Occupied Communique #8

December 19, 2011

Dear Unity,

The Day of Re-Occupation started off joyous and celebratory, but ended unfulfilled. Above is an Associated Press photo of myself and my buddy (the hands grasping my backpack behind me -- so we don't get separated in the crowd) heading up the ladder (previously disguised as a protest banner) to get into vacant lot that used to be Duarte Park. You can see the eager, happy child-within shining forth on my "gnarly and stalwart*" face, and my full backpack and one of three med kits of supplies. I had planned to be there for a long time, but 10 minutes was all I would get before being ordered to my knees and zip-cuffed with 3 other medics and about 46 other Occupiers. Included within our ranks that day was Bishop Stephen Chinlund, Bishop George Packard and four other christian clerics of note, as well as our brave and courageous Hunger Strikers, Diego and Mallory.

Let me frame this event in its historic, religious, political and civil aspects.

Juan Pablo Duarte Square and Juan Pablo Duarte Park was more than the focus of Occupy Wall Street's Day of Re-Occupation, much more. Juan Pablo Duarte is one of the founding fathers of the Dominican Republic. The highest peak in the Caribbean is named after him, and he is usually labeled as a visionary liberal thinker. He also was one of the founding members of La Trinitaria, a secret nationalist society dedicated to Dominican independence from Haiti.

Trinity Wall Street Episcopalian Church owns Duarte Square, including the vacant, fenced-off "park" slated for skyscraper development. Occupy Wall Street has asked for permission to use the lot but Trinity Church has denied the request. Trinity Church owns the land upon which the Stock Exchange is built, and owns enough property and wealth to be the second richest christian church in the world. Only The Vatican is wealthier. Make no mistake, Trinity Wall Street Church is a card-carrying member of the 1%.

Diego, Mallory and the other OWS Hunger Strikers decided to follow in the nonviolent footsteps of Mahatma Gandhi, while the christian clerics were following in the neighborly footsteps of Christ Jesus, and the Occupiers were following in the civil disobedient footsteps of Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr.. All were aligned against the duplicity of the corporatist Trinity Wall Street Church. It was a legendary and epic confrontation.

The deciding factor was Trinity Church's denial of the "love thy neighbor as thyself" doctrine**, and the resultant use of the New York City Police Department to violently deny the public access to the vacant lot.

Trinity Wall Street won that battle, but the revolution continues unabated. We are still here. They may be able to keep us from occupying public space in the full exercise of our rights, but they cannot keep us out of the city. We are everywhere, and if we choose we are anonymous -- we are the 99%.

The NYPD handled us with kid gloves that day, perhaps because of the presence of the clerics and hunger strikers. Even still, there were serious injuries among the Occupiers that were suffered during the police action. Injuries included head, neck, face and torso injuries from baton strikes and foot, knee & fist attacks. Some Occupiers were thrown to the pavement and kneed in the head, back, arms and legs. The zip-cuffs were often tightened too tight causing acute pain and possible chronic nerve damage. The health needs of the Hunger Strikers were ignored, and all of us were demonized as criminals and crazy people.

My zip-cuffs were too tight and my requests for loosening them went ignored. My demand that the hunger strikers receive medical attention during the arrests was not ignored -- I was told they would be sent to the hospital instead of the jail, but they lied; Diego & Mallory went to the same place and received the same non-existent medical care that the rest of us did. That is why some Street Medics choose to be arrested with the Occupiers -- so that they can provide emergency first aid while in the holding cell, and so that they can liaison with the police on the victim's behalf. All four of us medics provided medical services during the incarceration, and the police provided none.

Upon being released I was met by our Jail Support Team outside the Police property, and they tended to all our needs. Jail Support includes legal, medical and comfort services. My medic buddy and I joined the Jail Support Team after being tended to, intending to wait for the most seriously injured of the Occupiers to be released and then transport him directly to the hospital -- which we did. We stayed with that victim through that hospital's tests, and then rode with him in the ambulance to a better equipped hospital for further tests. We stayed with him until we were relieved by other street medics. My buddy and I had to then navigate bus and subway routes, with all our medical and Occupier equipment, to a temporary place of shelter in order to sleep and get ready to hit the streets again. Our 36 hour shift was finally over.

I did not get to participate in the Immigrants Occupy rally, march & GA on December 18, as I was still working on December 17 when the rally started. I was finally asleep sometime about the start of their General Assembly.

It is now the 19th, and I have to go figure out where I am going to stay tonight, and whether or not I will be working the night (and day).

All of this did not go on in isolation. The same day, the 17th, in Cairo, our sisters and brothers in the 99% were viciously attacked, beaten and senselessly brutalized. That same fate is in our future. With the National Defense Authorization Act the power and desires of the 1% are blatantly obvious. Now we know exactly who the FEMA camps are for . . . us. You. My child-within wants to hide, but there is no sanctuary.

This video below is of Cairo, December 17, 2011. It is a portend of Occupy Wall Street's future. Watch it and wake up! Only you can save us. Occupy Everything!

* "Mortimer is a trained street medic, one of many gnarly and stalwart veterans of the protest scene who form an underground collaborative of more or less medically savvy people who get their qualifications more from experience than from classrooms." The Fix, Does Occupy Wall Street Have a Drug Problem? http://www.thefix.com/content/does-occupy-wall-street-have-drug-problem8130

** Leviticus 19:18 & 19:34, Matthew 7:12, 19:16-19, 22:35-40, Mark 12:28-34, Luke 06:31, 10:25-28, Romans 13:08-10, Galatians 05:14, James 02:08



Best Regards,

Ed Mortimer

"Only when the last tree has died
 and the last river been poisoned
   and the last fish been caught
             will we realize
      we cannot eat money."

            -Cree Wisdom-

Occupied Communique #7

December 16, 2011


Dear Unity,


Tonight is Friday the 16th of December. Tomorrow is the Day of Re-Occupation, the day we assemble once more and take back the commons. The day after is the rally, march and general assembly of Immigrants Occupy, somos el 99%! Tonight I am on duty as Medical Dispatch, tomorrow I will be at Duarte Park at 6th & Canal for Occupation 2.0, and the day after I will be running on the Immigrants Occupy march.

I have no idea of what exactly to expect Saturday, but I am ready for whatever happens. Generally, I have a good idea of the wide range of possible scenarios, good, bad and ugly. I am very excited and hopeful for Occupation 2.0, not the least of reasons being I will have a place to call home once more; a place, the same place every night, to lay my head and sleep; a place full of authentic human beings, Occupiers! I can't wait! The people united will never be defeated!

And then on Sunday I get to be a part of a very important and daring rally, march & GA -- Immigrants Occupy! We are the 99% -- all of us worldwide. My own notion is that political boundaries are also a tool of the 1%, and so there is no such thing as an Immigrant or Foreign Occupier -- an Occupier is an Occupier, yo. No matter where in the world one was born, or which imaginary boundary lines one has crossed, an Occupier is always home at any Occupation. The notion of aliens and immigrants is nonsensical. We are a worldwide race of beings. We are the 99%. Who is left to immigrate to us? The 1%. If there is such a thing as an alien or an immigrant, it is the 1%. All of us in the 99% are family, yo.

I had a relatively restful week, first recovering from a slight stomach ailment, then traveling to Maine visiting Unity College, meeting with a couple of he evicted Occupy Augusta (Maine) people, and attending a meeting of Occupy Waldo County. I was welcomed back to New York City with love from my medic buddies, and was instantly back to work as we planned trainings for the future evolutions of Street Medics and the Occupy Movement, and discussed the tactics and strategies of hunger strikes and the failing health of the OWS Hunger Strikers.

Just a short letter this time. I wanted to send you my thoughts on the important Days of Action ahead because I don't know when I will be able to get online again. Until then, take back the commons!



Best Regards,

Ed Mortimer

"Only when the last tree has died
 and the last river been poisoned
   and the last fish been caught
             will we realize
      we cannot eat money."
 
            -Cree Wisdom-

Occupied Communique #6

December 08, 2011


Dear Unity,

I had the opportunity to run on the march that put a homeless family into an abandoned, foreclosed home. It was very exiting to be a part of that -- of standing up to the robber banks and claiming our inalienable right to shelter for this family. After the march and a joyous block party, the Occupiers got down to the nitty-gritty of an extreme makeover for the neglected house. I have been one of the medics assigned to the Occupied Real Estate at 702 Vermont Avenue. Our job is to be on site for any construction-type injuries, to be there for the Occupiers in case the police assault the house, and to provide security at the front door. I am proud to be helping the Occupiers fix up this house so it can be a good home for a needy family who were forced onto the streets by the predatory and criminal practices of the banks. The Occupiers, who rotate in and out in shifts to cover the 24-hour day, are without homes themselves. They do not know where they will sleep from day to day, yet they are working hard and risking arrest and injury for a family they don't know . . . but they do know that the family is part of the 99%, and that is all that matters. We are the 99%.

