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  • From: Keith Johnson <keithdj@mindspring.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] politics and permies
  • Date: Sat, 15 Dec 2007 14:26:04 -0500

Scott,
The original version is below with the italicized, bold sentences representing the parts removed. I considered removing the last paragraph, too. What do you think? My intent is to validate the design course and permaculture in general.
Keith



To my mind the very act of enrolling for a permaculture design
course is one

of the most political acts most people ever engage in. Since I have

certified over 3,000 people I feel that I have helped create a small
village

of active, engaged and aware folks who now have the tools to change the

reality around them - and many of them are very busy doing just that.


The very act of reading "Permaculture - A Design Manual" is extremely

radical and political as the information and realizations sink in of the

ultimate outcome of following the pc path. The beauty of permaculture has

always meant, to me, that I can travel all over the world in some of the

most brutal dictatorships espousing a revolutionary system of design and I

am considered harmless by the powers that be. That is an incredible

advantage folks, in a world that has become increasingly polarized by the

paranoia of rampant capitalism and lack of ethical guidance.


/*To state that pc practitioners in the first world are any less
political*/

/*than any other place is an exercise in one up man ship that may describe
the*/

/*feeling but not the reality. It would be something else to say that*/

/*permaculture in the third (developing - what ever) world is more
relevant*/

/*for survival than in the first then I would be the first to agree, if we
are*/

/*talking in the short term, but if we are talking in the not to distant*/

/*future I think it will be equally needed for survival in the whole
world*/

/*with the third world having a slight edge, just because they are a
couple of*/

/*generations closer to the land.*/


The effect of Permaculture worldwide is certainly more profoundly political

than Students for a Democratic Society of which I was a proud member for

several years. The primary difference being SDS was fighting against

something while permaculture is fighting for something. Within the ethical

guideposts of permaculture are contained all the political guidance one

could need. /* While changing laws and ordinances is good and necessary
work*/

/*it is extremely time consuming and deadening of spirit and I only resort
to*/

/*it when I see a real chance of succeeding otherwise I begin to feel a
little*/

/*bit like Don Quixote.*/


Most of what we understand to be politics, Democrat, Republican, Labor,

Communist, etc. are games that have been developed to keep us thinking that

we can make a difference by staying in the cultural/economic system and
that

we are involved in "democracy". It is an incredible demonic and clever way

of controlling an increasingly disenfranchised populace. For the most part
I

don't play except for the occasional trip to the polls in an attempt to
ease

the painful descent into the inevitable change that must come.
*//*

--
Keith Johnson
"Be fruitful and mulch apply."
Permaculture Activist Magazine
PO Box 5516, Bloomington, IN 47407
(812) 335-0383
http://www.permacultureactivist.net
http://www.PermacultureTradingPost.com
Switch to Solar Power the Easy Way
http://www.jointhesolution.com/KeithJ-SunPower
http://www.PowUr.com/KeithJ-SunPower
Blog: http://kjpermaculture.blogspot.com/
also Patterns for Abundance Design & Consulting
http://www.permacultureactivist.net/design/Designconsult.html
also Association for Regenerative Culture
http://www.ARCulture.org
also APPLE-Bloomington (Alliance for a Post-Petroleum Local Economy) It's a
small world after oil.
http://www.relocalize.net/groups/applebloomington
also Bloomington Permaculture Guild



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