Stop Waiting For Superman

I just finished watching Waiting for Superman, an emotionally evocative documentary about students in American schools.  A large part of the film focuses on the dilemma of educational reform in an environment of ironclad tenures that are vigilantly defended by teachers’ unions.  The documentary briefly mentions that these teachers unions arose decades ago because of mistreatment of educators (as is the history of most unions).  Now, those unions have become very politically powerful and they work to protect teachers, even if that protection comes at the cost of student success.

But wait! What is meant by “protect teachers?” Are teachers who just sit in class waiting for the day to go by because they can’t stand their jobs actually “protected?” I had one of those teachers who said we didn’t even need to talk to him because our assignments were written on the chalkboard.  He would spend the class time reading his newspaper with the soles of his shoes staring at us.  Maybe he had his eyes down there because he was definitely sitting on his head. 

Are hating kids and feeling miserable about the classrooms and hallways teachers inhabit 5 days a week something to be preserved and protected?  No, the real meaning is that their salaries are protected.  Or more to the point, their access to a means of living protected.  No wonder.  In an economy where every person must sell themselves on the labor market as their ONLY means of earning a living (unfortunately, there’s no alternative economy in which people are provided free access to life’s resources in our wonderful FREE market), it only makes sense for them to defend their tenures/salaries/means of living.  So, teachers, who have a decent degree of social respect for their professions, and sufficient incomes to fight for their means of life, are able to “protect” their livelihoods.  Students, and particularly students of non-wealthy parents, are not able to access a meaningful education.  They suffer the consequences of this broken system throughout their lives.

The film tries to end on a high-note with a review of the KIPP school program, which has had undeniable success in producing students with better test scores.  I’m not sure how the schools function in terms of student well being, but let me leave that aside for the moment.  These KIPP schools are scarce, and because they receive public funding, they must use a lottery system to determine who gets admitted.  The film follows five kids and it shows them anxiously waiting to hear if their number gets called.  You can also see the other parents and children in the background nail-bitingly attending each utterance from the announcers hoping the next name or number called is theirs.  As the number of names called grows and the available seats reduce, the sense of desperation on their young faces makes you want to rush in and rescue them all.  You hold on to hope to the last number, because that’s how all movies resolve the climax—at the last minute, and in the favor of the protagonist.  Not in this case.  It’s real life and most of the featured kids don’t get called.  The shattering of hope for the kids makes it difficult to hold back the tears.  Then, the realization on the parents’ faces that not only have their children missed an important opportunity to improve their lives been lost, but that they, the parents, have let their kids down.  Mommy can’t make it better.  She can’t throw money at the problem and make it disappear.  Their daily fight with the cruel market world, against which they try to insulate their kids, is a losing battle.  The system is king, and they are the pawns.  Somehow, they must summon all remaining strength not to let their sense of defeat, worry, and despair spill over onto their kids.  They have to console their children because it is their pain that takes priority at that time.  Despite every Herculean effort to shield their kids from the continuous battle to provide a better life, their kids know.  The kids know that their parents can’t protect them from the harsh world.  They know that the impact of this lottery is not just about where to go to school, but a lottery about how their lives will turn out, and it’s looking less and less favorable. 

These are the unsparing sacrifices we make to perpetuate our outdated, insufficient, and barely-above-savage social system.  All those people who work so hard to critique a resource-based economic model to find any unpleasantry, any objection, any difficult challenge that would be faced in an RBE amaze me in that they seem to overlook all the heartache of our current system.  It’s like they measure an RBE against a fictional utopian standard, in which everyone gets everything they want and problems are extinct.  They use that to argue against an RBE, without noticing that their measurement should be against our current system.  Proponents of an RBE do not expect utopia, just a life and planet a lot better off than what we have now.   With all the road kill caused by our current system, it feels like there must be a thousand better options, which is all we need—better!  And it sure is time for better, unless we want to continue to watch lives hinge on the outcome of lotteries.  

