I am struck this morning by the confluence of a hugely compelling “Security” question as the U.S. moves into Labor Day. So, please forgive what begins tangentially, but I do move to an underlying cultural change observation by way of this “Labor” and “Capital” exploration.
I suspect that Capitalism is no more the opposite of Socialism or “Sharia Law Tribalism” than it is opposed to reorganizing as a globally cooperative Information-based economy.
Capitalism is simply a historical-cultural mistake of reductionism. More specifically, “wealth” became reduced to the value of human enterprise, production, and financial measurement. Capital, physical assets, wealth, has its place and role, but it is not the whole story, or even most of the “Labor” and economic story.
There is also value (though currently less amenable to measurement) in learning, in information, in communicating effectively and inclusively, in loving, in goodness, in beauty, in nurturance, in caregiving, in discovering a new truth or insight, in enlightenment, in “spirituality.”
Capital came to monopolize economic value, in the Western hemisphere, with the advent of “Industry” severed from vocation, “Empire” or “Nation” severed from culture. “Capital” severed from its Value-root has fed the devolution of feminist culture, leaving three exorbitantly expensive evolutionary scars.
1. Empire-building is the de-valuation and displacement of aboriginal communication and communities, discounted as not rational and uncivilized. Older, smaller scale, aboriginal cultures assume highest values are found in organically fused (“permaculture”) local communities. Empire-building led to the ownership of, thereby power-marginalized, aboriginal cultures.
2. Slavery, historically speaking, was male imperialist ownership of de-valued aboriginal people, violently disrupted from their organic human communities and cultural/communication systems. Vestiges remain, and these contemporary versions remain male-over-female dominating power structures.
3. The emergence of post-industrialized “child welfare” systems de-value the relationship between our species’ nurturers and their children. This results in the forced disruption of primordial and neural-based communication, and considerable trauma to a vulnerable and marginalized population.
Perhaps this “Great Turning” moment, turning from historical precedent to a more inclusive global dia-logos about our shared cultural roots, potentiates a “PermaCultural Awakening,” fueled by our unprecedented globally inclusive communication potential, to recapture “feminist” aspects of our value culture that include species diversity and male-female, or Yang-Yin, equilibrium.
That was a very long and dense sentence. Nevertheless, it is my hope and prayer on this Labor Day that we can communicate our globally shared vision.
I imagine living in a U.S. culture that celebrates “Vocation Day,” inclusive of Labor;
“Nurturance Day,” inclusive of Mothers;
“Interdependence Day,” inclusive of Independence and Freedom and Security;
“Creativity Day,” inclusive of Christmas,
“Regeneration Day,” inclusive of Easter,
“New Seasons Day,” inclusive of New Years,
“Visioning Day,” inclusive of Memorial,
“Gratitude Day,” inclusive of Thanksgiving,
“Mentors Day,” inclusive of Presidents,
and maybe even the perennial kids’ favorite “Enlightenment Day,” inclusive of Halloween.
While I am reweaving what has been torn asunder, please forgive me the further hubris of suggesting some of these Days might be more significantly thought of as “Sharia-Analogic” global celebrations, more significantly than U.S. “legal” holidays.
Labor and Capital have not failed our economic prosperity. This Transitional Moment is about re-connecting them to their deep cultural roots. Globally cooperative species-vocations, analogic structures of inclusive dialogue, and richly inclusive values potentially mature our vast and stunning diversity toward a sustainably balanced global PermaCulture.
That would be my idea of Security, sustainable Labor, and, yes, Sharia Paradise.
gdill52 