On The Ways We are Connected
Incorporating the links of love, play, wander, wonder, work & trade
After witnessing some disheartening teardowns of totally decent, everyday folks based, not on the quality of their thoughtful, open-to-dialogue ideas…
…but on the basis of having socio-economic identities that “carried privilege” (better described as having more intact human rights and dignity)
…it feels like a good time for a reminder on the full suite of ways humans are cross-culturally connected to one another.
To be crystal clear:
**I am in no way suggesting to ignore bigotry, structural inequality or the very real violations/insecurities of human rights that the frame of "privilege" typically points to.**
We are certainly connected painfully through war and methods of domination that need to be addressed.
What I am saying is:
**For those who look such things in the eye, one of the dangers is that the ills of our world become the whole picture**
The whole reality- present and past-
The whole prewritten script on which to relate to one another.
And thereby, the whole of imagined possibilities for our future.
This vantage point is neither true nor productive.
In fact, it's destructive and works against its own stated goals.
By incorporating the ways outside of war that humans are connected:
love (brotherly, neighborly, romantically)
wander (human curiosity, adventuring, journeying…)
wonder (spiritual seeking, awe of the universe…)
work (particularly non-warlike work…)
play (games, sport, art, humor, parties, feasts…)
and trade (particularly non-warlike trade…)
we gain a fuller sense of our connections.
Connections that offer us clues, inspirations, and pathways on how to solve our current problems and move forward towards a Star-Trek future.
The only future I am interested in helping create. The only one you're likely interested in too.
Below are links to a few of the multitudes of ways beyond war that cultures have connected with and been the connection point for my Italian-American cultural base.
Find, celebrate, draw inspiration, and create from the ways beyond war that folks are connected through your cultural base- homeland, diasporic, regional, current, ancestral, by land, by sea or otherwise.
Above all, keep it civil and practice democracy, y'all.
It’s the only way through.
On The World’s Ancient Internets Contemplating humanity’s massive ancient networks of connection
Meet the Phoenicians who gave us the Western Alphabet and the Mediterranean cultural base shared on the rims of the three continents, Africa, Asia and Europe, that surround the sea
Check out the only tri-lingual newspaper in the United States created by Cuban, Italian and Spanish immigrants 100 years ago and still printing in English, Italian, and Spanish today.