If you’ve been wondering where I’ve been, I have to admit it’s been arduous trying to write about politics in the wake of the Sandy Hook event. In fact, I got physically sick from it.
Nothing could rise from within that could shake the horror and spirit flattening that would allow me even to think, let alone write clearly through this storm. And it’s hard to drive effectively through a storm when there’s mud on your windshield. And there has been plenty of mud.
Sandy Hook was but one of many instances in my experience where I have come face to face with, and been deeply affected by, violence directed towards our young people. My best friend’s nephew was gunned down while walking Christmas presents back to the mall on Boxing Day (the day after Christmas). Within a period of two years, her other nephew’s oldest son was gunned down for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, a witness able to identify and incriminate a killer.
The terrible grief of burying a child, your child or any child, is enough to make you scream for hours openly on public streets. This is what I could feel emanating nationwide from Sandy Hook. The breach of children ripped from their families too soon and so violently creates a void, with a deep ripple effect on the collective soul. It’s the same feeling I felt from my best friend’s family when they experienced their losses, but on a much larger scale.
Countless American families just this year alone are trying to come to grips with what has happened to them as they face their losses from gun violence: What can we do? What must our leaders do? Maddeningly enough, given the nature and structure of the government we have, all we can do right now is wait: for the grinding of political wheels to gain momentum. For the cruelty and insanity to stop. For the ability to act sanely for once, and to come up with answers that don’t involve having more weapons on our persons to protect our children. We’re trying to move those last, hard-to-reach vestiges of our civilization out of the 19th century and into the 21st.
When you look at the political picture since election day 2012, you could say that we’re passing through a very large collective social storm, beginning with the heartlessly tone-deaf and cynical response by the National Rifle Association to the Sandy Hook shootings and the vile ads in reaction to the President’s call to re-instate stronger background checks on purchasers of weapons. You have the harassment of the poor neighbor who protected the Sandy Hook School kids lucky enough to escape the gunfire, and the bile spewed by Rush Limbaugh.
It was this open display of our American gun psychosis that makes me feel like we’re wading deep through the thick and toxic sludge of our violent American psyche. Our propensity to glorify and propagate violence continues to rise with more frequency to the surface as pressure comes to bear on having no more of this.
Roughly 72 hours from now, the 44th President of the United States will be inaugurated for a second term in office. He will be inaugurated twice, once on Sunday the 20th in private and the second time in public on the 21st, the national holiday named in honor of civil rights leader Reverend Martin Luther King. A man killed by a gun. This timing gives all of us pause to reflect on the ideals of peace, non-violent (r)evolution and change for the better. Ideals far from our current American experience.
As I explained once to a friend from abroad, “we may call ourselves a civilization but here we’re not at all civilized.” Since the Sandy Hook murders, and all the senseless violent crimes perpetrated on ourselves since the beginning of the republic, it has dawned on us that the certain truths we’ve held to be self-evident have been obscured, trivialized, cartooned. Proven false. What is our national character now? Is it to be defined by how full we keep our basement storage bunkers with multiple rounds of ammunition?
It’s difficult to watch four years later as our country struggles hard through the work that it’s been needing to do long before we ever elected a black President. The racism, sexism, fear of others and fear of women have raised their heads like a hydra, proudly, in plain sight — and yes, finally. As we struggle through this, trying to break through a national fever detoxing from fear and addiction to violence, I have to remember that even with all the terrible losses, this is ultimately good.
Our body politic — like any person’s body — is in a much-needed healing crisis. It takes time for all the components of a body to do their part, just like it takes a few years for a human’s body to completely regenerate. Time is precious, and we are tasked with using it wisely. It’s hard work to build a civilization, and as we in America are finding out — many lives, countless years, wars and tears later — it’s even harder work to be civilized.
Gandhi.
Martin Luther King.
Abraham Lincoln.
William wilberforce.
