"Talking about what?" you might say.
And therein lies the problem, most people do not even think (or know) about these things that matter. These massive global issues that affect us all; environmental, social, and political as well as the more subtle aspects influenced by these greater issues which then become mental, emotional, and even spiritual. In a connected world, where every cause has an effect, every person's actions, thoughts, words, and even inaction's can create tidal waves of dysfunction, imbalance, and a continued deterioration of social and even moral integrity. Conversely one person's increased understanding, awareness, and conscious compassionate existence can create healing, balance, and a rebuilding of a foundation which can allow for growth, prosperity, and real evolution.
WHY AREN'T WE TALKING ABOUT IT?
The issue here is multifaceted: there is a bombardment of distraction, misinformation, and this is bolstered by our inability to see from various perspectives as critical and caring thinkers. There is a large part of the population who would just rather not worry about anything besides themselves, or who are working so hard just to keep up, they believe they barely have enough time to put food on their own table, let alone worry about anyone else's. There is a lack of transparency about the issues we are facing, their roots, and their connections to each other. (The political and corporate connections to large parts of the environmental and social issues for example.) This is why conversation is so necessary: to identify these roots and connections so that we might make the changes that matter.
These factors, and more, have allowed a kind of ignorant and dismal social climate to manifest. The media which guides common social consciousness, acting as a weapon of the corporate/ political interests rather than a tool of authentic journalism, has made heavy strokes in redirecting and reducing our concerns to that of the superficial, material, and commercial. However, we are still responsible for our conscious individual part in the collective landscape we see. To weigh the urgent social, political, and environmental threats as worthy of our collective attention and conversation, to learn about this enough to make a practical difference and to make a meaningful change.
Many have consciously chosen to turn a blind eye overwhelmed by the sheer size of the many issues we face, and those who are willing to face them are often are shut down by status-quo's battle cry of, "Get back in line!" before they can even begin. This creates an uphill battle which is difficult to overcome. I often hear people say, "I don't like to think about that, it's too negative." Which is the definition again of apathetic privilege rearing its arrogant illiteracy. We live in a polar reality, one in which both good, and evil are prevalent. The basic instincts of cooperation versus competition have relentlessly collided throughout the ages in efforts to overtake the other aspect. With such a dichotomy present, every tiny part weighs in on the greater whole. And the aspects to which you add your weight, your contribution, can change everything.
Before I go forward introducing and outlining just a few of the many problems (of which were carefully chosen to represent central issues that must be addressed first before we can move on). I would like to point out, there are various manageable solutions to these issues. I plan to provide access to these solutions, and they are not as far away as you would think. They are within your own capacities right now. They do not necessarily require money, or great amounts of time and effort. For all intents and purposes here, they simply require two things: awareness and the willingness to change.
WORLD HUNGER:
Each year, 2.6 million children die as a result of hunger-related causes. Some 805 million people in the world do not have enough food to lead a healthy active life. That's about one in nine people on earth. The vast majority of the world's hungry people live in developing countries, where 13.5 percent of the population is undernourished.
UNDERSTANDING THE SCOPE OF THE ISSUE
-21,000 people die of starvation worldwide each day.
-Poor nutrition causes nearly half (45%) of deaths in children under five - 3.1 million children each year.
-As of 2015 (2011 statistics), the World Bank has estimated that there were just over 1 billion poor people in developing countries who live on $1.25 a day or less.
-The world produces enough food to feed everyone. The principal problem is that many people in the world still do not have sufficient income to purchase (or land to grow) enough food.
If you do not care about this, then please stop pretending your interests are humane, moral, or anything but acts of self-preservation and advancement and at least do all you can to stay out of the way of a progress which concerns all life, not just our own (ie: refrain from voting for candidates whose sole purpose is to extend the assets and minimize loses and legal liabilities of the already unscrupulous wealthy few). On a planet where somewhere around 7% of people can live in relative luxury throwing away near 2/3rds of usable food as garbage, and no we are not referring to the elite on this one, this is us: you and me. All the while babies, children, people are dying for no other reason except that we live in a narcissistic world that draws lines around entire communities and says, "There, they do not matter as much". Systematically repressing entire populations through greed, resource exploitation, military aggression, and outright denial of basic and essential human rights.