Last night I had just returned to the medic safe house from being on duty all day and evening at Vermont Avenue when the call came in that the police were going to arrest everyone in the Vermont Avenue house. I joined a couple other medics, one who is down here from Maine helping us out, and made the long trip by train and foot back out to East Brooklyn in the cold rain. By the time we got there the situation had been diffused by the local political representative. It now seems that we have a few days to fix up the house before having to worry about the police shooting tear gas through the windows and then breaking down the doors to brutalize us for helping a homeless family fight back against a robber bank.



Best Regards,

Ed Mortimer

"Only when the last tree has died
 and the last river been poisoned
   and the last fish been caught
             will we realize
      we cannot eat money."
  
            -Cree Wisdom-

Occupied Communique #5

December 05, 2011




Dear Unity,

Time. Nobody knows what the future will bring, but one thing is certain: we are not going home. We are home. The Occupation is home to many of us here. Home is a place where you know you belong. Home is a place you know you must protect. Home is a place where you are loved. OccupyWallStreet is my home, and I live with hundreds of other people who all feel the same way as I do. It was with great joy we welcomed the Farmers March yesterday. It was with great joy we watched Liberty Plaza fill up with happy people. It was with great joy that we saw dancing again in Liberty Square The farmers came to Liberty Square on Sunday, and we welcomed them and their message of sustainability, seed exchange, local food, and no more GMOs.

MOFGA was there. Jim Gerritson was there. Maine farmers were there. One sign made me smile widely. It said: "MAINE FARMERS OCCUPY!" Yeah, baby! That's how we roll! Whose land? Our land!

It was beautiful. The march was a long one through the east side of Manhattan. City folk were amazed to see more than a thousand farmers, some with cardboard pitchforks and torches, marching proudly and happily through the streets shouting slogans of independence and defiance. Whose food? Our food!

When we got to the park the Brookfield Properties security goons got out of the way and let us pass without trying to bully us. Bullies are cowards at heart, and the large number of people scared them. The police, however, are terrified of our drummers, and they intervened to block our drummers from getting into the park. Bringing a drum into the park is a capital offense nowadays. On Thanksgiving, during the feast we gave for everyone (including the 1%, the police and the politicians), 20 police entered the park and tried to arrest 1 drummer for criminal trespass. We all came to the aid of the drummer, preventing the police from arresting him by demanding they arrest all of us on the same charges. The police walked away empty-handed.

The drumming is the heart of the revolution. The drumming is the pulse of change. The drumming is our voice lifted on high, defiantly proclaiming "WE ARE HERE! WE ARE THE 99%! WE ARE NOT GOING HOME!"

They are terrified of our drummers.

I am always happy to see the drummers, and I am moved to action whenever I hear the drums.

We estimate we have 350 homeless people within the occupation of Wall Street. They have been staying at churches, in the subway, in alleys and doorways and rooftops, in shipwrecks and abandoned buildings, and everywhere there is shelter and a modicum of protection against the 1% and their hired guns (the police). The churches have not been as open as they could be -- trying to force their hierarchical system upon the people they have invited in - appointing bouncers and instituting curfews and lists of acceptable people. I was on housing duty as a medic at one church when I was faced with an ethical dilemma. Occupiers who were not on the list were being turned away. Occupiers who were on the list but were late arriving, were turned away. Women were told to go sleep in the subway. Women were turned away to walk the streets alone at night. People were turned away but there was plenty of room in the church for a couple hundred more people. This is not how the Occupation treats people. The Occupation welcomes everyone. The Occupation makes room for everyone. I could not hold my silence, and when one bouncer declared that the Occupiers coming late were disrespecting the church and the rules, I declared: "The church is disrespecting Jesus Christ, so the church can go fuck itself." Jesus preached a message of love, kindness and inclusion. He did not preach about lists and curfews and obeying rules. I walked out of that church because I could not be a part of turning people away when there was plenty of room for them.

Speaking of room . . . I lose my living space in less than a week. On the other hand . . . in two weeks another church will allow us to occupy an empty lot they have -- that is if the powers that be don't prevent them (political pressure was put on them immediately after they announced). In the meanwhile I will be wandering about with the poorest of the homeless. I will not take refuge in a church while my brothers and sisters are being turned away at the door. I will walk with my brothers and sisters. I will walk all night, sitting here and there and nodding for a few minutes at a time. I will stay at Liberty Square even though the security goons do not allow anyone to lie down or to sleep, and harass us all night long. I will not go home. I am home. Whose city? Our city!

We are working on several new occupations, including a farm (or two), a national forest, abandoned buildings, donated spaces and more. We are not going away, yo! We are the ones we have been waiting for.



Best Regards,

Ed Mortimer

"Only when the last tree has died
 and the last river been poisoned
   and the last fish been caught
             will we realize
      we cannot eat money."
  
            -Cree Wisdom-

Occupied Communique #4

November 25, 2011



Dear Unity,

A little time and a lot of events have passed since I last wrote. I keep saying that nobody knows what will happen next, and I learned first-hand just how wrong I could be about the future. I had thought that police invading the park and brutally evicting us would send shock waves across the country, and even the world. Well, the police did invade the park -- after a restraining order was issued that sought to prevent them from even entering the park (but Bloomberg bought another judge to countermand it) -- and the police did brutalize us. That night over two hundred people locked down inside the park, and they were all tear-gassed, beaten, and arrested. All our property was tossed into garbage trucks, dumped in a warehouse, and systematically searched and destroyed (we were later allowed to sift through the destruction in case we wanted our broken, ripped, mangled property . . . if it was still there . . . none of my property was in the pile, all was lost, I am left with 3 changes of clothes . . . nothing else). The police did more than beat us and destroy our property, they also killed four dogs that night. I watched all through the early morning hours from between the first and second barricades. The police would not allow us into the park, and if we exited past the second barricade we would not be let back in. We were also told that when they finished with the park they would come and get us . . . despite that threat we stayed until the end, but they let us be.

I spent the next overnight, 15 hours, standing in the rain at the park, supporting 10-40 Occupiers who refused to leave the park. Brookfield Properties hired a private security force to "help us" follow the new rules -- rules such as no lying down, no sleeping, no personal property left unattended (even for a minute), no sleeping bags, no large backpacks or bags, no food, no music, no large signs, etc, etc, etc. In reality, they are goons whose job it is to harass us in every way possible while the police look on and protect them. Protect them? We have demonstrated time and again we are not violent.But still, they are frightened of us. Perhaps it is because they know what they do is dreadfully wrong.

Then came Thursday, and the day of action. I was involved in actions all day long, from the attempt to delay the opening bell at the Stock Exchange, to the march to Foley Square, and everything inbetween. I did not go on the Brooklyn Bridge march, but more than 32,000 people did go. I was there when we re-took the park, and I was there when the police tried twice, unsuccessfully, to force us out. I was there when they stole our rental truck full of army tents, and I was there when they brutalized non-violent protesters in the park. I was also there when we marched through the city streets, and the people came out on all the fire escapes and cheered us on, as people in their cars honked their horns in support of us, as people on the sidewalks smiled, laughed, took pictures and high-fived us as we passed.

During the stolen truck incident a police officer went berserk and attacked a protester who was demanding the police produce a search warrant before going into the back of the truck. I was right next to them, and, in a break of medic protocol, I tried to break it up after the officer went berserk -- but before I could do anything I was blindsided by another officer, who dislocated my knee and sent me tumbling in a hail of police fists. Lucky for me, the crowd of protesters saved me. They started chanting, "He's a medic, he's a medic!" Before any serious damage was done to me other officers responded to the crowd and pulled the berserk officers off of myself and the protester.

I popped my knee back in, my medic buddies wrapped it up, and back into the fray I went.

I was fifteen feet away when they brutalized one of us during the first attempted park eviction that day. The police beat bloody a protester, by the name of Branden, smashed his head into the granite curb and beat him with fists, feet and clubs. They then picked him up, handcuffed him, stood him on a stone ledge -- the highest spot in the area -- and displayed him to the crowd. When he did not show fear, two officers went behind him, and bent his fingers back until he cried out and sobbed in pain -- that pain was photographed and the New York Post ran the picture over the caption "Crybaby!". I was fifteen feet away, and the line of police would not let me through to treat him. My pleas to be allowed through to treat him were rejected, and I was physically restrained from getting to the injured protester. Who do the police protect? Who do the police serve?

