Posts Tagged ‘conflict’

Why Aren’t Americans Ending War?

Sunday, January 20th, 2013

Americans spend trillions of dollars on warfare every single year. This is an absurd amount of money to spend on anything, let alone using it to blow up your fellow humans on an industrialized scale. With that kind of cash, you could end extreme poverty the world over, give every person a home and an education, and dramatically lift the tide which raises all ships.

Ask the average person in America, and they would tell you they want the fighting to stop. The barely-adult people sent overseas to kill or be killed would sure as shit rather be home with their families and friends. And the people in Yemen and Pakistan? I imagine they could stand fewer innocents being killed by drone assassination.

The financial costs are an incredible burden, and the emotional scars would take generations to heal even if war ended this very second. The longer these large scale conflicts get prolonged, the worse off our entire world is.

So why aren’t Americans ending war? If the US people, much like the rest of us, just want to live and prosper in peace, why don’t their politicians listen to them and give them what they want?

The sad truth is that they can’t.

The entire American system has, to the detriment of the world, fallen victim to what can only be described as a parasitic entity, a beast that has been around in one form or another for thousands of years.

Whether through anesthetizing concepts like pride and security, the unfettered power of wealth, or, when all else fails, brute force, the war machine of which I speak has been able to keep countless populations within their grasp – and right now their prey is the American public.

In the United States, mainstream newsanchors all dance around the issue ending war, and ‘radical’ concepts like bringing home the troops rarely arise. Politicians are no better, for they too are in the pockets of the military industry, as made evident by a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate who intentionally escalates wars around the world.

So even when the vast majority of Americans want peace, a political system which is mostly theatre combined with a deliberate lack of guidance from the media makes it hard for the anti-war movement to gain the momentum needed to make a significant impact.

But peace-loving Americans won’t stay down for much longer. They simply cannot. Fueled by a crumbling economy, driven by global awareness, and united by social media, a multi-million person strong movement will prove more powerful than the entire military industrial complex. Or so we shall hope.

The world is changing faster than even those who sit atop can control. Unprecedented technology is causing new concepts like transparency and global solidarity to crash down on our world. As the old guard falls away, a newfound democracy is sure to bring to fruition the civilization our species has been cultivating for eons.

Automated Greenhouses – Soon to be a Reality!

Friday, October 12th, 2012

Picture a greenhouse that continually produces food all by itself, with little to no human interaction. This autonomous mechanical marvel – built from low cost materials and powered by renewable energy – could truly mean a sustainable source of fresh food all year round.

Sound too good to be true? Well, it is right now. But not for much longer. Automated greenhouses are fast becoming a reality, and these seemingly magic structures will give humankind a permanent solution to world hunger.

Consider the Horto Domi project, which aims to take the labor out of running a garden at home. Their working prototype can regulate soil and atmosphere conditions, runs on the economical Arduino micro-computer, and can be monitored remotely via web App.

So it’s not yet a magical box. But over the coming years, teams will hash out the remaining pieces of the puzzle. Atmospheric water collectors will provide all the fresh water needed to irrigate the crops. Wind and solar will provide the necessary energy to heat and run the system. The structure itself will be built from some kind of abundant material, shaped into whatever form works best. And all that will be left is to figure out how to mechanize the entire crop cycle safely and effectively.

The implications of this will be astounding! No one will be starving anywhere on the planet. Incredible, right?

If you think about all the wars and chaos in our world, so much of it is rooted directly in poverty. People in desperate situations are willing to do desperate things. When no mouth goes hungry, when everyone’s needs are met, there won’t be this fundamental drive towards violent conflict.

Automated greenhouses – and the incredible boon they’ll offer- give us one more reason to believe that world peace is just around the corner.

“Because we are at war…”

Wednesday, April 4th, 2012

“We are at war.” “This is a war here.” “Our country is at war.”

How many times have we heard these words, most often uttered by someone trying and justify the unjustifiable, like sacrificing liberty for the illusion of security, or giving away inch after inch of precious power for the sake of the nation’s interests – not to be confused with our own interests.

If you’re like me, then you’re sick of hearing this wartime pretense being used to co-opt  both common sense and human rights alike.

We are at war… with who? Your only enemies are the ones you keep creating through your actions. Preemptive war only proliferates ideas of hate, and you can’t kill an idea no matter how hard you fight.

This is a war… no it isn’t! If you truly want to strike a critical blow against terror, stop terrorizing people. Quit believing that you are in a war. Withdraw from that mindset… then withdraw from the battlefields.

Awaken to our new world. It’s no longer about fighting religions, countries or cultures. The threats we do face, we face as a species. Cooperation, not infighting, is the way forward.

Israeli Leaders Say No to Peace

Tuesday, December 27th, 2011

No peace for 10 years! This is a belief held by key members of Israel’s government.

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, in a conference on Sunday, revealed that he does not believe a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians will be agreed upon within the next decade.

Wow, what a terrible attitude. Way to not inspire your people with optimism and hope.

Do most of the people of Israel really expect another decade of war, or is the Foreign Minister’s opinion more a reflection of Israel’s dominant military industrial complex? As someone who believes peace is just around the corner, I’d like to attribute Israel’s institutionalized pessimism as a symptom of the war machine run amok.

As a tiny country surrounded by threats, you’d think Israel would want to avoid escalating conflict at all costs, but this isn’t the case.

For Israel, peace would actually interfere with their clandestine agenda of border expansion. Over the past 60 years, Israel has systematically usurped neighboring territories, so much so that a map of Palestine today looks like a lung overtaken by cancer.

To continue settling foreign land, Israel needs to hide their atrocities under the fog of war. If there were to be a ceasefire, there wouldn’t be enough carnage and chaos to mask their crimes from the rest of the world.

Fortunately for the Palestinian people, and despite the juggernaut Israeli PR machine, the International community is waking up to see what is really going on in the middle east.

Israel will likely find peace within the next 10 years, even if it has to be forced upon them by a world’s people united against the injustice.