All mystics. All saw what needed to be done, all put one foot in front of the other and would not stop until they were stopped. Their spirits live on. Each asked themselves the imperative question of “What am I prepared to do?” And then, “How far am I prepared to go?”.
If we are to commit ourselves as individuals we must ask ourselves “what are we prepared to give up?”
I will turn 57 on February 2nd and am of an age where it is more important to me to make a stand in whatever way I can than it is to hold on to whatever illusion of security I have left.
Going back to cycling Lance for a moment, think of all the individuals and corporations and media outlets who supported and enabled his lie for years and years. This is not an isolated incidence. Goldman Sachs handed out over eight billion dollars in bonuses this year. Obama is surrounded by people from Goldman. No one from the financial industry has been prosecuted. It is all interconnected and we are the ones who are financing all this.
William Wilberforce was a great humanitarian who championed countless other causes including animal rights. Take a look at the anagram of his name for a moment:
William equals ‘I Am Will’
Wilberforce equals ‘Wil Be (or ‘R’) Force’
The use of our willpower individually and collectively is the answer if we can only find the motivation to rally.
Wilberforce was not assasinated. His health was fragile as is the case with many mystics. At the time of his death his vast fortune was gone because he had essentially given it all away to causes he believed in.
Interesting article on violence here, which reminds me of what Eric wrote at the time of Sandy Hook, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joseph-bobrow/a-history-of-violence_b_2312740.html
“Our body politic — like any person’s body — is in a much-needed healing crisis”. Yes, so true, Fe. Welcome back, and thank you for this moving and wise piece. I’m so sorry for your best friend’s terrible suffering. I too have been shaken to the core by Sandy Hook. Just yesterday, once again, while travelling on the bus to early morning lessons, I watched the lovely kids being carted off to school by their parents, and my mind turned to that awful event.
Welcome back, Fe, and thank you for example you always and continuously set.
Be:
I so appreciate your astrological lead on this, and especially the role Jupiter is playing along those very sensitive degrees of the Gemini-Sagittarius axis.
There is an opening between the leadership we have and the government we want, though I think right now the aims of the two are in separate quarters. There has to be a movement of the people to overturn the corrupt political ruts we find ourselves in. Not sure if that means a leader who would help us rise above it, but finding that leadership within ourselves. We are still just beginning to wake up to this. The dismantling to get to that leadership has to happen within and without, because the knots that have created this quagmire are complex and deep.
Its more than a vision, its also the persistent will of the people. Perhaps, as we approach the Aquarian Age that is the real leader we seek. Our lesson is to learn we can open the door, come out and seek it in us.
reminds me of the Gandhi quote – when asked by a journalist what he thought of western civilization – it’s a good idea. still is, depending on your (social, cultural, historical, political) perspective of such.
Unfortunately our president is guilty of crimes against humanity. When Americans choose to truly accept responsibility for the actions of our country real change will happen and not until. The planets can incline. Through free will man determines his or her own actions for better and for worse. The web woven by Lance Armstrong is child’s play compared to what our politicians are doing.
Thanks for writing about this subject Fe. It is painful for all of us to recall and after the numbness we feel after any tragedy of this nature, we struggle to return to normalcy and move on. Because of that, the cycle repeats and repeats because we fail to confront and address the problem which is the only way to evolve and rise above it.
This past summer Venus made an “occultation” of the Sun, the 2nd of a pair of passes in front of the Sun, and these pairs happen about every 120 years.
In 120 years, Jupiter will complete 10 cycles through the signs, each cycle 12 years long.
Another cycle, that of Neptune and Pluto, takes about 500 years to complete, the last one began in the 1890’s. That cyle is almost meaningless to us because of its length. Even the aspects between Neptune and Pluto don’t significantly register with most astrology lovers because they are so long in duration. The fact is, we should really study the one we are in; we Americans especially, because the last one was conjunct the U.S. Sibly Uranus in Gemini.
