"In our dreams, we have seen another world, an honest world, a world decidedly more fair than the one in which we now live. We saw that in this world there was no need for armies; peace, justice, and liberty were so common that no one talked about them as far-off concepts, but as things such as bread, birds, air, water, like book and voice. This is how the good things were named in this world. And in this world there was reason and goodwill in the government, and the leaders were clear-thinking people; they ruled by obeying. This was not a dream from the past, it was not something that came to us from our ancestors. It came from ahead, from the next step we were going to take. And so we started to move forward to attain this dream., make it come and sit down at our tables, light our homes, grow in our cornfields, fill the hearts of our children, wipe our sweat, heal our history. And it was for all. This is what we want. Nothing more, nothing less.
Now we follow the path to our true heart, to ask it what we must do. We will return to our mountains to speak in our own tongue, and in our own time.
Thank you to the brothers and sisters who looked after us all these days. May your foot-steps follow our path. Good bye.
Liberty!
Justice!
Democracy!" ---from a letter to the peoples of Mexico, from Marcos, while hiding in the mountains.
This letter makes me want to address several points.
1) The idea that peace, liberty, and justice, are not just idealistic concepts, unable to be attained in unity. The idea that these concepts come from the voices of the people, not from dollars and cents, not from paper and pen. These are ideals to be lived...breathed! I am often chastised for my idealism in this area...."youthful ignorance" and the like. I find it absurd to shun or mock a person who believes that all men are truly created equal and should be afforded the right to live as such. To simply write off these goals, because there is no one visible answer, because there are too many mountains of opposition, is to roll over and die. To give up on the possibility of a life freely lived. My mind skips to Thoreau: "Law will never make a man free, it is men who must make the law free". If we keep overlooking injustice, in the name of the constitution, or in the name of convenience, or in the name of fear, or even cynicism, we overlook our greatest gift. The freedom of will, bestowed upon man, by either divinity or evolution, is what is at stake. To enslave a man to his economic position, to his race or religion, to his beliefs or his lack thereof....this is to enslave peace, liberty, and justice to these things. So what is the answer? Surely there cannot be one single solution....save beginning to live your life as a servant to these ideals.
2)The idea that our leaders should rule by obeying. My mind skips to Socrates. He believed, so greatly, that the laws of Athens were just, that he was willing to be imprisoned and die in obeying them. He refused to talk his way out of his sentence, knowing that to believe himself above the laws that sentenced him, would be to undermine his social contract to the state, going against the belief that the laws are just; that they nurture and educate its citizens. How novel a concept that our government should behave the same. We claim the Hellenic heritage, but fundamentally are against it. Our rulers believe to uphold the laws, they must be above them (as is seen time and time again in political scandal after political scandal....in the litany of amendments and exceptions placed upon the freedoms of the presidency and its adjacent offices...). How can a people have respect for the laws that its makers refuse to uphold? How can we have equality, if our rulers do not see themselves as our equals? There will continue to be injustice in the laws as long as freedom from the law is seen as a privilege and not a crime.
3)The idea that our history may be healed. We are a country shadowed by a dark past....and the shadow only continues to creep further under our doors. We have tried to shut out the memory of our actions towards the native americans during the colonization of our country, to cover up from our consciousness the treatment of our colored, our women, our children (something like one in four children in the united states are born into poverty, more than that are without health care). Our history seems to only grow darker. Testimonies by soldiers from iraq reveal the deception our government places on the reality of the war. Women, children, civilians, and mosques are bombed without cause or care. Few are even phased by these facts anymore, and it still continues. I have to believe there is hope. There can be healing. We cannot right the wrongs of the past....but we can stop those in the future. There is nothing more powerful than your voice. With it, you can pull the tide of change closer to the shore....washing away the dark shadows and hopefully bringing with it a better life for those who will come after us. A better life for those not yet marred by conflict and agenda.