Without our army tents, we decided not to stay in the park -- and we left of our own volition in the evening. Of course, there is a steady presence of Occupiers in the park even now, but the "occupation" has not yet re-commenced. The security goons harass all Occupiers, and police provocateurs continually try to disrupt the determination of the Occupiers. But still we persist. Still we remain peaceful. Our response? We sent a drum circle and love-in festival to Bloomberg's neighborhood. We held a Thanksgiving Day feast and invited the police, the politicians and the 1%. We remained peaceful despite the unjustified, criminal violence perpetrated upon us.

Only the police came to the feast on Thanksgiving -- and they came to disrupt the festivities, not to join in. At one point, 20 police officers entered the park to arrest a lone drummer -- to charge the drummer with criminal trespass because no musical instruments are allowed in the park nowadays. The crowd went to the aid of the drummer, and after a long confrontation where everybody was willing to be arrested with the drummer, the police backed down and left.

I was wrong about the police starting to "get it". I was so wrong, that the violence I witnessed all day long (even I was manhandled or clubbed several more times that day) had a traumatic effect upon me. In the days that followed I found that I could not control my anger. That I was getting dangerously close to fighting with the police whenever they harassed Occupiers. I had to leave for a couple of days in order to center and ground myself, to re-affirm my commitment and reason for being there, to find the ocean of calmness within me so that I can do my job as a medic. Do no harm, is a street medic's first rule.

After the eviction from the park the Occupiers needed a place to sleep. Several local churches opened up their doors to us at night, allowing us floorspace to lay out and sleep. Quickly, however, the police threatened the churches with raids, code violations, arrests, and shutting them down. The Fire Marshall was sent out to intimidate the churches, and some closed their doors to us. This police-church struggle continues at this moment, and overnight housing for the Occupiers is a daily problem . . . but we are not going home.

Whose city? Our city!

 
Best Regards,

Ed Mortimer

"Only when the last tree has died
 and the last river been poisoned
   and the last fish been caught
             will we realize
      we cannot eat money."
  
            -Cree Wisdom-

Occupied Communique #3

November 14, 2011


Dear Unity,

If anyone doubted that this is a global movement, that global politics and political borders do not restrain or chain us, that we are the 99% around the world and we are the revolution you have been waiting for . . . let them read this:

Communique from Cairo Re: Egypt Trip

November 13, 2011 in News

What follows is a response from our Comrades from Cairo to the recent proposal from our Movement Building Group to send OWS Ambassadors to monitor upcoming elections in Egypt. You can also download this communique as a pdf file, as it was originally sent to us.

To our kindred occupiers in Zuccotti park,

When we called out to you, requesting you join us on 12 November in defending our revolution and in our campaign against the military trial of civilians in Egypt, your solidarity—pictures from marches, videos, and statements of support—added to our strength.

However, we recently received news that your General Assembly passed a proposal authorizing $29,000 dollars to send twenty of your number to Egypt as election monitors. Truth be told, the news rather shocked us; we spent the better part of the day simply trying to figure out who could have asked for such assistance on our behalf.

We have some concerns with the idea, and we wanted to join your conversation.

It seems to us that you have taken to the streets and occupied your parks and cities out of a dissatisfaction with the false promises of the game of electoral politics, and so did our comrades in Spain, Greece and Britain. Regardless of how one stands on the efficacy of elections or elected representatives, the Occupy movement seems outside the scope of this; your choice to occupy is, if nothing else, bigger than any election. Why then, should our elections be any cause for celebration, when even in the best of all possible worlds they will be just another supposedly “representative” body ruling in the interest of the 1% over the remaining 99% of us? This new Egyptian parliament will have effectively no powers whatsoever, and—as many of us see it—its election is just a means of legitimating the ruling junta’s seizure of the revolutionary process. Is this something you wish to monitor?

We have, all of us around the world, been learning new ways to represent ourselves, to speak, to live our politics directly and immediately, and in Egypt we did not set out to the streets in revolution simply to gain a parliament. Our struggle—which we think we share with you—is greater and grander than a neatly functioning parliamentary democracy; we demanded the fall of the regime, we demanded dignity, freedom and social justice, and we are still fighting for these goals. We do not see elections of a puppet parliament as the means to achieve them.

But even though the idea of election monitoring doesn’t really do it for us, we want your solidarity, we want your support and your visits. We want to know you, talk with you, learn one another’s lessons, compare strategies and share plans for the future. We think that activists or as people committed to serious change in the systems we live in, there is so much more that we can do together than legitimizing electoral processes (leave that boring job to the Carter Foundation) that seem so impoverished next to the new forms of democracy and social life we are building. It should be neither our job nor our desire to play the game of elections; we are occupying and we should build our spaces and our networks because they themselves are the basis on which we will build the new. Let us deepen our lines of communication and process and discover out what these new ways of working together and supporting one another could be.

Any time you do want to come over, we’ve got plenty of comfy couches available. It won’t be fancy, but it will be fun.

Yours, as always, in solidarity,

Comrades from Cairo
13 November, 2011

P.S. We finally got an email address: comradesfromcairo@gmail.com
 

Best Regards,

Ed Mortimer

"Only when the last tree has died
 and the last river been poisoned
   and the last fish been caught
             will we realize
      we cannot eat money."
  
            -Cree Wisdom-

Occupied Communique #2

November 14, 2011

Dear Unity,

Thank you for the generous hospitality and loving support you gave me during my visit last week. Everywhere I went in Maine and Connecticut I was welcomed with open arms, and the people of Unity treated me as family. At the moment I am with other medics preparing for November 17th, our two-month anniversary of occupying Liberty Park. The 17th will be a day of many actions, and all the medics will be active and ready for any situation. I encourage you to help one of the Occupations in Maine with their own plans for that day.

While I was in Maine and Connecticut the New York City General Assembly ( www.nycga.net ) passed another important document: The Statement of Autonomy. This joins the Declaration of the Occupation of New York City and the Principles of Solidarity as the guiding documents of the Occupation Movement. These three documents reveal the identity of the revolution. Discuss them. Debate them. Spread the word. When someone asks "What are these Occupations about? What do they want? Who are they?" -- the answers are within these three documents. Read them. Listen to our voices. Join us and let us hear your voice!

Statement of Autonomy

Passed by the General Assembly at Occupy Wall Street

Occupy Wall Street is a people’s movement. It is party-less, leaderless, by the people and for the people. It is not a business, a political party, an advertising campaign or a brand.  It is not for sale.

We welcome all, who, in good faith, petition for a redress of grievances through non-violence.  We provide a forum for peaceful assembly of individuals to engage in participatory as opposed to partisan debate and democracy.  We welcome dissent.

Any statement or declaration not released through the General Assembly and made public online at www.nycga.net should be considered independent of Occupy Wall Street.

We wish to clarify that Occupy Wall Street is not and never has been affiliated with any established political party, candidate or organization.  Our only affiliation is with the people.

The people who are working together to create this movement are its sole and mutual caretakers.  If you have chosen to devote resources to building this movement, especially your time and labor, then it is yours.

Any organization is welcome to support us with the knowledge that doing so will mean questioning your own institutional frameworks of work and hierarchy and integrating our principles into your modes of action.

SPEAK WITH US, NOT FOR US.

Occupy Wall Street values collective resources, dignity, integrity and autonomy above money.  We have not made endorsements.  All donations are accepted anonymously and are transparently allocated via consensus by the General Assembly or the Operational Spokes Council.

We acknowledge the existence of professional activists who work to make our world a better place.  If you are representing, or being compensated by an independent source while participating in our process, please disclose your affiliation at the outset.  Those seeking to capitalize on this movement or undermine it by appropriating its message or symbols are not a part of Occupy Wall Street.

We stand in solidarity.  We are Occupy Wall Street.



The Declaration of the Occupation of New York can be found at https://www.nycga.net/resources/declaration/
The Principles of Solidarity can be found at https://www.nycga.net/resources/principles-of-solidarity/
The Statement of Autonomy can be found at https://www.nycga.net/resources/statement-of-autonomy/


               



Best Regards,

Ed Mortimer

"Only when the last tree has died
 and the last river been poisoned
   and the last fish been caught
             will we realize
      we cannot eat money."
  