Regarding The Educational Imperative

It is commonly understood in the Zeitgeist community that education is the means by which we can move into a transitional economy, which will evolve into a transformed society that respects and advances each person’s well being. By educating people, we intend to promote the value shift that becomes necessary to survive on this planet—the shift we have all experienced through recognition of certain vital facts that dismiss outdated understandings of human nature and faith in the monetary-market regulating paradigm.  After being disabused of these cultural myths, and comprehending a unifying perspective that twines the seemingly disparate strings of planetary suffering into the rope and noose of a core social danger, we are compelled to share with each other.  Such is the sensible response.  Like the sentinel meerkat warning its playful clan that danger threatens them all, we cry out in hopes that we will be heard and our clan will act.

Our clan is stubborn, though.  Many will not listen, and some will react violently.  The pugnacious status-quo defenders already notice that something is “wrong with the world,” but their ideological helmets constrain the expansion of their perspectives.  They’ve already committed themselves to this battle, so deeply entrenched in a worldview where war is the only means to resolve the problems.  To peer above the trench is not an opportunity to see if the war is worth fighting; it’s just a risky move that will end with a bullet to the head.  To be exposed to the body of evidence gathered under the Zeitgeist library beckons the inner skeptic, anthropologist, and psychologist to lay bare a history of woe and a “self” identified with that woe.  Make no mistake! Even those who have been most advantaged by this system have at least some awareness that their profit has come at the cost of their conscience.  Wounded are we.

Those that do not listen because they “have better things to do” are generally too busy “keeping their heads above water,” not realizing the forces that conspire to drown them.  Or they have an artificial divide between their lives and the rest of the world.  This lack of awareness may be natural in the sense that we are not born with a mature understanding of the complex relationships that exist in, around, and between us.  It does not mean that no effort should be made to displace that ignorance.  Humans are not born literate, but we make considerable effort in educating people to become so because it provides them with unceasing access to useful and entertaining information.  Similarly, every effort should be made to foster people’s understanding of the ecological framework in which they live their lives, and the ways in which nature circumscribes our behavior. When we have a better grasp of what limits nature sets, we actually gain more freedom from what our minds conceive as “the limit.” Nature is a much bigger thinker than we are, which is why scientists discover unimagined life forms, cosmological marvels, and invisible realities.  Charles Darwin recognized this when he stated, “We are not here concerned with hopes or fears, only with truth as far as our reason permits us to discover it” (Descent of Man).

The goal of the Zeitgeist Movement to educate is necessary and logical.  We cannot create a new, sustainable, and emergent society without a comprehensive education to allow the maturation of ecological perspective (I use the term ecological in the broadest sense possible, inclusive of the interconnections among earth, society, and psyche).  The predominant conception of “education” needs to be examined.  When people discuss education, there is a somewhat narrow view that it means sharing written or verbal intellectual information that will stir one to question their own ideas and revise when reasonable.  We intuitively know that this isn’t always effective, but we persist anyway.  The Zeitgeist Media Festival and Media Project are addendums to the educational campaign that seek to connect emotionally with people.  

Ultimately, the movement is concerned with accelerating a value shift, and my purpose in writing this article is to encourage members to embrace an omni-directional approach to “education.”  Some people will be moved by the plentiful intellectual output, and some by the artistic output, but for this movement to reach critical mass, it will need to reach a very diverse population of different motivations.  A common conclusion is that either people wise up or they will have to deal with painful bio-psycho-social disasters.  Various forms of protest, so-called “sustainable community” projects, and cooperative farming are seen as outside the scope of the Zeitgeist Movement.  Alternative currencies like time banking or community-based “dollars” are properly criticized as corruptible and inadequate for accomplishing the lasting change we need. 

