Eric wrote in response to my "Just do it":
This begs the question, "Do what?" Jeff has spent a lot of
time thinking and looking into sustainability which may
make "it" more obvious. Someone else's "it" might be
building a spacecraft to carry thousands of people to
another planet. Don't we have some responsibility to at
least engage these people in some kind of debate? Do we
just let everyone "do their own thing"? Pessimistically,
perhaps, this is all we can do. But I'm not convinced yet.
Sure, we can find problems with the statement "just do it"
and i agree with them. The alternatives also have problems
and face the same "Do what" question.
How about these for components of "just do it"
1. Empower people and take control of their life.
2. Encourage life long learning.
3. Build community and talk about future models.
4. Tolerate many different viewpoints and hope they
will converge and build a sustainable culture.
5. Always give priority to "process" and not to
specific viewpoints or beliefs.
This is a "design" or "process" oriented philosophy that
doesn't pressure anyone or tell them what to believe. It
defines the "do what" in terms of a process rather than a
specific philosophy.
This philosophy would accept other ways of proceeding and
avoids some debate/conflict. We could argue that the whales
need saving "now" and this requires a different approach.
OK, but we still need a long term solution that gets at the
cause of problems and builds sustainable systems (culture).
We might feel uncomfortable around those who view a future of
spacecraft and stun lazers, but arguing doesn't do much good.
A better approach might be to build something while they
waste time and get tired of chasing fantasy. We can act and
discuss our activities all the while avoiding supporting
ideas which fail our test of sustainability. Hummm, doesn't
cultural activism say something like this?
I had this discussion once with a person who was going off to
start an intentional community. My feeling was that they were
running away from society and hiding from some of the problems.
He responded; by staying in society i was supporting it
and all the activists were helping build the very thing
they were fighting.
There is some truth in both of these viewpoints. The part about
activists is a little difficult to understand till you look
closely. For example, if we wanted to start an organization to
save forests. It might be called the Sara Club and we could
get into political activities. This would require fund raising
and accounting. We might give tours and publish a magazine.
We might fly important people around and hire lobbyists.
In the end we use a lot of resources and face the possibility
of some new administration coming along and dumping all our
gains. This new president called Ray-Gun can bring out the
model of growth and economics and lead everyone off into the
brave new world of pollution.
The way to fight this requires more than laws or working
within existing cultural structures, it needs a new cultural
mind set. People have to understand and begin living new
models or they will be mostly talk. This is the old stuff
about:
Be the change you want to see in the world.
-- Ghandi
---
Eric, i just read your article in the Pc Activist on building.
Looks good, does this mean you are now a celebrity.
jeff (who almost avoided mentioning a path is
a "just do it" process <grin>)
