Al Owski > Recent Status Updates

“The behavior and reactions of the oppressed, which lead the oppressor to practice cultural invasion, should evoke from the revolutionary a different theory of action. What distinguishes revolutionary leaders from the dominant elite is not only their objectives, but their procedures. If they act in the same way, the objectives become identical.”

“In the first case, the oppressor is "housed" within the people, and their resulting ambiguity makes them fearful of freedom. They resort (stimulated by the oppressor) to magical explanations or a false view of God, to whom they fatalistically transfer the responsibility for their oppressed state.”

“In the first case, the adhesion or partial adhesion of the people to the oppressor makes it impossible for them (to repeat Fanon's point) to locate him outside themselves. In the second case, they can locate the oppressor and can thus critically recognize their relationship of antagonism to him.”

“It is as if the metropolitan society were saying: "Let us carry out reforms before the people carry out a revolution." And in order to achieve this goal, the metropolitan society has no options other than conquest, manipulation, economic and cultural (and sometimes military) invasion of the dependent society...”

“Cultural invasion, which serves the ends of conquest and the preservation of oppression, always involves a parochial view of reality, a static perception of the world, and the imposition of one world view upon another. It implies the "superiority" of the invader and the "inferiority" of those who are invaded, as well as the imposition of values by the former, who possess the latter and are afraid of losing them.”

“The people are manipulated by the series of myths described earlier in this chapter, and by yet another myth: the model of itself which the bourgeoisie presents to the people as the possibility for their own ascent. In order for these myths to function, however, the people must accept the word of the bourgeoisie.”

“By means of manipulation, the dominant elites try to conform the masses to their objectives. And the greater the political immaturity of these people (rural or urban) the more easily the latter can be manipulated by those who do not wish to lose their power.”

“With this false generosity, he attempts not only to preserve an unjust and necrophilic order, but to "buy" peace for himself. It happens that peace cannot be bought; peace is experienced in solidary and loving acts, which cannot be incarnated in oppression.”

“They want to save their riches, their power, their way of life: the things that enable them to subjugate others. Their mistake is that men cannot save themselves... either as individuals or as an oppressor class. Salvation can be achieved only with others. To the extent, however, that the elites oppress, they cannot be with the oppressed; for being against them is the essence of oppression.”

“In addition, the dominators try to present themselves as saviors of the women and men they dehumanize and divide. This messianism, however, cannot conceal their true intention: to save themselves.”

“Unity and organization can enable them to change their weakness into a transforming force with which they can recreate the world and make it more human. The more human world... however, is the antithesis of the "human world" of the oppressors a world which is the exclusive possession of the oppressors, who preach an impossible harmony between themselves (who dehumanize) and the oppressed (who are dehumanized).”

“People are fulfilled only to the extent that they create their world...with their transforming labor ... If for a person to be in the world of work is to be totally dependent, insecure, and permanently threatened—if their work does not belong to them—the person cannot be fulfilled. Work that is not free ceases to be a fulfilling pursuit and becomes an effective means of dehumanization.”

“"If the workers do not become in some way the owners of their labor, all structural reforms will be ineffective... They want to be owners, not sellers, of their labor.... At present the workers are increasingly aware that labor represents a part of the human person. A person, however cannot be bought; neither can he sell himself. Any purchase or sale of labor is a type of slavery." (Bishop Franic Split)

“the oppressors' depositing myths...to the preservation of the status quo: for example, the myth that the oppressive order is a "free society"...that all persons are free to work where they wish, that if they don't like their boss they can leave him and look for another job...that this order respects human rights and is therefore worthy of esteem; the myth that anyone who is industrious can become an entrepreneur...”

“the revolutionary leaders cannot be falsely generous, nor can they manipulate. Whereas the oppressor elites flourish by trampling the people underfoot, the revolutionary leaders can flourish only in communion with the people. Thus it is that the activity of the oppressor cannot be humanist, while that of the revolutionary is necessarily so.”

“In the process of oppression the elites subsist on the "living death" of the oppressed and find their authentication in the vertical relationship between themselves and the latter; in the revolutionary process there is only one way for the emerging leaders to achieve authenticity: they must "die," in order to be reborn through and with the oppressed.”

“President of the Royal Society, raised objections which could be matched in every country: "However specious in theory the project might be of giving education to the laboring classes of the poor, it would be prejudicial to their morals and happiness; it would teach them to despise their lot in life instead of making them good servants in agricultural and other laborious employments...”

“Revolutionary leaders cannot think without the people, nor for the people, but only with the people. The dominant elites, on the other hand, can—and do—think without the people—although they do not permit themselves the luxury of failing to think about the people in order to know them better and thus dominate them more efficiently.”

“This solidarity is born only when the leaders witness to it by their humble, loving, and courageous encounter with the people. Not all men and women have sufficient courage for this encounter—but when they avoid encounter they become inflexible and treat others as mere objects; instead of nurturing life, they kill life; instead of searching for life, they flee from it. And these are oppressor characteristics.”

“More than anything, I want to hear a great song of thanks rise on the wind. I think that song might save us. ”

“But the uncertain path to the future could be illuminated by language. In Potawatomi, we speak of the land as emingoyak: that which has been given to us. In English, we speak of the land as "natural resources" or "ecosystem services," as if the lives of other beings were our property. As if the earth were not a bowl of berries, but an open pit mine, and the spoon a gouging shovel.”

“They carry the lesson, passed to us by our ancestors, that the generosity of the land comes to us as one bowl, one spoon. We are all fed from the same bowl that Mother Earth has filled for us. It's not just about the berries, but also about the bowl. The gifts of the earth are to be shared, but gifts are not limitless. The generosity of the earth is not an invitation to take it all. Every bowl has a bottom.”

“You never dishonor the gift. A gift asks something of you. To take care of it.”

“Woven into my dad's fire teachings was appreciation for all the woods gave us and a sense of our responsibility for reciprocity. We never left a camping place without leaving a pile of wood for the next people on the trail. Paying attention, being prepared and patient, and doing it right the first time: the skill and the values were so closely entwined that fire making became an emblem of a certain kind of virtue.”

“If grief can be a doorway to love, then let us all weep for the world we are breaking apart so we can love it back to wholeness again.”

“As the temperature drops, single voices—clear and hollow-replace the keening chorus: the ancient speech of frogs. One word becomes clear, as if spoken in English. "Hear! Hear! Hear! The world is more than your thoughtless commute. We, the collateral, are your wealth, your teachers, your security, your family. Your strange hunger for ease should not mean a death sentence for the rest of Creation."

“It has been said that people of the modern world suffer a great sadness, a "species loneliness" estrangement from the rest of Creation. We have built this isolation with our fear, with our arrogance, and with our homes brightly lit against the night. For a moment as we walked this road, those barriers dissolved and we began to relieve the loneliness and know each other once again.”

“Collateral damage: shielding words to keep us from naming the consequence of a missile gone astray. The words ask us to turn our faces away, as if man-made destruction were an inescapable fact of nature. Collateral damage: measured in overturned soup pots and wailing children.”

“We may not have wings or leaves, but we humans do have words. Language is our gift and our responsibility. I've come to think of writing as an act of reciprocity with the living land. Words to remember old stories, words to tell new ones, stories that bring science and spirit back together...”

“Scientists are particularly good at learning about the lives of other species. The stories they could tell convey the intrinsic values of the lives of other beings, lives every bit as interesting...as those of Homo sapiens. But while scientists...are privy to these other intelligences, many seem to believe that the intelligence they access is only their own. They lack the fundamental ingredient: humility. ”