I understand and appreciate these criticisms and they serve to remind us—repeatedly—that we should not lose sight of the bigger picture.  However, such community-based initiatives can be seen as a learning tool to show members of our communities that we can and should work together.  Strengthening social bonds and social responsibility will give us pause before rewarding behavior that is loyal to the prevailing “golden” rule: profit over people.  Rampant misguided individualism, ideologically driven by “freedom from society” and “my property” are colossal barriers to the value shift that is necessary for a new society to take root.  Scientific evidence will compel a definite segment of the population to overhaul its value system, but as we can see with religions, reasoning alone will not suffice.  Direct experience in real situations that challenge people’s beliefs regarding human nature and social systems requires them to reach beyond their conditioned reflexes and ideas.  Protests, community projects, and alternative currencies may provide those challenges at different levels of meaning for a greater variety of people.  There are, no doubt, many other forms of situational challenges, but it is important to ask if a particular situation can serve as a transformative educational tool.  So, let’s not get stuck in confined paths of “education” and be open to a broad, multi-layered approach. Besides that, people will want to be activists in various ways, and that is the promise of a resource-based economy: people contributing in ways that fulfill them with an understanding that social interest and personal interest need not be in conflict with one another.  When we help each other, we help ourselves.

Letter to OC Register about Bank of America

I wrote a quick letter to the editor in response to this article:
Bank of America in $8.5B mortgage settlement


Chris Kahn wrote in the Bank of America article (June 29 2011), "Countrywide enriched itself at the expense of investors by continuing to service bad loans while running up servicing fees."  Isn't this the principal concern of business: to make a profit at the expense of others' lack of knowledge or skill?  Where are all the "free market"
advocates on this?  They usually say they don't want regulations interfering with the almighty invisible hand, so why not let BofA and its subsidiaries grab as much money as they can from consumers/investors?  Rather, they prefer to complain about the government using money to help those who suffer from poverty.  Until we decide to move to a resource-based economy, these kinds of uncomfortable business practices will remain with us.

Zday 2011 Orange County Long Beach

With about 20 people in attendance at the comfortable and tranquil Avia Hotel in Long Beach, we had plenty of delicious snacks and great discussion.  Thanks go to Mico for securing the venue for us.  I was so pleased that the group felt welcome to participate and share their perspectives.

Originally, I had extracted 25 minutes (in 1 to 3 minute segments) of video from ZMF to use as discussion points.  There are so many research findings shared in the film, but while watching, one doesn't have the time to explore them in more depth.  This was the occasion for that exploration.  In fact, we only made it through 13 minutes of film in nearly three hours!

We took a few moments at the end of the evening to share what we would all do if we weren't forced into wage slavery, and it was great to hear how each person would share his/her individual talents to contribute to society. 

With a nascent movement like this, it is not difficult to find yourself feeling alone in wanting to create the change that is called for in a resource-based economy.  To discuss these topics in more detail with people who already feel compelled to create that change makes for a friendly environment of peers.

Thanks to all those who attended and helped make this event a great one!

Defending Against Shame

I think it's useful to research criticisms of a Resource-Based Economy (RBE). However, I think it's important not to lose focus on the larger picture of dealing with the source of the innumerable ways that suffering is manifested in our current socio-economic system.  People focus so much on the content of particular arguments (will I have my violent video games?) that they lose sight of motive and the reasons for that motive. 


Consciously or unconsciously we refuse to see the essentiality of being passively aware because we do not really want to let go of our problems; for what would we be without them? We would rather cling to something we know, however painful, than risk the pursuit of something that may lead who knows where. With the problems, at least, we are familiar; but the thought of pursuing the maker of them, not knowing where it may lead, creates in us fear and dullness. --J.K.


The monetary-market system is so pervasive--worldwide--that we can barely tolerate questioning it.  After all, how is it possible that this system could be wrong if it is so pervasive?  We see the same kind of thinking in terms of religion.  If it's a belief-system with many followers, it is called religion.  Few followers? A cult.  The deference we pay to religion while we vilify cults makes clear the way we subjugate our thinking by perceived authority.  The subtle, perhaps unconscious, implication is that what I've believed for so long was an untruth.  How could I (so clever and wise) have been so easily mislead?  To put it bluntly, "are you calling me an idiot for having fallen into this system hook, line, and sinker?"  Ohhhh, the self-shame.


We must be aware of this tendency when talking about the merits of a RBE.  Are the questions and criticisms sincere in their interest to find out how things could function for our collective benefit in a new system, whether you call it a RBE or not?  Do we have the interest in even giving it a try or do we prefer the old system with its familiar patterns of destruction?  At what point do we get so fed up with these recurring problems that we say "enough is enough! let's try something else!"  


