TomDispatch: Tomgram: Rebecca Solnit, #YesAllWomen Changes the Story

According to one account of the feminist conversation that followed, a young woman with the online name Kaye (who has since been harassed or intimidated into withdrawing from the public conversation) decided to start tweeting with the hashtag #YesAllWomen at some point that Saturday after the massacre. By Sunday night, half a million #yesallwomen tweets had appeared around the world, as though a dam had burst. And perhaps it had. The phrase described the hells and terrors women face and specifically critiqued a stock male response when women talked about their oppression: “Not all men.”

It's the way some men say, “I’m not the problem” or that they shifted the conversation from actual corpses and victims as well as perpetrators to protecting the comfort level of bystander males. An exasperated woman remarked to me, “What do they want -- a cookie for not hitting, raping, or threatening women?” Women are afraid of being raped and murdered all the time and sometimes that’s more important to talk about than protecting male comfort levels. Or as someone named Jenny Chiu tweeted, “Sure #NotAllMen are misogynists and rapists. That's not the point. The point is that #YesAllWomen live in fear of the ones that are.”

TomDispatch: Tomgram: Rebecca Solnit, #YesAllWomen Changes the Story

Rebecca Solnit - "If we are to save San Francisco, then we have to...

Rebecca Solnit

"If we are to save San Francisco, then we have to make Tom Perkins’ worst fears come true. It’s time to take this city back from the arrogant tech moguls and timid city hall administrators who are killing San Francisco values." A rich day in tech-dystopia watch, and a deep bow to David Talbot, who's been watching for a long time and writes: But over the years, the innovation bubbling up in the Bay Area has become much more market-oriented than socially driven. Vast fortunes have been created overnight by raiding the intellectual content that others have painstakingly built over the years. Other new empires have risen by convincing millions of people to give up their privacy and reveal their deepest thoughts and desires for free – a kind of Tom Sawyer business model based on persuading the public that it’s lots of fun to paint someone else’s fence.

Much of the new tech wealth is either built on this kind of shameless piracy – or on what I call the idiocy of ingenuity. You know — creating apps that are nothing more than solutions in search of problems. The fact that so much of this new wealth is based on either trivial or downright damaging human pursuits makes it doubly hard to stomach the arrogance and self-absorption of this new tech elite. These are men – and as we know, 98 percent of them ARE men – who sincerely believe that just because they came up with some new “friction-free” way of accessing people’s bank accounts, they are now entitled to run the world.

(Just a little aside — I love terms like “friction-free,” dreamed up in the world of tech-capitalism – language that romanticizes a brave new world where there is no human contact and where the very human consequences of innovation are hidden underneath layers of marketing hype. Another one of my favorite terms is “content aggregation” – which really means intellectual property theft. ) http://48hillsonline.org/2014/03/14/san-francisco-bust-class-war-need-stand-fight-save-city/

Rebecca Solnit: Resisting Monoculture - Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics

do forgive me for posting so much of Solnit's work recently, but she is on a roll describing the upheavals that we are facing in the industrial world these days. 

Solnit has written of the Google protests throughout and describes what is really at stake in the quote below and in the link. This piece was a response to a badly researched criticism of one of her original pieces.

I’m seeing the town that gave birth to the Sierra Club and Rainforest Action Network and seminal movements for human rights, a town that produced great insurrection and antiwar activism and idealism and new social ideas, become a place where you can’t afford to live unless you’re doing something incredibly lucrative and time-consuming—and probably involving technology corporations.
A young human rights activist is not so likely to be able to afford to live here, or a nurse’s aide, or a baker, and so the biodiversity of the city is being laid waste, and in its place springs up a monocrop of technology workers. If this continues, the contributions San Francisco has given the world will not be given any more.

Rebecca Solnit: Resisting Monoculture - Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics

Solnit on Occupy (aka The American Fall)

"...this is a revolt, among other things, against the confinement of decision-making to a thoroughly corrupted and corporate-money-laced electoral sphere and against the pitfalls of leaders. And it represents the return in a new form of the best of the post-9/11 moment....


