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Archive for the ‘Be Socially Responsible’ Category

Happy Valentines Day!

February 14th, 2010 angela englund, cmt No comments

heartGreetings and salutations!

the following is a message that I feel is very worthy of sharing with those of us who are seeking wholeness, especially on this day many call “valentines day”. This message was sent out yesterday from the founder and leader of Young Living brand essential oils. if you don’t know who or what i’m talking about then here’s my quick shpeel: Young Living is passionate and serious about producing therapeutic-grade products; Gary has the strictest standards for purity, potency and safety when it comes to the essential oils that Young Living produces, and he is passionate about bringing a higher quality of life to all of the world. if you are new to ‘essential oils’, they can be considered, but are far from limited to the word aromatherapy. they are basically considered the blood of a plant/tree/fruit/flower and this blood contains enormous healing potential, and is imbued with the intelligence of nature.

I am a distributor of these oils-
i use them in a variety of ways daily, on myself, on dogs, and in my massage and healing practice, so i have stories from using the oils myself, as well as from other people over the last year and a half, since I first heard about Young Living.

i hope you have a wonderful valentine’s day! know that i love you, and care for you so very much. You are an invaluable piece of the giant Cosmic Puzzle, I will say. and that is no small thing! I mean, your ability to realize grander dreams and desires for ourselves and others, is important. Your health, happiness, fulfillment and satisfaction in life IS IMPORTANT. i think you came here to this thing we call “Life” to evolve and achieve deeper fulfillment in your own unique and perfect way. And really, right here and now, you are doing that just perfectly. You are perfect, whole and complete. You are lovely. I love you!

if you would like to get to know more about the Young Living essential oils on your own, you can click here or just get in touch with me.

peace!

~angie

Happy Valentine’s Day!
Advice from founder of Young Living brand therapeutic oils, D. Gary Young
“I feel very strongly that the biggest problem we face today is a lack of love. I learned several years ago from patients I saw in my practice that the cause of what we call “dis-ease” is nothing more than a deficiency of self love. When we have self love, we take care of our body–our temple–because we expect it to serve us. When we have self love, we feed it the way it should be fed. When we have self love, we nurture and care for our bodies. We don’t damage and destroy them.

Stop The Toxic Sulfide Metal Mine in Minnesota

January 29th, 2010 Ethan Z No comments
I just received this email and am sharing it here with you.  Please consider taking action now!

Subject: HELP, please: Comment by FEBRUARY 3 on PolyMet’s Draft EIS – first proposed toxic copper mine

My dear friend of Minnesota’s environment and public health,

Can you take just a couple minutes to help save Minnesota lakes, rivers, streams, and groundwater from the first serious threat of pollution by toxic Acid Mine Drainage from copper-nickel mines?  Here’s a quick-and-easy webform provided by our friends at Organic Consumers Association:  http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/642/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=1839

TWIN-CITIES COMMENT-WRITING WORKSHOP  this Sunday:

Also, you and anyone you  know who might be interested are invited to attend this special comment-writing workshop Sunday, January 17, 1-4 PM in St. Paul.  Please refer others, even if you’re not likely to attend.  It is a private meeting for contributors to substantive public comments on the draft environmental impact statement, hosted by WaterLegacy.org.

This is a limited opportunity, with comment period set to close *February 3*, 2010. Your comments are critical to the project receiving the scrutiny it deserves. It would create toxic acid mine drainage for hundreds or thousands of years.

Register NOW. Be sure to state your topic(s) or area(s) of interest in the DEIS.
http://www.mepartnership.org/mep_calendar.asp?cal_id=3510

All levels of citizen participation are welcome. Some would just like to sign a form letter and hand it in. Some would like to pick a narrow topic and write comments in one hour, or stay for the duration and write extensive comments. We held a similar workshop in Cloquet last weekend, which was very well-attended and productive.  Many completed and either emailed or mailed their comments that day.

You will benefit by learning from other citizens, background and technical documents, information about PolyMet and the environmental review process, and tips to make your comments most effective. We can provide talking points and drafts.  We will facilitate according to your needs.

Professional input will be available and more is welcome.

NOTE:  Even if you may not feel comfortable submitting written comments on the EIS directly, your expertise would be very beneficial.