I cannot allow myself to believe these are youthful ideals, or ignorant blisses. I am often discouraged by the state our government is in....particularly during the bleak time of these primaries. But I have come to realize small changes can make a significant difference. Taking action towards the changes you believe in does not require a certain candidate. It only requires daily devotion to the cause, kindness yet firmness, and the shedding of fear that your voice wont matter or be heard.
Showing posts with label zapaista. Show all posts
Showing posts with label zapaista. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
our word is our weapon
as of late, i have been making (a rather sordid) attempt at understanding just what, exactly, my political ideals are. Influences abound...and i am finding myself creating a political philosophy that pulls from the writings of robert heinlein, subcomandante marcos, and a recent re visitation to joe trippi. the common thread among these writtings:
change must come from within. a quote: "god forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion...what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time that this people preserve the spirit of resistance?" -- thomas jefferson. this then ties into mark twain..."when one finds that they are on the side of the majority, it is time to reform."
from marcos:
"zapatismo is not an ideology,
it is not a bought and paid for doctrine.
It is....an intuition.
Something so open and flexible that
it really occurs in all places.
Zapatismo poses the question:
'What is it that has excluded me?'
'What is it that has isolated me?'
...In each place the response is different.
Zapatismo simply states the question
and stipulates that the response is plural,
that the response is inclusive..."
It was once said to me that what happens, economically, to the U.S., hits twice as hard in mexico. this seems to be the reverse of the incitement of political reform/rebellion. surely one cannot deny the correlation between the indigenously driven zapatista movement, and the new "grassroots/netroots" political movement in the united states. (spearheaded by trippi during the presidential campaign of howard dean). dean repeatedly told us "the future lies in your hands, not mine." the unvanquished hunger of the unrepresented began to speak out. more than 640,000 individual donors and supporters rose to the call...more than any democrat before. dean said it himself, that he wanted to "forge a new American century from the bottom up." this is exactly the process by which marcos executed the ezln. describing the revolution as a snail, spiraling outward, enlisting civilian after civilian. (i could easily go on a tangent about the similarities in simple execution of ideas: taking on the advantages of the internet, grassroots campaigning, small budgets, local involvement before national focus, decentralized campaign stratagies, street art and youth involvement, etc etc etc). ( it should also be noted that howard is not the only one to have employed these strategies stateside....ron paul, mike huckabee, and bidden have all made similar attempts.)
marcos:
"she. has no military rank, no uniform, no weapon. Only she knows she is a Zapatista. Much liek the zapatistas, she has no face or name. she struggles for democracy, liberty, and justice, just like the zapatistas. she is part of what the EZLN calls "civil society"-- a people without a political party, who do not belong to "political society," made up of leaders of political parties. Rather, she is part of that amorphous yet solid part of society that says, day after day, 'enough is enough!'"
this brings me to another comparison: the rise of the female voice. so much of the zapatista movement if focused on women's liberation....on women having a voice and holding rank. it is not surprising, then, that the united states would now have a woman running for presidential office, and a number of women as front runners within the selection of vice presidential nominations. and it is about damn time. but that is another tangent....for my own benefit, i am just connecting threads at this point....
and so how does heinlein tie in?
specifically in "the moon is a harsh mistress" (incidentally written before either of these movements ever began, and a fine example of how sci-fi is one of the best predictors of the future (not just due to the socio-political ideas i am about to discuss, but also technologically....see the recent washington post article on the space shuttle business in new mexico)).
