the Poverty Stricken Homeless", and "Homeless in St. Louis, Mo Lose Everything" are aimed at helping shed some light on this phenomenon.


This trend shows no signs of letting up anytime soon. Here's a quote from an article in The Gazette in Colorado Springs that indicates they don't have enough laws on the books to harass the homeless so they are going to make some more.

The scores of homeless people camping along creeks, trails, parks and other public property in Colorado Springs may have to find another place to live soon.

The Colorado Springs Police Department, which suffered a public relations nightmare earlier this year for its role in city-sponsored sweeps of homeless camps, is proposing a new law that would prohibit camping on public property.

The proposal was met with scorn and anguish from some of the many homeless people living in tents and under tarps along the snowy banks of Fountain Creek on Friday.

“Where do you want us to go? Out of town?” asked Chris, a 44-year-old man huddled underneath nothing more than two old sleeping bags. “Everybody hates the homeless.”

The proposed law makes it illegal for “any person to camp or to set up or occupy a tent, shack or other temporary shelter that could be used for camping on any public property.” The city also amended an existing law that bans camping “on any park property.”

http://www.gazette.com/articles/public-90297-camping-springs.html


For every person residing in a tent city it would be my guesstamation that there are about another 5 living in vehicles or more obscure areas trying to remain "out of sight" and "under the radar" of local authorities. Many of these people live in cars, vans, and campers. There is a growing segment of the population that have begun to refer to themselves as vandwellers.

One of my favorite characters from the counter culture spent many of the later years of his life as a vandweller. My post on "Nature Boy, eden ahbez" ,or ahbe as his friends called him, was one of my personal favorite posts. We will be looking at more vandwellers, rubber tramps, and vagabonds ( a positive term in my definition ) in general this month.