Just a few comments on some of the things you've written, Ray.
You say:
I could be wrong about this but my impression of what you have said is that you
believe in your superiority over the groups you dealt with and yet that the
failure of your culture in the present is obvious. It seems logical to me
that even though there is a paradox in that thinking, it still makes my
culture "less than viable" in your mind. Is this true?
No, it's not true at all, Ray. With whatever cultures I've encountered in the
Canadian north, in Brazil, in Russia, in Costa Rica, in Jamaica, or wherever
else, I've tried very hard to see the world as they see it and understand it as
they do. I've never felt myself to be superior.
Written words are poor carriers of intent and tone. Psychological project is
the rule of the day in written conversation. Most everything in writing is
assumption and inference on a historical grammatical structure of understanding
rather than actual knowledge. So what I'm asking you is: Is the above
paradox really your belief? Indeed, is it really the belief of the majority
on this list? I would add that even asking these questions in such a
straightforward manner is not comfortable to me, even at my age. As I said
earlier, "like" is a word that I have for you in spite of the questions.
Sometimes the issue is not individual but systemic to the language and group on
lives within.
Like ever so many other people in our pluralistic society, I feel myself to be
an outsider with many groups. Because I've never really fit into any group,
I've tended to find myself doing intellectual things like participating in the
discussions on this list or being a member of a book club. I've known many
people that lead very robust lives in the commonplace, and I've always envied
their ability to do that.
That nightmare is a total bust as a dream for any type of a future for
humanity. There are effects still waiting in the wings to be played out.
Still to play out in the present are the results of the Boxer rebellion and the
Western Tai Chi takeover of China by the Communists with their cold superiority
over you and their hatred for the West that goes back to Genghis and that
plague that destroyed the last great Asian Empire.
One thing that fascinates me is how the simple, profound and even holy becomes
nightmare when put into practice. Christ's sermon on the mount became the
Crusades and the Inquisition. The thinking of the Enlightenment led to wars
and head choppings. Marx became Stalinist Russia and the state capitalism of
Communist China.
On a personal note, Ray, I had a bit of artistic talent when I was a kid. By
the time I was in my early teens, I was convinced that I would become the
world's greatest artist, living a life of luxury on the Riviera and driving
fast cars. I dropped out of highschool and spent a year at what is now the
Emily Carr school in Vancouver. There I learned that several other kids had
far more talent than I had. So I went back to school and on to university. I
had no idea of what I wanted to be in my first and second years, but I finally
fell under the influence of Marx -- not Karl Marx but Ziggy Marx, who kept
telling me how wonderful the economics courses he was taking were. So, I
thought, OK I'll take some economics. So I became an economist, or at least
that is what I was classified as while working in the Canadian public service.
I still occasionally paint and pretend to be an artist, but my art isn't really
any better than my economics. The only thing I've really proven is that I'm
very good at being mediocre in whatever I do.
Regards, Ed
----- Original Message -----
From: Ray Harrell
To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION,EDUCATION'
Sent: Monday, October 11, 2010 10:09 PM
Subject: Re: [Futurework] Fw: The only exception -- was Living within ourmeans
Ed,
The present is dreamed in the actions of the past. It's done. Tomorrow is
today's dream. That we continue to repeat present scripts and dreams means
that the future will be bleak, lacking in quality and imagination. I told
you my past as a statement of ownership. That's mine. If you want to know
about it then you have to ask me because I was there. The same for my
fathers. They are my fathers and mothers. I have both the history and
what they left me in writing and accomplishments as my history.
But I too have to dream a different future through my actions of the present.
I have to speak in the language of those who I am talking to. Use the
etiquette of those to whom I am speaking. And most of all, admit that others
are, at the very best, mirrors (in my mind) of my own experience from a
distance. That when they differ from my experience with their own reality,
I would be a fool to assert that I knew more about their history, culture and
values than they do. We all evolve the future through the respect we give in
the present for each other's individual and cultural identity.
Simple repetition of past mistakes or insufficient assumptions, is the realm
of fools. Refusing to challenge one's own assumptions is to deny the reality
of uncertainty and to turn a positive possibility into a negative conservatism.
To create another dream through reflection, observation and exchange means to
change those actions in the present for a better tomorrow for one's
"relations."
I could be wrong about this but my impression of what you have said is that
you believe in your superiority over the groups you dealt with and yet that the
failure of your culture in the present is obvious. It seems logical to me
that even though there is a paradox in that thinking, it still makes my
culture "less than viable" in your mind. Is this true?
Written words are poor carriers of intent and tone. Psychological project
is the rule of the day in written conversation. Most everything in writing is
assumption and inference on a historical grammatical structure of understanding
rather than actual knowledge. So what I'm asking you is: Is the above
paradox really your belief? Indeed, is it really the belief of the majority
on this list? I would add that even asking these questions in such a
straightforward manner is not comfortable to me, even at my age. As I said
earlier, "like" is a word that I have for you in spite of the questions.
