“Once asked,
“And what is your religion?’ artist Gottardo Piazzoni hesitated, then replied,
‘California.’”
--Crocker Art
Museum curatorial notes
A strange wind blew through California this last March revealing a great many things. We see that Gavin Newsom is poorly equipped to lead. We see that government leadership within the two
parties has fallen capture to corporate interests and an unholy trinity of pharmaceuticals, media, and
technology has emerged. We see our
government demonstrating that they are effectively captured
and controlled by a corporate greed
death mentality that's been destroying everything for generations
already. This mentality extracts
the planet's resources and makes us sick. It medicalizes, drugs, tracks, and monetizes everything. The corporate greed death cult's mentality has
created fertile terrain – in the physical, biological and the psychological
senses of the word terrain – for “the virus” to hurt and kill far more people than it should be able to.
The unholy trinity that is attempting a coup of the nation and the
world will attempt to convince everybody, including everybody who is actually
healthy, that they are constantly and everywhere at risk of getting sick and
dying; thus, the need to be scared and hide and sanitize everything and not
behave like humans anymore-- that is, until they provide us with their preferred treatment. We can
see the overarching challenge is, as the writer-philosopher-thinker Charles Eisenstein frames it, that humanity is stuck in a story of Separation for the last couple thousand years—basically the entire
Judeo-Christian era. This story repeats itself inside every societal value and moray,
and informs our inner voice almost exclusively: "I am separate from
everyone and everything. Life is a zero sum game and a struggle for resources.
Winners and losers. Me versus them."
You can see the younger generations
straining against these binaries that have defined the parameters of our
thinking, and thus living, and they yearn for a new dream that isn’t so heavily
defined by the story of separation. It's not how we are
supposed to be living. It's not how we evolved to live. And many of
us, deep down, know this already; many more are remembering; and still many
more continue to slumber within the nightmare.
We
need a new dream, one that is centered on an affirmation of life. Too many humans have forgotten that we
can change the dream; we can change our story. What is happening in the world right now is an unveiling
and unmasking of the nightmare. It is also a call to remember, if we choose to listen; to re-humanize ourselves, to reorient and rededicate our selves to life
affirming practices, beliefs, and structures. Let's harness the collective frustration stirred up by these strange winds and anchor a new story
and dream together. We can even dare to dream up a new political party; for the sake of this discussion moving forward, I will call this the California Defends Childhood party.
Corporal Autonomy
Corporal Autonomy is a life-affirming fundamental
human right, and is the cornerstone of the California Defends Childhood (CDC) platform. You decide what to do with your body, and I decide what to do with
my body. It is not abstract in the sense that each individual has a right to
"pursue life, liberty, and happiness." It literally means you have a body
and it will belong to you from the moment of birth until the moment of death. Moreover,
corporal autonomy describes the individual’s ability to move through time and
space without unnecessary interference to that body. Currently, bodies that are
gendered and/or racialized as “Other” receive the most interference, and the
least amount of constructive support. A useful and evolved State would support
life-affirming policy to mitigate the impacts of being "Othered" as well as promote personal responsibility and freedom.
In a broader sense, modern society’s
continued advancement into “modernity” alienates people from their inherent
humanness. Human activities and rites of passage like birth, music/dancing,
food production, eating, dying, and mourning are all mediated by “technology.”
The recent events of “pandemic” hastened the transition to technologically mediated and/or digitized life.
Corporal Autonomy would speak also to the relative lack of choice in the
hegemonic narrative bearing down on the world currently, and the horrific
"one size fits all" response measures.
An evolved democratic republic with a
life-affirming respect for Corporal Autonomy would imply a reasonable expectation
of safety from firearms at your school, in your place of business, the grocery
store, Garlic Festival, rock concert, casino, movie theater etc. but the CDC does not want to impinge on your second amendment rights.
Corporal Autonomy means you have a
reasonable expectation to breathe air that is clean; drink water that is clean;
and eat food produced from soils that are not contaminated with toxins or
slated to disappear in the next 50 years altogether.
Corporal Autonomy means you have a
reasonable expectation to move your body through time and space, and not be
sexually molested or assaulted. Sexual violence is the real epidemic in this
country. This is particularly pertinent in regards to the health and well being
of children, the smallest most vulnerable and least empowered population among
us. 1 in 3 American women report
being molested or sexually assaulted, usually as children. This number is based
only on reported assaults. An honest assessment of the numbers would indicate
that bodies are generally not safe from sexual violence and assault, especially
if the body is female and/or a child. These sorts of numbers would indicate a
level of threat on par with war. But since Andersen Cooper hasn't reported on it, is just an indication of war, and not a formal declaration of war. Still, why haven't we summoned the full force of our public health agencies to address this crisis? Imagine if 1 out of every 3 Americans was dying of Covid-- instead it's 1 out of 3 American women being sexually assaulted, usually as a child.
Medical Freedom
Medical Freedom and medical rights sits under the Corporal Autonomy
umbrella. If your body belongs to you, you decide how to keep that body in
health (or not). Your body, your choice. An evolved democratic republic would
incentivize healthy practices and behaviors.
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| No Tyrrany Enki by Arturo Romero |
Prioritizing the health and well-being of all children has never actually been tried before. Children are routinely dismissed and forgotten despite all the "for the children" platitudes parroted by elected officials. For example, if as a society we really loved children, the debate over funding education would be nonexistent. Children are the most vulnerable population in the nation, completely dependent on others for their care. Middle aged and elderly adults with co-morbidities acquired one choice at a time are not vulnerable, they are scared. And while it is ok to be scared, it is not ok to ask 9 million children to sit at home and look at computer screens all day. It is not ok to close playgrounds, cancel all child-friendly amenities, and look the other way while suicide and drug overdoses take our kids out an an alarming rate. Some kids are literally pulling their hair out from depression and frustration, and California's own public health department confirms there have been zero deaths from Covid in folks under the age of 19.
This "pandemic" has revealed a great many things, including how the needs of nearly every single other special interest group were prioritized, and yet the basic fundamental needs of healthy children were abandoned, and their primary care providers were also thrown under the bus. Who out there will be expected to quit her job and home-school or supervise "distance learning"? Funny how this strange wind cut 75 years or so of women's progress off at the knees. Women and children deserve so much better.
Men have been in charge, and this is the hell we've wrought. Maybe they should sit down for a minute though. And maybe we should start standing up. Standing back. Waking up. We love men, but we need to center the health and well being of children first. For the next seven generations. Men start out as children. We all do.
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| wake the bear by starshine astral travel agency (2020) |
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