Forum Post: List of steps we can all take to affect change
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 8, 2011, 9:49 a.m. EST by readytogo
(80)
from Brooklyn, NY
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
I thought we could start a list of things we can do right now or long-term to change in our daily lives. Please feel free to add on. Some of these are from others that I've summarized and some I've done and feel they have really made me feel liberated and empowered.
Move your money. Put your money into a credit union or community bank, change your insurance provider to a mutual company. If you have a mortgage or school loan with one of the big banks, refinance to a smaller community bank/credit union. moveyourmoney.org is a good resource for this.
buy local, consume less. This is big. We are addicted to consumption. All of us and if we stop fooling ourselves that buying their endless products (future garbage is all it is) will make us happy/beautiful/successful, we truly break the chains. You don't need all that junk. Your kids don't need all that junk.Teach them their value comes from something much deeper than corporate stuff.
cut your cable. i know this is hard for people, but our lives exist outside tv and it is very much a drug of sedation that is programming us to accept their definition of the world. Any favorite show is available now online. Did you know our brains are more active when we sleep than when we watch tv. Do yourself a favor and take a nap!
Don't rely on mainstream media. Don't buy what they define as news- celebrity relationships and child kidnappings are not national news. They are distractions. Find alternative sources for news online. Watch/listen to public tv/radio.
ride a bike or walk instead of drive when ever you can.
if you are in the market for a car, buy the smallest one you can and try to get one with alternative energy source- electric, hybrid, alternate fuel
spread the word around. Educate yourself, and then use what you learn to discuss the issues with friends, your family, your coworkers, your neighbors,
Start making something. We all have the power to create. Start making something that you used to buy- cook homemade sweets, sew clothing, build some furniture, start a garden.
Look for free stores, freecycle listserves in your city (http://www.freecycle.org/group/US), and garage sales.( I found I could satisfy my shopping bug by browsing used record.)
For those who celebrate it- DO NOT buy into this false Christmas insanity. You do not need to buy a bunch of crap to make Christmas meaningful. No one wants the stupid scarf/glove set you bought them from Marshalls. Buying too many gifts for your child does not make them happy- it makes them disappointed when the quick high disappears and they find themselves depressed by 3pm Christmas Day. Get old school and create Christmas traditions that don't focus on going into debt. Make ornaments, make cookies, donate time to those in need of compassion and love. Announce it confidently to your family & friends by Thanksgiving so you don't get consumed by guilt prior to Christmas.
One thing my family does instead of buying gifts and buying into the whole " christmas shopping" is to take a small vacation or a weekend trip together and spend time with each other, it helps with bonding and you get your head in a right place
Thank you for this! I think this list of suggestions probably should become the thematic basis for the "demands" of this "revolution". I read the straw-man list of ‘demands’ in another post and sat shaking my head thinking that they demand so much of the system without recognizing the responsibility of “us” the people. Free college education, raised minimum wage, elimination of debt… To me these objectives only stand to shake clear the Etch-a-Sketch to redraw the same picture all over again. It would seem that we would seek to raise the income standard in a noble effort to bridge the gap between lowest paid wage earners and the shrinking middle class, and yet fail to assess the risk of stabilizing this middle class. We’re now competing in an economic game with the surging economies of China, India and the Middle East, who are growing their middle-classes at a rate far in excess of our own and with a similar pursuit of this vision of “Americanism”, and in doing so we all will drain the pool of resources at increasingly higher rates. I think the problem is that the objectives of the global economy are too large and destabilizing in their current format. We get stuck in a feedback loop of consumption and resource depletion which ultimately is an end-game scenario. To me your suggestions of focusing more closely on local, sustainable economies points to a solution which offers us more hope for our future. And while it might not be reminiscent of something you’d see on MTV Cribs or Jersey Shore, it is a future which we likely can offer as a legacy to subsequent generations. Maybe when all is said and done the idea of having a “national revolution” is a folly: we need local ones combating local manifestations of these national problems. These local events could target: specific companies leaving the US for cheaper overseas labor pools; energy companies poisoning local watersheds; factory farms which put local producers out of business and take local food out of the ‘local’; specific local regulations and tax structures which penalize small business and entrepreneurial endeavors. After engaging in specific actions around these local points, while at the same time beginning to create more sustainable local economies, perhaps people will reach agreement on national or regional level opportunities to deregulate, manage banking, build infrastructure, provide health care and leverage public dollars for actual good. But to me it starts with everyone owning a piece of the problem and a stake in the solution; hearkening back to the days during WWII when everyone in our nation owned a part in combating the evils of totalitarianism. In those days we as a nation conserved, created, supported and fought as a nation with both local and national efforts. We need that type of spirit and those types of solutions, even if at this point the enemy may very well be ourselves. At least hopefully now the ball is rolling…
Thank you so much. Such good points. I have learned that we all contribute to this system in the way people all contributed to slavery. Everyone became addicted to the cheap sugar, cotton and rum and then the system was necessary. We are all addicted to lifestyles that are created on the backs of slave and child labor in other countries, toxic cheap chemicals and stolen resources. I agree that it is not possible to make everyone middle class. That is such a good point. The middle class needs to recognize that their level of unnecessary consumption is unsustainable and hurts other people who made their 6 pairs of socks for $3. Our grandparents, whom we often reference as having such ideal American lives and could live on one income, didn't buy things constantly. They lived very frugally. I'm sure we don't want to live like people are forced to in 3rd world countries, but we can each make small changes to bring down our level of participation in the madness.
