Some interesting questions

4 thoughts on “Some interesting questions”

1. Oh, I forgot–about complacency. My favorite mentor always uses the phrase: Agitate, Educate, Motivate. Only some will respond–whether in classrooms, living rooms and on the internet. That most will be complacent is often the response. But 20,000 responded to Tahir Square. Agitate, Educate, Motivate. Enough eventually will weigh the odds and face down their fears, and the world will move up another notch in desirability for a place to live.

2. Great site, great conversation on you tube. Thanks, Amanda. To me it seems Fear will always face us. Making decisions about how we face it back, just as Enceno Macy so poignantly described as what he is doing in his present transition, is the only preparation for success that I have come up with to strengthen me to not make decisions, choices, or live based on unhealthy, self-defeating fears, but to attempt to live by …what shall we call it….courage?

   To be able to decide, choose, live, NOT by what my fear tells me NOT to do, but to do it because I want to do it, because it must be done…is that really courage? I don’t know. But I do know for myself that that is thankfully, living in a way that for that moment at least is not controlled by fear.

   When I decided in October of 2009 to participate in an action that was intending that the participants be arrested, it did not feel to me like courage, or what I think of as courage. But perhaps that was because I had outlined all the consequences one by one and felt they were negligible compared to my feelings about the issue we were addressing. Then, at the beginning of that day, another test came, and because I had thought it through, again I knew, after processing it again, ok, this is how it is going to be (not as had been planned) and I am still going ahead.

   No regrets, except that the arrests did not occur in our city (intentional reaction to NOT draw attention to us by those we were dealing with) but many arrests were made in other cities across the country that day, and we (those of us I was with) did get media attention, and my soul-sister in activism who was with us that day has her face posted frequently on the internet now as the face of activism when it is deemed to be needed to highlight an article.

   Would I do it again? I would do the same process again. And would know, at the end of the process, exactly how I would walk through that next face-off with fear, is my hope. Because of my activism in the late sixties-early 70.s I have been aware of the reality of exposure to people who do not agree when putting oneself “out there”. I have been aware of my internet exposure. A couple older friends and I have laughed together about how whoever “they” are who are “watching us” (and they are), how they would be comparing their 60’s files to today’s and trying to figure out who is who now that we are older and look different. Thanks for letting me talk about my thoughts on what have been considerations of mine all my life: fear, activism, what to do about it, for me, personally.

3. Just off the top of my head…Repetition can also cause complacency. We often link this to accidents in the workplace, i.e. getting sloppy because you are doing the same job over and over again – until you slice your thumb off. So if you keep seeing the same old shit happening I suppose you could become complacent.

   But the more I think about it, I wonder if complacency is the right word – or is it apathy we are aiming for? Complacency says to me a kind of smug satisfaction that lulls us into a false sense of security, whereas apathy is a real ‘I don’t care anymore’ experience. It’s indifference and a lack of emotional engagement. For me emotion is what gives the dynamism to life, our emotional engagement is how we assess the value of something, it’s what motivates us to dig deeper, to try and understand. In apathy we really are tuned out, which means all kinds of foul play and dirty pool can sneak under our radar. What causes us to switch off could be traced back to fear or lack of empowerment or maybe overwhelmment and the need for self protection (who hasn’t felt that even occasionally this last breathless year or so during which the shit just keeps on raining down).

   In part I blame the lack of intelligent, but also sympathetic, analysis in the media. Where do people go when they want to start to make sense of all that is happening? Twitter? Facebook? The daily news? You have to be very determined to find any real context today. Yes you could go online to sites like PW but you still have to have the energy to fileter out all the crap that is online, and what about the 75% or so (last time I checked) of the global population who aren’t online – what do they do? I’m grabbing at figures from memory now but I recall that more than half of all people online don’t even use social networks. So most people get the headlines, see the drama of the pictures and the language, get scared or overwhelmed or disempowered and just switch off and reduce their worlds down to what they feel they can cope with/have some control over: work, food, shopping, family, sex… I guess what I am trying to say is that probably a lot of roads lead to the fear/apathy problem. Sorry, that’s probably not much use! Be interesting to hear what others think.

4. Amanda,
   Thank you for another nail squarely struck. If i may so venture, complacency comes of feeling without power. That where we can act and also help each other. Help the other person feel empowered. Welcome and promote their expression (expression is the opposite of depression, right?). Show love by empowering other people. It is one of this highest acts of sedition. It banishes complacency and challenges those who would enslave us.