We have disconnected ourselves as we look through the screens of our televisions at the starving children of what we consider “third world countries” (which is really just a rich man’s way of justifying the unimaginable poverty stricken status of entire populations). That thin shade of glass dissolving our connection to the reality it portrays to us. We must remove the veil, and recognize on the deepest levels, that we have not only disconnected ourselves from the millions of unfortunate people across the world, but from our very selves, our very souls, and the quintessential quality that makes us human in the first place. This is a sickness, a manufactured and distorted perspective that has lied to us. Denying us our connection to every living life upon this shared planet. We are each responsible for the collective conditions of this world, and we can only become accountable if we both become aware and caring enough to act and to change ourselves. http://www.wfp.org/hunger/stats
(SEE HOW YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE right now for each of these issues on the “Universal Change” tab above.)
MILLIONS OF PEOPLE DISPLACED DUE TO WARS BASED ON LIES:
Political conflicts, the relentless drive of corporate interests, security threats, and perhaps even climate change itself have created a dangerous and unstable social environment over the past decades in much of the Middle East, particularly so most recently, in Syria. These issues are multidimensional in their roots, and the side-issues being created through this instability are complex themselves. The total number of refugees (at the date of this publication according to the Syrian Regional Refugee response) is at 4,088,099 people of concern. People (like you and me, children and elderly alike, none are discriminated against in the effects of this crisis) uprooted and forced away from their home, their livelihoods, and their once imaginable future. They flee for safety, exiled into the unknown and perhaps unwelcoming world surrounding them.
"In Syria there's no safety and no peace, we saw with our eyes people get killed everyday..." - Syrian refugee
"..because the situation was so unjust, the war, the hard life without water, electricity, a house... there is war, a lot of planes dropping bombs on us and we cannot protect ourselves..."- Syrian refugee
These social injustices involve all of us, and the suffering of life anywhere, is the business of life everywhere. We cannot turn our backs on those in need, knowing we would beg for that same consideration should the borders be drawn encapsulating us, our children, our freedom. We are all members of the same race, the human race, and each responsible for the well-being for the collective family of humanity.
UNDERSTANDING THE SCOPE OF THE ISSUE:
IRAQ- 1,500,000 (1.5 million) men, women and children have either been displaced or fled the country (that is 1 out of every 20 Iraqi’s) http://costsofwar.org/article/iraqi-civilians
AFGHANISTAN: 155,000 people have fled their homes, and a total of 450,000 people have been internally displaced.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/29/world/asia/afghanistan-displaced-people/index.html
SYRIA: 4,000,000 (some 4 million) men, women and children have either been displaced or fled the country due to the Civil War. http://www.npr.org/2013/12/31/258699435/of-2-3-million-syrians-displaced-by-civil-war-45-found-home-in-u-s
GAZA: More than 50,000 people displaced sleeping on classroom floors and courtyards.
http://time.com/3009796/israel-gaza-invasion-casualties/#3009796/israel-gaza-invasion-casualties/
Our government as it stands is (LITERALLY) a bought government, acting as a corporation itself and working in the interest of the large corporations which fund it. As a result many horrendous conflicts of interest have been created. Example: Vice President Dick Cheney an obvious advocate for the “War on Terror” waged by then President George Bush, legally retaining the ability to generate massive profits ($39.5 Billion) at the cost of taxpayers on Halliburton Oil Company which benefited greatly through its expanded enterprise opportunities created by the war itself (Halliburton also patented fracking, and was in large part liable for the BP gulf spill, but was not held responsible, as well as being given exemption, lawfully by Dick Cheney himself, from the Clean Water and Air Act.) This is what we are dealing with in a government so deeply intertwined with big business that you cannot tell where one ends and the other begins—a convoluted partisan nightmare.
Whatever one’s political philosophy may be, the fact is: wealthy donors are now able to drown out your voice. We must begin to recognize we are voting for two sides of the same coin, the different political parties create an illusion of choice. To have any choice at all, it requires getting money out of politics. Big money is destroying freedom, reinforcing agendas which benefit very few at the expense of many, creating immense social injustices and human rights issues, and irrevocably destroying fragile ecosystems while absolving those in power from any responsibility to maintain any semblance of ethical judgment or liability to legal recourse.
