Welcome to the TZM newsletter for the new-year 2014.
The dominant news story at the close of 2013 was of course the passing at 95 of Nelson Mandela on December 5th – one of the few giants of our generation and a man who came to symbolise human progress against dogma, structural violence and inequality. Amassing 250 international honours (not to mention a legendary shirt collection), and known affectionately by his ancestral tribal name ‘Madiba’ he will stand forever tall amongst those who have resisted the status quo and kept on pushing forward towards the light. A part of his legacy is the Elders (theelders.org/about) an independent group of world leaders collaborating for world peace and human rights.
As Madiba has said:-
‘… to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others…’
So now we’ve burned off the last of the mince pies (courtesy of that Wonga loan), and popped last year’s tasteful Rudolf jumper in the recycling bank to make room for the one Aunty Joan bought us on her credit card (although, cynicism aside, the new one does have an LED in the nose), it’s time to make a new year’s resolution to do what we can to build a constructive relationship of our own with the Elders and many others like them.
If you’re one of those people who have not yet become involved in any educational activism for TZM, Let this be the year when all that changes. Let’s keep learning, get organised, and double our efforts in trying to wake up all those lost souls who’ve been sleep walking back to their hamster wheels in every town in the land. Each and every one an agent and victim in…
Alas, time to turn our attention from rare giants back to the deeds of rather more mediocre players. Last month George Osborne released the autumn budget statement, insisting that worker’s overall pay has not fallen during this government. The Office for National Statistics begs to differ however, publishing figures that show middle income families have seen a £5,000 a year reduction in their household incomes over the past five years. Osborne has dismissed these figures as ‘misleading’(!) and says he’ll publish his own report to clarify the situation.
And the Chancellor’s rose-tinted sense of clarity is not exactly flavour of the month for a group of independent housing experts, either. They have warned that the Government’s help to buy scheme (designed to help first time buyers onto the property ladder) will overheat the housing market and detonate a bomb under the British economy. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg…
…More people in working families are living in poverty than those in non-working households for the first time, research published recently by a York charity has revealed.
The annual Monitoring Poverty and Social Exclusion Study, compiled by the New Policy Institute for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF), said almost 13 million people in the UK are below the poverty line. 6.7 million of these live in a family with at least one working adult - a 500,000 increase on 2012.
The report said the decline in average incomes over the last two years has wiped out any benefit from the UK’s ‘boom’ decade, but incomes for the poorest ten per cent of people have been falling for even longer, since 2004/05. The JRF said this showed that, despite optimistic noises about economic recovery, this was not being reflected in people’s pay packets and living standards. Clearly this ‘recovery’ money has been circulating within the financial markets only, and has not ‘trickled down’ into the real economy.
This is also an indication that low/part time work is masking the effects of technological unemployment, and allows the government to boast reassuringly low jobless figures….
…And still on this topic The British medical journal has also released a report stating that hunger in Britain has reached a ‘public health emergency’, adding that the Government may be covering up the extent to which austerity is adding to the problem. British hospitals have seen an almost doubling of the number of malnutrition cases - from 3161 to 5,400 since 2008. During the same period the number of people relying on aid from food banks has increased more than thirteen-fold, from 26,000 in 2008 to 347,000 in 2012.
As 13 million Britons went deeper into debt to pay for Christmas 2013, The Bank of England reported that the British population has seen the biggest drop in savings for 40 years. In 2013, British long term savings reduced by £23 billion – an average of £900 per household. As private fractional reserve banking needs to maintain levels of deposited funds on which to base its money creation, it is clear that these lost deposits are being progressively replaced by funds generated through quantitative easing. This represents a huge shift in the benefits from investment away from the main population.
That’s a lot of misleading figures for you to clarify, George. Good luck with your report!
Meanwhile, David Cameron is insisting that the coalition government’s economic plan is working - but admits the benefits are not being felt by many people. Hmmm – perhaps he should get a dictionary and revise his definition of the word ‘working’! And following his visit to China, Britain has won a contract to export pig semen to that country, worth £45 million to the UK economy. Well at least he’ll be kept busy for the rest of his term in office…
In the USA the crumbling state of Detroit, once the car-making capital of the US is officially bankrupt. This will be a test the Government’s ability to honour its pension commitments to all those retiring baby boomers –as will the BRICs nations as they continue to undermine the US dollar’s position as international reserve currency. As Detroiters face the prospect of becoming the Greece of the USA, perhaps it won’t be too long before they follow the lead of the Pine Ridge Native American nation, as they prepare an experiment to dump the Dollar and mount a Bitcoin revolution to revive the financial fortunes of indigenous Americans.