            -Cree Wisdom-

Occupied Communique #1

 November 08, 2011


Dear Unity College,

I have been working as a street medic for 39 days at OccupyWallStreet. I would have written sooner but my access to computers is very limited, and free time is a luxury I have not experienced since arriving. It has been an incredible journey, and I wish you all were here with me to ride this wave of history. However, all of you back in Unity have a more important job than I do, because to be successful the Occupy Movement has to spread to every neighborhood. Wall Street is a battleground in the revolution against the global power structure. Occupying your neighborhood is the revolution realized. When the people in the neighborhoods rise up and determine their own sustainable future by solving their own local neighborhood problems the global elite will have lost all power. Whose streets? Our streets!

The occupation at Liberty Park (aka Zuccotti Park) evolves daily. Nobody can foretell what will happen next. This is what democracy looks like.

The day I arrived at Liberty Park 700 people were arrested while on a protest march across the Brooklyn Bridge. Since then I have been on many marches as a street medic, witnessed many incidents of police brutality and provocation, and many more incidents of protester courage and restraint. The occupation has remained peaceful in the face of constant provocation because the protesters are powered by love -- love of themselves, love of their sisters and brothers, love of their inherent human rights. On the other hand, the police are being paid to act the way they do. No contest, yo! Money can't touch love.

I am sure you have heard of the incidents of crime at Liberty Park, a place that offers free food, free clothes, free shelter and free medical care. Yes, there is criminal activity victimizing people at Liberty Park. Men have been bussed in on Rikers Island buses. Dope dealers and drug addicts from the surrounding neighborhood ply the edges of the Occupation community with the previous knowledge that they would be free from police intervention. Homeless people of all description have been purposefully sent to us in order to over-burden our infrastructure. Yet through all this the community at Liberty Park has not lost sight of their goals while creating new and constructive ways to deal with the constant attack upon their integrity and resolve. Through all of this we continue to provide free care and love to all who come to be with us. Through all of this, though we struggle against all the problems that have plagued society for ages. We know that the sick society that the elite have abused us with has traumatized these people. This trauma can be healed, and is being healed by the outpouring of love by the occupation community. Many times I have heard a person exclaim: "I have never experienced such love in my whole life." It is a beautiful event to witness, and always brings a welling of tears to my eyes because it is the creative moment that is the birth of conceptualizing the new society we are building. It is how we become the 99%.

All of the outside social problems afflicting Liberty Park and the Occupation of Wall Street are important aspects of the movement, and are problems we need to have solutions for when we have moved out of the parks and into the neighborhoods, but are not what OccupyWallStreet is about. What goes mostly unreported, even though sometimes it seems the press outnumbers the occupiers, are the countless daily acts of kindness, care and solidarity by the occupiers to each other, to the thousands daily who come to gawk, and even to the local and federal police charged with harming us. That outpouring of love has changed the attitude of the local police -- who were totally non-communicative and undeniably hostile when I first arrived, to the situation now where except for a few individuals the police are now seen to greet us with smiles and conversation even though they still accept money to surround and menace us. They are beginning to get it -- we are the 99%, and so are they. Soon they will reject those 30 pieces of silver, and join us. That is what OccupyWallStreet is about: enabling an awareness of how all the disparate groups we have been divided into by the 1% are the 99%.

I have been moved to tears almost daily by the joy, love and exuberance the occupiers are living life. Even though we live in a park carved out of solid rock, with no soft soil or grass to rest upon, hearts full of love cushion our existence and soften the harsh realities of living in a toxic urban environment. The river is only a few blocks away, and the view of the Statue of Liberty is inspiring, but the utter lack of water birds or of any kind of life except the blind shuffling of zombified pedestrians tears at my soul. This is Ground Zero. Yes, the Twin Towers once stood here, and the new abomination taking their place rises above Liberty Park and serves me as a landmark to find my way back home, and to remind me of the disconnect between the 1% and the 99%. Despite this, and more, the myriad, spontaneous acts of kindness by one occupier to another wipes away all the hardship for me. No matter the time of day or night there are people helping people throughout the park. We depend upon each other, and we continue to be strengthened by our love of each other. That love transforms us. This is what I have been waiting for my entire life.

Many of us come to the park trapped in our old habits, by our old ideas, and with our old possessions. Living in Liberty Park changes our habits, our ideas and our possessions. This is the revolution in action. This is the new Ground Zero.

All of us here at Liberty Park are dedicated to fighting the global power structure -- the CEOs, the bankers, the politicians. We will remain relentless in our demands of the worlds billionaires -- the thieves, rapists and murderers of millions around the world. The Occupation Movement at large is not about Wall Street. It is about your neighborhood -- whether that is in Oakland or Bangor, the United States or Palestine, the middle of Asia or the middle of the Pacific -- what matters is your neighborhood. We march against the billionaires on Wall Street so that you can peacefully occupy your own neighborhood, so that you can peacefully assume political power in your neighborhood, so that you can become sustainable in your neighborhood. Please don't let us down. Occupy Everything!

               
Kanye West said it best: "Don't be afraid to say the word 'revolution'."

It is revolution. It is exactly what the Declaration of Independence promised, but was never delivered. Now is the time. We are the 99%, and this is what democracy looks like on our streets all day and all week.

Please email me your questions and I will attempt to answer them in future communiques. Thank you all for your support, I am very grateful to be associated with the people of Unity College in Maine. 


Best Regards,

Ed Mortimer

"Only when the last tree has died
 and the last river been poisoned
   and the last fish been caught
             will we realize
      we cannot eat money."
  
            -Cree Wisdom-

Redemption

Redemption

The seeds remember the land they came from.

 Winona LaDuke

Time

Time

Tick-tock?
Certainly not!
Discrete time zones?
More like cyclones!

Agroecology, Fragment 2

Agroecology, Fragment 2

A philosophical critique of Gliessman's "Agroecology" text, chapter 2.

Chapter 2 Food For Thought:

In order to come closer to “nature's image” conventional farming has to be completely unraveled and then re-woven. Monoculture has to give way to diverse micro-ecosystems of individual groupings of plants, which in turn reflect the overall pattern of the encompassing bioregion in a smaller fractal dimension.

The passing of monoculture means all of the other fundamental strategies of conventional agriculture (the 7 basic practices¹) become unnecessary. The new foundation of diversity will itself invite natural ecological webs of life, fungi, flora and fauna, to form – each facet cooperating and strengthening the others. The farmer then must also view her endeavor as a cooperative effort with nature, and not a constant battle against nature. It isn't a struggle against everything “nature throws at us”, it is learning what nature (earth) wants to happen and then discovering the ecological (that is, human) benefit in it.

A “natural image” farm encourages and nourishes the natural bounty of the ecosystem, enhancing the native production instead of forcing alien systems upon the bioregion. “Natural image” agriculture relies on solar, atmospheric and animal inputs for all the various forms of energy to put into the crop cycle in order to produce food. External inputs in the way of fossil fuels, chemical fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides and complex (non-sustainable) farm machinery are not needed or desired in “natural image” agriculture. In fact, if the consumption of food is limited to the bioregion where the food is grown, then there is potentially no external output – thereby keeping the energy and nutrient cycles closed within that bioregion. This becomes especially important in the wider context of agricultural waste poisoning watersheds, aquifers, rivers, oceans and all the lands and lives associated with them. As well, nutrients such as phosphorus are limited in supply², and we have wasted most of the earth's reserves using the unsustainable tenets of conventional agriculture. Keeping the cycle within the bioregion also allows for the enrichment of local culture, and the opportunity to create a local and sustainable economic system.

Of course, there is a sociological component to agroecology, and the financial facet looms large. We force external influences upon our “natural image” agriculture when we try to “plug into” the global economy. Since mimicking natural ecosystems means closing the external inputs and outputs, we have here in globalization and national economics the first obstacles to employing agroecological principles³.

Money, food and consumer capitalism.

A “natural image” farm cannot be sustained in a consumer system where everything is sterilized, segregated and sold along intercontinental and trans-ocean trade routes developed by distant corporations to maximize profit. In order to fit into this, or any, consumer-capitalist system agriculture has to conform to the lowest-quality-highest-quantity-highest-profit (Wal-Mart) model that characterizes all the parts of such a trade system. “Natural image” agriculture doesn't fit so it must develop its own characteristic distribution (note: distribution not economic) network (bioregional, biocultural).

