Back to the unreal world!

So I arrived back from Chile to Australia on the 12th of April. If you have been following my blog or getting my emails while I have been away you know that I love to reflect on what I see and share my experiences with the world, however this dialogue will not be about the journey that has opened my mind and heart to the world. It will be about actions in the minority world of massive excess where most people have reasonable access to the things that the majority of the world don't but don't care enough to take action to fix the emergencies our way of life inflicts on the third world.

As all the biggest companies in the world prove with their human rights records - Capitalism Kills! At best they exploit more often their actions to maintain their interests go much further whenever they think they can get away with it.

Part of the reason that I started this blog and decided to send emails to everyone I know is because I believe that it is an effective way to create change. I know this is true by the overwhelming number of people who respond with their thoughts about issues I have brought up.

Other the things I have done which fit with the way I think about the world include:
* Joining Amnesty international and a member, donor and employee (Fundraiser)
* Blogging my thoughts and experience and encourage people I meet to browse them to get to know more about me and what I care about
* Encouraging dialogue with people from all over the world to get their thoughts and engage debate about important things
* Decreasing my consumption as a consumer. (This is in response to the actions and advertising of big sellers. It has allowed me to travel the world (financial benefit), donate money to people who need it more than I need new shoes, music CD's etc. and not endorse companies that I don't agree with the practices of or wealth distribution)
* Choosing small vendors and companies in Latin America as a way to support local economy and development rather than multinational companies (for example Wal-Mart owns a number of supermarkets chains in Latin America, I strongly disagree with the fundamentals of the biggest company in the world and never support them with my patronage)
* Not driving because it’s not essential for me now.
* Reading about the issues of the world. The history behind current issues is often the key to their solutions
* Applying for Uni to study international development and political development
* Writing letters to government at home and abroad about issues that need to be addressed by government
* Making contact with more people who believe in taking action to create a better world
* Becoming vegetarian because of the inhumane treatment of animals in mass production farming, the health implications of poor quality produce that we are being fed and the environmental costs of farming including: destroying water sources; using scarce water supplies; damage to land; gas emissions both by animals and in transport.
* Supporting the causes of others which I agree with through signing petitions or taking on membership
* Companies that I avoid at all cost include Coke (www.killercoke.org - they are a militant organisation responsible for death and their product is toxic even when it's not filled with pesticides), McDonalds (mcspotlight.org)

I am a little embarrassed by this list because I know that there is so much more that I can do and that what I have done doesn't really fit with the passion that I have for a better world.

To know something is wrong is important but really if we know something is wrong and our lives and actions don't fit with what we know is right we are really being complicit in the things that we don't agree with. In democracy we wear the responsibility for the actions of our governments.

If I become complacent about the worlds problems I make an effort to look through the eyes of the victims. I read a little, watch some movies, check-out some documentaries, look at the newspaper critically with an open-heart or listen to musicians who take on the biggest issues of their times (Bob Dylan, Rage Against the Machine, SOAD, NOFX, Pink Floyd, Michael Franti or whoever else gets your blood flowing!)

If I get a feeling of being overwhelmed I look at what others are doing and the things that have been achieved in the past by people who care about creating a better world.

My journey is trying to be the change I want to see in the world - as prescribed by Ghandi.

Please tell me about any actions you take to try to make a positive influence on the world and think about those, which endorse the problems of the world (we all have these). If currently don’t take any action why not? Every action has significance.

Only when we come together can the world become a better place.

Love for people and love for the earth over corporate dictatorships, destruction and militarisation.

Try the link for a funny look at the world of politics.
http://www.thepeoplescube.com/red/viewtopic.php%3Fp%3D615%26sid%3D4387d09a19f598587033c6af3b613516&h=239&w=200&sz=11&hl=en&start=6&um=1&tbnid=2gcZ-3VQIPmVVM:&tbnh=109&tbnw=91&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dcapitalism%2Bkills%26svnum%3D10%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dsafari%26rls%3Den-us%26sa%3DN

Iraqis vs Soldiers. White American Activists Vs Mexican

Ok I just read this article below which hit right on the head of a nail I have been thinking about for sometime. That sharp implement that I wish to build this post with is the idea of the worth of a life.