Venus symbolizes values and when she occults the Sun it is a time to re-evaluate values. In June, 2012, her conjunction to the Sun was at 15 Gemini. Jupiter reached the degree of the Venus-Sun conjunction (occultation) at the same time Uranus and Pluto made their 2nd exact square, tying the 2 astro events together. Jupiter expands whatever it touches and it touched Venus where she touched the Sun, symbol of consciousness. Jupiter will touch that Venus degree again this April.
There is a link between 3 recent significant charts which we use to study the times we live in, one is the WINTER SOLSTICE. The other two are the November 2012 ECLIPSE OF THE MOON, and the JUPITER STATION-DIRECT later this month. What they have in common is the axis line between 6 Gemini and 6 Sagittarius; 6 Gemini is where the eclipsed Moon was and the Sun opposite her was at 6 Sagittarius. This is an axis of information (Gemini) VS meaning (Sagittarius). In the Winter Solstice chart, Venus was at 6 Sagittarius. When Jupiter stations this month he will be in 6 Gemini. Everything is connected to everything else.
It would appear that we are in a very special time to change ourselves for the better. Not only are we in an important turning point in the Pluto-Uranus cycle, we are also in an important point in the Venus cycle, and an important point in the Neptune-Pluto cycle. Jupiter will not only connect to the Venus cycle again (same degree as the Venus occult Sun), he will then move into Cancer and connect with both Pluto and Uranus in August to form a t-square with them – opposite Pluto and square Uranus. Jupiter is the key to connect these cycles in a meaningful way. Jupiter rules Sagittarius, the meaning side of the axis. We have the opportunity to stop the insanity, rise above it – right now, this year. Or we can wait another 10 years for Jupiter to reach the Venus degree in Gemini.
Neptune and Pluto as outer planets don’t connect easily with the human psyche, not in a conscious way. The can connect to individuals through personal planets like Venus and Mercury or they can connect with societies through Jupiter and Saturn. Through the Sandy Hook tragedy and others before it, we are all aware of the results that come from a combination of negative Neptune and Pluto energies. We have a President who will lead the battle to begin the changes needed in our society, but we must also change as individuals. Right now Neptune and Pluto form a septile, 1/7th of a circle. It is an aspect of karmic forces at work guiding us to action. Venus says: Become Aware Of Your Values; Expand Your Consciousness. How can we as individuals reduce violence? Jupiter is the key to expand our efforts in a united way.
Jupiter connected to the Neptune Pluto cycle when he was conjunct the U.S. Uranus in the Winter Solstice chart. he will conjunct U.S. Uranus again in March. It is time to rise above where we are, so stuck in the mud. Become conscious, help make others conscious, actively support the President if you are a U.S. citizen in whatever way you can. The gods and goddesses are working to make it happen. We are not alone.
be
,
Fe
Agreed. There must be an organizing moral principle to unite like-minded people which usually is galvanized by a true believer. Truth about what is going on behind the scenes can provide the cohesion as more and more people understand how our lives are manipulated and controlled. In order for that to happen we all need to speak out at every available opportunity.
Mia:
Point by point, I totally agree with your post. If anything President Obama’s proposed drawdown of troops from the war abroad will probably focus those returning on the war at home. We’ve got work to do up ahead, for lack of a visionary leader, and we’re going to have to heal our own body politic.
No other country on earth is trapped in violence quite the same way as America. England was able to abolish slavery by the efforts of a small group of individuals led by William Wilberforce without firing a single shot. It took 20 years but the decision to end slavery was based on his moral example and the ultimate questioning and soul searching by all the other members of the House of Lords. 600,000 were killed in our civil war to accomplish the same thing. The end of slavery was one of humanity’s greatest accomplishments.
America is killing countless children with drones and dirty bombs leaving countless lives and families destroyed. Moral soul searching must take place in order for this to change. Sandy Hook is a reflection of what we are doing elsewhere to others.
Martin Luther King, Jr. used the power of his own moral courage, knowing full well he would give his own life in the process. Abraham Lincoln did the same thing. I do not see a leader on the horizon with that type of moral courage.