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VisionQuest Pictures presents a Storkboy Declaration
What A Way To Go
Life At The End Of Empire
A middle class white guy comes to grips with Peak Oil, Climate
Change, Mass Extinction, Population Overshoot and the demise of the
American Lifestyle.
Featuring interviews with Daniel Quinn, Derrick Jensen, Jerry Mander, Chellis Glendinning, Richard Heinberg, Thomas Berry, William Catton, Ran Prieur and Richard Manning. Produced by Sally Erickson. Written, Directed, and Edited by Tim Bennett. More about the film…
“What we have been doing has not been working. We will have to do something else.”
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What’s New with Sally? |
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What’s New with Tim |
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11/18/09 Sobering map of the growth of unemployment Jan 07- Sept 09. Thoughts about how to offer comfort and support. Our Conscious Conversation group had it’s third meeting. Growing connections, great insights, increasing trust. 11/15/09 Okay, so The Culture of Pretend: How Psychotherapy Keeps Our Communities Sick… Is here. And some great comments follow. I’m also in the process of writing about death and the “Call to Non-Action.” Probably continue to irritate some people. That’s the risk of real dialogue. Too bad real dialogue can’t really happen on the internet. Sort of requires bodies in a room to make the deeper shift to what Bohm referred to as collective learning which supports collective intelligence. Also there’s a very intriguing article about Detroit with an interesting vision of transforming that city into an urban farm capable of feeding it’s people. Is that possible? Possible or not it is a compelling vision to consider and perhaps apply to other settings, like small struggling towns that will be popping up as people flee jobless areas especially in challenging climates. Speaking of which, a friend just reported to me that some northern cities have been paying one-way bus fare to Florida for their homeless…I wonder how Florida is feeling about that? 11/5/09 Communication/Communion: When two or more people understand deeply the truth of their individual experiences. We’re all bozos on this bus! The Culture of Pretend reinforces shame! Stay tuned for my next blog, in the edit stage. Not short and sweet. Long and hopefully compelling. 10/19/09 ‘member the Woody Allen quote from WAWTG about one path leads to despair and utter hopelessness and the other, to total extinction… pray we make the correct choice? Well…it’s not funny anymore. I just read Apocalypse or Extinction and then went to check out the author’s academic creds…I’ve been thinking about the implications of 2-4 degrees C all day…. 10/18/09 Planning trip to NC to shoot more Shut Up and Drum footage. I’m sobered by how little help there is for people w/OUT substance abuse problems. Hopefully we can facilitate some coordinated support for Rocco on our trip. 10/18/09 We’ve started a Conscious Conversation group in our small town to learn group communication skills and to provide for a place to establish deep relatedness, embrace differences, tap collective wisdom. It’s an experiment in doing dialogue in a weekly rather than weekend format. Scroll to the bottom the Dialogue Workshop Gatherings page to read more about Conscious Conversation! 10/14/09 - We just watched a Ted Talk by James Balog from the Extreme Ice Survey. Astounding video of glaciers melting. |
11/19/09 - Nothing to Lose but Our Illusions: An Interview with David Edwards by Derrick Jensen. I just read through this again. In my opinion, one of the single most important conversations around. I could stand to read it every day. 11/18/09 - Dope-en-hagen. 11/15/09 - I’m thinking a great deal today about redemption. How do we redeem this millennia-old experiment in isolation, control and destruction? One way is to work to stop the destruction, such that some part of the community of life is able to make it through the bottleneck. Another way is for the humans of the dominant culture to learn what is to be learned here, to grow up, to change, to evolve, to step into the next paradigm. That’s the work I feel most called to, though I will not disavow the work of protection. Human survival alone does not feel like redemption. Growing up, learning, transforming - those things feel like redeeming acts. 11/10/09 - I just finished this wonderful address - Thomas Merton and Technology: Paradise Regained Re-lost - by Fr. Ezekiel Lotz, OSB. It’s an examination of Merton’s views on modern technological society, ecology and “the world we have lost,” written last year for the Gethsemini III conference. It was a marvelous and moving read for me. I found it while Googlefishing for mentions of WAWTG… 11/5/09 - Copenhagen approacheth, and denial is in the air. Taking on Superfreakonomics. Monbiot digs for understanding. David Roberts examines the polling data. Americans for Prosperity full of hot air. Little boys play games. The media goes more insane. Denial becomes a spectator sport. The home team searches for new strategies. And more new strategies. How will it all play out? Stay tuned. There’s enough insanity in the air to make certain that we’ll be surprised. 11/2/09 - Over half-way through the Portuguese subtitles now. Very fun. Am also about six chapters in to the first of three novels (assuming I finish them this time!). What happens when collapse meets UFOs meets the holographic universe meets the modern day thriller? I’m finding out every day. It’s not like I’m in control here… 10/29/09 - Back in VT, here’s the latest news to come across my radar: decimated krill populations; “killer” algae foam; and invading jellyfish. Yes, by all means, let’s find a way to keep this current lifestyle going. Meanwhile, if this poll is true, then the decline in numbers of Americans who “believe” in climate change should cause us to question some basic assumptions. No wonder people are looking at the psychology beneath the actions. Back soon, after I catch up. 10/23/09 - I just read Adam Sacks’ Dispassion as the world ends: The absent heart of the great climate affair. You may wish to as well. Adam’s chopping away at the psychological, emotional and cultural context our our present predicament. Good stuff. 10/22/09 - Traveling this week. In NC now. Met with Rocco today. He’s doing well. Will be visiting kids and making connections before returning to VT to hunker down for the winter. 10/19/09 - My recent encounters with the climate/environmental news of the world here and here and here and here and here. Sigh… 10/19/09 - This is cool. The fabulous (in my opinion) movie Mindwalk (based on Fritjof Capra’s book,The Turning Point) is available in its entirety here on Google Video. This has never been released on DVD and has only been available as used VHS copies. Check it out. I remember first seeing this on cable TV in a previous life, but was not ready for it at the time. 10/17/09 - Check this out. If you click that link, though, you’ll be in Big Brother’s Database! 10/16/09 - For the past year or so I’ve been reading much more fiction than non-fiction. Most of that has been sci-fi, as sci-fi seems to be the spiritual literature of our time and place. Right now, I’m just getting into Richard Paul Russo’s Ship of Fools. A bunch of humans on a huge space ship wandering through space for so long that they no longer remember where they came from or what they’re supposed to be doing. Sounds familiar 10/13/09 - I’m reading Seven Life Lessons of Chaos: Spiritual Wisdom from the Science of Change by John Briggs and F. David Peat. Good stuff. Much food for thought here. |