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  • From: Mark Ludwig <mpludwig@facstaff.wisc.edu>
  • To: permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Re:The American view of the world
  • Date: Sat, 07 Dec 2002 15:03:03 -0600

At 12:11 PM 12/8/02 +0800, you wrote:


Mark Ludwig wrote:
1I think much of the 1st world besides the USA is already fixed, I focus
here cuz #1, it's my country and I'm actually in a fairly good position to
shape it's future and #2 I'm quite sure there are plenty of my fellow
citizens who need a little reordering of priorities. Like it or not the
USA has tremendous influence on how other nations will act; I'm not saying
it's right or sane, I'm saying it is.
we'd all like it if you could all be a little less influential :-)

Ditto here. I have high hopes for the EU and to some extent the UN to provide other models of action. I have some hope also that the rise of positive NGO's will make the problem of slow action by governments less of an issue in both development projects and emergency response. Another aspect of American power that is seldom considered is the almost non stop flight of our large corporations over seas, this has made them a global free lance power pressuring all manner of governments for privileges and special deals. The dirty secret of American politics is that they have lost control of the companies.


>In the US - where education standards and TV are appalling and mostly in the
>hands of private enterprise. Compared to public TV/Education in most other
>countries of the world. Also the degree of political repression of facts,
>dissenting opinion is much greater in the US than many other parts of the
>world
>despite your much vaunted democracy. We don't for instance regularly shoot
>protestors or unionists in this country.

this is almost total nonsense. Most of out schools are still public,
though there are right wing wackos in the USA trying to change that. As
for the repression of dissenting opinion, that is also almost impossible
these days with 500 channels of TV and a thriving Internet. I am an active
unionist and know of no killing in this country in decades. It's bad here,
no question; but not that bad.



Protestors shot by US government agency's include Kent State 1970 and the various killings that have occurred on Native American reservations. As for unionists I was referring to Chicago in the 1930's. Judicial executions like those proposed for Leonard Peltier for instance. The existence and widespread use of the death penalty and extremely long jail sentences and heavy fines to curb protest activity also occur far more in the US than in Australia for instance. Consider the jailing of 80 yo nuns protesting at military bases recently.

Some of your facts are wrong here, the rest are a bit dated, no? Peliter was indeed rail roaded into prison, but is not on death row. You may be thinking of Mumia abdul Jamal, who may well be executed. I do not support the death penalty, many Americans don't, and 9 of our states do not have one (mine included). There certainly is much harassment of protesters in the USA these days, but that also happens in Italy (one dead, scores arrested last year) and other nations. No one said messing with the state was painless or risk less, I'm a libertarian (by temperament rather than party affiliation) and have a very health skepticism of government power in general, and this administration in particular. BTW - those nuns get arrested every year protesting at Ft Benning for trespassing, not for demonstrating.

American justice as such appears to be under extreme threat at the moment. One has to ask how the political process in America became so corrupted that it is impossible without large amounts of money to get elected. First past the post voting systems, voluntary voting, electoral computer fraud, disenfranchisement of ex prisoners etc. etc.

There surly are problems here, one of the biggest being a general apathy and cynicism that tends to blur distinctions between parties. I have some hope the Internet will provide more direct communication to voters, yielding lower cost campaigns and a better informed electorate.

One can only judge things like American Education by the fruits that it produces. Most US citizens appear to have a woeful lack of understanding of the rest of the world apart from how it impacts upon them personally. The general acceptance of superiority by Americans of their country is hubris of the worst kind. Australians are either convicts or refugees, the country has always run like a sort of prison. We don't have a bill of rights, our politicians are often corrupt or more often just dumb.

All fairly accurate and very dangerous. Smells like old Rome round here these days....

So we don't go round the world proselytising 'democracy' or how great our country or our culture is. But we do let prisoners vote and it only costs about $400 to stand for Federal Parliament.

> > All true. The move to pull the charters or errant corporations is a very
> > positive issue, if investors are faced with the loss of share value because
> > the companies they own commit illegal acts they will demand better
> > action. It is sadly, all about money.
> >
>
>A view not shared by the rest of the world.

which part? pulling charters or $ making the world go round? You're flat
wrong in either case.
$ making the world go round - the dystopia of greed and modernism. I'm not wrong at all - most countries put much greater emphasis on the public or ethical good than the US whether it's for state reasons (China, Singapore) or religious reasons (India, the Islamic world). Most people believe in something more than money.

If you believe the polls, the USA is very religious compared to the rest of the first world, and yet the party of strong religion here is also the party of greed. IOW I think religion is no check on the love of money. I suspect a look at other cultures will find similar situation true to some extent. My broader point is that money makes it far easier to do damn near anything, wether it's building churches, schools and clinics or self aggrandizing monuments to greed. It is necessary, but not sufficient for most kinds of good action IMO.



