OutKast- Prototype
Dave Matthews Band- Dive In
“Wake up sleepy head
I think the sun’s a little brighter today
Smile and watch the icicles melt away and see the water rising…
Summer’s here to stay, and that sweet summer breeze will blow forever
Go down to the shore, kick off your shoes, dive in the empty ocean.”
Michael Franti and Spearhead- Gas Gauge (The World’s In Your Hands)
One of my favorite songs.
The Berkana Institute: whatever the problem, community is the answer.
“Living the future now”
(Source: 091days)
“if you understand the nature of inner freedom, you realize that transient sense pleasures are
nowhere near enough, that they’re not the most important thing. You realize that as a human being
you have the ability and the methods to reach a permanent state of everlasting, unconditional joy.
That gives you a new perspective on life.”
-Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche
“To enter the spiritual path, you must begin to understand your
own mental attitude and how your mind perceives things. If
you’re all caught up in attachment to tiny atoms, your limited,
craving mind will make it impossible for you to enjoy life’s
pleasures. External energy is so incredibly limited that if you
allow yourself to be bound by it, your mind itself will become
just as limited.When your mind is narrow, small things easily
agitate you.
Make your mind an ocean.”
-Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche
Searching for a Post-Sexist Society
Imagine A Baby
May 2010
By Lydia Sargent
Lydia Sargent’s ZSpace Page
Imagine a baby. A baby girl, like the one pictured here. It’s March 1942 and she’s two months old. At the New York hospital where she was born, they immediately identify her gender with a white business card attached to her hospital baby bed, with a little pink ribbon on the card. They put a pink beaded bracelet around her wrist. Her older brother got the same thing when he was born two years earlier—only in blue. This girl baby lies in her bassinet covered by a blanket crocheted by her grandmother and smiles up at the world. If she knew what was in store for her she would not be smiling. In fact, based on the intersection of her gender, class, and race/ethnicity, we can predict this baby girl’s life in some detail. Add in genetic factors, her parents’ individual preferences, geographical location, religion, and a few other surprises and we can predict her future (and that of her brother) in even greater detail—as we can the lives of the other babies born around this time.
In this baby girl’s case, her parents are White Anglo-Saxon Presbyterian Republican (WASP-R), well educated, members of a professional intellectual social lifestyle and network that considers its status to be based on their hard work, in the best Calvinist tradition. This requires, of course, the belief that those who aren’t in that group are lazy or, in her father’s view, Catholic dupes. Her father graduated from Harvard and Harvard Law School. After serving in World War II, he joined a prestigious, conservative law firm on Wall Street with the help of his Harvard connections. Her mother, at the time of her marriage, was working toward a masters in English from Barnard/Columbia University.
“Bill Fletcher: (U.S.)
“Without organization, the people have nothing. The forces arrayed against the downtrodden and the dispossessed are immense. Mass actions and spontaneous movements are essential. All forms of progressive resistance to oppression must be embraced. Yet, in the absence of organization these struggles will exhaust themselves. Organization is about education; it is about training; it is about strategy; and tactics. But in this case it is also about building the international ties that are critical in taking on global capitalism and global injustice.
No project toward the building of organization comes with any guarantees except one: This will not be easy. That said, if we want to win power for the global dispossessed, I don’t think that we have any alternative but to build radical organizations. IOPS is one such effort.”
