As a subscriber, I honor and respect that this is your forum. I am not sure whether you want a dialogue or if this Substack is only for people who already agree with you. That would be perfectly fine. Just let me know.
I am in general alignment with the need for systems transformation and have been working on just that for more than forty years at the practical level of local community.
I am trying to wrap my head around your guiding principle - "Belonging: build for the 100%. We believe humanity can create an “us” without a “them” ... and your stated desire to build a more "left" and "progressive" movement whose aim is to defeat the far-right, as an existential and authoritarian threat to democracy.
I viewed the video and the need to fight authoritarianism -- I would argue that we already live in an authoritarian country, where the main threat is oligarchic power and economic inequality brought by both the Left wing and Right wing. I want to point out that it was President Obama who doubled down on the power of the US and global financial systems in the wake of 2008 financial crisis. Now, global banking and financial power is even more entrenched and money has an even greater impact on politics. Now, we are in a system pitting every local region and its economy against a top-down extractive set up.
You could argue that we are now closer to a true Global Oligarchy, a sort of Techno-Feudalism. I would say that the Left has themselves contributed to the current authoritarian system.
It seems like the Left have been uncritical of their support for the development of this system of Corporatism, because they have had other objectives in their quest for using electoral power -- issues around race, LGBQT, and gender.
Right now, it seems to me, we need to build a grassroots movement capable of inspiring inclusion of both left and right around basic community needs. In order to do that, people would have to trust that it did not have any agenda promoting what is now considered Left or Right.
thanks Richard for the comment, and for the opportunity to add more nuance to my shorthand here. I would say I generally agree with you, and perhaps it's a question of what we mean when we say Left. I think the terms Left and Right have largely lost their meaning: I think of the Democratic party as a center-right party by historical standards, e.g., and see Obama as a fundamentally centrist figure (so too with Biden and Harris).
I reluctantly use Left here as a heuristic (in the same way I might say progressive: primarily to distinguish my radicalism--which is rooted in a commitment to belonging and not othering--from far-right radicalism, which is based on othering and supremacy). I talked more about this, and the complexity/nuance in these terms here (I identify with the worldview that I characterize as "indigenous"): https://citizenstout.substack.com/p/polarization-isnt-the-problem-its
in this post I'm talking about electoral politics in America, which in 2024 as you know still consists of a two-party system (and while i support efforts to break that framework, as with what the Working Families Party is doing, for this year we have two viable parties). While in general I'm interested in building an inclusive movement that rejects win/lose framing, in the context of an election I think it is imperative to defeat authoritarianism... which unfortunately, is now represented by the Republican party and Trump as the standard-bearer. as a matter of simple description of ideology and behavior, I think that is beyond dispute.
this does not mean that all who support him or the party are intending to support authoritarianism; which is why I think it is incumbent upon us (who aspire to what I call the indigenous worldview) to offer a compelling and inclusive vision that attends to the needs of all (which so far, the Democratic party has been unable to do). to me that vision is largely synonymous with how I understand the ambitions of social justice (which is what I mean when I talk about the Left as shorthand).
Thank you for taking the time to respond so clearly. I figured that the post was in the context of the urgency of the upcoming election and how, to some extant, may not be your movement framing in general.
I suppose, by the look of it, I have you on age - I know that doesn't necessarily translate as Wisdom! I remember the Reagan era -- 1981 + so more than 44 years ago and I saw the same demonization of both sides, where each saw the other as an existential threat. I was an anti-nuclear movement organizer (at 22years old) doing training in non-violent civil disobedience.
While I do understand the focus on the upcoming election, the ratio of grassroots movement building (in my frame, what I call Symbiotic Culture and Networking) to electoral political work is infinitesimal. Most of our consciousness is sucked out from us into what I call a Culture of Separation, like an energy vampire, with its worldview of materialism, really physicalism. This has been going on my entire lifetime and now accelerating because of social media and algorithms fueled by AI targeting us.
I guess I believe we are already in an authoritarian time and both parties are an existential threat because they will both further entrench Global Oligarchy, while the elites of both parties (and what I call the Everything Industrial Complex) consciously divides us all the way down from global to the grassroots in sideshow Culture Wars.
So, I been watching this show for quite a while. I don't believe any of the traditional political framing can help us move forward whether now or after the election. That's because I believe we are in a deeper spiritual crisis, where our materialistic society has become unhinged and unmoored from a deeper spiritual AND natural reality of Creation herself.
We need a more Radical grassroots endeavor that can deal with this fundamental rift. If we can connect with all human beings around this felt spiritual alienation (of both the religious and also the spiritual) in the context of collectively organizing around shared, universal principles and basic needs (food, water, energy, education, local sense of place, those "on the margins", and others) that would be a foundation for an independent movement that doesn't have to be "captured" by any traditional political perspective.
Thank you for letting me share in your domain here. I do appreciate your Spirit.