My point is that its really none of your business how hard people work, who
they screw and how, what drugs they take or what kind of art they
make. the sooner governments get out of the business of regulating
relatively harmless human conduct and focus in on stopping pissing in the
water the better off we will all be.
US citizens often express such sentiments about 'big government' interfering with their lives. It betrays a simplicity of thinking. The issue should not be how big or small your government is but how well it is doing the job.

I'd bet I'm in the top 10% of my countrymen as far as understanding how government works or not (scary huh?). The issue I bring up isn't size, it's priorities....

Of course it matters what drugs you take. Do you not prosecute people for driving under the influence?

OF course, but it's the driving, not the drinks that are illegal.

Do you allow bus drivers or truck drivers to be full of speed or other stimulants instead of sleep?

No, that's air force pilots who get to take speed instead of sleeping (sad but true).

Oh I forgot- you allow people all sorts of weapons of mass destruction hand guns, automatics etc. so what's a drunk at the wheel of a petrol tanker going to do that's so awful..

The licensing you need to drive such a vehicle in this country is pretty strict. As for guns, as a nation we like um, no question. I have among my firearms and SKS rifle, 10 shot semi auto, nasty little thing, 50's vintage Soviet block military weapon, kissing cousin of the AK-47. Works great on feral dogs and may come in handy if the world really goes to hell. I'm not exactly proud to own such a thing, but I'm also not ashamed. I'm sure some of you are horrified citizens can own such things, I'm not. I personally am much more concerned about the continuous erosion of the political debate in this country into demonization of opponents; in a national collapse dehumanizing generally follows, then the massacres with whatever is available. They killed 600,000 people in Rwanda, mostly with machetes, when their politics imploded.

Do you not consider it a right for people to refuse to work more than 12 hours a day (for instance) - if you don't then you belong to a very strange union.

I consider it the right of workers to collectively bargain and form unions with contracts to limit such exploitation. I support the overtime laws in this country that require higher pay for long days (or more accurately long weeks). However, if you take a job that requires 3 - 12 hour days a week, rather than 5 - 8 hour days that's your business.

[snip]

>What was going on was the downgrading of reproductive economics in favour of
>productive economics. Reproductive economics is centered around woman's
>bodies.
>The labour for labour for instance.
>
>Reproductive work differs in three fundamental ways from productive work.
>It is cyclical with respect to time instead of linear.
>It is time compulsory instead of time voluntary
>It is necessarily social instead of socially necessary
>(Mary O'Brien "The Politics of Reproduction")

Dude! I've been a dairy farmer for god's sake! I love fertility! Women
are swell! They are not however incorruptible flowers of virtue any more
than men are doomed to be motor sports enthusiasts. I find all of this to
be totally absurd posturing to fit in with people who drive me nuts. I'm
not doing it any more! 15 years was plenty.

I'm afraid you've missed the point. I'm not saying anything about the virtues of women. I'm talking about the nature of reproductive labour. Reproductive work is not exclusively done by women. It is however centered around women because of their biological role in reproduction (all those cows you feed and just one bull right)

actually 2 bulls and a semen tank.

I'm not talking about virtue I'm talking about the nature of work and the way in which capitalism (and communism for that matter) discounts the importance of reproductive work.
Consequently, permaculturists spend much of their time discussing the issues of sustainability when it could be more illuminating IMHO to discuss the nature of reproductive work and how it differs from productive work as defined by capitalism.

Obviously "reproductive work" is important and should be better supported, though modern western society here and elsewhere does a lot through public schooling, tax incentives, leave options etc. A greater value placed on child care services would be nice, and I think we may see that over time (unions would do these folks a world of good). How this relates to PC except tangentially is missing me.

A synthesis that treats all work as having both reproductive and productive dimensions could be a map to a coherent economic alternative. I just have to persuade a few men to stop fearing feminism..

Actually I consider myself a feminist, if that means women should have equal rights and opportunities. I'm still trying to wrap my brain around this distinction you are making, I guess I don't understand it very well. Is it just that the nature of child rearing is different than the nature of widget manufacture? How does such a distinction really help anybody?

>Reproductive work in modern societies is the work that is done by governments
>e.g. education, policing, health etc. etc.
>
>It is the reproductive goods that are most threatened by the ecological
>consequences of Patriarchal Capitalism's juggernaut of greed.

Stupidity is gender neutral in my generation.

Not reading what is written and responding emotionally is not very clever either. I'm not just talking about gender!!!

Here's my tip then, take the gender loaded words out of your debates and use well recognized economic terms instead. So reproductive work is what most people call social services or public goods?

