Saturday, January 29, 2011

A letter to our leaders and to ourselves

I was going to send this letter to the Chief Rabbi of England but on second thoughts, I realise that such leaders are often chosen because they dont like to rock the boat. So I am publishing it here. Feel free to spread it if you want to...

In the past few years I have been involved in a rather unusual type of activity on the streets (mainly of London) which has led me to meet many 'activists' These activists care deeply about the direction humanity is being led and campaign as best they can about Ecology, environment, pollution, war, inequality between rich and poor. education, helping the homeless and poor etc etc.

Because I have been filming this and posting on youtube, and the films have become quite popular amongst a certain type of people (not that there are 'type' of people) I continue to meet people who call themselves 'activists' wherever I go.

Whilst in Israel last week I met one of the most interesting 'activists' I have ever met and what he told me was very very disturbing and sadly fits with what I have learned and experienced over the past 2 years.

There are people all over the world who are very concerned about all the above issues. The type of people are of course very mixed. I have in particular come across many people who themselves have very little in the way of material possessions. They have deep spiritual yearnings part of which is to free themselves from what they see as the bondage of modern society (forcing people to do work they often hate doing in order to make money to buy things that in the most part they dont really need - a society which is driven by a soulless machine which is bombarding us with subliminal and overt messages that deliberately cause us to be unsatisfied and to buy buy buy to fill the gap.) They are often people who try and live healthy lives, eating as healthily as they can, etc and have really good intentions to help improve this world. They often end up getting harassed by police, investigated by secret services, taken to court (and often cases dropped) infiltrated by private investigators or police etc.

The problem is that there are huge vested interests in keeping all the above things going. There are vested interest in keeping war going - Israel is apparently the third largest exporter of weapons and arms - I wonder how Israelis and their supporters feel about that ? There are vested interest in people eating unhealthy foods - Big food companies and then big pharmaceuticals companies who come in and 'pick up the pieces' when people get sick. There are vested interests in people using lots of fossil fuel - Oil companies etc; there are vested interests in terrorism continuing - security industry and Government megalomaniacs who seek to control us more and more. There are vested interests in widening the gap between rich and poor, vested interests in controlling education.

The clever and twisted aspect of all this is that these interests, who have resources of Billions to play with, are controlling the information too. They set up organisations which look on the outside like fabulous groups out to help us. But what happens is they actually end up being fronts out there to make sure that business interests are not interfered with. And through their 'foundations' (many of which end up being fronts for tax evasion) control which charities get what money.

This guy I met in Israel, has been threatened, taken to court , his girlfriends stepfather found hanging mysteriously in his apartment with unexplained blood and the police not wanting to investigate. And if you met this guy, you would see that he is in some sense a modern day saint - risking his life for the sake of the underprivileged.

Why am I writing to you ? Well I am aware that I need to take responsibility for what I can do in relation to everything, However, you are in a position of influence. Although you write books about these things, I rarely see you come out and expose the ROOT of the problem in the media. The root surely being that this system we are living in, a capitalist consumerist society, is leading us down a road of such intense destruction, that its difficult to see a way out. And yet almost nobody is crying out against the system and against the super rich elites because those people have everyone in their pockets. Nobody is revealing and exposing the deep corruption that is at the root of almost all of our problems ? Nobody is openly asking 'Who are the people benefitting from war, pollution, inequality ? Who benefits from the Israel Palestine conflict ? I must say its ingenious on the part of the vested interests. They are more than happy with two sides fighting it out against each other - right and left, religious and irreligious, capitalists and socialists etc - whilst they get on with their business of making more money and gaining more control ! My brother-in-law works for a multi billionaire in Israel. As far as I am concerned the man is sick. He has more money than he could spend in a lifetime yet he is addicted to getting more and more and more. He has a private jet, a large yacht companies all over the world yet he is stressed out all the time about his money and continuing to accrue more and more. This is nothing short of sick and yet nobody is talking about it because they dare not. And he is nothing compared to the few families that are trillionaires.

