Five Star Pieces, Quotes, SoundBites, and Columnists from the world press; Crop Circle Diary; Conversation tracks -- plus Monthly Reports and Updates sent to listmembers through 12/31/02
TheConversation.org had its start when 9/11 dictated that we were in a new world. At this threshold moment for humanity, when we must choose wisely to avoid what could be our annihilation, this site is dedicated to tracking the emerging intelligence that we need for our very survival, and to conversation in which that intelligence can be forged.
Let those who see beyond the idea of force imposing world order, to where we look to heal the causes of despair, meet here.
Society deals primarily with cosmetic change, no matter how threatened the world is. But, the way we think got us into the mess we are in, and, unless we grapple with paradigm change, it's fingers in the dike. For this column, send your thoughts about what outside the box ideas might contribute to setting us on a better course.
Look at this chilling story by the great British journalist, George Monbiot, about the recent UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. It concludes:
"...we have to stop calling it climate change. Using 'climate change' to describe events like this, with their devastating implications for global food security, water supplies and human settlements, is like describing a foreign invasion as an unexpected visit, or bombs as unwanted deliveries. It's a ridiculously neutral term for the biggest potential catastrophe humankind has ever encountered. I think we should call it 'climate breakdown.'"
If we knew that without intervention the world would end at a finite date, humanity would dramatically scratch its collective head. Short of a deadline to save ourselves, what could we do that might change our course? Here are some of my thoughts.
1. My #1 idea is to investigate the crop circle phenomenon. If we knew there was other intelligence, which the circles indicate, we would be one humanity in relation to 'the other,’ working together to solve planetary problems.
2. Florida’s St. Petersburg Times asked, "How Would You Fix the Economy?" Here's one answer:
Patriotic Retirement: There's about 40 million people over 50 in the work force; pay them $1 million apiece severance with stipulations:
1) They leave their jobs. Forty million job openings - Unemployment fixed.
2) They buy NEW American cars. Forty million cars ordered - Auto Industry fixed.
3) They either buy a house or pay off their mortgage - Housing Crisis fixed.
Much cheaper than the trillions being ineffectively spent on the financial industry…
3. Promote a change of paradigm where getting the most money as the primary goal would be replaced by doing the most good.
4. Make a brilliant ad campaign: "Whoever Does the Most Good Wins!"
5. Have revered states people look out from TV and address the human core in everyone, urging us to think as a planet to solve the challenges we face.
6. Call for a truce worldwide, where wars end -- via inducements, including a clean slate for everyone. Even terrorists. Promise everyone universal health care, universal education and job training, and whatever it would take to give everyone the fundamentals of a decent life. Pay for it with military budgets.
7. Give ecstasy to people we want info from -- turn evil people into heart-connected ones.
8. Use plants for vision, a la shamans who use psychedelic substances for guidance.
9. Convene a new Twilight Club. "The Twilight Club was an organization founded in the late 19th century, with the intention to counter the moral decline by bolstering up the spiritual and ethical awareness of the society. Illustrious members were Ralph Waldo Emerson, Herbert Spencer, Walt Whitman, Andrew Carnegie, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and Mark Twain...From this club, service clubs such as the Rotary Club and the Lions evolved at a later stage."
When somebody sent a ping back on what’s been quietly parked on my blog onto his website (the headline isn’t what’s posted), I got inspired to rev up my energy to figure out what to do with it. A little while ago, I pointed Arianna Huffington at it — although we have a faint connection, she graciously answers my emails.
She told me to blog about it on Huffington Post.
Actually, I did blog there, briefly. I struggled for approval of my pieces during a probation period, and finally was told my topic was a bit off-putting.