As a subscriber, I honor and respect that this is your forum. I am not sure whether you want a dialogue or if this Substack is only for people who already agree with you. That would be perfectly fine. Just let me know.
I am in general alignment with the need for systems transformation and have been working on just that for more than forty years at the practical level of local community.
I am trying to wrap my head around your guiding principle - "Belonging: build for the 100%. We believe humanity can create an “us” without a “them” ... and your stated desire to build a more "left" and "progressive" movement whose aim is to defeat the far-right, as an existential and authoritarian threat to democracy.
I viewed the video and the need to fight authoritarianism -- I would argue that we already live in an authoritarian country, where the main threat is oligarchic power and economic inequality brought by both the Left wing and Right wing. I want to point out that it was President Obama who doubled down on the power of the US and global financial systems in the wake of 2008 financial crisis. Now, global banking and financial power is even more entrenched and money has an even greater impact on politics. Now, we are in a system pitting every local region and its economy against a top-down extractive set up.
You could argue that we are now closer to a true Global Oligarchy, a sort of Techno-Feudalism. I would say that the Left has themselves contributed to the current authoritarian system.
It seems like the Left have been uncritical of their support for the development of this system of Corporatism, because they have had other objectives in their quest for using electoral power -- issues around race, LGBQT, and gender.
Right now, it seems to me, we need to build a grassroots movement capable of inspiring inclusion of both left and right around basic community needs. In order to do that, people would have to trust that it did not have any agenda promoting what is now considered Left or Right.
thanks Richard for the comment, and for the opportunity to add more nuance to my shorthand here. I would say I generally agree with you, and perhaps it's a question of what we mean when we say Left. I think the terms Left and Right have largely lost their meaning: I think of the Democratic party as a center-right party by historical standards, e.g., and see Obama as a fundamentally centrist figure (so too with Biden and Harris).
I reluctantly use Left here as a heuristic (in the same way I might say progressive: primarily to distinguish my radicalism--which is rooted in a commitment to belonging and not othering--from far-right radicalism, which is based on othering and supremacy). I talked more about this, and the complexity/nuance in these terms here (I identify with the worldview that I characterize as "indigenous"): https://citizenstout.substack.com/p/polarization-isnt-the-problem-its
in this post I'm talking about electoral politics in America, which in 2024 as you know still consists of a two-party system (and while i support efforts to break that framework, as with what the Working Families Party is doing, for this year we have two viable parties). While in general I'm interested in building an inclusive movement that rejects win/lose framing, in the context of an election I think it is imperative to defeat authoritarianism... which unfortunately, is now represented by the Republican party and Trump as the standard-bearer. as a matter of simple description of ideology and behavior, I think that is beyond dispute.
this does not mean that all who support him or the party are intending to support authoritarianism; which is why I think it is incumbent upon us (who aspire to what I call the indigenous worldview) to offer a compelling and inclusive vision that attends to the needs of all (which so far, the Democratic party has been unable to do). to me that vision is largely synonymous with how I understand the ambitions of social justice (which is what I mean when I talk about the Left as shorthand).
I welcome other thoughts.
Thank you for taking the time to respond so clearly. I figured that the post was in the context of the urgency of the upcoming election and how, to some extant, may not be your movement framing in general.
I suppose, by the look of it, I have you on age - I know that doesn't necessarily translate as Wisdom! I remember the Reagan era -- 1981 + so more than 44 years ago and I saw the same demonization of both sides, where each saw the other as an existential threat. I was an anti-nuclear movement organizer (at 22years old) doing training in non-violent civil disobedience.
While I do understand the focus on the upcoming election, the ratio of grassroots movement building (in my frame, what I call Symbiotic Culture and Networking) to electoral political work is infinitesimal. Most of our consciousness is sucked out from us into what I call a Culture of Separation, like an energy vampire, with its worldview of materialism, really physicalism. This has been going on my entire lifetime and now accelerating because of social media and algorithms fueled by AI targeting us.
I guess I believe we are already in an authoritarian time and both parties are an existential threat because they will both further entrench Global Oligarchy, while the elites of both parties (and what I call the Everything Industrial Complex) consciously divides us all the way down from global to the grassroots in sideshow Culture Wars.
So, I been watching this show for quite a while. I don't believe any of the traditional political framing can help us move forward whether now or after the election. That's because I believe we are in a deeper spiritual crisis, where our materialistic society has become unhinged and unmoored from a deeper spiritual AND natural reality of Creation herself.
We need a more Radical grassroots endeavor that can deal with this fundamental rift. If we can connect with all human beings around this felt spiritual alienation (of both the religious and also the spiritual) in the context of collectively organizing around shared, universal principles and basic needs (food, water, energy, education, local sense of place, those "on the margins", and others) that would be a foundation for an independent movement that doesn't have to be "captured" by any traditional political perspective.
Thank you for letting me share in your domain here. I do appreciate your Spirit.