Tamsin Omond At TEDxThames

Two wonderful things together – the TEDxThames event organised by David Voxlin/UKYCC and Tamsin Omond rocking out.

 

Link Loving 21.12.11

• Thank you Anarchists. What progressives have learned and why it’s worked. Nathan Schneider.
• Mapping globalisation. McKinsey.
• Erin Brockovich on her novel, Occupy Wall Street, and saving the world. Claire Thompson.
• The top 10 green business stories from 2011. Andrew Winston.
• What a bunch of farmers can teach the Occupy movement about how to keep growing. Ash Anderson.
• Tax isn’t taxing when you’re Goldman Sachs. Alex Hern.
• Serious question – can we classify the USA as a failing state? Umair Haque.
• Who really has power in Burma/Myanmar? Thelma Young.

Hey Girl, Occupy

If you’re not familiar with the Hey Girl meme (I, II, III), this genius development is slightly lost on you – Hey Girl, Occupy.

Link Loving 20.12.11

• What are the barriers to green job creation? Hanna Thomas.
• How not to behave on the internet. Read the comments and weep. Mark Lynas, George Monbiot and Aubrey Mayer.
• Everyone still pretending they know what they’re talking about. The Daily Mash.
• Herman Van Rompuy and his advice on happiness. Hilarious and touching. Jules Evans.
• My favourite Silicon Valley douchebag gets his long-awaited six-page piece in Fortune magazine. Ramit Sethi.
• All this national debt we hear about – what is it? Turns out it’s overwhelmingly financial debt. Sunny Hundal.
• How the crisis may puncture the GDP cult. Eivind Hoff.
• The purpose of an elevator pitch isn’t to close the sale – it’s inviting them into wanting more. Seth Godin.

Goodbye To The Barefoot Diva

“Our music is a lot of things,” she once told a newspaper interviewer. “Some say it’s like the blues, or jazz. Others says it’s like Brazilian or African music, but no one really knows. Not even the old ones.”

Rest in peace Cesária Évora.

Link Loving 19.12.11

• How Peruvians are fighting back against destructive mining corporations. Louisa Trujillo.
• The Roman Empire had better levels of equality than the United States. Alex Tabarrok.
• “It’s not a movement—it’s an awakening.” Seane Corn gets off her yoga mat and Occupies Wall Street. Jennifer Cusano.
• Awesome conversation between David Carr and Danah Boyd.
• A vicar wins a Nativity themed X-Factor competition by beat-boxing. BBC.
• The problem of politicians talking ‘values’. Mairi Campbell Jack.
• David Mitchell lays into Barclays CEO Bob Diamond. Dangerously delicious.
• Gay rights in Europe – another front of variable geometry. Alessandro Valera.

Things Are Opening Up

This is as unscientific as reflections come – but I am beginning to see things opening up all around me. The obvious glimpses of systemic change you’ll recognise – but I’m seeing more and more people step out of change-making as normal and into something less comfortable, but full of potential.

• Claire Melamed‘s piece on inequality and her own family history.
• Dominic Campbell‘s reflection on the systemic failures of politics.
• The Otesha Project‘s new structure – moving beyond hierarchy.

Everybody Wants To Have A Community Until They’re In One

“Community is a place of conflict: conflict inside each one of us. There is first of all the conflict between the values of the world and the values of community, between togetherness and independence. It is painful to lose one’s independence, and to come into togetherness. Loss of independence is painful, particularly in a world where we have been told to be independent and to cultivate the feeling that ‘I don’t need anyone else’.”

Jean Vanier, From Brokenness to Community, p.30

Link Loving 18.12.11

• Meet the country’s coolest new protest group – the Deterritorial Support Group. Dan Hancox.
• A love letter to the overcommitted – burnout and lessons learned. Cheyenna Weber.
• We need to design a new economic order. Caroline Lucas.
• Capacity building – isn’t that what development is all about? (Or, as we say, this is the work.) Jonathan Glennie.
• Ten admissions the Labour party should own up to before voters will listen. Éoin Clarke.
• Spreading revolution through rap in the Middle East. Ulysses.
• 2011’s most corageous political leaders. Joe Klein.
• Global banking giants over the last 30 years visualised. Sam Ro.

A Strategic Question For 2012 – After Disappointment, What Then?

In 2008 – millions of people committed themselves to the Obama campaign. It was beautiful, generative and powerful. People had hope and envisaged real change.

In 2009 and 2010 – the White House utterly failed to use this movement to achieve what so many had believed was possible. People lost hope and change was too slow.

In 2011 – visionary leaders stood up and called for new levels of commitment (eg. getting arrested) on super strategic issues. People rediscovered their own power and inspired a new wave of political action. Most importantly – we had real impact.

This year has been extraordinary – the Arab Spring, Occupy, the anti-austerity movements across the world. It has been a year of possibility and promise.

Next year will inevitably be more difficult – the reality of change-making will be slow and difficult. It will be easy to lose hope.

What are the super strategic issues that we can ask people to risk more of themselves for? How can we take the step from changing the narrative, to changing the system?

• Home-ownership/Occupy repossessed houses?
• Direct impact of environmental destruction?
• Loss of purpose in life, discovering a richer spiritual life?

What else?