A few notes before I can leave you to the article about Oaxaca a place I wrote about in a 2006 post before the death of Brad Will.

* Under the blockade in Iraq between the first and second imperial wars waged for control of this country 1 500 000 people died because of lack of medical supplies and food. The things needed to survive in a war zone or any other. Madeline Albright was asked if the lives of 500 000 children claimed by these sanction was a price worth paying, (to encourage the Iraqi's to push for a regime change) she answered, "It's difficult but yes I think it's a price worth paying." If this was a statement made about condemning 1 500 000 Jews to death during the Holocaust (6 000 000 is a number thrown up to cover all those exterminated by the Nazi's from Gays to Poles to Communists, Anarchists and Jews) people would look on it with disgust and condemnation yet in the case of the US they are able to march on from Clinton to Bush to commit genocide all over again with support from blind and or stupid little brothers John and Tony. Fortunately the UN Security Council were not all swayed which made this pre-emptive war illegal.

* When a reporter or soldier is killed in Iraq there are photos of the victim along with words from the family in order to invoke the human emotions associated with death. When 300 Iraqi's die at the hands of another Iraqi, (as a direct result of the illegal intervention by the imperial masters) it's just a number. Surely among these figures we see every day are pregnant woman, teachers, taxi drivers and school children play in the street, people just like you and me. These deaths are not reported as losses to the world, Iraqi's are not better nor worse than Australian's or American's or British, in fact they never asked to participate in this war. They didn't fly to get to this foreign location. They are just living in the country they are born. Is it any wonder that people are resorting to violence to end the occupation they never asked for. (Even those who wanted Sadaam out didn't want their country to move into a new military dictatorship more violent than the last.)

Consider Eric's point about society and the left.

Brad Will death and Racism in the North
by Eric Monday, Oct 30 2006, 10:01pm
north america / mexico / the left / non anarchist press

How White Privilege Teaches Us to Value Certain Lives Over Others

This past Friday, October 27, 2006, at least five unarmed people were killed on the streets of Oaxaca City, Oaxaca. One of them happened to be a young, white, male, American anarchist, working for the radical media outlet “indymedia.org” named Brad Will. Now it is no surprise that the Corporate American media would jump on a story where any American is shot dead in the streets of a third world country, but that same mentality has trickled down across leftist/independent news resources like those of infoshop.org, indymedia.org, Democracynow.org, and others, to the point where the popular struggle in the streets of Oaxaca, is only a legitimate struggle now that Brad Will was killed. This Brings up many interesting questions of how the radical left in the United States views itself in the context of a global struggle.
I’m not going to pretend to understand, or have lived the struggle that people of colour, especially Blacks and Latinos, go through in this country, as I am myself, a white American. However, we have some real issues of racism within our movement that must be confronted in our everyday lives and in our organizing that many have witnessed this past weekend.

This past Friday, October 27, 2006, at least five unarmed people were killed on the streets of Oaxaca City, Oaxaca. One of them happened to be a young, white, male, American anarchist, working for the radical media outlet “indymedia.org” named Brad Will. Now it is no surprise that the Corporate American media would jump on a story where any American is shot dead in the streets of a third world country, but that same mentality has trickled down across leftist/independent news resources like those of infoshop.org, indymedia.org, Democracynow.org, and others, to the point where the popular struggle in the streets of Oaxaca, is only a legitimate struggle now that Brad Will was killed. This Brings up many interesting questions of how the radical left in the United States views itself in the context of a global struggle.

Out of the 5 people murdered on the streets last Friday, how many pictures have we seen of them? And compared to how many pictures we have seen of Brad Will? Will we ever know, or pursue, the story of the teacher shot down just a short time later by the paramilitaries? Will we recognize her life by blockading the Mexican consulates in her name? Will there by calls to action only after Americans are killed? How many calls to action read “In memory of Brad and…”? Is this really how we value life? Do we believe 3000 lives on 9/11 are more important than the million and a half killed in Iraq during the sanctions? Are we really going to condemn our government, while at the same time replicating it’s own bigoted mentalities? This is dancing on the rough edges of nationalism.

