Accountability and Working for Change


The goal-always- has to be- to right the wrong.

Find the wrong.
Determine the root cause.
Find the solution.
Do the work-whatever it takes- to right the wrong.

   With our present political system; with the lobbying of special interest groups; with what now amounts to overt buying of political office by campaign contributions- it is easy to see things that are wrong, but very difficult to arrive at a consensus as to the cause, solution, or to move forward to make things right. The polarization of partisan politics has become a spectacle of inertia, as time ticks away and resources- natural resources, financial resources, the resource of international good will- are progressively depleted. We have lost the will to make things right.

1. The Rights of nature

  http://www.awakeningthedreamer.org/

  http://www.pachamama.org/our-work/rights-of-nature

'Establishing a Legal Basis for Protecting Our Planet

'Rights of Nature

'Recognize the Earth and all its ecosystems as a living being with inalienable rights: to exist, to live free of cruel treatment, to maintain vital processes necessary for the harmonious balance that supports all life.

'Supporting the inclusion of Rights of Nature in the 2008 Ecuadorean Constitution, making Ecuador the first country in history to do so, and ensuring the enforcement at a local level.'

global alliance for the rights of nature
http://therightsofnature.org/

'What is Rights of Nature?

'Rights of Nature is the recognition and honoring that Nature has rights. It is the recognition that our ecosystems – including trees, oceans, animals, mountains – have rights just as human beings have rights. Rights of Nature is about balancing what is good for human beings against what is good for other species, what is good for the planet as a world. It is the holistic recognition that all life, all ecosystems on our planet are deeply intertwined.
'Rather than treating nature as property under the law, rights of nature acknowledges that nature in all its life forms has the right to exist, persist, maintain and regenerate its vital cycles.
'And we – the people – have the legal authority and responsibility to enforce these rights on behalf of ecosystems. The ecosystem itself can be named as the defendant.
'For indigenous cultures around the world recognizing rights of nature is simply what is so. All life, including human life, are deeply connected. Decisions and values are based on what is good for the whole.
'Nonetheless, for millennia legal systems around the world have treated land and nature as “property”. Laws and contracts are written to protect the property rights of individuals, corporations and other legal entities. As such environmental protection laws actually legalize environmental harm by regulating how much polution or destruction of nature can occur within the law. Under such law, nature and all of its non-human elements have no standing.
'By recognizing rights of nature in its constitution, Ecuador - and a growing number of communities in the United States – are basing their environmental protection systems on the premise that nature has inalienable rights, just as humans do. This premise is a radical but natural departure from the assumption that nature is property under the law.'

Rights of Mother Earth

Proposal; Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth

  http://pwccc.wordpress.com/programa/



Peoples Agreement; World People’s Conference on Climate Changeand the Rights of Mother Earth

http://pwccc.wordpress.com/support/

   I want to support this, but my gut feeling is that it is a slippery slope of legal precedent; good in theory, but leaving way too many ways in which it can be twisted to deny human rights of one group and covertly promote the aims of another group.
   Advocacy for Nature is in fact key. If we hurt our mother, we hurt ourselves. If we kill our mother, we kill ourselves. Justice is necessary, but judgment cannot be left in the hands of corrupt individuals, . 'Who shall guard the guardians?' Who has the wisdom to see all things and judge fairly?
   And yet, as I look out the window at my animals and the ecosystem that I love- at my mother- my answer is- We do- we have to; have the wisdom to see and judge fairly.
   I think part of what is disturbing me is that these documents propose waging change on a political and national level- and I have a conviction that the change must come from each person, in the heart, in their relationship with The Mother.
And yet, major damage is being done by multinationals, by nations such as ours, manipulating currency and trade, taking an unfair share of resources, and dealing duplicitously with weaker nations. If ill is done at such a large scale, then solutions have to be large scale.
   We must also recognize that in our attitudes, our patterns of consumption and behavior, ill is also being done at the individual level. We have been given such an extreme picture of entitlement- 'subdue the earth' from the Biblical story on to Manifest Destiny- that I know many people who simply WILL NOT see this truth. They feel they have a God-given right to act the way they do.

   A Fox News report on the subject, you tube link included which works if you know Spanish;

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/04/25/obama-adviser-van-jones-helping-push-rights-mother-nature/

2. The problem with money, and how people are trying to solve it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monetary_reform

   This mentions the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, notable for making micro-loans, beginning in 1976, to small groups of impoverished members of the community (mostly women). The founder received the Nobel Peace Prize for his work in 2006. One of the interesting factors involved in the lending process was the inclusion of a set of vales ('the Sixteen Decisions) which are believed to produce parallel and beneficial social and behavioral changes among the borrowers. It is believed that this is far more effective than charity or the conventional 'welfare' system. Thus was included a major piece of social engineering which, by its enunciated goals, makes clear the societal deficencies it is intending to remedy.

The Sixteen Decisions
  1. We shall follow and advance the four principles of Grameen Bank: Discipline, Unity, Courage and Hard work – in all walks of our lives.
  2. Prosperity we shall bring to our families.
  3. We shall not live in dilapidated houses. We shall repair our houses and work towards constructing new houses at the earliest.
  4. We shall grow vegetables all the year round. We shall eat plenty of them and sell the surplus.
  5. During the plantation seasons, we shall plant as many seedlings as possible.
  6. We shall plan to keep our families small. We shall minimize our expenditures. We shall look after our health.
  7. We shall educate our children and ensure that they can earn to pay for their education.
  8. We shall always keep our children and the environment clean.
  9. We shall build and use pit-latrines.
  10. We shall drink water from tubewells. If it is not available, we shall boil water or use alum.
  11. We shall not take any dowry at our sons' weddings, neither shall we give any dowry at our daughter's wedding. We shall keep our centre free from the curse of dowry. We shall not practice child marriage.
  12. We shall not inflict any injustice on anyone, neither shall we allow anyone to do so.
  13. We shall collectively undertake bigger investments for higher incomes.
  14. We shall always be ready to help each other. If anyone is in difficulty, we shall all help him or her.
  15. If we come to know of any breach of discipline in any centre, we shall all go there and help restore discipline.
  16. We shall take part in all social activities collectively.
   Compare this to the current US morass of predatory lending, bank bailouts and massive defaults on loans and bankruptcies. We are making the wrong decisions, and trusting the wrong people, with our resources, with the capital that we have worked to get.

3. The Future of Nature

http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/mag/5863/

'...It is Orion’s fundamental conviction that humans are morally responsible for the world in which we live, and that the individual comes to sense this responsibility as he or she develops a personal bond with nature.' In reading this web site, i came across the following piece;

the_future_of_nature_teachers_guide.pdf
File Size: 464 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File
   See page 15; Moving Mountains, which in turn leads to

http://mountainroadshow.com/

http://vimeo.com/5914497

    Please enter your comments here