Occupy Cafe
Integral Activism - Creating the 'We' space.
For the movement to grow we need to find a shared meaning that is robust enough to bring all the voices together into a joyous song of protest and action. Integral Theory shows that a new way of being emerges when we are able to take multiple perspectives and include all the perspectives, allow a transformation to a greater depth of meaning. This new meaning brings a vibrancy and clarity to our shared meaning as we converge and create a new way of being. This group supports both an integral dialogue in how we create a shared meaning and an active space in which we can bring about change. You do not need to have any knowledge of integral theory; you only need an inquiring mind to address the question of how we create the culture space for the movement.
You, Me, We, Ethics and People-Centered Economics
On a group aligned with WE I introduce myself with the background story of how we developed and how our founder died, challenging capitalism in the form of organised crime where children had become a profit centre.
Jeff Mowatt - P-CED
Anna Harris
Hi Jeff,
Your idea of turning Capitalism around by using the profits made for the benefit of the people sounds generous and kind. But it is also patronising and humiliating. Giving handouts to the 'neediest' people - (how do you judge who are the neediest? this is charity writ large, but it is not addressing why these people are needy. It is the inequalities inherent in capitalism which create this neediness in the first place. I guess you would say some people are just better at business than others, and we shouldn't grudge them their talents or their luck. Yes that is the way it is set up. But it doesn't need to be that way. Neediness is not a natural state. it is created by the system we have. The world is abundant with natural resources, and human ingenuity can create from that all that we need, enough for everyone. But the way it is set up, some go without, and some have too much. The answer is not for those that have too much to give some 'out of the kindness of their hearts' to those who have nothing. The answer is to change a system that deprives people of access to the wealth that is their birthright, and stop those who would use this system to drain precious resources, create and ignore pollution and destroy the possibility of human life continuing on this planet.
Anna
Dec 28, 2011
Jeff Mowatt
There's a legal form which is seemingly congruent with the P-CED model in that it goes further than the CIC in defining the role the Community Benefit Society or Bencom has in serving the community rather than a membership, as with a coop
I've created a new group on Linkedin to discover why it's so difficult to find support for creating this I&PS form.
Dec 29, 2011
Gail
Perhaps I’m a glutton for punishment, but I’m going to try to convey what I am talking about using another metaphor.
Let’s say that you and I are both looking at a puzzle. They are both 3X5 and they both depict the same rural scene that is quite lovely. But I start noticing something odd at the edges, and I start wondering if the puzzle is complete. The more I look, the more something doesn’t make sense.
So I go out into the world and I start collecting puzzle pieces and discover that this puzzle is really odd in that it is a puzzle in a puzzle in a puzzle in a puzzle. Each puzzle is rectangular, and because the puzzle is composed of many puzzles, there are a lot of flat edges. My assumption that flat edges means the outside of the puzzle was obviously a mistake, but until I explored the oddities, I didn't know that. I insisted that flat edges ONLY appear at the outside of a puzzle.
By the time my puzzle is completed, I see that the original 3X5 is really just a painting hanging on the wall above a table holding a vase of flowers. But then, noticing that there seems to be more, I finally get all of the pieces together and discover that the painting includes those things but now I see that I can see the whole room and there is a sliding glass door through which I see the ocean – with surf and seagulls in motion – and I can hear the sounds as well.
The reason you say that I accuse you of saying things that you are not saying is because I too see the original painting, and agree with what you see, but I see that it is not isolated from its surroundings. In fact, it’s a very small part of a much more beautiful and entirely cohesive image.
I’m only saying that by moving the original puzzle pieces around, you don’t fundamentally change the original puzzle or the problem that you see. This means that you will recreate the same problems. And because yours is not a complete image, you are discounting the very thing that you are looking for – motivation. (A way to sell your idea) And you will not find or sell the motivation unless you see the bigger picture. The smaller picture is the same old box that seems to imprison society. It is too oppressive to sell. To change the outcome, you have to step out of the little box to find new ways of thinking about the world. Such ways do exist and some are already living it.
The larger picture is life-affirming and it extends forever in every direction. The purpose is far grander than the small purpose of living your life in service of others or even the co-op for the benefit of self and humanity (which is nothing more than a different form of capitalism that ultimately devalues all.) In the larger picture, morality is built-in, but not by a group or a god, and it does not devalue even one single individual. It respects and empowers all, enslaving none.
Feb 29, 2012