Since the uprising began in Oaxaca, the police and other paid agents of the state, have been murdering and disappearing people on a weekly, if not daily basis. And where were our blockades then, comrades? Where was our solidarity? Left on the sidelines for us to live out our privileged lives here in the US, until we see potential? Until we see a revolution to Capitalize on? How many Mexican lives is worth an American? How many Mexican-American radicals have been told that solidarity actions with Oaxaca weren’t as crucial as some other type of organizing?

The most widespread action in the US in support of the APPO and the greater struggle in Oaxaca, has only now surfaced within a matter of days. Infoshop.org has ran a headline since Friday, “NYC Indymedia Journalist Killed; Protests Scheduled; Updates From Oaxaca.” Now normally, I believe infoshop runs a headline for 1 to 2 days, this headline has ran for 4 days. The organizers of a speaking tour of APPO delegates in Los Angeles have been overwhelmed with phone calls since Brad Will’s death. Democracy Now has dedicated almost the entirety of today’s programs to the life and death of Brad Will. People are excited, they are optimistic, they see potential. And yes, there is reason to be excited, we are living in a time where the fascists have to send in Federal troops to once again attempt to break the strikes. Their police forces can no longer take us, and their authority, as well as legitimacy, is being challenged all over the world. But we must not patronize the people of Oaxaca, now that we realize they have an amazing fight to fight. We cannot jump on the revolutionary band wagon and ride out the heroic end of the struggle, now that they have created their own radical potential. This all nearly replicates the lives Mexican American live in this country, and is a reflection of this white privileged/supremacist mentality that has been conditioned into us. Example: Mexican labor, has created so much of the wealth and resources we have here in the United States, especially in the Southwest, and yet the Mexican American population’s wealth comes nowhere near those numbers- The Anglo American society benefits. And in Oaxaca, the people have labored, and struggled, and sacrificed their lives, and now that we see all that they have done, we seek to, at least, call it our own, and at worst (and what I fear the most) co-opt it.


The lifting of Brad Will’s death over all other faceless, nameless Mexicans, is just one further example of the racism that people of color experience even in what is supposed to be ‘safe settings.’ White Supremacy has deep roots in this country, but the struggle against oppression, in all it’s forms must be one of an International sense. I pledge no allegiance to the United States, however I love the communities that I live in, and the streets that I’m from, just as the strong companeros and companeras do south of us, when they fly their red white and green. We must confront out racist conditioning day by day, but continue our organizing and fight all the oppressions that we have been taught, and those that we witness. Call out your white comrades, because if you don’t, what kind of comrade does that make you?


In solidarity with ALL the lost lives in the struggle for freedom,

Eric, pathology@graffiti.net

Murdured, tortured children and thier stolen babies. Plaza 5 de Mayo Grandmothers

Plaza 5 de Mayo (Plaza of the 5th of May) is the meeting place for the mothers and grandmothers of the dirty war in Argentina that began with a military coup of the 24th of May 1976 and lasted until 1983. The regime was responsible for the disappearance of 30 000 individuals from various left wing and social organisations in an effort to suppress opposition to the new economy they wished to create. The government succeeded in creating a new economy with economic power in the hands of the privileged. Wages and unemployment benefits were eroded to decrease business expenditure while civil liberties were destroyed with kidnappings, tortures and executions of those that opposed or may have had an interest in opposing these changes.

The stories told in the award winning film "Botin de Guerra" (Spoils of war) describes the kidnapping of pregnant women who were kept alive in special cells until they gave birth, they would then be executed and the baby adopted anonymously. These children, along with those stolen away from their parents as infants, were sent to live with other families (sometimes those of the extreme right involved in the killings). The documentary tells the story of these children who learn about the fate of their parents, who their adoption parents really are and the fight of their relatives to find them.