"The companies can give you all the money in the world but you don't want to give it up for what you love. The money is not worth anything." - Storm Powell⁴

As well, agroecology does not fit into current social norms, and therefore it can only be a fringe subculture unless it also seeks to change social norms. It can never become mainstream, or even just a “player”, in a consumer capitalist society. So society and the distribution system have to be changed or circumvented. Society, as it is, cannot be joined, as all of history bears witness that whenever profit is a major concern money eventually overrides all else. That is why we have conventional agriculture in the first place. That is why we have joyfully raped and maimed our Mother, the Earth. That is why we have sacked and burned our Home, the Earth. That is why we have polluted and sickened our Paradise, the Earth. All for money . . . do we really want to make economics a primary concern of agroecology? What are we looking for? A kinder, gentler conventional agriculture? Or a truly gentle, sustainable cooperation with nature to enhance the quality of the carrying capacity of a particular bioregion. If it is as the title of a seminar by Stephan Bellon⁵ indicates: “Agroecology in France: an emerging notion, between utopia and institutional greening", the agroecologists in France, at least, recognize the Aristotelian poles on the agroecology scale of virtue and vice. Bellon sees the paradise possible but also the hell that masquerades as utopia. In an Aristotelian world-view⁶ it is somewhere on this scale that agroecology will eventually fall. In a global capitalist society agroecology will be relegated to institutional greening, a facade for show – no depth, no substance, no ecology.

So . . . for a natural image farm the nutrient cycle of the bioregion must remain intact. That means diverse, small-scale crop and husbandry farms producing only for the local communities. By diverse small-scale farms what is meant is small-scale farms that are themselves each a diverse enterprise, like nature. What is not meant is a diverse assortment of different monoculture small-scale farms.

Composting needs to become universally practiced, human wastes must be recycled into the soil creation cycle, and the implements and accouterments of daily life must be created from local materials (what is local culture without that, I ask – and answer: generic one-size-fits-none global insanity). The engines of transportation must be scaled back to a local size: human, animal, solar and small biofuel engines.

Energy must come from small-scale solar, wind, water, kinetic, geothermal and other non-intrusive sources. A note here about power generation: the same situation applies here as in agriculture, and that being the large-scale power projects are inherently destructive and unsustainable. Instead of giant hydroelectric dams there should be a plethora of waterwheels and newer technologies that provide localized water power without an intrusive human bootprint upon the environment. Wind, solar and kinetic energy can be utilized in every bioregion, and every bioregion has other sources of energy peculiar to the ecosystem there. Small-scale, local energy production means energy sovereignty just as local food means food sovereignty. Like it or not, sovereignty is a major sociological, agricultural and ecological issue – and the corporations are willing to kill to win⁷.

Therefore, as a member of this consumer society we all hold the ultimate power – that of not participating⁸. Buying “green” won't work because it will all eventually be corporate greenwash. Buying “local” won't work because the local system is still attached to the global system – base prices and wages are set outside the region. Buying “smart” won't work because there is no “smart” in this global economic system. Only disengagement from the global system in favor of a biocultural and bioregional system will work. It is the only thing that has ever worked, and that is because that is how nature works – how the earth lives. We are addicts to the current system, and as addicts we have a muddled and confused perception of reality. That which can save us is rejected as harmful, and that which destroys us is welcomed as beneficial. It is never easy to rehabilitate from addiction, but it is very simple – remove the drug, change the behaviors, live ethically.

And that brings the question of ecological vs. agricultural stability to the table. The earth, nature, is always in a state of flux. That is the “stability” of nature. Conventional approaches to agriculture, and even many self-identifying non-conventional approaches, seek a stability where there is no flux. If we are honest we would admit that there has never been such a stable farm as farms have always been at the mercy of variable yields due to a number of environmental and anthropomorphic variables the farmer has no control over. We would further admit that it is the height of foolishness to even attempt such an unnatural act. It is this debilitatingly myopic mindset regarding “stability” and “change” that causes us to view farming as a battle against nature. If we truly wanted “natural stability” we would “go with the flow” of nature, and not try to impose the monolithic drabness of domesticated order upon the beautiful function and art of “wild chaos”⁹.

A final thought: industrialization, simplification, specialization and externalization (All Aristotelian principles) are not only the hallmark symptoms of monoculture, but also of our philosophical disease.

1The 7 Basic Practices of Agriculture according to Gliessman 2007 (Agroecology 2^nd Edition): monoculture, intensive tillage, irrigation, inorganic fertilizer, chemical pesticide/herbicide, genetic manipulation of plants/animals, factory farming of animals.

2Three (3) of many . . .

Phosphorus Famine: The Threat to Our Food Supply” Scientific American, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=phosphorus-a-looming-crisis accessed 04 September 2011

“Peak Phosphorus" Foreign Policy Magazine, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/04/20/peak_phosphorus accessed 04 September 2011

“Forget Oil, Worry About Phosphorus” The Daily Yonder, http://www.dailyyonder.com/forget-oil-worry-about-phosphorus/2010/09/08/2929 accessed 04 September 2011

3“Do Trees Grow On Money” Earth Island Journal (Earth Island Institute), http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/eij/article/do_trees_grow_on_money accessed 05 September 2011

4“Dreams lost to mining plans” Queensland Country Life, http://qcl.farmonline.com.au/news/state/agribusiness-and-general/general/dreams-lost-to-mining-plans/2278892.aspx accessed 04 September 2011

5 2^nd International Summer School of Agroecology, accessed on the Web 04 September 2011, http://web.me.com/philogene/Agroecology/Home.html and http://web.me.com/philogene/Agroecology/Summer_School_Program_files/ISSAE.Program.pdf

6I mention here that I am not an Aristotelian philosopher (though most of Euro-American society follows that core philosophy in one form or another), but I have studied Aristotelian philosophy intensively and have rejected that world-view as fundamentally flawed. Evidence: look around, smell the smoke, see the flames, feel the heat.. I use an Aristotelian example here because it is generally understandable to society-at-large, but it does not accurately reflect the real situation.

7“Rash of murders threatens to silence environmental and social activism in Brazil" Mongabay , http://news.mongabay.com/2011/0609-moukaddem_killings.html accessed 05 September 2011

8“Italian town Filettino declares independence” BBC News http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-14774526 accessed 05 September 2011

9We are so wrong-headed that we name chaos as order, and order as chaos. Inflicting a supposedly ordered monoculture upon a region actually has utterly chaotic consequences, while discarding conventional agriculture and working within the natural system of chaos using such methods as permaculture, biodynamics or biomimicry has demonstrated incredible resiliency and sustainability – in another word, order. Orwellian doublespeak has evolved into the common person's doublethink because of mass brainwashing through censored education.

Agroecology, Fragment 1

Agroecology, Fragment 1

A philosophical critique of Gliessman's "Agroecology" text, chapter 1.

Chapter 1 Food For Thought:

I will answer all four questions with a single essay answer, as they all intertwine in my mind.

I preface my response with this anecdote from personal experience. In manufacturing seminars I attended there was always one point driven home: every business has to grapple with three things and only three things: quality, quantity and profit. We were taught that only two of those things were possible at the same time, never three. They taught us some statistical analysis to demonstrate how quantity and quality correlated with profit (for profit is seen as an immutable principle), and how increasing quantity decreases quality, and increasing quality decreases quantity – assuming a stable net profit sufficiently large to enable the sustained increase in the scope of the business, and in the enrichment of the owners. If any business was foolish enough to attempt quantity and quality at the expense of profit, we were told that business would surely fail.

Of course, all of their assumptions are based on the irrevocability of American capitalist theory.

Quality=ecological soundness, profit=economic viability, quantity=social equity. We have the same problem, and since we know fractal theory we can deduce instantly that we have the same situational relationships worded in different perspectives – mathematically we have the same pattern in a different fractal dimension. Among other things, that means we don't have to reinvent the wheel – we can learn from the results of what the best manufacturing minds have pondered long and hard upon. We can learn that we cannot have a holistic approach to anything under American capitalism as it is antithetical to such theories – it is a different fractal relationship. The 7 basic practices of “conventional” agriculture are held together by one thread – maximization of profit. Capitalism is hierarchal-based and profit-driven at its core. Any type of holistic approach is communally-founded and health-motivated. Two different fractals, two different philosophies, two mutually exclusive choices. We can't have both.

And so, that is why decentralization of power, local sovereignty of resources and community health (that is, sustainability) are so necessary to agroecology, and so foreign to our economic sense of reality. Capitalism is the reason why Americans cannot comprehend the destructive, even suicidal, nature of our entire system – a large component of which is the business of agriculture. After all, we made money, and money is the mind, spirit and body of capitalism. Conventional thought, agriculture and otherwise, says therefore that we won – the objective was to make money. Ecological thought says we lost, we killed the planet and the objective was to keep it healthy. It is hard to admit we've been so stupid as to value fiat money over the bounty of the planet, that we valued playing a number game over the business of reality, that we knew what we were doing all the time but were having such a good time we just wanted it to last a little longer.