the book begins with the meeting of a revolutionary group composed of citizens of luna. they are making an attempt to overthrow a government that is exploiting not only their labor, but their resources. (sound a bit liek mesoamerica to anyone else?) eventually, the revolution is reorganized by a woman, wyoming, prof. bernado de la paz (translated as bear of peace...or bearer of peace), mike, a super computer (note the correlation between the influence and use of the internet and technology as a presence in reform movements) and mannie, an unsuspecting computer repairman. mannie (i wont read in too much to the verbal closeness to the name marco) lays out a structure which communication among members of the revolution should take place. a "self-healing crystal lattice" which "begins at a single fixture" (mike) and spirals outward. Marcos himself describes the zapatista movement as ...slowly moving forward; ever spiraling outward in a fully participatory democracy. there are more than just verbal parallels. from its onset, one of the main goals of the lunar rebellion is to restore the planets natural resources to the people, while reinstating traditional subsistence methods to counteract the depletion the planet has undergone under the reign of "lunar authority". this same sort of exploitation is what prompted the zapatista movement! the export of resources (more than 100,000 tons of coffee), with little to no return to the farmer, the abolishment of article 27, and government subsidized farming are what lead to the public emancipation from the mexican government. centralized around marcos, and elisa, the zapatista movement was one comprised not of people seeking political ideologies, but people seeking CHANGE. one zapatista stated " i watched m father die because there was no money in our village to buy him medicine for his stomache. That is why i went with the zapatistas....i decided to fight because if we're all going to die, it might as well be for something."
i refer now back to the earlier marcos quote...."zapatismo is not an ideology...." these words remind me of prof. bernado de la paz. wyoming is trying to make him agree to a few basic political tenets. he states "tell me the rule, dear woman, and i will tell you whether or not today i will obey it." this is the mentality of the zapatista. there are not rules...save the belief that change can happen....that there is a better way.
and so i cannot help but allow my mind to wrap back to the united states: the voices of the dissatisfied are growing louder. everyone i talk to is fed up with this political folly. our constitution has become a joke, a thing to find loop holes in. our political system is a corporate monopoly, and we are all painfully aware of our lack of connection to natural resources. the looming threat of economic depression has many thinking in "survival mode" and others wanting to flee liek rats from a ship. while some turn a blind eye to our own exploitation, it seems the majority are painfully aware. this excites me...for i can only hope that at some point, the spiral will form. radiating and powerful, perhaps we truly can make a real difference. sans laws and documents. sheer action. without fear of failure, because there can be none...there is only action and the lack of it.
i end with pablo neruda:
"the word
was born in the blood,
grew in the dark body, beating,
and took flight through the lips and mouth.
farther away and nearer
still, still it came
from dead fathers and from wandering races,
from lands which had turned to stone,
lands weary of their poor tribes,
for when grief took the roads
the people set out and arrived
and married new land and water
to grow their words again.
and so this is the inheritance;
this is the wavelength which connects us
with dead men and the dawning
of new beings not yet come to light."
change must come from within. a quote: "god forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion...what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time that this people preserve the spirit of resistance?" -- thomas jefferson. this then ties into mark twain..."when one finds that they are on the side of the majority, it is time to reform."
from marcos:
"zapatismo is not an ideology,
it is not a bought and paid for doctrine.
It is....an intuition.
Something so open and flexible that
it really occurs in all places.
Zapatismo poses the question:
'What is it that has excluded me?'
'What is it that has isolated me?'
...In each place the response is different.
Zapatismo simply states the question
and stipulates that the response is plural,
that the response is inclusive..."
It was once said to me that what happens, economically, to the U.S., hits twice as hard in mexico. this seems to be the reverse of the incitement of political reform/rebellion. surely one cannot deny the correlation between the indigenously driven zapatista movement, and the new "grassroots/netroots" political movement in the united states. (spearheaded by trippi during the presidential campaign of howard dean). dean repeatedly told us "the future lies in your hands, not mine." the unvanquished hunger of the unrepresented began to speak out. more than 640,000 individual donors and supporters rose to the call...more than any democrat before. dean said it himself, that he wanted to "forge a new American century from the bottom up." this is exactly the process by which marcos executed the ezln. describing the revolution as a snail, spiraling outward, enlisting civilian after civilian. (i could easily go on a tangent about the similarities in simple execution of ideas: taking on the advantages of the internet, grassroots campaigning, small budgets, local involvement before national focus, decentralized campaign stratagies, street art and youth involvement, etc etc etc). ( it should also be noted that howard is not the only one to have employed these strategies stateside....ron paul, mike huckabee, and bidden have all made similar attempts.)