Sometimes the issue is not individual but systemic to the language and group on
lives within.
The acceptance of the pendulum as a way of life for an individual would be
considered a bipolar pathology. Yet in the way of a society and culture,
pendulums between political parties and the abuse of minorities is considered
nature itself and that one is helpless to change it. The answer proffered is
that one must "let it be" and do the best they can making it at least tolerable
for those abused, as an act of compassion, against an invisible hand of
cultural superiority.
I would suggest that we must all consider dreaming a different dream that
acknowledges and appreciates the past as simple fact. Done and over with.
That the present is pretty much the result of that dream or should I say
nightmare of murder and genocide for profit. I believe there are no debts
that go unpaid. The Universe does that whether we do or not. That is why
we cannot rape and pillage the land and the helpless with impunity.
Cause and effect for all traditional Native beliefs that I am familiar with
is considered law. That the basis of each of the choices in our existences in
the present is the end effect of past horror, whether we like the choices or
not. Why would we choose to even consider perpetuating such a thought?
Witchcraft? I'm sure you heard that thought expressed in Indian country.
Pueblo writer Leslie Marmon Silko won a MacArthur genius grant for a book that
codified the ceremonial of that belief.
That nightmare is a total bust as a dream for any type of a future for
humanity. There are effects still waiting in the wings to be played out.
Still to play out in the present are the results of the Boxer rebellion and the
Western Tai Chi takeover of China by the Communists with their cold superiority
over you and their hatred for the West that goes back to Genghis and that
plague that destroyed the last great Asian Empire.
How to stop this nightmare. These thirteen hells begun in the last great
plagues that wretched out of the Kahn's empire and ravaged Europe then three
cycles later met Columbus on the beautiful shores of the Taino peoples. But
facts are facts. And people who cannot accept and tolerate facts are the
losing species of history. No one is more accepting of facts than the Inuit
or the current traditional peoples who are left.
Like I said to a Moslem cab driver who had just given me a beautiful but
sharp conversation about the issues of the 9/11 Islamic Center at ground zero.
I said to him that both his people and the Christians needed to make their
peace with their grandparents. He said: Who? I said, your grandparents,
the people who were there before Mohammad and Jesus and who are your relatives.
I said: we are all human but we are not all a part of your family and you
drag us into your family fights when you should be responsible for peace
yourself. We are all responsible for the worlds we dream beginning with our
families. He said who are my grandparents? I said: The Jews.
When we accomplish great things, like being elected Senator, it then means
that the family must bear the burden or your actions as Senator. No matter
how much we protest, they still see the Senator who is a power over them and
the relatives are the closest people to repay the favor to.
What is the world that we would dream down to the seventh generation? We
are dreaming it now. Is it deliberate and carefully thought through or are
we just treading water and trying to stay afloat as long as we can before we
sink beneath the waves and disappear?
Remember, we don't credit for anything we got paid for. If we collected a
salary or were paid a fee, it is a part of our own integrity that we do a good
job. That should be our pride and appreciation for our teachers who taught us
well.
What we get credit for is what we did that was balanced, intelligent,
generous and long lasting. We didn't have to do that because we weren't paid
for it. We get credit in your history for our sense of intelligent charity
and the healing that we create as a result. People who leave a dump in
their wake get no credit at all except as a representative of the Beast. Who
gives you the credit? History? the Creator of all? Our offspring down to
the seventh generation? Humanity? Or maybe there really is something to
that "higher consciousness" stuff that says the spirit is eternal and that the
husk returns to the earth as a thank you. That since the spirit is eternal,
the spirit is also responsible and working his way into something that is of
greater meaning and import in the ultimate scheme of things. That the only
question that will ever be asked is whether you were really here or not or were
just faking it waiting for a different Swan.
Several years ago the composer Pauline Oliveros brought a tape to a party at
my apartment in New York City, of Gibbon Monkeys singing up the sun in the
forest. They started when the sun barely peaked above the horizon and as He
showed his face the Monkeys chant rose a perfect octave at the point when the
Sun left the horizon for the sky. A violinist at the party asked Pauline
whether she was going to compose a piece from that incredible tape. She said
no. The violinist thought that with the current technology available she
could have composed an amazing work from the sounds. Pauline said: "Maybe
but why mess around with a perfect piece of Art just to express yourself?"
Art should express yourself. Fooling around should make it better not just
point to your existence. You exist and you are eternal. Now start from
there. If it isn't true you lost nothing. You are still better. If it
is true and the ancestors are right then you can take the next step. You
have to prove that you were better than those people in that cave at Monte
Verde Chili 30,000 years ago to get any credit for evolving. It is said that
their artifacts proved that they were masters of the knowledge of the plants of
the jungle. The point is "mastery." You're dreaming the next world now.
What do you want?
Dream well,
Dream deep
Dream deliberately
REH
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