Note: This is an archived site. All articles and sections were written for specific audiences, for particular purposes. Without the proper context, a given piece can be puzzling or off-putting. Please only read what is directly recommended to you. What’s below is UNEDITED. But it’s spot-on about not wanting to simply fight the good fight… This piece has been tweaked as of 8/14 to secure the interest of STS9. Hunter Brown et al. might want to glance at the excerpt at the very bottom before reading this article.. UPDATE FOR MONDAY, 8/16: Just heard from Liz at 1320. I’m hoping that my style of writing/communicating doesn’t interfere with the importance of the message. I’m praying that Liz will get it, and — with great urgency — pass the word to STS9. All this writing amounts to sound bites. I’m shooting for some deep in-person dialogue to do justice to the idea of having STS9 spearhead a TOSCA-like effort. For I know it could change mountains overnight.

For More Than Pocket Change
Dedicated to http://www.playingforchange.com/episodes/3/One_Love
O’Xman

“They try to make us think that solidarity is just givin’ to charity, never mind the reason we got such disparity” — from http://www.zcommunications.org/who-owns-ya-mind-by-jonathan-uss (”Who Owns Ya Mind” by Uss, Atkinson et al.)

“Liberals and progressives and radicals left-of-center alike all berate the general public for being ignorant of history, but, for the most part, they all seem to be quite out of touch themselves with the history of making change in the world, clinging to obsolete paradigms for protest, pulling levers in booths which give them zero traction, or trying to stop our horrid momentum by screaming at traffic in the streets… in lieu of actually getting into essential drivers’ seats. Neither voting, nor petitions nor direct action, as presently practiced, allows citizens to secure control of the wheels, but I have a proposal for action which can provide that necessary hands-on scenario.” — the author, at a local meeting of permanently marginalized/fully domesticated activists at UCSC

“Resignation, apathy, cynicism, ignorance and — most of all — atomization are our challenges, not — contrary to universal agreement among the Left — Fox and their first cousins, politicians and corporate killers.” — the author to his ten-year-old son

You going to bend down, bend over to pick up some pocket change on the sidewalk, whilst cries of murder can be heard — loud and clear — from across the street? That’s a serious fucking question. ‘Cause that’s what they got you doin’. And there is a THEY. They is people like Steve Jobs (who owns the majority of Disney’s shares), and all the people — ignorant or otherwise — who have jobs workin’ for Steve or Disney. The ones, that is, who don’t really care whether or not you have your share of the Apple Pie that is America. And they is also ALL the powers that be, the ones that send children overseas to kill other children. And the people who provide them with weaponry. And the parents who still hand over their offspring to be fodder. [Unfucking believable, yes?] Those who blindly salute the flag, and all of their first cousins. And so on.

This is for Uss and Atkinson and all of their first cousins in activist circles. I’m tired of our documenting ourselves to death in lieu of organizing for an inevitable confrontation. Inevitable if we’re going after more than personal pocket change. I’ve got lots of energy, on the other hand, for discussing action which follows a fresh paradigm. Doesn’t have to be my particular plan. Just want the obsolete models for action to be set aside as we sit down for talk.

Want to deal with disparity? Here’s some unacknowledged facts:

1. You can’t do that unless the disparity you’re confronting is worldwide disparity. You’ll never address the disparity locally… if you’re dealing exclusively with your personal, immediate situation.

2. You can’t confront disparity by working at it Monday through Friday… only during biz hours. What’s required is that at least a core group is workin’ it 24×8, no holidays.

Permit me to point out a bottom line fact now:

If you overturn, say, Prop 8 in California, or you manage to get what you want vis-a-vis a change in copywright law, whatever… no accomplishment with regard to any single issue will suffice (to put it mildly) unless the “advancement” is tied to at least two things. One, you can’t have what you want if it’s contingent upon killing people abroad or at home. Which means you’re obliged to be heavily involved in creating an internal threat to the powers that be as per http://www.zcommunications.org/why-wikileaks-won-t-stop-the-war-by-noa m-chomsky. Two, for many reasons you’re obliged to reconcile your personal concerns to our collective need to radically change our lifestyle in the U.S. We can’t sustain our present momentum. Current green alternatives — on the drawing boards, being implemented — are slated to fail in the Big Picture. The Gulf Horror and its aftermath provides a recent example. Turning Utah, shortly, into another Alberta, Canada (re establishing another Tar Sands situation) is another. These are only two among many abominations which provide end-of-the-world scenarios which make a mockery of things like recycling and such.