marcos:
"she. has no military rank, no uniform, no weapon. Only she knows she is a Zapatista. Much liek the zapatistas, she has no face or name. she struggles for democracy, liberty, and justice, just like the zapatistas. she is part of what the EZLN calls "civil society"-- a people without a political party, who do not belong to "political society," made up of leaders of political parties. Rather, she is part of that amorphous yet solid part of society that says, day after day, 'enough is enough!'"
this brings me to another comparison: the rise of the female voice. so much of the zapatista movement if focused on women's liberation....on women having a voice and holding rank. it is not surprising, then, that the united states would now have a woman running for presidential office, and a number of women as front runners within the selection of vice presidential nominations. and it is about damn time. but that is another tangent....for my own benefit, i am just connecting threads at this point....
and so how does heinlein tie in?
specifically in "the moon is a harsh mistress" (incidentally written before either of these movements ever began, and a fine example of how sci-fi is one of the best predictors of the future (not just due to the socio-political ideas i am about to discuss, but also technologically....see the recent washington post article on the space shuttle business in new mexico)).
the book begins with the meeting of a revolutionary group composed of citizens of luna. they are making an attempt to overthrow a government that is exploiting not only their labor, but their resources. (sound a bit liek mesoamerica to anyone else?) eventually, the revolution is reorganized by a woman, wyoming, prof. bernado de la paz (translated as bear of peace...or bearer of peace), mike, a super computer (note the correlation between the influence and use of the internet and technology as a presence in reform movements) and mannie, an unsuspecting computer repairman. mannie (i wont read in too much to the verbal closeness to the name marco) lays out a structure which communication among members of the revolution should take place. a "self-healing crystal lattice" which "begins at a single fixture" (mike) and spirals outward. Marcos himself describes the zapatista movement as ...slowly moving forward; ever spiraling outward in a fully participatory democracy. there are more than just verbal parallels. from its onset, one of the main goals of the lunar rebellion is to restore the planets natural resources to the people, while reinstating traditional subsistence methods to counteract the depletion the planet has undergone under the reign of "lunar authority". this same sort of exploitation is what prompted the zapatista movement! the export of resources (more than 100,000 tons of coffee), with little to no return to the farmer, the abolishment of article 27, and government subsidized farming are what lead to the public emancipation from the mexican government. centralized around marcos, and elisa, the zapatista movement was one comprised not of people seeking political ideologies, but people seeking CHANGE. one zapatista stated " i watched m father die because there was no money in our village to buy him medicine for his stomache. That is why i went with the zapatistas....i decided to fight because if we're all going to die, it might as well be for something."
i refer now back to the earlier marcos quote...."zapatismo is not an ideology...." these words remind me of prof. bernado de la paz. wyoming is trying to make him agree to a few basic political tenets. he states "tell me the rule, dear woman, and i will tell you whether or not today i will obey it." this is the mentality of the zapatista. there are not rules...save the belief that change can happen....that there is a better way.
and so i cannot help but allow my mind to wrap back to the united states: the voices of the dissatisfied are growing louder. everyone i talk to is fed up with this political folly. our constitution has become a joke, a thing to find loop holes in. our political system is a corporate monopoly, and we are all painfully aware of our lack of connection to natural resources. the looming threat of economic depression has many thinking in "survival mode" and others wanting to flee liek rats from a ship. while some turn a blind eye to our own exploitation, it seems the majority are painfully aware. this excites me...for i can only hope that at some point, the spiral will form. radiating and powerful, perhaps we truly can make a real difference. sans laws and documents. sheer action. without fear of failure, because there can be none...there is only action and the lack of it.
i end with pablo neruda:
"the word
was born in the blood,
grew in the dark body, beating,
and took flight through the lips and mouth.
farther away and nearer
still, still it came
from dead fathers and from wandering races,
from lands which had turned to stone,
lands weary of their poor tribes,
for when grief took the roads
the people set out and arrived
and married new land and water
to grow their words again.
and so this is the inheritance;
this is the wavelength which connects us
with dead men and the dawning
of new beings not yet come to light."
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