Happy 10th Anniversary #Occupy Wall Street!

September 17th marks the 10 th anniversary of the day that protesters descended on Zuccotti Park in New York City, re-naming it Liberty Park and launching #Occupy Wall Street!  

Here's the song I wrote that fall as I heard the announcement on the #Occupy livestream that Mr. Bloomberg had relented in his decision to clear the park that day at dawn.  The occupation would continue for another another six weeks before the NYPD cleared the park.

Life Support

A Good Friend sent me this quote from Alicia Garza, one of the co-founders of Black Lives Matter, today.  IMHO, it's a wonderful expression of the Way It Is -- and of our on-going Mission Impossible quest to co-create a world that reflects the compassion and wisdom of an Awakened Heart.

One Love,

Brother Lefty

 

"My hope for us is that we begin to intimately understand that living in a society where everything can be bought or sold but not everyone can buy or sell is harmful to our health, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. That the best way to care for ourselves is in the manner that Audre Lorde described: to connect with each other in ways that propel all of us toward care—for ourselves and one another.

But with that hope, I also see reality. I believe with all my heart that change is possible and inevitable, but my honest estimation is that we are far from that change. And that means, for me, that we need to treat our work as if it is in fact hospice care for that which is dying and prenatal care for that which is being born." - Alicia Garza, The Purpose of Power

Thanks -- but No Thanks

Some Personal Reflections on Thanksgiving Day 2020

"Oh, Great Spirit whose voice I hear in the winds, 
and whose breath gives life to all the world, hear me, I am small and weak,  
I need your strength and wisdom." 
 -- from a prayer

by Lakota Chief Yellow Lark, 1887
(Entire Prayer)

"Treat the earth well: it was not given to you by your parents, 
it was loaned to you by your children. 
We do not inherit the Earth from our Ancestors, 
we borrow it from our Children." 

-- Ancient Native American Proverb

The three day feast that brought together 90 Wampanoags and the 50 surviving Pilgrims at Plymouth Plantation in 1621 has become part of our nation's mythology.

Unfortunately, this idyllic tale doesn't portray the stark reality.  A holocaust occurred as the European colonists descended on this continent. They brought with them white supremacy,  a harshly judgmental Christianity, the European notion of private property, and an emergent capitalism.  (The pilgrims received a land patent from the London Virginia Company and financing from Company of Adventurers. The investors who formed these corporations sought to profit by colonizing lands overseas. )

Although the set of democratic ideals set forth in the Preamble to the US Constitution reflect humanity's quest for a just society, "our forefathers" also brought forth on this continent disease, death, domination, and the destruction of a Way of Life.  Rather than embrace the indigenous cultures that seemed to better understand and honor humanity's relationship to Mother Earth, to the Great Spirit, and to the Circle of All Life, we branded them heathens -- and drove them out of their homelands.

The worldview of the Indigenous People embraced Connection and Reverence.  Our forefathers brought with them, instead, the Unbridled Greed buried in the belly of Capitalism, and a myopic form of doctrinal Christianity that produces a profound sense of separation from one another, from the natural world, and from our spiritual connection to all that is.  

Through force of arms, including germ warfare and the power of "law," the bad guys won.  Unfortunately for Mother Earth and her myriad beings, they still hold tremendous power today.

Yet, it doesn't have to be that way forever.

It is true that history shows us that those with more guns and less morals have often taken power.  Yet, the opposite is also true.  

In my own lifetime, Mahatma Gandhi, armed with nothing but a spinning wheel, the force of Great Loving Soul, and the Power of the People, sent the mighty British Empire packing.  Martin Luther King and legions of non-violent activists toppled the framework of legal racial segregation that existed here in the "land of the free." Non-violent revolutions toppled the communist governments of eastern Europe. 

So....? 
(READ MORE)

Never Afraid to Make Some Noise

RIP Congressman John Lewis

 

Our fallen hero, Congressman John Lewis is laying in state in the Capitol Rotunda in DC. A memorial service for this lifelong champion of the movement for human rights, justice and equality, has been streamed on CSPN. You have the option of starting from the beginning (they cover the transport and arrival of his casket until the ceremony opens at 43: 56) or viewing a clip at link below:

https://www.c-span.org/video/?474218-1/representative-john-lewis-casket-arrival-memorial-service-us-capitol

 

Our fallen hero, Congressman John Lewis is laying in state in the Capitol Rotunda in DC. A memorial service for this lifelong champion of the movement for human rights, justice and equality, has been streamed on CSPN. You have the option of starting from the beginning (they cover the transport and arrival of his casket until the ceremony opens at 43: 56) or viewing a clip a link below:
https://www.c-span.org/video/?474218-1/representative-john-lewis-casket-arrival-memorial-service-us-capitol