[Ailist] The Zietgeist Movement and Venus Project

Tue Mar 10 15:03:40 MST 2009

Thanks Cheri

We have to use discourse to change the status quo if it is wrong.  Radical activism is necessary to make people aware of the need to change if change is necessary - I believe that the quiet approach does not work.  Why?  People think they have the right to abuse society and the environment to optimise their personal situation.

I think Appreciative Inquiry is a radical approach.  It is confronting.  That is, it challenges people to focus on the appreciative and not frame things in deficit terms.  My clients have told me that it was a radical and confronting approach at first, but then they realised that they did not have the right to frame things in deficit terms.  The point is, it was radical and confronting - I challenged them.

It is important to clarify that radial activism does not mean violence, but it does require that people are challenged by confronting approaches.  For example, Australian public service announcements to stop people drinking and driving have included graphic television advertisements that involve images o people who have been ripped apart in car accidents apparently caused by excessing alcohol consumption.  Similar advertisements are currently being shown in Australia to help motorcycle riders realise that they need to wear protective leather suits or they will have horrific injuries to their legs arms and buttocks (they have some really good makeup artists).

Many people do think they have the right to take advantage of other people and the environment.  For example, watch "The Smartest Guys in the Room" about Enron.  They all believed that they had the right to disrupt society (for example driving up the price of electricity in certain parts of the USA and causing blackouts in other parts of the USA) in order to achieve their personal incentive payment objectives.  What about the people who set up investment business based on lies about the returns from their investment management?  These people really thought they had the right to engage in these lies and corruption!

In Australia, the emissions trading scheme is being undermined and diluted by Australian's desire to maintain their standard of living by raping the environment.  Likewise, many Australians insist on driving excessively large 4 wheel drives and living in outrageously large homes with airconditioning on far too high.

People will not wake up by gentle persuation.  The Shell situation demonstrated this.  The Board of Shell was happy to sink defunct oil drilling rigs in the North Sea and kill Nigerians who opposed their oil production operations in Nigeria (this is well documented in the press at the time).  It was not until radical activists such as John Elkington (see his business www.SustainAbility.com and note the testimonial from the CEO of Shell on that website) obstructed sales of petrol from Shell service stations around Europe by stopping cars from entering Shell serivice stations that the Board of Shell took any notice.

Of course, we are all too nice to be radical activists (including me).  So, humanity will suffer the consequences of our lack of appropriate action.  Cause and effect - aka scientific method.

My approach is to help people to realise that they do not have the right to engage in these actions (sometimes I have to be cruel).  If they really get it (in the way that Ray Andersen, the Chairman of Interface Carpet did) we may see some changes.  However, most people choose to ignore my approach.  It is easier (and somehow more profitable for policy makers, accountants and lawyers) to establish a new market in which we trade carbon as a sort of commodity.  This is what the Australian Minister for the Climate Change - Senator Penny Wong - said last night on Australian national television.  In other words, the Australia government has sold out to powerful lobbyists, who think they have the right to abuse society and the environment in order to improve their personal position.  There is nothing at all challenging about a carbon trading scheme - it is an easy way out.

So, I agree with the Zietgeist Movement - I just think it needs to be radical in its implementation.

Certainly, once people are ready to listen an appreciative approach can be taken.  However, until they have been confronted somehow they will not realise that the rights they have assumed for themselves are wrong.

Perhaps I have my thoughts clouded by current events in Australia and have misinterpreted the paper and your comments.  Sorry if that is the case.

Lionel Boxer CD PhD MBA BTech(IndEng) - 0411267256
Associate of RMIT University - lionel.boxer at rmit.edu.au
Graduate School of Business
my "Assessment of Quality Systems with Positioning Theory" 
now in a googe book - see link at http://intergon.net
>>> Cheri Torres <cheri.torres at gmail.com> 11/03/09 8:29 AM >>>
Lionel,
Not sure how I see the connection between what you have written below and
the book I forwarded.  Can you make it more clear.

Thanks,
Cheri

On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 4:00 PM, Lionel Boxer <lionel.boxer at rmit.edu.au>wrote:

> Cheri knows Rom Harre.  His 1999 book (Greenspeak: A study of environmental
> discourse), uses the term ZEITGEIST on page 11 (see my reference to this:
> http://intergon.net/phd/phdch2.doc).  I do not recall if that book got
> into the "THE ZEITGEIST MOVEMENT", but the term ZEITGEIST was used in the
> context of environmental discourse.
>
> In http://intergon.net/phd/phdch3.doc I discussed how activist movements
> initiated a great deal of the triple bottom line / sustainability behaviours
> we see today.  For example, John Elkington was originally an activist
> applying pressure to Shell.  He is now a prime consultant to the Shell board
> and other significant international businesses.  For example, I saw an email
> from the CEO of Shell Jac Nassur about a meeting he had with John Elkington
> and the CEO of British Petrolium.
>
> We study order in AI.  A little focused anarchy goes along way towards
> realigning the status quo by disrupting what needs to be disrupted.
>
> Lionel Boxer CD PhD MBA BTech(IndEng) - 0411267256
> Associate of RMIT University - lionel.boxer at rmit.edu.au
> Graduate School of Business
> my "Assessment of Quality Systems with Positioning Theory"
> now in a googe book - see link at http://intergon.net
> >>> Cheri Torres <cheri.torres at gmail.com> 11/03/09 5:20 AM >>>
> I've just learned about the Venus Project and would like to encourage
> everyone to look into it.  I'm attaching a short book that offers an
> incredible pathway forward. With our monetry-based economy about to
> collapse, this is an opportunity to step into a resource-based economy of
> abundance, joy, peace, and enough for everyone. The world in which AI is
> the
> norm!!
> Please take the time to read through this, check on the project and
> consider
> how you and the work you do might support our moving towards this before it
> all ends in tears!
>
> An interview with Jacques Fresco
>
> http://magazine.chictoday.com/issue023/therealityoffantasy/therealityoffantasy.php
>
> The Venus Project Website:
> http://www.thevenusproject.com
>
> If anyone is already involved, I would appreciate hearing what you are
> doing
> and how it is going.
> Thanks,
> Cheri
> --
> Cheri B. Torres, Ph.D.
> Collaborative-by-Design
> Asheville, NC
> 828-225-5088
>
>

-- 
Cheri B. Torres, Ph.D.
Collaborative-by-Design
Asheville, NC
828-225-5088
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