In 1983 when the dictatorship fell their was an expectation that justice would be served by the new leader and impunity for the perpetrators would end but this was not to be the case. There were a number of convictions and life sentences handed out to some of the worst criminals of the time but this soothing justice was taken away from them when President Menem announced that the black time in Argentina's past was to be forgotten and all criminals would be pardoned. This was met with massive protest, which were not heard by the leader.

In the background to all this is "Operation Condor" designed by the CIA in 1974, run out of U.S. controlled Panama, to end the influence of the left (the so called communist threat) in South America. It was to target possible troublemakers and provide direction for all the countries in the southern cone of Latin America and would later extend to include Peru and Ecuador. Henry Kissinger who was responsible for many part of U.S. foreign policy at the time is now wanted in Chile and Uruguay for his crimes in these countries and is considered by many in Argentina to be as ruthless a killer as Hitler. He was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate in 1973. The United States government have kept him from trial and justice.

The wikipedia version of these events casts doubt over the involvement of the U.S. There have been quotes released from Kissinger and his people directly advocating torture and execution which were on TV in Argentina on the day of commemoration which leave no doubt that he should be charged for his crimes along with many other members of the U.S. government who have been involved in subversive acts to undermine democracy around the world.

May the atrocity of using all possible means to meet economic and political means one day a thing of the past! End the war in Iraq and Afghanistan!

Robin Hood or just innate knowledge of what is right!

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN1123415520070411
If the US (Western world) have this trait for compassion after being taught that "man eat man" and "the strongest will survive" is the way society should be there is hope for us all!

There will be no prison which can hold our movement down. Huey Newton

I see the human race as a people being stabbed, poisoned, kicked, bitten and sodomised by a brutal machine which has no heart, no blood and no consciousness of thought. There are many good people in the world putting band-aids on the wounds of this people and performing resuscitation to maintain it's pulse. There are people which remain asleep, unaware of the damage, busy with something which obscures the realisation that they are feeding the machine.

I want to be one of the ones attacking the machine!

Those giving out the band-aids are seen as great kind-hearted people by the sleepers. Those attacking the machine are a noise which annoys the sleepers but rarely suffices to wake them.

Thoughts and Actions!

Friends,

Time for some conclusions and a statement of intent.

My trip has a little less than 3 weeks remaining. I have been to 21 countries in Europe and Latin America with only Chile remaining. I left home looking for a clearer path and a better understanding of the world I live in. I wanted to speak another language and know another life. For the most part I feel that I have achieved these goals, some thoughts of which I have shared with my mailing list and those who've been to my blog ( http://www.searchingforchange.blogspot.com/). With so little time remaining and almost a year passed I do feel like I have gained a lot from my trip.

I left a confused man with a fire smouldering inside me about something I couldn't put into words. I didn't share my thoughts about with many people but now I´m ready to return. I have learnt to share these thoughts and with them in the open air they have been able to transform into a fire. For what do I burn?

I want a better world.
That´s clear and a thought that I´m sure everybody has at some time in there life whether it's: as a child learning that there are children starving in Africa in a world with an overproduction of food; as a teen unhappy with the prospect of becoming a slave to a wage and a mortgage; as a college student seeing people young and old dying in war all over the world for a needless greed or a tyrannical leader; or as an old man on a park bench wondering why a life's work hasn't left him with enough to live on cursing the corruption of politics and the history they have lived to see repeated. I want a better world.

So what does it mean?
Everybody knows that governments have the power and young people are idealists who will sooner or later fall to the system and into silence. So I guess that leaves me with some weeks, months or years of idealism before I´m muzzled by my own quest for a house and car.. ..

What am I complaining about?


This child was a victim of the 2003 bombing in Iraq.

1. War (Blanket bombing as a war tactic) - The cost of war is increasingly paid by citizens innocent of whatever crimes there government may have invoked war (in Iraq its 80% civilian deaths, Vietnam was more than 50%, WW1 was 20%). The threat of more war the means used and nuclear proliferation are all a call to action!


2. Misinformation by media and use of propaganda to manufacture consent (more people have been in the street to protest the Iraq war in the US than went to the streets against Vietnam but still the media debates fringe arguments neither of which condemn an illegal war.)