Perhaps another nudge in that direction for all Americans is provided by the need to protect their bank balances from our old friend the NSA. In a white house report, it is revealed that measures are recommended to reduce the freedom of the NSA in using its offensive cyber capabilities to change the balances in bank accounts. This raises the question: whose accounts have they already accessed, and to what end? Angela Merkel has likened president Obama’s administration to East Germany’s Stasi, who would plant phantom transactions in political opponent’s accounts to incriminate them.
And chief among Brics currencies, the Chinese Yuan has overtaken the Euro to become the world’s second most used currency. I wonder if it will still be number 2 after February 7th, when the US treasury prepares to face its debt ceiling. That fateful can of worms has been feebly kicked down the road from last October – since which time US technology companies have seen a collapse in exports resulting from their collusion with the NSA spying scandal. Reports estimate that Silicon Valley could be facing total losses of up to $180 billion in export trade due to the debacle. Aerospace giant Boeing – one of America’s biggest exporters – has lost a $4.5 billion contract with Brazil to renew its fighter aircraft fleet. Brazil has now awarded the contract to Sweden’s Saab. I don’t fancy Edward Snowden’s chances of getting much of a pension from his old employer!
And on the environmental front from Brazil, its indigenous people are the latest culture to direct their wrath at Canada’s conspicuously ecocidal fossil fuel industry. Amazon Watch joined a global coalition of organizations to launch a campaign in defence of indigenous and traditional communities threatened by the Canadian mining company Belo Sun. The Toronto-based company plans to build Brazil’s largest gold mine on the banks of the Amazon’s Xingu River in the ‘Big Bend’ area that is most impacted by the disruptive Belo Monte dam. Brazil’s government has been seduced by the prospects of vibrant economic growth, and has railroaded its way past any ethical process in considering environmental impacts or the rights of indigenous nations. The targeted site – formerly part of the river bed - has been left largely exposed and dry after the river was diverted for hydro-electric power. In a scene reminiscent of the film ‘Avatar’ the region is now a target for a huge gold mine that would create a lifeless landscape with pits extending up to 300 metres into the ground, displacing populations and threatening biodiversity.
Together with partners in Brazil, Canada, the United States, and Europe, Amazon watch are standing against Belo Sun’s opportunistic scheme to reap massive profits from the social and environmental disruption already being caused by Belo Monte. I wonder how long before Amazon watch adopts Bitcoin to fund their campaigns…
More serious still in ecocidal potential than Canada’s Southerly fuel-mining ambitions are its Northerly ones - as the accelerating threat of peak-oil turns geopolitics more candid and nasty, and the battle for the world’s last bastion of untapped fossil fuel reserves starts to attract alternative media attention.
As covered previously, the global-warming-induced melting of the arctic sea-ice has made previously inaccessible oil and gas reserves in that region recoverable (to those by whose logic global warming - if they dare have the gall to acknowledge it - presents a commercially irresistible opportunity). Canada is now preparing a sovereign claim over the North Pole, as are Denmark, the USA (who else) and of course Russia (see last newsletter) whose trumped-up charges against Greenpeace’s ‘Arctic 30’ protestors sparked outrage amongst the environmental movement. After some back-peddling by The Russian government, the Arctic 30 have now thankfully been released, albeit on the strength of an ‘amnesty’ for a crime they never even committed in the first place!
It might be worth keeping an eye on Denmark and Norway’s future decisions on fighter aircraft procurement, with their fleets of American F-16 fighters due for retirement this year and next respectively. If these countries were to take Brazil’s lead and dump American imports in favour of neighbour Sweden’s Saab fighters – and Iceland’s monetary policy - Scandinavia could achieve decisive economic clout in the polar geopolitical chess-match.
Another Wikileaks release recently exposed the secretive Trans Pacific Partnership, in which 12 countries would sign up to an agreement allowing big businesses to sue national governments for taking any action that would reduce the profits of big businesses - including Monsanto.
Avaaz has stated:
‘The leaked Trans-Pacific Partnership drafts read like an extended Christmas wish-list for big business — it would set a global standard of companies imposing their will on our governments through an opaque system of tribunals. These courts could limit access to cheap generic medicines in favour of branded medicines, and even allow cigarette companies to sue governments over health regulations that they say threaten profits! It’s almost too crazy to be true.
But practically no one has heard of the TPP! The talks are so secretive that not even our elected lawmakers know what’s in it — just the negotiators and 600 corporate lobbyists. Now leaked texts have shocked politicians and citizens from Chile, New Zealand, and Australia. And they are pushing back on the corporate bullying, and against the US that is hell-bent on getting a deal agreed before there is too much public scrutiny.’
In Shanghai, China, vehicles were recently ordered off the roads after traffic air pollution reached ‘unindexable’ levels. Concurrently George Osbourne (who else), who was accompanying David Cameron on his trip to China was berating Britain for not following an economic model more like theirs.
