We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Friday, May 6, 2016

Future Options: From Militarism And Monsanto To Gandhi And Bhaskar Save

Click here to access article by Colin Todhunter from his blog East by Northwest

Because this Britisher lived a number of years in India, he knows a lot about the disastrous effects that industrialized agricultural corporations have had on that country. To counter these disastrous effects on the minds of citizens, he writes how corporations manage the growing opposition to their destructive but very profitable practices.
...to ensure it remains ‘business as usual’, part of the message is that there is no alternative to the chemical-intensive, GMO model of farming. ...the companies they head or their associates have done everything possible (including bribery and fakery) to ensure their model dominates by smearing certain scientists, capturing trade bodies and negotiations, incorporating themselves within government policy and regulatory agencies, using the concept of ‘commercial confidentiality’ to justify a lack of transparency and by funding universities, media outlets and research with the ultimate aim of privileging their model of agriculture ahead of others, which they or their supporters seek to attack, discredit and marginalise.

The industry and its supporters attempt to wrap themselves in ‘free market’ ideology, while failing to acknowledge that any concept of ‘freedom’ that they attempt to associate with ‘the market’ has long been discredited.