3. "Democracy" - It´s the catchphrase of the US government used to justify war and sabotage of every movement which threatens the western model of capitalism. Strong words such as "fascist" and "dictatorship" have been used sometimes with and sometimes without justification to describe the governments of all that opposed modern day capitalism, in Russia, Vietnam, Latin America and other third world nations. In the rich world this prized word disgraces us all if the world that we are running is democratic. We cannot separate ourselves from our government if we believe that we live in democracy. If we don´t live in democracy what do we live in? If we want democracy what are we doing about it?


Democracy is really the issue . .
*If we have a democracy in Australia what kind of people are we going to war with Iraq killing more than a million of their citizens.
*Why are we opting out of the Kyoto protocol which would have allowed us to continue as the most polluting country per capita?!
*Why do we have a sub-population of Australian's, who have been persecuted in a way that should be condemned all over the world and is by those who know about it, continuing with a life expectancy of 20 years less than their non-indigenous country men.
*If we are so free what are we doing with this freedom
*How can we even debate about whether the wars waged are just or not when none of us live through this in our own country?

Throughout my trip I have had people telling me that people are bad. There are bad people everywhere that I need to be scared of robbing me stabbing me or kidnapping me. I acknowledge this is a possibility but where does the blame for this lie? To me it's clear that desperate people do desperate things. I would steal if I was hungry without food. I would probably steal if I grew up in a broken home in a bad neighbourhood and I wanted drugs or a new phone or a gold chain! I believe that it is the social environment that we live in that creates these "bad people. "


The German citizens supported the Nazi's just as the US government had majority support from its citizens in polls at the beginning of its wars in Vietnam and Iraq. (Not all US citizens can see that there government has been willing to go to any length to maintain its economic status but when you learn about them testing chemical weapons on their own citizens and soldiers its not hard to see how they could torture in Guantanamo or train in the art of torture at the School of the Americas.) Does this mean that people in the US or Nazi Germany are bad people? I don´t believe it is so. I think these people were born or educated into a way of thinking which allowed there governments to carry out acts which they themselves would describe as inhumane in a different time or from a different point of view!

What I´m getting at here is where I get my hope from. I think that people have innate traits of compassion, empathy and solidarity. This can be seen in all groups of people who identify with each other whether it be a team, rural community or family. I believe in the human ability to survive through terrible events to achieve great things. I believe in the human ability to create and innovate and one day that this will be for the good of man rather than for the dollar. (Even medical research is made obscured by the inability for us deliver drinkable water and food to all the people of the world or affordable AIDS drugs to the parts of the world most effected). All the barriers that we have to a peaceful livable world such as nuclear proliferation and capitalist materialist consumer driven pollution can be overcome.

The root of the problem?
I see a world where most government driven conflict and suffering comes from economic roots whether for mineral or oil rich lands or to maintain a global the global system of exploitation known as the global free market economy. I see a world were most local crime is driven by bad social circumstances and lack of education. People are scrambling to survive and feed real and imaginary needs by any means.

Conclusions?
I believe we need a global system of co-operation not competition. As demonstrated by the European union, where countries are economically working together war becomes unthinkable. (The probability of a French - German war while the EU exists in zero! Nobody thought that was possible 100 years ago). We need a new system of mutual interest internationally to work the same way that the nation-state has ended intra-country regional wars in the developed world.

Locally we need money for education, we need children to be supported by parents, we need sick people to be able to see doctors. When we end the fear of hunger and sleeping on the streets crime will fall! When we concede that drug addicts are citizens that need help not jail crime rates will fall! When we stop teaching about bad people, just wars and that killing is cool, crime rates will fall!


