Successful? What's that?

“The plain fact is that the planet does not need more successful people,” writes David Orr in The Earth in Mind. “But it does desperately need more peacemakers, healers, restorers, storytellers, and lovers of every kind. It needs people who live well in their places. It needs people of moral courage willing to join the fight to make the world habitable and humane. And these qualities have little to do with success as our culture has defined it.”


[found on Cooperative Catalyst]

Reading up on the Occupy X Protests

Starhawk pointed me to Riyanna. And mathbabe pointed me to David Graeber. If I weren't a mama, I'd be there. The times are bad, and maybe people are finally rising up.

I hope Michigan can fight off the attacks on eduction

Fred Klonsky pointed me to this video:

Creepy

The police are watching I-80 Westbound this morning. It sure doesn't look like they're watching for traffic violations. A motorcycle cop has been on the overpass near my house for over half an hour, just watching the cars. There were cop cars at the 2 entrances I passed this morning, too. And I think I saw another motorcycle cop on the left side of the freeway lanes.

I wish I knew what it's about...

What is Debt? by David Graeber

Fascinating interview. Here's my favorite bit so far:

And, I might add, if Aristotle were around today, I very much doubt he would think that the distinction between renting yourself or members of your family out to work and selling yourself or members of your family to work was more than a legal nicety. He’d probably conclude that most Americans were, for all intents and purposes, slaves.

(Thanks to Cathy aka mathbabe.)

Happy Labor Day

I'm watching a math video right now, but I hope I get a chance to watch this later today.

Mentioned by Marc Bousquet, in his 'Every Day is Labor Day' post:

Charter Schools, Hmm...

From Christian School to Charter School

Gates Foundation: What Can Big Money Do Right?

They interfere with the education system, and cause more trouble than good. But perhaps this initiative has a better chance of doing good in the world?

Visitors...

Hmm, I've neglected this blog, and just now noticed that I went from around 500 page views last time I looked to almost 5 times that. There were some huge numbers in April, when I did nothing here. None of them commented (as far as I know), and I have no idea what brought them here.

If anyone reading this can tell me what happened, I'm curious.

Good Article on Racism

Good Whites, Bad Whites: A False Dichotomy

Spam Evolves...

It used to be "You won big!" Now, for the first time, I've gotten spam that's trying to scare me into replying:

Thank you for ordering from Bobijou Inc.     
    
This message is to inform you that your order has been received
and is currently being processed.              
          
Your order reference is 93611.      
You will need this in all correspondence.    
           
This receipt is NOT proof of purchase.               
We will send a printed invoice by mail to your billing address.
              
You have chosen to pay by credit card.     
Your card will be charged for the amount of 717.00 USD 
and "Bobijou Inc." will appear next to the charge on your statement.
     
You will receive a separate email confirming your order has been despatched.
              
   
Your purchase and delivery information appears below in attached file.
 
 
Thanks again for shopping at Bobijou Inc.       
________________________________________      

name="Doc-0357.pdf"
Content-transfer-encoding: base64
Content-Disposition: attachment;
filename="Doc-0357.pdf"

JVBERi0xLjMNCiWTjIueIFJlcG9ydExhYiBHZW5lcmF0ZWQgUERGIGRvY3VtZW50IGh0dHA6
Ly93d3cucmVwb3J0bGFiLmNvbQ0KJSAnQmFzaWNGb250cyc6

Don't reply to junk!

I Like Laura's Style of Parenting

Laura Grace Weldon writes about Guerrilla Encouragement Efforts.

I wonder if I can get my son interested in some of these sweet games.

Wisconsin

Seems I'm posting here once a month these days. I've been listening to the news on Egypt, but saw no blog posts I needed to keep track of. Wisconsin may not be as big a deal in the world, but this post ... I want to read it again later.

Overall, I much prefer finding non-violent ways to communicate, but I was tickled that the governor was told by a whole restaurant how wrong he is:

However much he likes to talk about the silent majority who supports him, I have seen almost no evidence that anyone likes or supports Walker, let alone a majority. He literally cannot be seated in a restaurant in Madison. Walker went to one of Madison’s premier fine-dining restaurants, and the owners refused to serve him.

The owner (or manager) asked him to leave because other customers were booing him. What if, instead, each customer came up to him and said, "Let me tell you what collective bargaining has done for someone I know." And include not only the (legitimate) economic benefits, but the way that unions have helped teachers to do their jobs better, or helped other workers to fight for safe working conditions.

But perhaps booing is right, when he's so dishonest, claiming that there's a budget crisis when he created it by giving tax breaks to the rich.

Connecting With the Natural World

I just loved this post and want to be able to find it later... From Laura Grace Weldon's blog.

The Youngest Have The Oldest Way Of Knowing

I had a translation problem when I was very small. Like any other reasonable preschooler, I knew full well that people had names just as I had a name. But I saw people’s faces as having their own animal faces too. I wasn’t sure why everyone else couldn’t see this. Many of the animals I saw flickering right under the surface of outward human appearances were creatures I didn’t recognize. Some kind of deer or antelope on one face, an unusual hound on another. This was fascinating and distracting. It also meant I had to translate in my head from what I saw as a person’s animal identity into their given name.