How long do you think we can go on living like this ?

Let me give you a classic example of this which is close to home. My wife runs a fabulous charity called GIFT. It works on a small budget and distributes bread and food to poor families in London. (it does other great work including encouraging young people to volunteer to help young families , visit old age homes etc) The bread is saved from being thrown away as is a lorry load of fresh vegetables which it receives every fortnight. At first sight it seems like a great work. But if you look a bit deeper you see that this work does not oppose vested interests in that it doesn't get out to the public the HUGE waste that vested interest PURPOSELY impose and create to protect themselves. Every year billions of pounds worth of food is thrown away. In the school in which my children attend they are NOT ALLOWED to keep any of the food left over from lunch so they throw it every day. Now although people know this to some extent, the system cleverly keeps the information from being flooded into their minds. Instead they are fed a daily does of terrorism and murder in the news because that is exactly what suits big business. If people were reminded every day of the sick waste that is going on and more importantly who is benefitting form this waste, they would demand an end to it. So you see how big business has its tentacles everywhere. And nobody is saying anything. Why are there not groups here and in Israel who's purpose is to expose on a daily basis the huge waste that Corporations are forcing upon us ? In other words, nobody is asking 'who is benefitting form the poor being poor and from the criminal waste ?'

I dont know if you have come across this man http://www.derrickjensen.org/ but I urge you to read some of his material - for example his book Endgame. And once you have read it, tell me what you think our young kids are going to experience by the time they reaches our age ?


Regards
Danny Shine

Thursday, January 20, 2011

real democracy ?

Wanna do something interesting and useful ?

I met 2 separate people in Israel who were talking about a fascinating new political party they want to set up. The party would be called something like the direct internet party. The idea would be to set up a party with no agenda whatsoever. Anyone who votes for this party would then have a vote for each policy the party would put forward in the parliament (of their country) and this is how all decisions would be made. Its true democracy.

This idea is very interesting especially when you speak about it to poklitical animals. just see what they say.

Now in Israel, such a party could get seats because they have proportional representation but they have other hurdles to ensure that democracy is really demockery. Like the thousands of dollars it costs to set up a party. Or like the problem of infiltration of any good idea by the secret services.

I think it would be interesting to start to develop such parties all around the world, even if they dont get into power. It will send shivers down the spines of the elite I think but I maybe wrong (I usually am)

It could be that this is already happening like it is in israel but i couldn't find much action on google. I am suggesting that a few people set something like this up in each country rather than just speak about it.

Comments ?

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

everything is ok in Israel

I have been spenbding the last couple of days in Israel with my Everything is Ok sign (this one also has a translation into Hebrew) MOst of it hasnt been filmed because I didnt have anyone with me to film it so I thought I write about the memorabl;e moments.

After 5 minutes near a shopping mall, in typical Israeli style, a midfdle aged guy comes up to me with a marker pen, telling me how to enhance my sign and actually added an exclamation mark after the everything si ok ! He wanted to add an acronym 'BSD' which means with the help of God but i just drew the line htere and told him to get his own sign. I like holding the sign 'upside down' here because so many people tell me to turn it around. Oh the one hand they are trying to help ands on the other they cant handle things that dont look right.