Why don´t we have the environmental reforms and peace agreements that all citizens fundamentally want ?(Air, food and water that won´t poison them and security they are not going to be shot or blow-up.)
I think the best explanations I have come across are from "The Corporation" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pin8fbdGV9Y http://www.thecorporation.com/) which explains the why and Noam Chomsky´s "Understanding Power" ( www.amazon.com/Understanding-Power-Indispensable-Chomsky-Noam/dp/1565847032) which explains everything! If I was to put it in 2 sentences. Business goals have come to influence media and government in such a way the both people and government are acting in ways which don't represent their purpose. People are educated that they must live in a way that meets the needs of business and governments are not representing what their populations really want because they need financial backing and media support to retain power. Nowhere is this more clear than the US who´s reforms are spreading across the developed world causing a scramble for third world lands and labour to exploit to stay ahead in the competition of economy. The drive for lower prices is the same thing that drives worse working conditions, worse pay, fewer environmental controls, lower corporate taxes, higher personal taxes, less money for welfare etc. The means the US has been willing to go to in order to enforce this system is best explained by Bill Blum´s, Rogue State - A guide to the world's only superpower.


What can I do?
1. Become more informed through formal and informal study.
2. Join organisations (such as Standup.org.au , Greenpeace and whichever others fit with that I'm thinking)
3. Try to meet other people that think about things like I do that are involved in actions that meet with the change I want to see
4. Encourage people to take their own journey to be more informed about the wold
5. Encourage people who are not content with the world they live in to take actions to help a transition toward the world they would like to live in.
6. Continue to look for ways to take action


So when I get home this is what I will be dedicating myself to. What I´m hoping for by sending this email is for a small part to tell people what I´m doing but for a much bigger part a call for support. I would love to hear not only about which ideas you support and disagree with but about where you see the future, what advice you have for me, what you are doing . . .

This is a call please give me something!

With love,
Keegan Smith
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-c4Cc09aETU








(Me with Fernando my crack addict friend in Colombia http://searchingforchange.blogspot.com/2007/01/fernando-can-you-hear-him.html.)
We need to end the war on drugs. It´s killing people all over the world for the secret economy that has grown every year without impediment. It turns our brothers and friends into criminals for something which hasn't harmed anyone but themselves. It puts addicts on the streets, on the edge of society making them a danger to themselves with unsafe practices and to the rest of society with their need to get money without a job to feed their chemical needs.


I hate to say it but "I told you so" - George Orwell

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYRx_GmFIwI&mode=related&search=

Che

Well I'm finally in Argentina. The place where "Che" means "mate". It´s also how Ernesto "Che" Guevara got his nickname when he was organising with Fidel Castro to invade Cuba. I spent a bit of time reading today some of Che´s writings from http://www.che-lives.com/home/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=2 If you take a glance its very intense stuff. I have read about him before in Biographies and 2 of his diaries but even still this took my thoughts about him to a new place. It´s obvious that he was a very intelligent and had a vivid image of what he wanted to be a part of. He demanded amazing discipline from himself and all those around him both in the time of revolutionary struggle and as a government official. He was known for working through the night into daylight regularly. I admire the self-discipline and dedication that he had for what he believed in.

In this letter he explains why the socialist citizen has more liberty than a citizen under a capitalist regime. He describes the ideal of listening to the demands of the people and making all decisions with them in mind which will in turn be endorsed by the people and carried out with enthusiasm. This is the way that he came to think after travelling through Latin-America and seeing the suffering and repression at the hands of imperialist backed regimes. (Motorcycle diaries and before he was involved with Fidel in Mexico). If you have seen "motorcycle diaries" or read the book it is clear that he experienced a big change both during that trip and in the time between then and his writings in Cuba. My point is that everyone is in a different stage of awareness about the world and many will never cross paths. This is something I have thought about before when dreaming about a united world. The education and experiences that separate people that Che also talks about as a key to uniting them. The influence of there fellow citizens in encouraging consciousness and understanding of political life.

My conclusion is that even Che himself probably would not have fit within his ideas for the "new man" before his trip in Latin America and that people cannot be forced into thinking about the world much less to come to the same conclusions.

I see him as an example of what man is capable for his qualities of passion and belief in human capabilities. I also know that he executed a traitor that nobody wanted to execute then described the entry and exit wounds of the bullet and recounted that he slept very well that night with no trouble from his famous respiratory ailments