This is bullshit. Words. Blah blah.

Like Beckett said, “Habit is the great deadener.” Contact me at 831-688-8038 at any hour in Aptos, California, and — perhaps — set things up so that YOU can be contacted at any hour (or within 12 hours or so wherever you happen to be). You can also reach me at tosca.2010@yahoo.com; “tosca”, as in what’s delineated at http://oxtogrind.org/archive/687. It might be too late now to deal with the gubernatorial (electoral) arena in CA for 2010… following the official treadmill parameters, but I’ve got a few ideas that can help us to circumvent all that nonsense anyway.

Questions: What the hell is going on with the greatest (negative) health experiment in history going on without so much as peep from the peeps? Fuck the sheeple. Don’t figure out what others are or are not going to do. Join hands with me in solidarity. Don’t just think in terms of your own lifetime (”We don’t inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.”), but do think of your mortality, and do think of having something to do with creating a life worth living for during your lifetime. What the hell is going on when taxing only taxing the top 1% of CA’s wealth 1% would deal totally with the entire state’s debt, totally transforming life for the better virtually overnight for 99% of the peeps? What’s happening when we refuse to terminate the unnecessary/horrid nuclear research on UC campuses in the midst of historic budget cuts in education statewide? I’ve got a thousand more questions like these which I can draw from the top of my head, having immersed myself 24×8 in such crap for such a long time, but it doesn’t mean diddle without you playing the fiddle with me in joyous Jambalaya. Yes, I’m now officially out of my mind with this shit. [Pause.] But I’m not bending over for no pocket change. You can count on me not pretending like I can’t smell our Auschwitz ‘cross the street, that I don’t know that this is Heaven on Earth, my life… when unmolested.

I love The Rhyme, I do. But… to get the country, the world to turn on a dime, it’s gonna take more than pocket change. I say focket the mange. Dream very, very beautifully, and abundantly strange. Spend all of your heartbeats, and those of everyone else within range. Awake and sing!

Special note for STS9 added 5:30PM, Friday the 13th: Check out “Ecstatic Politics” as a supplement to the above, all else being equal. I posted what’s directly below on the STS9 site this morning 8/14:

“I’ve been trying to reach members of STS9 as of yesterday, but no response yet. It’s absolutely wonderful that any band, let alone a high profile group, gets behind the work of Zinn and Chomsky, and such effort/accomplishment should be applauded and supported. But, that said, the apathy addressed in REGENERATION will NOT be countered by what’s put on the screen. Seeds will be planted, yes, but they will not bloom in time. We have serious deadlines when it comes to the issues spotlighted in REGENERATION. And that’s where I come in. There’s a proposal for action which Howard Zinn supported with his imprimatur… that I want to share with STS9. It follows a new paradigm for protest/change. Although at this late date it has to be tweaked, you can get a taste of it at http://oxtogrind.org/archive/687. I want STS9 to head an effort along those lines, for it will give us a chance to actually alter our horrid momentum. As things stand, we are simply documenting ourselves to death. Blessings in solidarity, Richard Martin Oxman in Aptos, CA at 831-688-8038 at any hour or at tosca.2010@yahoo.com. PLEASE, please. See http://oxtogrind.org/archive/710 too, if you will.”

Supplementary note: Just read the first two paragraphs of Missy Beattie’s http://www.counterpunch.org/beattie08132010.html, and tell me why we aren’t obliged to do something FRESH immediately. I have a plan for dealing with it (which will address many other issues)… but I can’t implement it alone. I need you.