I really understand that Congress cannot do much and politicians are intrinsically corrupt. However, if we, the Occupy Wall Street movement, want to really change something, we have to send representatives to the US Congress. And somebody within our movement should run for elected offices. This is not a fantasy. Tea Partiers did it during the last congressional election. If Tea Party could do it, we can do it, too! We, the Occupy Wall Street movement, are acting like pathetic supplicants begging Obama and Nancy Pelosi to listen to our cry. Nonsense! With our political energy, we can send our representatives to the US Congress. If Tea Party right-wing fanatics could do it, we should do it!! We should create a Occupy Wall Street wing within the Democratic Party. If Tea Party wants to hijack the Republican Party, we will hijack the Democratic Party! Voice for the oppressed 99%!!
I see what your saying, but the Tea Party grew very differently from what I understand. They weren't "the people". They were heavily funded by the Koch brothers and had an agenda that was in keeping with corporate America. They were trying to blame Obama and Democrats and were no threat to the status quo. Their actions as elected officials have not protected people's rights, but tried to pit people against each other. Wisconsin comes to mind as what the Tea Party politicians represent and why people have run from that movement as they finally saw past the racist rants that those "leaders" didn't have their best interest at heart. The Tea Party supported a false mythology of America that was not based on historical facts. To me, the problems transcend parties because politics has become theater to distract us from even discussing our real problems. I haven't heard anyone on this forum being supportive of the Democratic party. In addition, several times, I've posted something and people have attacked me as supporting the Democratic party when I said nothing about either political party and do not at all support the Democratic or Republican party. Nor would I trust a third party. I don't know where that leaves me, really. Because I understand the reality we live in and know we can make some small gains through the current system, but it seems to me people here are thinking much more long term as far as consciousness building and engaging people in the conversation of how to we get from where we are to where we want to be, which is a more human-based society rather than profit-based. I don't think anyone here is naive enough to fall for any leader or political party whole-heartedly from what I'm reading. Which is why we aren't spending energy trying to build a party. I think that is great if that is the answer for some people and they should totally go for it, but for me, they are simply a means to an end.
This is a great list of rational things Americans can do. Unfortunately most protestors don't want to have to do anything, or take responsibility for their actions.
I disagree. Current protestors are people who already have made a lot of these changes, are very educated about the issues, and know how to model a different paradigm of social cooperation. That is why the park has so organized from the beginning and was able to quickly incorporate the thousands that have come on board.
Remembered a few more:
if you own your home, get off the electric grid- go to solor or geo-thermal energy
Meditate. Turn off the devices and be quiet and still for a brief amount of time every day. Work towards training your mind to be still during this time, rather than allowing your brain to be a chatter box in your head, running through worries, problems & frustrations. Rather, try to listen to the quiet and see where this takes you. Meditation is a practice like exercise that transcends religions and ideologies and allows us to become aware of our inner compass.
What I want is for people like you to allow me to be responsable for myself, and to stop trying to get everyone to see the world through the same rose colored glasses you do.
before you can be responsible to yourself learn how to spell.
Uhh..seeing through rose-colored glasses means you're optimistic and happy with the way things are, the Occupy movement is happening for the opposite reason. Also, no one is dis-allowing you anything - you are free to make your own choices.
If there was equal justice for all, fair pricing with standard profit margin then our lives would improve. Railing cry should be equal justice.
who sets the "fair pricing". who has that right? isn't pricing based on what people are willing to pay? sorry, but it seems to me, all you want is equal misery
If there was equal justice for all, fair pricing with standard profit margin then our lives would improve. Railing cry should be equal justice.