Right now everyone is trying to figure out what happens next and quite a few self-appointed outside advisors are telling the Occupy movement exactly what to do (without all the bother of attending general assemblies and engaging in the process of working out ideas together). So far, the Occupy instigators and Occupy insiders have been doing a brilliant job of improvising a way that civil society can move forward into the unimaginable.

As for me, the grounds of my hope have always been that history is wilder than our imagination of it and that the unexpected shows up far more regularly than we ever dream. A year ago, no one imagined an Arab Spring, and no one imagined this American Fall -- even the people who began planning for it this summer. We don’t know what’s coming next, and that’s the good news. My advice is just of the most general sort: Dream big. Occupy your hopes. Talk to strangers. Live in public. Don’t stop now."



Read more

Creative economy: It's a rhizome, not a tree root.

Reading this morning about the Travellers, Irish nomadic people that little has been written about. They may be descendants of the Tinkers, or a much older population of religious peoples (some even tell a version of the Wandering Jew story of the metalworker who fashioned the nails for Jesus' cross) , or conversely, rise from the more recent Famine times.
In any case, author Rebecca Solnit went to find them in the 90s while in Ireland and reviews their clash with the settled people of Ireland in her "A Book of Migrations." Much like the Gypsies, laws have been designed to stop them and altercations with settled citizens recorded by officials when the Travellers attempt to stay or send their children to settled schools for a short time. Travellers do not want to stop. As one of their activists told Solnit, "Just as settled people remain settled people even when they travel, Travellers remain Travellers even when not traveling."
She sees how this would rankle those rooted citizenry and how the Travellers are lumped into a pillaging, roving mass whenever there was trouble during their stay, even when it was an isolated case or had nothing to do with a Traveller.

The following analogy struck me (as tropical gardeners will understand): "The French theorists Deleuze and Guattari declare that the hierarchical model of the tree has dominated too much of Western thought and offer in its place the rhizome, the loosely structured, horizontally spreading root system of plants such as the strawberry." Horizontal roots are the visual patterns that work best for creative economy structure. Allowing the rooted citizenry to hold their traditions and mores and flourish with their own growth while welcoming nomadic tribes to camp and offer a sidelong culture is an example of that. Even though people use the term gutter punks quite loosely, they are not the totality of young people in New Orleans, nor are the opportunistic carpetbaggers that come in the city's various moments of weakness and then go with our gold, the sum of the entrepreneurs. The ARK and Recycle For the Arts and Iron Rail Collective Library and Plan B (for example) were designed with the involvement of tribes of nomadic people, many who have since left, never to return.
No better example exists than those who came in March of every year from their own alternative lives and stayed until June, building, running and breaking down our New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival in its glory days. Those tribes are mostly gone, replaced by corporate and professional festival designers, but not forgotten.

When the ARK was closed down, or when the Eris parade was stopped, statements of literate, progressive neighbors and friends went like:
I hate the gutter punks/everyone has to follow the same rules/troublemakers are not artists/who started it/I need a permit, why don't they/they're not from here/
What I hear in that tone is what was said about the Travellers:
Nomads are literally unsettling for sedentary populations. People are uncomfortable with traditions not being melded.

But the port (al) that is New Orleans needs vibrant people that create rather than extract. And defining the extractors as all of "those who will not stay" will not do.
New Orleans' creative economy should be welcoming and as diffused as light through a thick, wavy old piece of glass, with its source of energy is as collective and mysterious as the sun itself.

Tomgram: Rebecca Solnit, The Earthquake Kit | TomDispatch

Once again, Rebeccca Solnit adds some value to the conversation; no question that disaster recovery has long needed another voice besides FEMA.

It's clear to me that she heard our stories while she was in New Orleans and has added Haiti's own story as well to her excellent reporting.

Tomgram: Rebecca Solnit, The Earthquake Kit | TomDispatch

Green building, green money.

I recently presented at the Sierra Club's New Orleans Green Rebuilding Conference at the Doubletree. Big fan of the organization. I think they are keeping the conversation going and real issues on the table. Not a diatribe against our leading enviros.
But was troubled by the lack of interest among many attendees in making at the connection with social justice issues around costs of greening. Let me elaborate:

To recycle in New Orleans, one must contact a private company, pay a monthly charge each month. To have the type of ceiling fans that Global Green recommends using as the most efficient, one must fork over 400.00. To install solar in your house, will run you anywhere from 10,000 to 100,000 and in a humid, sub-tropical climate like ours, how smart is it to punch bunch of holes in one's roof and hope for good installation during wind gusts of 30-90 mph?