In the battle for the Senate, 42 extremely wealthy donors accounted for nearly a third of all super PAC spending. But if there was a silver lining in the elections’ display of plutocratic might, it’s that there’s growing awareness of how a flood of money is distorting our politics. And watchdogs at Open Secrets, The Campaign Legal Center, Common Cause, The Sunlight Foundation, Democracy 21, Public Citizen and countless other organizations have been working to turn back the tide.
We have the power, and we have had it all along. These political powers, bankers, and mega-business’s are not indomitable. And they are not succeeding without our help. We allow them to continue through supporting them: by buying their products, voting them in without understanding their financing lobbyist obligations, endorsing their ideals, and therefore strengthening their hold and reinforcing the continuance of actions which profit them and their financers, while harming people and the planet. As we recognize the ways in which the political and big business money really is connected to the various other issues, we can make changes in what and who we support going forward.
RAINFOREST DEFORESTATION:
At a time when carbon emissions and climate change are of great concern, it is a main factor to consider and fiercely protect our organic regenerative carbon filtration system: the lungs of the planet: the rainforests. Deforestation refers to permanent destruction and/ or removal of a forest. Common methods of deforestation are burning trees and clear cutting. These tactics leave the land completely barren and unable to regenerate. http://www.livescience.com/27692-deforestation.html
UNDERSTANDING THE SCOPE OF THE ISSUE:
Almost half of the world’s original four billion acres of rainforest are now gone. The lost area equals the combined size of Washington, Idaho, California, Nevada and Arizona. Man has recently increased nature’s "normal" extinction rate by 10,000%. By conservative estimates 9,000 species are going extinct each year, most of them from the rainforests. We are presently experiencing the largest mass extinction since the demise of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago; only this time it’s occurring at a much faster rate."
What is responsible for this? In large part our own habits of consumerism, and buying products which we have no idea about the origins of, or the business practices of the company which sells it. Conflict palm oil: which is used as a cheap (however NOT sustainable or environmentally responsible) resource for packaging of everything from snack foods, to beauty products. (See more here: http://www.ran.org/conflict_palm_oil)
Along with logging companies using rainforest for lumber to make cheap furniture, housing, paper, and even clothing, as well as oil companies which exploit the irreplaceable and once rich ecosystems of the rainforests. Therefore it stands to be a reasonable course of action to understand the business practices and resources used for any company’s products you are buying, retract financial support from those business’s tied to rainforest deforestation (or other forms of environmental neglect), and work toward becoming sustainable as much as possible in your daily life. (Recycle, reduce, reuse, and re-purpose.)
Find out more about this issue and what you can do to make a difference on the “Universal Change” tab above.
TARSANDS/ FRACKING:
This is a widespread environmental disaster in the making and it has been happening relatively unchallenged right before our eyes. Fracking is the process of injecting liquid at high pressure into subterranean rocks, boreholes, etc. to force open existing fissures and extract oil or gas. Tarsands relates to the bituminous sands, used as an unconventional (and hazardous) petroleum deposit resource. The oil extracted comes out as a form of crude which must be transported to facilities where it can be processed. This means that crude is sent through hundreds of miles of pipeline (or by truck/ train) to the processing facilities. This also presents potential (and probable) dangerous scenarios which have proven to not only be an unfounded fear, but a cold hard reality. Oil line spills are a common fact, occurring (of course not publicized) hundreds of time just in the past decade and poisoning millions of gallons of water, land and even air. (See a comprehensive list here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pipeline_accidents_in_the_United_States_in_the_21st_century)
The areas selected to run pipelines, or for fracking/ tarsands extraction itself, are not differentiated against due to their irreplaceable value as natural habitats, necessary ecosystems, providers of large amounts of fresh water, irrigation water which grows much of the US agriculture or land upon which much of that agriculture takes place. This controversial practice is already responsible for massive poisoning of land, water and air, not to mention the toxic carbon emissions generated through the dangerous extraction process. This is a health concern, a public safety concern, an environmental concern and a continually growing threat. This can be offset by drastic reduction in our use of plastic and all petroleum products as well as offering resistance to new pipelines and fracking ventures which are being introduced more and more often across the US and Canada.