And on a more positive note…
The Venus project UK are doing some activism events this year, so if you’re free and local, please go along and give some support to Sheena Bratt, who will be speaking about TVP at VegFest Brighton Sat 29th March 2014.
TVPUK have also begun a radio show on UK Collapse Radio Tuesday at 20:00 UTC.
ukcollapseradio.com/?page_id=1097
Video choice
A couple of great new videos have recently become available in TZM’s inventory, so be sure to watch and pass them on if you haven’t already: -
‘Will work for Free’ www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SuGRgdJA_c is Sam Vallely’s comprehensive treatment on technological unemployment. This is an ideal choice to post on all your local Linkedin business networking groups, universities and local newspapers.
And ‘economic calculation in a natural law/Resource-based economy’ www.youtube.com/watch?v=K9FDIne7M9o is PJ’s latest video recorded during his visit to Germany. PJ gives a robust explanation on how the RBE can solve the problems of supply and demand without the need for the control mechanisms of the monetary system. This is a must-see to equip you with answers to all those pro-market naysayers.
The Law of the few
A topic discussed endlessly in TZM circles is how to find the ‘100th monkey’ - that magic trigger that will succeed in waking up the population from their sleepwalk and set an unstoppable cascade in motion to propel us into the great transition.
In Malcolm Gladwell’s book ‘The tipping point’ (Abacus), he explores the factors which, in combination, result in a phenomenon going viral and bringing about a major historical change in society. He cites the three rules of the tipping point: the law of the few, the stickiness factor and the power of context. These rules provide us with direction for how to go about reaching a tipping point.
The first of these factors - the law of the few - recognises that some people have social gifts that make them more effective transmitters of ideas than others. Therefore, to optimise the spread of the TZM message, we need to focus our efforts on finding these gifted individuals, and getting our message to them (ensuring of course that the ‘stickiness’ and ‘context’ of that message are maximised as well) so they can become key mouthpieces of our movement. They are represented by three personality types: -
Connectors (avid networkers with exceptionally wide social circles)
Mavens (avid goldmines of knowledge – who love learning and passing on that knowledge to others)
Salesmen (gifted persuaders)
A legendary figure in American history is Boston Silversmith Paul Revere. On the afternoon of April 18th, 1775 he received news from a stable boy who overheard a British soldier saying in hushed tones there would be ‘hell to pay’. British soldiers had been gathering in some numbers in response to armed rebellion by local militias and their resistance to British taxation. That night Paul Revere and a friend, William Dawes rode off in opposite directions and spent the night alerting residents in neighbouring towns that the British were coming to arrest their militia leaders and seize their caches of makeshift weapons.
Although both men reached similar numbers of neighbouring towns that night, William Dawes’ efforts only yielded a lacklustre response. Residents of some of the towns he visited didn’t heed his warnings at all, while others only responded half-heartedly, lacking the level of preparedness and motivation they’d have needed to offer decisive resistance.
But for Paul Revere it was a different story. It so happened that he possessed two of the aforementioned social gifts: he was both a connector and a maven. In every town he visited he was well known and respected by influential people. He knew exactly whose door to knock on in each stop, and exactly what to tell them to get them motivated and prepared. And amongst those he alerted were sufficient numbers of salesmen – persuaders with the gifts to get their fellow townsfolk motivated for action. When the British attacked the next day, the surprising level of resistance they encountered was enough to turn the tide in the colonists’ favour. The Americans won their independence – and ironically set in motion a chain of events that would lead to the formation of the Federal Reserve Bank 138 years later. Bummer!
What gifts do you possess – are you a local Paul Revere? Or can you think of a local candidate for that title in your office, pub or college who would make a humdinger of a representative for your TZM chapter? So what are you waiting for? Put on your charming trousers and mosy on round to their place with an invitation to your next ‘culture in decline’ video evening!
Strategy for 2014
On the 11th of this month, a group of TZM regulars is meeting in London to discuss the activism strategy for TZMUK. Peter Joseph recently announced the publication of the ‘TZM defined’ booklets which are a published form of the orientation guide. So we need to discuss how these can be most effectively distributed. Let’s make sure all our local colleges get a copy each.
Do you have any ideas regarding regular TZM activist projects you’d be willing to get involved with? How about a regular web-show perhaps using a similar format to The Keiser report?
Or perhaps you’re keen to roll up your sleeves and get stuck into a local project that grows food, produces renewable energy, makes and distributes household goods - and helps to make your community a bit more socially sustainable ready for when supply chains start to feel the strain of economic collapse?
Please give us a call on www.thezeitgeistmovementuk.com/contact-us and let us know of any ideas you’d like to contribute. And read all about it in next month’s newsletter.
Let the closing words of this newsletter be those of Nelson Mandela:
‘Sometimes, it falls upon a generation to be great. You can be that great generation. Let your greatness blossom.’