We can also deduce instantly that the theoretical approach used by the writers of the text is the same as that used by the lecturers at the manufacturing seminars – because they are framing the problem in the same capitalist viewpoint: quality=ecological soundness, profit=economic viability, quantity=social equity. What they are asking, having all three at the same time, has been taught by the best business and manufacturing minds in American history to be impossible.

In other words, the System is broke, was always broke, and cannot ever be fixed in regards to sustainability because it never worked in the first place. Specifically to agroecology it means that agronomy (quantity) will always trump ecology (quality) because of the staggering number of mouths to feed (social equity). We do need a holistic approach, but by its very nature of being holistic that means we also have to heal the economic system we labor so fearfully under – remove the cancer (capitalism), nurture the patient (bioregional/biocultural), and learn a new lifestyle (decentralized local sufficiency) so as not to fall sick again. Money, profit, must be relegated to a secondary status.

Agroecology seeks to bring quality in the form of ecological soundness back into our lives. It seeks to do this by maintaining the health of the soil and preserving the range of biodiversity in the bioregion. It is a noble goal. It is an essential goal necessary to sustain the continuing evolution of the human race. Agroecology seeks to bring quantity in the form of social equality back into our lives. That is also a noble and essential goal necessary to sustain the continuing evolution of the human race in the direction that the greatest minds of human history have determined is best – toward the Good (no lesser of two evils here or billions will suffer for generations – that's just plain evil). Agroecology seeks to achieve both of those goals and maintain a profit (economic viability). Economic viability is a vague and misty term, but even if defined as only enough profit to sustain a business it is still not in any way a necessary thing for the continued evolution of the human race toward the Good. If we have ecological soundness we have the ability to live well. Agronomy also depends, long-term, upon the ecological health of the land. Non-local, non-renewable inputs to maximize production are a short-term gain that has a long and costly downside. Therefore, a healthy ecology is the primary factor (outside humans, of course) in a sustainable agronomic situation. The agronomic and ecologic health of an area is the common ground upon which sustainability is gathered.

“Wherever our villages were, wherever we picked our food, those places are blessed places. . . . That patch over there — Artesa land in Annapolis — that is a blessed place for us. We went there as kids. We picked berries there with our mother. We picked berries for necklaces. There is another place over there where there is a lot of Manzanita, and that was really important to us. We made spoons from that and also awls to make baskets. These are the things we grew up with. We dedicated our trees not to be cut. The trees in the forest are blessed. The Redwoods give us good medicine from the sap that hardens. It was used for anemia. The young shoots are used for colds. Bark dolls are made from Redwood.

Everything out there is used for something.

The reason we are against the disturbance in Annapolis is that place is alive. It is a dedicated area. It is a special area. If they do something wrong there, things are not going to go right. Who will believe us? We are speaking from the viewpoint of Kashia. We have to talk from the viewpoint of our spiritual leader, what we were taught. The non-Indian may not understand — there are things that we Indians can’t touch but can see. Good teachings are spiritual.

We are disturbed by all the things that are happening around us. We can’t go to some beaches to harvest food, we can’t pick huckleberries any place we want. We can’t find good sedge to make baskets because the best place was ruined by Lake Sonoma. We know that there is sedge on that place over there. Baskets were our cooking pans and used to store things like acorns. That is important for kids to learn. It would be a good place to teach the kids how to make baskets.

Religion was all our life. We’ll tell you why. There were no man made conveniences here. Everything was from the creation. That is why we take care of it. That is what the leader did, she taught us to take care of the food, the water. We took care of the trees. . . .

It is a blessing to pick food. It is a blessing to roam around. The creator wants us to take care of this place.

- Violet Parrish Chappell and Vivian Parrish Wilder, elders and scholars of the Pomo Kashia band¹

In other words, if you don't have your health you don't have anything. Ecological health translates into agronomic health which translates into human health. Economic viability is not necessary. A truly holistic approach to agroecology would have as its primary goals: ecological soundness, social health and social equity. This means an entirely different lifestyle than what we are used to . . . but then, we knew that anyway. It is time to stop clinging to bad ideas.

All of this may seem lofty and out of reach of the common person in a small village in a northern wetlands . . . but it is ground-level local. Sustainability is ground-level local. Sustainability depends upon each and every individual within a community being aware of their impact upon the ecologic health of the bioregion, as well as all their neighbors' impacts. Local resources drive sustainability. Local control of resources ensures sustainable lifestyles. If agroecology cannot break away from a profit-driven system at ground-level local then it cannot be what it needs to be – holistic.

Chapter 1 did a good job of exposing a lot of falsehoods we often hear recited as truths about conventional agriculture. But it stopped short of where it needed to go to identify the source of the problem, and possible solution. As long as profit is a driving force agroecology will remain agroeconomy.

1Ahni, Intercontinental Cry, World’s Largest Wine Corporation Threatens Sacred Pomo Redwood Forest , http://intercontinentalcry.org/worlds-largest-wine-corporation-threatens-sacred-pomo-redwood-forest/, 30 August 2011

Little Things

Little Things

If you don't get the little things
right
how do you expect to get
the big things
right?

If you don't care about
the little things
why the hell would you care
about the big things?

All big things
are composed of many
little things
and
all little things
are composed of
littler things.

Life is about
the littler things
no matter how big
the thing
is.

It Matters

It Matters

It matters what I do today
I may not be alive tomorrow
and yet today
for a fistful of dollars
due tomorrow
I sold
a piece
of my
soul.

It's such a little thing
they said
waiting for agreement
it's only
for a little while longer
just
put up with it.

Just a little thing
yes
but it is wrong
and yet
I did it for money.

But you need the money
they said
hoping for agreement
that's
what matters
not the job.

I need the money
yes
but it is wrong
and yet
I bowed my head.

And it hurt
now
for today
and all tomorrows
I did it for money
and it hurt
someone else.

I didn't mean it
it was not
intentional
but I knew
it could happen.

Just a frog
she was
just a frog.

But she died
I saw her
such a little one
writhing in agony
desperate
to get away
desperate
to live
but she died.

I did it
for money.

Mother
forgive me.

New Glory?

New Glory?

. . . or just a paintjob?

Lost

Lost

Love
is always a sacrifice,
a core of ice
in a fiery paradise,
defiant cold, forever bleeding,
a comforting pain
when there is
no direction home
at the edge of night
.
.
.


(photo by campmusa)

Goddess Loves Rock and Roll

Goddess Loves Rock and Roll

I blunder as if blinded,
a blessed fool am I,
kin to drunks and little children,
caring for their fears,
lost in their shared insanity,
oblivious to our last chance,
a lost chance,
I can leave them behind
turn and cut through
the herd
to walk alone
last chance, lost chance
for calm sanity
yet how can I
be someone else not me,
there's me and . . . me,
a longing to be free
alone and content
at peace
and yet still
I stay
overlooked and overlooking
here
in a thundering crowd where
I am
lonely
carrying the news
a spark looking for
tinder
to flame
I am
looking for someone
to please
before
the darkness
falls.

"My Law"

"My Law"

Written by Tieme Ranapiri (1700AD/CE?)
and translated from Maori by Kere Graham.

The sun may be clouded, yet ever the sun
Will sweep on its course till the Cycle is run.
And when into chaos the system is hurled
again shall the Builder reshape a new world.

Your path may be clouded, uncertain your goal:
Move on - for your orbit is fixed to your soul.
And though it may lead into darkness of night
The torch of the Builder shall give it new light.

You were. You will be! Know this while you are:
Your spirit has traveled both long and afar.
It came from the Source, to the Source it returns
The Spark which was lighted eternally burns.

It slept in a jewel. It lept in a wave.
It roamed in the forest. It rose from the grave.
It took on strange garbs for long eons of years
and now in the soul of yourself it appears.

From body to body your spirit speeds on
It seeks a new form when the old one has gone
and the form that it finds is the fabric you wrought
On the loom of the Mind from the fibre of Thought.
As dew is drawn upwards, in rain to descend
Your thoughts drift away and in Destiny blend.
You cannot escape them, for petty or great,
Or evil or noble, they fashion your Fate.