Back when I was working to build a small house post-Katrina, I went looking for info about green and if I could make it downtown to info sessions, I could learn how I could BUY green. I could not see demonstration projects in my neighborhood about building small, not could I go to a group that would just show me how to reduce useage or band with others to buy cheaper. (more on that on the subject of geothermal another time).
What concerned me then and again when reading about building green, most is about buying new products that will allow me to have the same relationship with the environment (meaning how is it to be used to my benefit at my pleasure) rather than being a movement about building an alternative to consumption and to an energy industry that literally controls governments.

I can't ask that the store allow me to use my own jars to fill coffee or spices. I can't demand that the city buy their power from alternative sources. My landlord will not change the orientation of the house so I can get light from natural sources during the day.
I am still in the industrial energy system and I see no way out while it is only a system to encourage me to buy new things and what I get in return is only a reduction in the pocketbook costs for me.

I often talk to groups about the beginning of the "good food" movement back in the early 1970s and how small farmers came out of the hippie movement and started to bring organic products to the marketplace. Unfortunately, those organic apples usually cost around 4-6 bucks each at those tiny, well-meaning natural foods stores one saw back then. And you had to be a member and usually donate time as well. So, it did not spread into a movement. (Recently went back to my first co-op in Cleveland, which is still there more than 25 years later. It was still the same, with crowded shelves dusty and with prices that shocked me now. Funny how perception changes...)

Luckily, many activists in the enviro and consumer movements came to see that food issues were at the core of many of our problems and that the lack of healthy food and healthy spaces to look for food was moving our world to epidemic. Painstakingly, the new open-air markets started to spring up and when they did, those organizers were pretty savvy for 3 reasons:
1. They reached across the political spectrum for supporters. Libertarian farmers, old-money funders, environmental warriors, regular shopppers who didn't even know what a persimmon was, all were invited to join the town square. As far as issues, farmland preservation, soil and water quality, public safety, nutritional access and F-U-N social space were all part of the organizing strategy ever week.
2. They made competition a hallmark of good public markets. Trust me, we argue among ourselves about how much competition we allow in our markets, what underselling is allowed, how to balance different farmers needs, but the point is, we work to manage a fair price for both shopper and farmer. We do that to ensure that price can remain as democratic as possible for all.
3. They designed a taut but elastic structure that allowed for change and growth. Now, with the advent of electronic wireless technology, many of us are bringing debit and food stamp useage into these parking lots, raising money to pilot this and the outreach needed.
Listen, we got our problems. We have angry rural people coming into the city and sometimes missing the point of taking products to market; bringing inferior stuff or charging prices that are unrealistic. We have rich shoppers who are still the face of most markets, and they tend to be white and when in New Orleans, from the other side of Canal. We obsess over every tiny detail and then miss some big ones to our everlasting embarrassment.
And sometimes to my large frustration, I realize how few people have heard our message that we are building an alternative to the industrial system of food and as the alternative, scale is different and success is different. When we are compared to storefronts who buy food from wholesalers, never insuring that the farmer is also winning with this transaction or that price will be managed as fairly as possible, I know it is a marathon not a sprint.

But we know this food movement is not just about buying local. It is about knowing where your food comes from and how it is made and what the benefits are to you to participate- when you can. And the market movement is about more than food. I can define that with one sign you see at many "third places": "Seats are reserved for paying customers" Understandable I guess for a retail store that needs people to buy every hour. With markets, we have no such sign and most of us would leave before that ever even discussed seriously. Storefronts are usually single entrepreneurial activities and do not need to stand in for grassroots movements, so I am not comparing apples to satsumas, but point made.
Reality check: with 4 tiny farmers markets weekly in the city, you had either be very mobile or unemployed or a true zealot to get ALL of your food from them. If you're not a bunny-kissin', tree-huggin' food fringer, you need to get to that industrial food system too once in a while. Yes Whole Foods is part of that. Yes, Dorignac's is part of that. Yes, Terranova's is part of that. It's okay as long as you see the consumer side and the movement side. When so many shoppers of ours tell me that they now grow some food, or seem to know that local is not as available at those stores as it could be, or when we see a kid learn how to dig in a lavendar plant over a lazy, sunny Saturday morning under the tent, I know we are really, truly building a movement and not just another part of the consumer system.