Here you may be surprised to find I agree totally. Just finished Bruce
Sterling's "Heavy Weather", been reading plenty of apocalyptic SF
lately. It just that I know the American people all to well an know that
while they will feel bad about people starving in where ever spuring them
to action requires something more, like a better deal. Like trains that so
350 KPH rather than cars that go 120 KPH. That's going to work far better
than guilt trips.

A 'gee whiz' gimmicky education system will do that sort of thing. Why do you think that a 'better deal' is going faster?
Insulting my education does not answer my basic objection to this whole thread, that all the good intentions, guilt trips etc. won't do a damn thing if people won't go along with you. And in this country we don't have to even listen to such talk. You have to offer a positive vision and realistic plans for action, which I see sorely lacking much of the chatter that passes for proposed social change.

Faster is better because you get where your going sooner, and damn near everybody likes that. Remember too that in my example it has to be much better since I live in a car happy culture that sees autos as an expression of personality and a form of recreation; the replacement for the auto will take something special if it is to succeed. This is just on example; want people to eat better? provide better food that busy folks can actually see themselves using (pasture meat instead of factory meat). Want them to live in "green built" homes? Start building them on a scale that makes them affordable and get bankers to loan at lower rates for such to reflect their lower operating costs and lowered externalities. Want green fuels and electricity? Tax fossil fuels and mandate dual fuel compatibility in new vehicles; offer reasonably priced conversions. All this is implementable and offerers people a better alternative than the status quo. Being cold in the dark is not a better deal and will never be perceived as such by the vast majority of my countrymyn.

> >
> > Mark:
> > Lets further be honest that this piggy society is FUN AS HELL!
>
>Having fun are we?

Damn right! Every day is fun in the first world! I love it!

I was of course referring to the people who weren't having fun...

I'm a little nutty here to; I think the goal of development should be getting the whole world to a point of comfort and security equivalent to living in the first world. Of course that's not possible by replicating the lifestyle of the USA, but with a little help from my twin pals technological advancement and sane design (PC), I think we can get there in 100 years or less. What we lack is vision and will.


>Mark wrote in response to Misha:
>
> > You seem to suffer from angry liberal syndrome, the unfortunate
> tendency to
> > lash out at
> > your less than pure allies rather than focus on the real problem, the
> > system that has us all trapped looking for enough $ or time or platform or
> > whatever to build a better world. I don't stand in your way, I am in fact
> > on your side.
> >
>
>This is paternalistic crap.
Like heck it is! This is a plea to not alienate the vast majority of
people who are not far left, self flagellating wet blankets. I like
winning elections, mass movements and saving the world; not just feeling
self riotous satisfied with ones own purity. If thats somehow beyond PC
then count me out.

Accusing someone of "lashing out" and then saying that "I am in fact on your side" is paternalism in my book. You're putting her down and assuming an air of moral superiority. Fulminating about "far left, self flagellating wet blankets" belongs in a letter to the editor of the National Enquirer not in a permaculture discussion group. You don't know anything about her or me to make such insulting generalizations.


I know what I read, and I hardly think I have gone too far given what a tirade the initial post was. If one decides to post their strong opinions, expect the same in return.


>There are no technical solutions only ethical ones.
>
>Bob Howard

Hogwash. Like these are somehow separate!


I didn't imply that they were.

Write more clearly then.


Most of us live in a technical society, and I'll guarantee right now no matter how bad it gets there will be technology to make it comfortable and pleasant for those who can pay for
it. Pursuing a benign technical future is no shameful venture, and in fact
has a far greater chance of succeeding in saving the world than all the
brow beating and guilt you or anyone else can generate.
I'm not interested in brow beating or guilt any more than you are. But it does seem like the pot calling the kettle black here.


Possible, I am an American after all, some of us do shoot from the hip (lip?)


Go back and read
what I wrote the first time and look at how much I agree with MGS;
especially the C tax (which is the key to getting people making more
rational decisions). I don't expect people to love all my opinions, but
for goddess sake MAKE COMMON GROUND on the aspects that are essential and
agreeable.


Good perhaps you too can read what is being written rather than responding to your prejudices.

This is why I generally go point by point when responding, I like everyone else have my prejudices, and may be a little strong when responding to some of this. As I said, my goal is a MASS MOVEMENT, a-political, non sectarian and focused on saving the world. If I challenge people to tone down their rhetoric it is because I am so politically oriented and know how a lot of stuff gets misused to marginalize movements like PC to the fringes. Anyway, I know all your hearts are more less in the right place, carry on comrades - just keep the door open for everybody OK?

Have a good day

Bob Howard


And you as well.
Mark Ludwig




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