Somewhere on some planet, sometime and somehow
Your life will reflect your thoughts of your Now.
My law is unerring, no blood can atone
The structure you build you will live in alone.
From cycle to cycle, through time and through space
Your lives with your longings will ever keep pace
And all that you ask for, and all you desire
Must come at your bidding, as flame out of fire.

Once list' to that Voice and all tumult is done
Your life is the Life of the Infinite One.
In the hurrying race you are conscious of pause
With love for the purpose, and love for the Cause.

You are your own Devil, you are your own God
You fashioned the paths your footsteps have trod.
And no one can save you from Error or Sin
Until you have hark'd to the Spirit within.

Not Now

Not Now



Memorial Day, 2009.
I was there.
I was at a coffee house.
I was with my intimate friends.
I was drinking coffee.
I was.

Memorial Day, 2010.
I was here.
I was in my cabin by a lake.
I was remembering my intimate friends.
I was drinking coffee.
I was.

Memorial Day, 2011.
I am still here.
I am in my cabin by the lake.
I am remembering remembering my intimate friends.
I am drinking tea.
I am.

Intimate friends.
once real, now Facebook.
I see them :-) and :-( and lol.
But I don't feel them smile.
I don't feel them frown.
I don't feel them laugh.
I don't feel them touch.
Except in my memory.

Memory.
Is old.
Not new.
Not now.

We are not together
exploring the universe
determining reality
searching for truth
enjoying life.

Not now.

How I miss Now
when I remember
Memorial Day.

The Fractal Universe – God or Machine?

The Fractal Universe – God or Machine?

“. . . the way we think defines our world. Classic teachers, such as Aristotle or Confucius taught not in specific subjects but wide ranging thoughts that involved man and nature. Today's students are taught to be specialists. We know more and more about less and less. The classic philosophers were aware that they knew less and less about more and more.”

Andrew Sheng

Systems Thinking¹

(Fractal by Rafael La Perna)

I have been saying for years that all things are fractal in nature – that our reasoned awareness of reality filtered as it is through the left hemisphere of our brain perceives the universe unfolding in myriad fractal patterns that are, ultimately, variations on the same theme. However, I have a strong right-brain awareness that Time is the deciding factor in our left-brain perception. Time, my right-brain instinctively intuits², is fractal – not the Universe. The Universe is infinitely one within itself, and therefore the paradox is that everything within the Universe is fractal, and yet the Universe itself is not. Why? The Universe is complete. It is one. The fractal patterns we observe are indeed just that – fractions of the entire pattern – the pattern that some call The Creation Script (the uni-verse), in effect the Word/Sound/Music/Vibration that began creation in many myths and theories and still reverberates throughout the Universe.

We once knew that the Universe has a pattern, and the pattern of the Universe has meaning to us as a part of the Universe. We once knew that there is a correspondence between all things. We once knew that there are many patterns and many variations of patterns, but that many things share the same basic pattern, and all the patterns merge into a Great Pattern which is more than the sum of its parts. We once knew that every thing has its own pattern, including humans. We once knew that every individual thing has its own variation of the basic pattern it shares with all its kind, even you and me. We once called that science of knowing the patterns of Nature, Divination³ – the art of interpreting the future from the portends (that is, the science of interpreting the patterns of things⁴). However, since this artful science utilized right-brain methodology⁵ it fell into derogatory disrepute and massive misuse in our post-Enlightenment left-brain culture. We lost a lot of knowledge when we decided this science was insignificant, worthless, mathematically approaching zero.

The pattern of the Universe can be described as a Symphony of Life. But is it orchestrated by a maestro, or is it a player-piano that works by itself and ultimately will break down?

Perhaps, neither.

Experiences in shamanic meditation and Socratic research – otherwise known as old-time (that is, classic) philosophy – leads me to “try to” define the Universe as a fractal symphony of infinitely beautiful precision wherein there is not a single errant random note. And so, except for Free Will, everything would repeat in the same precise patterns and become pointless. Free Will can change the pattern, and that is the Point. Please note that humans are not the only ones with Free Will. Every thing that makes a choice exercises Free Will.

I said “try to” because there are very few words for what the right-brain sees, and very little of what it sees agrees with left-brain logic. Some things you just know instinctively and intuitively⁶. These things are too big and too small and too between for words. Fractal knowledge. Universal knowledge in a tiny crevice in the curve of a straight line that applies to every thing in its own way.

A quick point on meditation and research. Meditation shuts down the left-brain control of perception and allows the right-brain to communicate its emotional awareness of the Universe – which is that all is one, all is alive, we are all (place name of favorite deity here). And yet, we are not⁷. Paradox.

Research (asking questions, seeking answers, left-brain stuff) naturally follows. The state of “wonder” is a right-brain communication. No question can be born without first there be a wondering. Wonder is a right-brain communication. The left-brain trys to understand what the right-brain experiences by question and answer – the so-called Socratic method (which is simply the way the right-brain works). Philosophy is what happens when you put meditation and research together, just as 3 usually follows 2 which usually follows 1.

It is important to note that in a natural context (that is, in the philosophy I espouse) Emotion (right-brain/art/heart/female) births Thought (left-brain/science/mind/male), but in our post-Enlightenment society we have been taught (that is, coerced) to believe Thought (left-brain/science/mind/male) has natural dominion over, and indeed must control, Emotion (right-brain/art/heart/female). However, the Reality is that Emotion does not lie, but Thought very often does⁸. The symbology in this is massive – it is a fractal of knowledge, a foundational pattern of the Universe infinite at different levels. It is Creation, Sustenance, Revelation and Redemption. In other words, for some it's the meaning of life, yo. Life is a wonderment in beauty that often doesn't make sense, until it does.

In all things, truth reveals itself in paradox. That which cannot be, is, and by it being we know Reality⁹ from Perception, Viewpoint, Rhetoric and Opinion. Humans, left-brain-thinkers especially, are too smart by half for their own good (pun intended). We make models of logic and reason, and play with these toys like children playing in the middle of the street, fantasy steading for reality in our minds, oblivious to our inevitable fate. Our perception of reality has very little in common with what is real.

The Cantor Set cannot be, yet it is. Achilles overtaking the Tortoise cannot be, yet it is. A fractal cannot be infinite, yet it is. Paradox. Truth. Beauty.

I know modern day 'philosophers' (i.e. pretenders) are deeply troubled by the word “is”, but the common person on the street has no doubt about “is”. It is what it is, yo. Word.

The Second Law of Thermodynamics has been broken¹⁰ in various¹¹ and repeatable¹² scientific experiments¹³, and yet we still cling to the belief that the Second Law is an unbreakable Law of Reality. It is not. It is simply a reasoned (that is, a left-brain lying) way to explain our 18^th century, Western Civilization, Imperialist-founded, Church-nurtured, patriarchal perception of reality. It is an opinion, nothing more. We should have listened to Newton when he said his work was not fit to be published, that it was just fevered ramblings. It has distracted us from reality. The reality is that the universe is actively creating (that is, the universe is always changing¹⁴). Entropy is a myth concocted to support The Church Doctrine on the separateness of God and Nature¹⁵. The Universe, in much the same way as the Hindu Goddess Kali-Ma, is a creative force, not a degenerative one. Despite this knowledge, scientists still cling to Newton's World, frightened like children in the dark, afraid that the quantum universe is waiting in the shadows to snatch them up.

They are right. It is. It is hiding in the shadow of the fractal curve of every straight line.

What about God? What about a Mechanical universe (ala Stephen Hawking)?

Well, first I have to abuse the notion of God. Archaeological and historical evidence points to “God” (as is historically defined) being the creation of the criminally patriarchal, Indo-Aryan, mountain war-chiefs of Middle Asia. That same band of murderers and rapists who are chronicled in cuneiform telling how they descended upon pre-Sumerian Mesopotamia and usurped power from the Sisters of Inanna (that is, the women elders), and sent their progeny throughout the world overturning the old (pre-patriarchal) order. The cruel Rapist Gods of Mount Olympus of Greek mythology and the angry Destroyer God of Mount Sinai of the Abrahamic mythology are but two examples of this Indo-Aryan influence in the historical record that stretches in many guises world-wide from before Ur to the present day. The progression of this patriarchal usurpation was described in writing by history's first known poet, Enheduanna, in her tales of Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth¹⁶. The same pattern can be found in the foundations of all cultures within patriarchal “civilization”. Each is a fraction of the story, each a budding of the fractal replicated in all its major points at different levels of “zoom”. Together they make up the The Patriarchy Fractal – the pattern of destruction and oppression the patriarchy always follows regardless of time or culture. Is it a wonder they “created” entropy?