And for those who don't like markets with their multiple check out lines and corny events, I say don't worry- we are building an alternative system that will allow more people to grow food to see good food and to find that food in spaces that we don't manage but (as long as they remember to benefit farmers, shoppers and maybe their own bottom line last) we will assist them. They can surely have access to some of the lesson we are learning. Schools who are building a whole system like Green Elementary, or that Rouse's down the street that is buying a bit directly from farmers, we can work with that while building our movement.

And THAT is what I am waiting for in the green building movement. I think it is coming, I do skeptical friends, but we need to insist that is about more than a 200.00 faucet that is beautiful and energy efficient. We need managed competition and a balance of education, advocacy and marketplace.
We need to see more than retail stores on Magazine street looking at energy efficiency-and those non-profits involved need to find ways to reuse, reduce AND build an alternative system of clotheslines and open windows in the fall to go along with their shiny new products. Like Janna Levitt, the architect from Toronto who was assisting me. She drew a 400 square foot house with every idea used being about my comfort level and knowledge about useage, climate. Spent more time explaining to me how I could reduce whenever needed than ever selling. She gets it.

I end with a quote from my current favorite writer, Rebecca Solnit, who spoke at the recent conference. When talking to these green activists and well-meaning, visionary architects at the Doubletree, she reminded them to not only think of the buildings, but also "remember to build the social space in between the buildings."
In other words, build a movement.

Interview with activist-writer Rebecca Solnit

Solnit interview

Activism clarified

A lot of activists expect that for every action there is an equal and opposite and punctual reaction, and regard the lack of one as failure... But history is shaped by the groundswells and common dreams that single acts and moments only represent. It's a landscape more complicated than commensurate cause and effect. Politics is a surface in which transformation comes about as much because of pervasive changes in the depths of the collective imagination as because of visible acts, though both are necessary. And though huge causes sometimes have little effect, tiny ones occasionally have huge consequences… History is like weather, not like checkers. A game of checkers ends. The weather never does."

Rebecca Solnit

Are we winning?

solnit/The Nation

Slow Solnit

Was just reading an article by Rebecca Solnit called "Finding Time" in the latest Orion magazine. Saw it online on aldaily.com, a very good listing of essay, review and opinions.
I have started to look forward to finding Ms. Solnit's pieces in the odd places that my brain and eyes wander to, coming across them almost like free range chicken eggs in a morning backyard hunt.
I see title, first lines and then, eyes travel for author-
her?

recognition

another one found.

This started with her quirky but delightful book on walking a few years ago, and then recently I was in San Francisco and picked up a book titled "Storming the Gates of Paradise: Landscapes For Politics", noticed the same author's name and when I went to the counter to purchase it, the City Lights bookseller told me "Rebecca is spending a lot of time in New Orleans right now" as he read my driver's license state of origin. Hmmm, I thought sourly, even her? thinking she can-what?

Still, I liked the premise of the book and bought it.

As I read her essays while waiting in the hotel or at the North Beach coffehouse in the evening, I realized that instead of another outside voice flying in on Friday til Tuesday morning to tch silently over the state of affairs in my poor city and to look for consultant's fees, this voice could probably add something. If she could share her knowledge and critical eye on the degradation of place and the disappearance of long-held traditions that we worry and fight for daily here, she is welcome on my street and at my farmers market.
So, when I arrived home from San Francisco, I tried to tell 2 friends that I thought would get it about the book, but they just kept talking about other essays that they had each recently read (that I HAD to read right away); when they saw the book, they both said, "hey, that's her!"
more eggs.

The article in the Orion Magazine talks about her choices for the new 4 Horsemen: Efficiency, Convenience, Profit and Security. Her premise is one that my neighbors and others agree with and are glad to see in print. The need to slow down and connect in more ways is mandatory for the future of community; it is only on a meandering walk through the nearby landmarks of your own landscape that you will find the place you deserve to call home.
And when you get back from that walk, look for those eggs.