Comment by Ben Roberts on February 29, 2012 at 1:19pm

KMO:  You talk about "the tension in the Occupy movement between people who advocate direct action in resisting the status quo and those who insist on a strictly non-violent approach to social transformation."  Why can't "direct action" be non-violent?

Comment by KMO on February 29, 2012 at 5:12pm

Hi Ben,

In the episode description I'm contrasting actions which systems of civil authority allow with actions that systems of civil authority disallow but are powerless to prevent. I've used the phrase "direct action" to describe this second category, but I don't claim ownership of the phrase, nor do I claim to know better than you what it means. If it is important to you that "direct action" can include actions which are taken with the permission or tolerance of existing systems of unjust authority, then I will defer to your preferences and change my episode description. What phrase would better convey what I'm using "direct action" to convey here?

Comment by Jitendra Darling on February 29, 2012 at 8:24pm

You know, this is the first time I've ever noticed the toroidal bubble floating around my head.  That explains a few things.

I thoroughly enjoy and appreciate your presence as an interviewer, KMO.  Especially that you're genuinely interested in illuminating more than one side of an issue. 

I'm inspired to choose the theme, Occupy Inner Authority, for my Occupy Heart call this Friday.  Understanding the dynamic of locating the axis of authority in relationship to individuals, organizations and structures can be game changing.  Looking forward to unpacking this topic further.

Comment by Jitendra Darling on February 29, 2012 at 10:10pm

In re-listening, I notice I may not have directly responded to your pointed and excellent concern regarding Foster's/Bucky Fuller's idea of allowing individuals to freely potentiate themselves without apparent regulation or intervention by government/some outer agency. Therefore, unchecked technological development fueled by free energy would essentially exponentially accelerate our trajectory over the cliff of unsustainability.  Oh My!

Foster clipped the extended description of that idea so it sounds as though he advocates giving people/corporations carte blanche to be all they can be, create unhindered and grow without care of limits.  That actually runs counter to that which he promotes.  The fully extended version of this says that people in their most natural state of harmony do only what they love and contribute because they want to.  My experience tells me that when a person is happy and fulfilled, they have a natural curb on their appetite for all things. 

Bucky, and by extension Foster, advocates syntropic vs entropic activity.  Activity that adds value with that value calculated on its true galactic scale.  By this calculation, fossil fuels are astronomically costly due to all the natural processes and time invested (dinosaur soup, et al, steeping under pressure for millions of years) in the production of a barrel of oil.  So there is far more to the equation than Foster illuminated.  Unfortunately, I think he fell into the trap of a limited # of minutes to layout what would have taken at least twice the running time to give more than a few brushstrokes to most of the topics.

What was not said by me, and I don't know how Foster would put it, is that our society and culture is not "old" enough to handle that level of unchecked autonomy.  There are too many kids running around who would be all too happy to hoard everyone else's ice cream and toys, so we need to have some ground rules and limits as to how much ice cream any one person can stash in their freezer, especially if others have none.  And you can't go around to disadvantaged neighborhoods and give yourself the exclusive licensing rights to tree climbing, selling tree climbing to other rich kids while giving nothing to the kids in whose yards those trees grow. 

Well...you get the idea.  I'm hungry...heading for the freezer.

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