God as an anthropomorphic “Him” is an obvious fiction originally contrived to counter the so-called Goddess-societies that were prevalent before patriarchal history. The stories of the ages confirm “His” evolution from mountain god to sun god to creator god, all the way usurping what had been female power in order to control the population¹⁷. Under its destructive influence we deny our inborn divinity, and stifle our inherent need for creative self-expression. In this way we bring Entropy (that is, Hell) upon ourselves, creating it ourselves, afflicting ourselves. God needs Entropy/Hell to exist, so we create it in order to create God. Without Entropy/Hell there is nothing for God to do. The Universe as a creative force negates the need for God.

Goddess, on the other hand, is obviously real.

Paradox?

Perhaps. Perhaps just a aeons-old Lie found out.

The creative force of the universe is female in nature. Look around you. There is a deep felt species-wide emotion, an instinctual intuition, a knowing that persists, that the earth is Mother. That is not an insignificant emotional fact. Deny this, and you deny your eyes, your ears, your tongue, your heart, and your Self (soul/spirit/I-ness) in favor of an immoral war hierarchy based upon rape, paternity and murder.

Do not we all begin in the womb as female? The male seems to be an evolution descended from the female for the specific purpose of providing sustenance – that is, figure out (left-brain) how to provide shelter, food, and comfort. A hint toward that purpose, and how the male power went astray, can be deduced from the current “Extreme Male Brain Theory of Autism” (Simon Baron-Cohen, 2002, Autism Research Centre). As well, this theory supports the right-brain experience as being just as real as the left-brain experience, and, more importantly, a moderating force that keeps the left-brain sane – when all is working properly, that is. Of course, Simon Baron-Cohen doesn't philosophize about any of the points in this paper. He merely reports scientific evidence on the physical characteristics of male and female brains in relation to autistics, hysterics, and so-called normals. His work, however, supports the philosophical leaps I seem to be taking in reference to it.

But does the femaleness in the character of Creation mean a “female God”? No. I am not describing a God in Human form, alternately destroying and creating, who meddles in Human affairs, performing miracles of parthenogenesis or otherwise apportioning apocalypses. Goddess is an emotional perception, an instinctual intuition, a left-brain label for a right-brain sensing. What is the sensing . . . of? It is the sensing of the awareness of the live Universe; the Universe as a live and aware organism connected directly to you and to everyone and everything else. Something like that, perhaps. It is ineffable – meaning I'll never get the right words, you will have to look into my eyes (that is, my soul) to know what I mean.

So . . . that doesn't qualify as an anthropomorphic deity, even if we, as a species, can only emotionally relate to the essence of the Universe (that is, Nature) as Mother. No God or Goddess in human form, or otherwise centered solely upon the human species. There is just the neverending Universe¹⁸, it is alive, it creates (that is, gives birth) and we are all a part of it – literally and emotionally. Aho mitakuye oyasin¹⁹.

So much, as well, for the Machine Universe . . . for how can the Universe be an unthinking, unfeeling, unliving mechanical construct when all within it is alive with an energy that is always changing but is never destroyed? A non-living machine created Life? That is not a paradox, that is simply absurd in an experiential reality (that is, the only Reality that matters). Life is created by life through the female essence. The truth of it is all around us.

Look at the Universe through a starry night sky, and meditate upon its entirety. Meditate upon its ultimate vastness. Meditate upon whether or not any species upon this tiny, lonely speck of a planet qualifies as more than an insignificant detail that can be equated mathematically as approaching zero. Meditate then upon the fact that there is no randomness, and that there is no zero in infinity. Therefore, everything is significant and nothing ever fades to zeroness²⁰. Then meditate upon the fractal zoom, where molecules of coherent energy whizz like solar systems through their galaxies of energy bonds, and we stand midway between them and the stars in the galaxies of the sky. And know that by deep meditation, by letting the right-brain freely experience reality, we can experience Oneness with the Universe – and then we realize everything's gonna be all right. It's good to be alive. As for death, in a sense, we never die, only change, just like everything else. We are, after all, beings of energy (Jill Bolte Taylor).

1 The Star Online, Malaysia, Business, editorial, Andrew Sheng,

http://biz.thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2011/4/30/business/8562396&sec=business

2 Instinct and intuition comprise emotion's (right-brain) wisdom (experience). Emotion Wisdom is the wild form of domesticated (left-brain) thought (belief) – it has escaped being corraled by the left-brain logic/belief system, and revels in the wonder of the infinite paradox of the universe.

3 By definition I mean all old sciences and traditions, from astrology to dream-walking to throwing the bones.

4 Which is, of course, the primary goal of every modern, accepted science – to learn enough to have the ability to anticipate an event prior to its actual occurrence, in other words, to divine the future from the portends. Societal stigma aside, the means, intents and ends of Divination and Science are the same. We shouldn't fool ourselves with words and beliefs. The goals of Science and Divination are description, explanation, prediction & control.

5 In some instances, for instance, chanting, dancing, trances, etc..

6 Instinct and Intuition are two Human senses that have been termed “wild” and “female” and so have been effectively banned from scientific thought by the patriarchy except to be treated with the utmost condescension and colonialism.

7 Jill Bolte Taylor's “Stroke of Insight” on TED.com corroborates the description of right-brain reality in this essay. It is a major support to my philosophy.

8 Demote all of what Sigmund Freud wrote to the fiction shelves. The man was insane and vicious. Following his philosophy has made us insane and vicious in his image. The Heart does not lie. The Body does not lie. The right-brain does not lie. The left-brain lies all the time in order to live comfortably in a shared (compromised and domesticated) reality. Most energy healing techniques utilize this knowledge at one level or another in their healing.

9 “Reality is that which, when we stop believing in it, doesn't go away.' Philip K. Dick

10 D.P. Sheehan, “Four Paradoxes Involving the Second Law of Thermodynamics”, The Journal of Scientific Exploration, http://www.padrak.com/ine/SHEEHAN.html

11 “Beads of Doubt”, BBC, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/2135779.stm

12 “Does Nature Break the Second Law of Thermodynamics?” Scientific American Magazine, 10/28/2008, http://www.mtech.edu/clsps/chemistry/syllabi/P%20CHEM%20Lectures/Does_Nature_Break_the_2nd_Law.doc

13 “Physicists close two loopholes while violating local realism”, PhysOrg.com, http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-physicists-loopholes-violating-local-realism.html

14 the philosophical idea (aka The Divine Mystery) of Kali-Ma, and in a greater sense, Durga-Ma.

15 Separating God from Nature (that is, Goddess) has been the goal of the Patriarchy since the Indo-Aryan mountain war chief days – evidence, the creation story of the Battle of Marduk and Tiamat. Tiamat, the Mother of All Beings, is killed by Marduk, and her body is rent in two – half to make the sky, and half to make the ocean. Marduk is then hailed as Creator and Chief of All Gods. Marduk eventually becomes YHWH of the Hebrews during the time of the Tribe of Levi. The Priest Tribe of Levi being descended from the Indo-Aryan mountain war chiefs of middle Asia.

16 Diane Wolkstein , “Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth: Her Stories and Hymns from Sumer”, Harper & Row; 1st edition (January 1, 1983)

17 “Beware Harmonia”, a poem, a symbology, a philosophy, a history, a fractal of how the patriarchy gained power, http://only-ed.blogspot.com/2010/06/beware-harmonia.html

18 The Big Bang was only one of an infinite number of Big Bounces – the Quantum Universe is not insignificant – now, then or ever . . . “Another universe may have preceded ours, study finds”

http://www.world-science.net/othernews/060514_bouncefrm.htm

19 “Aho Mitakuye Oyasin is a simple yet profound statement. It comes from the Lakota Nation and means all my relations. It is spoken during prayer and ceremony to invite and acknowledge all relatives to the moment. To most of us today, relative means a blood relation or another human in the family lineage. We have not been taught that an entity, other than human, could be a relative. Understanding this simple statement and contemplating it, could change your outlook on life forever. If you love and honor your relatives, you would be loving and honoring most of what is on this earth, if you lived by this meaning of relative. What a different world we would be living in! Sit with this statement, see the Truth in it. Everything is related because it all emanates from one source and has purpose. Truth can be found in Native philosophy, Buddhism, Christianity, Judism, Islam, all belief systems, because they are all related. I have studied Buddhism and found Christ. I have studied Native philosophy and found Buddha. I have studied Mother Nature and found self. Truth does not owe homage to humans. Humans owe homage to Truth.” - Silver Wolf Walks Alone

20 Plato and Diogenes, Cupness and Emptiness