Yesterday, somehting happened that never happens in the UK except at protests. There were 2 male and 3 female polivce officers hanging around where I was standing and they were loving it. One fo them even filmed the whole thing on her phone !
A guy comes up to me and says 'Everything is NOT ok. I have a headache!' to which the police officer replied 'Thats good. If you have a headache, that means you have a head !
People kept telling me to turn it around and even came up to me and forced me to do so. A street cleaner came passed and asked me what was written. i asked if he could read and he said no so I told him what the sign said. He said 'Thats a ridiculous sign and came up to me and tried to snatch it out of my hand claiming that it was his job to put it in the garbage!
A couple of guys in the 60s came up to me as I was holding it upside down. they were Yemenite Jews. In Yemen when they were kids, they were so poor that they could only afford one book so they sat around the table and learned to read upside down so these guys were perfectly fine with the sign that way. One of them wanted to try it out himself so he took the sign and stood there. I got my megaphone out and anjnounced in Ivroit that if there were any psychologists in the area they should make themselves known because this crazy guy didnt think the sign was upside down.
Another guy came up to me saying everything is not ok for him. His 17 year old son is depressed and suicidal and the next son down has been thrown out of school and they cant get him back into school. It was of course moving toi was hear his story after 1 minute of knowing him. Another woman started talking to me and after a few minutes asked if I was married. Turns out she had just divorced and was desperate to get married and was hoping I was available !
I then headed to the stricly religious area called mea Shearim in Jeruslam. Crowds of ultra orthodox jews started huddling around and asking me what I was doing. One of the kids then interrogated me to check if I was a religious jew. I asked him why he was asking and he replied 'if you are not religious you are not allowed to stand here!' I checked this out with his elders who just laughed !

Sunday, January 02, 2011

Full Body Scanners !

This is a=written by an American soldier...

As the Chalk Leader for my flight home from Afghanistan, I witnessed the following:

When we were on our way back from Afghanistan, we flew out of Baghram Air Field. We went through customs at BAF, full body scanners (no groping), had all of our bags searched, the whole nine yards. Our first stop was Shannon, Ireland to refuel. After that, we had to stop at Indianapolis, Indiana to drop off about 100 folks from the Indiana National Guard. That's where the stupid started.

First, everyone was forced to get off the plane-even though the plane wasn't refuelling again. All 330 people got off that plane, rather than let the 100 people from the ING get off. We were filed from the plane to a holding area. No vending machines, no means of escape. Only a male/female latrine.

It's probably important to mention that we were ALL carrying weapons. Everyone was carrying an M4 Carbine (rifle) and some, like me, were also carrying an M9 pistol. Oh, and our gunners had M-240B machine guns. Of course, the weapons weren't loaded. And we had been cleared of all ammo
well before we even got to customs at Baghram, then AGAIN at customs.

The TSA personnel at the airport seriously considered making us unload all of the baggage from the SECURE cargo hold to have it reinspected. Keep in mind, this cargo had been unpacked, inspected piece by piece by U.S. Customs officials, resealed and had bomb-sniffing dogs give it a
one-hour run through. After two hours of sitting in this holding area, the TSA decided not to reinspect our Cargo-just to inspect us again:

Soldiers on the way home from war, who had already been inspected, reinspected and kept in a SECURE holding area for 2 hours. Ok, whatever. So we lined up to go through security AGAIN.

This is probably another good time to remind you all that all of us were carrying actual assault rifles, and some of us were also carrying pistols.

So we're in line, going through one at a time. One of our soldiers had his Gerber multi-tool. TSA confiscated it. Kind of ridiculous, but it gets better. A few minutes later, a guy empties his pockets and has a pair of nail clippers. Nail clippers. TSA informs the Soldier that they're going to confiscate his nail clippers. The conversation went something like this:

TSA Guy: You can't take those on the plane.

Soldier: What? I've had them since we left country.

TSA Guy: You're not supposed to have them.

Soldier: Why?

TSA Guy: They can be used as a weapon.

Soldier: [touches butt stock of the rifle] But this actually is a weapon. And I'm allowed to take it on.

TSA Guy: Yeah but you can't use it to take over the plane. You don't have bullets.

Soldier: And I can take over the plane with nail clippers?

TSA Guy: [awkward silence]

Me: Dude, just give him your damn nail clippers so we can get out of here. I'll buy you a new set(hands nail clippers to TSA guy, makes it through security).

To top it off, the TSA demanded we all be swabbed for "explosive residue" detection. Everyone failed, (go figure, we just came home from a war zone), because we tested positive for "Gun Powder Residue". Who is hiring these people?

This might be a good time to remind everyone that approximately 233 people re-boarded that plane with assault rifles, pistols, and machine guns - but nothing that could have been used as a weapon.