If we had a new society to design and I proposed a system in which 30% of the world's people would go hungry, even more would have no access to medical care, and nearly all would be abused endlessly (with little recourse) in their work, do you think that would be a system we would hastily implement? It would be torn to shreds and thrown off the table as a suggestion. Yet, that's the system we have now. It meets only some of our needs. It offers abundance for just some people, and if we are so narrow-minded that we only include them in our calculation then we can come up with millions of reasons to support it. Inequality is not a concept, it is reality.  The system we have today encourages this stratification and conflict.  It engenders competition, not cooperation.


Some may argue that human society as a whole has no meaning in a cosmic sense and that a sort of "kill or be killed" model seems to be the natural order of things. That's a nice abstract argument, and it's true. It lacks authenticity though. It lacks any compassion. We no longer live in a society of "kill or be killed" and we wouldn't really embrace that change. If we truly wanted to organize society by these principles then might would be right.  If I wanted your stuff, I could kill you to have it.  Why not use "the visible fist" to regulate our economy?  Supply and demand would be determined by how much we could conquer another to make what we needed.  The doctor would have to mend my broken arm if she didn't want me to shoot her.  Then again, she could give me some "medicine" which got rid of the threat.  Oh that's right, we had a system somewhat resembling this in history.  People learned of the benefits of cooperation in creating a society that met many people's needs simultaneously.  Now, it's time to make another jump in cooperation.  That jump could lead us to a RBE.  Two hundred years ago, slave owners would have been outraged to think of an economy that didn't operate on forced labor.  Today, such a slave economy would be considered indefensible.  And someday, wage slavery will carry the same feeling of disgust.


When I witness people vehemently attacking the Zeitgeist Movement or resource-based economy, it becomes clear to me that there is a deep sense of fear, and generally, a desensitization to the current suffering.  Instead of arguing about the understandings of the ZM, it would be more fruitful to attend to the emotional issues that are obstructing sincere inquiry.  We all fall victim to conditioning.  The shame isn't in having been conditioned, but in insisting on preserving it.

A World Without Geniuses

Most people recognize the profound influence a particular genius has had on human society, whether it be technical, philosophical, or artistic. I watched a biographical film last night about Beethoven and one of the circumstances that was highlighted was the fact that Beethoven was not a member of the aristocracy, so he had to do compose piano sonatas instead of full orchestral pieces because that is how he got paid. Beethoven was lucky because his parents were musicians, so they taught him to play music when he was young. It was most likely the only skill they could pass along to him so he could earn a living. Of course, he flourished in his training, and eventually, he created a revolution in musical composition that has made him one of the most famous names in classical music to this day. In fact, there is even a Beethoven scholar--a man who is spending his life studying about the life of another man! Imagine that.

Now Imagine This:

I just plucked many great geniuses out of history. Beethoven, Babbage, Buddha, Aristotle, Da Vinci, Darwin, Einstein, Shakespeare.....all gone! Since this is just a thought experiment, we can try to stretch ourselves over two realities in which they exist and they don't exist. You come upon the feeling of what a great loss that would be to humanity to lose all that insight and creativity. It's more difficult to imagine what the technological loss would be.

My reason for putting you through this is to consider that this reality of absent geniuses is the world we live in. The people mentioned above all had some "chance" at life in the societies they were raised in. I mean they had enough financial means for them to grow their talents. Ultimately, they were able to earn a living from those talents, but they needed to start off with some opportunity to develop their genius, which is why we know about them (or their works) today.

Another Beethoven may have been born a few years ago, but sadly, his parents couldn't afford to feed him and provide him with health care, so he's dead now. Women geniuses haven't been afforded the educations they needed to bring out their talents, and even then, they had other duties to attend to. In a monetary system where everyone must compete with each other for resources, we have missed out on much innovation.

This will be corrected in a resource-based economy. The understanding that each human has a certain set of talents, grand or simple, will be valued not by how much money it can make, but because it will contribute to the health and growth of humanity. We don't feel the loss of these absent geniuses because we can't really be in two realities, but we can realize that this current system produces this absence, and we can work to disentangle ourselves from it.