More on how to help with this issue at “Universal Change” above.
BEE DEPOPULATION:
Honey bees– wild and domestic– perform about 80 percent of all pollination worldwide. A single bee colony can pollinate 300 million flowers each day. Grains are primarily pollinated by the wind, but the best and healthiest food– fruits, nuts, and vegetables– are pollinated by bees. Seventy out of the top 100 human food crops, which supply about 90 percent of the world's nutrition, are pollinated by bees. Scientists know that bees are dying from a variety of factors– pesticides, drought, habitat destruction, nutrition deficit, air pollution, global heating, and so forth. The causes of collapse merge and synergize, but we know that humanity is the perpetrator, and that the two most prominent causes appear to be pesticides and habitat loss.
CREATING CONVERSATIONS THAT CAN CHANGE THE WORLD:
We need to shift our focus, from ME to WE, from helpless bystander to empowered participant. As we begin to open our eyes to the many global issues around us, and educate ourselves about what is really going on, we will become likewise aware of our own piece in all of this. We will see the ways in which we are contributing, and what we can do to stop it, the least of which begins with using the greatest tool we can implement to counteract it all--our voice.
In passing conversation, in the brief encounters we have each day, begin to be that conscious voice asking others: “What do you know about this?” And, “How can we work together to change it?” As each individual becomes caring, active, and aware, the collective tides will shift, and as we begin to work together, we will create a wave of change the likes of which the world has never seen.
Changing our common dialogue means directly changing social consciousness about these often taboo issues. It can no longer be acceptable to overlook these important crises. It can no longer remain appropriate to say, “I don’t like to think about that.” Or, “It’s not my problem.” It can no longer be tolerable to waste resources, to pollute our environments, to neglect those in need, or to overlook the suffering around us, and damage done. That standpoint must become as loathsome as those reprehensible views that allowed slavery and discrimination in the US until the Civil Rights movements introduced arguments of reason and equality into discussion. Becoming aware of, speaking out about, and acting on these fundamental issues has become a moral imperative and they must be. This needs to become a mainstream topic in every person’s daily conversation, as we identify the ways we can help each other and the world around us heal and regain its humanity.
“I urge every reader who cares for themselves and their loved ones to research what is really happening. I have made these points not to upset but to inform… These times are shaking us up, and this shaking is shifting and pushing us into the realizations which are required to create a new way of living, a way which is compassionate to all life. Hopefully this will generate the motivation to become more educated and to call for a meaningful reform. This can allow us to forge the harmony which is compulsory to truly evolve... I truly believe in humanity, and I believe in you right now. I believe that we are smart, strong, caring creatures who will do what is right to protect what is most important…
We must awaken, in whatever route the awakening takes form, whether by the notions of environmental concerns, political instability, social inequality, economic disparity, spiritual suffocation, or intellectual manipulation, all of these can lead to a very necessary awakening for the whole of humanity, perhaps that is the point. The very few at the top are notably ineffectual at making humane decisions for the collective whole, they have shown this. They are very sick in their soul and completely cut off from the connection of spirit. We are now waking up and reconnecting with that spirit, we can see what cannot be seen by people so blind. We will not allow ourselves to be slowly poisoned and the entire planet along with us.
Billions of honey bees are currently disappearing. Honeybees are a vital, absolutely imperative link for the entire food chain. In fact, Albert Einstein said if the honey bees disappeared completely, humanity would have four years to live. He also said “The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the level of thinking that created them.” It is time to change that level of thinking, recognize our connection to everything, and love each other and the earth enough to stand up for not just ourselves but for what cannot defend itself. We do have a choice, we can make this change, and we are making that change right now.” (Excerpt from the book: Universal Hidden Insight: The Connection Between Love, Existence, and Reality by Lisa Falcon G.)
The difference between what we are doing and what we are capable of doing would suffice to change the world. ~Mahatma Gandhi