Can someone please tell me What happened to OUR country while we were gone?

Sgt. Mad Dog Tracy

Free Range Humans

I dont know if its 'permitted' to include someone elses writings in a blog but the next 2 articles are not mine

many years ago, my partner at the time berated me for buying "caged eggs" in a supermarket.
It had never really occurred to me before to consider under what conditions the hens might be living who were donating the eggs I was purchasing.
After being "reprimanded" by my partner for contributing to animal cruelty, I researched the process of "battery hen" eggs and was shocked and revolted to the point where I am happy to say I have never knowingly purchased "caged eggs" again.
A few years ago, in a bid to be more eco-friendly I started my own veggie garden and obtained a couple of chicks from a local pet store, who grew into lovely fat black hens who free-range in the yard, devour the insects that live in the veggies and provide healthy free eggs for my family. At one point, I was offered the opportunity to provide a home for a "battery hen" or a "caged hen" by a person who "knew someone" who "knew someone" and so on.. who needed homes for hens that had been "rescued". Remembering what I had learned about battery hens I was happy to offer my home for as long as required.
The creature that was delivered to my home had more resemblance to a "chicken nugget" than it did to a living breathing hen. There was no apparent life in this poor creature, barely any movement, almost no feathers to speak of and those that remained fell out like rotting hair when I first touched her. She look for all the world like one of those comedic squeaky "rubber chicken" toys you see in the stores.
I was so disheartened I couldn't stop crying. I laid this poor little girl down on the ground and my other girls immediately ran over to inspect her. Instead of the territorial pecking I was expecting, they acted as though they were witnessing a concentration-camp survivor. There seemed to be an air of shock and disbelief, of fear even, as though they didnt recognise this creature as one of their own, which, in a way, she wasn't.
After a long while of disbelieving inspection, poking and odd noises from my girls, they both settled down next to this poor half-dead creature and began to have a dirt bath, with her in the middle. During this entire event, my new little survivor had her eyes tightly closed, huddled in on herself and seemingly terrified - agoraphobic? It was probably the first time she'd ever seen the sky, grass or other creatures with real feathers and flesh on them. After a while, my girls got bored and wandered away to forage, leaving the new hen lying in the dirt on her own.
Slowly, slowly, she opened her eyes and looked around her. She then stretched out her wings and lay them on the ground as though hugging the earth for the first time, which it probably was. She lay like that for an hour or so, I thought she had actually died, but then suddenly folded wings and sat up, showing the first signs of real life.
After that she went mad in a frenzy of dirt bathing and started to hobble around and nibble at the grass. Watching this hen come to life over time was the most amazing thing I'd ever seen. She's a mum now, and protects her chicks more strenuously, has more personality and seems to be more vivacious and life-loving than my other girls. I put this down to the fact that she never knew what she was missing until she had the opportunity to find out, and it now means more to her than to the others, who were born to it and never underwent the privations that she did.
Recently, I realised I am also a "battery hen" stuck in a cage made for me at my birth, where I seem to have no choice but to be shaped and contained by it, being fed what they want me to ingest, participating in the huge production line that is my current life, until I am too old to contribute and therefore useless and may look forward only to the mercy of death.
In realising this I have realised that I do not want this life, I have not chosen it, but rather had it chosen for me by the "society" that I am a part of. I am no longer a willing participant in this "society" where I cannot even close my bank account as I will then not be able to earn an income, as my employer does not offer "cash" as a payment method, where I cannot live in any kind of legal dwelling as I must have a legal identity, job and bank account in order to be on a tenancy agreement and pay my rent to keep a room over my children's heads and food in their mouths, where I am controlled by rules and regulations I don't fully understand at every turn and am not offered any alternative to these "choices" that I have been forced into - which negates the very definition of "choice". Even worse is the realisation that I have brought my own offspring into this same situation before ever realising what it really is that we are living/existing/imprisoned in.
How then, does a battery hen escape the cage? I wish to wake up from this nightmare and start my life.
Jules