TEOTWAWKI

I try on a daily basis to check out Timothy Scott Bennett's Facebook page. For those of you who don't recognize the name, he is the author of All of the Above. I consider him to be an author with a changed mind*, and that's one of the reasons I follow his work. And to be honest I haven't read All of the Above yet, but I plan on it. The other day I had one of the librarians at our local library check to see if she could get it for me through inter-library loan. She located two copies: one in Missouri and one in Washington. She put the order in and said, "we'll see what happens." It's a long way from Missouri to northwestern Wisconsin, so I will probably just end up buying the book.

The point of this post, though, is to mention what he said on his facebook page yesterday. It resonated with me. It's what I've felt and what I've heard others express in one way or another. It's something that my great-grandfather(He was a Jehovah Witness) spent alot of time thinking and talking about, so I've heard. It's what Derrick Jensen means when he says that this culture has a death urge. Here is what I read on Mr. Bennett's page:

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the problem with "warning" that "civilization is at stake" is that, at a deep emotional, psychological, and spiritual level, and likely unbeknownst to the vast majority of people in which this is at work, the Civilized™ humans on this planet seem, to my mind, to actually be craving TEOTWAWKI (the end of the world as we know it.) I'd much rather we become conscious of, and speak about that possibility, and why that might be the True™.--Timothy Scott Bennett

My great-grandfather died when I was around a year old. But given the chance I would have asked him why he thought the world was going to end. I was never convinced by the "he was just a nutcase" argument. Why? Because I think at some level we're all craving it. It's just that some have better ways of expressing it than others.


*His work has been influenced by Daniel Quinn.

More on Ishmael

Took the time and watched this video this morning. Now I have a better understanding why I recently wrote a letter into our local newspaper thanking a local high school student for mentioning that Ishmael was her favorite book in 2011. It took me three weeks to finally make up my mind and do it. And the letter really only amounted to a short paragraph thanking her (I'll post the letter within the next couple of days). But after putting aside all of my fears it was clear that: First of all, I wanted her to know that somebody in the community was paying attention to this. Because, like Mr. Bennett said in this video, once your mind is changed you look everywhere for signs of this different vision, and sometimes it's nice to know that others are looking too. Secondly, I wanted to publicly acknowledge that it was good to see that Ishmael was alive and well twenty years after its publication. Lastly, I know that after I read Ishmael, and the rest of Quinn's work, I longed to meet up with other readers (Where I live it's 15 miles to the closest city, so it was tough at times) and sit face to face and talk about his work. And as a side note, and as fate would have it, I met up with a like minded woman (She's an old hippie, just ask her.) that lived just down the road from me, and she mentioned that she had a daughter returning from California that I might be interested in. And again, as fate would have it, we're happily married expecting our 3rd child this September. I'm glad the book fell into my hands when it did.

The Second Time Around

The other day we watched What a Way to Go for the second time with a friend of ours, it was a lot better the second time around. Wow! After it was done my friend looked over at me and said, "That was probably one of the best documentaries I have ever seen. There is a years worth of reading packed into two hours."

I agree. If you want to know why this culture is so descructive and unhealthy to live in definately take the time to check this out. It's well worth it!

Here is a blog post talking about the effects it had on a person that recently watched it.

Also, if you want to check out some really funny comics take the time to visit Minimum Security.