Meanwhile, you can demand that DNR provide adequate public participation in the environmental review process. Specifically, ask for 1) extension of the comment period from only 90 to at least 180 days; 2) more convenient and interactive public hearings around the state. Email: Stuart Arkley MDNR stuart.arkley@dnr.state.mn.us <mailto:stuart.arkley@dnr.state.mn.us>

Read more…

Elders Speak – Listen to Native American Prophecy

December 30th, 2009 Ethan Z No comments

Very valuable – must watch:

Christmas, It’s The Time To Be Stress Free!

December 21st, 2009 Ethan Z. 2 comments

xmas2It is sad how people experience stress during the holidays, but things don’t have to be this way!

The shopping, driving, mailing out greeting cards, going to the post office, budgeting, traveling and seeing relatives. Sounds familiar?

I want to tell you now, that you can change this. You do not have to be stressed. In fact, you can be happy and make a bunch of other people happy.

You do not have to navigate crowded malls, get stuck in traffic, drive long distances, deal with airports and air travel, worry what gifts to buy, wrap gifts, mail gifts, send cards… nothing! Yes, you can simply say “no”.

Many alternatives to the commercialized, stressful, costly and polluting norms exist. Consider finding a bunch of friends that are close to your heart and locale (in your same state or region) and spend time with them.

Give people good words, give good wishes, give hugs, give love, give smiles, do good deeds, be extra relaxed, open doors for people, plant trees, etc.. The sky is the limit. You do not have to venture into these pesky malls.

You have the power to save money, save the environment, save yourself from headaches and have a greater more positive impact this season by being a better friend to yourself, to others and to nature.

Yes, YOU have to power to keep things simple. To say no. To start new traditions. To be unique.
Consider giving a donation to non profit organizations, give the Gift of Microfinance , be selfless, serve others, or make some good food and invite people to eat.

Consider spending time alone in meditation, in counting your blessings, in reflection, in prayer, in adoring Nature or a candle’s flame. Take a walk on a trail, go alone or take a loved one, if it’s cold bundle up and go out, adore the snow, adore the sky, adore the trees, spend time with your God or Nature.

Make the new years, Christmas, solstice or Yule a time to be good, truly good to yourself, to nature and to other people.

If you celebrate Christmas, this year remember that Jesus said “Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” and “sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”

Rid yourself of materialism and stress, keep things simple, honest, spiritual; you will be happier and make others happier while saving a bunch of trees, reducing your carbon and waste footprint and feeling better than ever for having done what you KNOW is right, not what you are told is right.

Remember, you are not alone.

Blessings, Love & Wisdom

This Holiday Season, Give The Gift Of Microfinance

December 19th, 2009 Ethan Z 1 comment

Rather than buying gifts, packaged in boxes, wrapping them & mailing them out (think of the carbon and waste produced as a result), how about giving the gift of hope and opportunity to people via micro-finance or micro-credit?

This season, you can help others find hope and start businesses in the US or around the world with a small financial gift!

Learn more here:

Find more on how you can support charitable efforts

Winona LaDuke – Added to Seeking Wholeness’s “Best Of”

November 15th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

winona_ladukeWinona LaDuke, is an Anishinaabeg (Ojibwe) enrolled member of the Mississippi Band of Anishinaabeg and is the mother of three children. Winona is the Program Director of Honor the Earth and Founding Director of White Earth Land Recovery Project.

Leading Honor the Earth she provides vision and leadership for the organization’s Regranting Program and its Strategic Initiatives.  In addition, she has worked for two decades on the land issues of the White Earth Reservation, including litigation, over land rights in the 1980’s.  In 1989, she received the Reebok Human Rights Award, with which in part she began the White Earth Land Recovery Project.

In 1994, Winona was nominated by Time Magazine as one of America’s fifty most promising leaders under forty years of age, and has also been awarded the Thomas Merton Award in 1996, the Ann Bancroft Award, Ms. Woman of the Year Award (with the Indigo Girls in 1997), the Global Green Award, and numerous other honors. A graduate of Harvard and Antioch Universities, she has written extensively on Native American and environmental issues.

Her books include: Last Standing Woman (fiction), All Our Relations (non-fiction), In the Sugarbush (Children’s), and The Winona LaDuke Reader.

To show respect to all of her work, I post this article about Winona LaDuke under the Best Of category.

For more information, visit: http://nativeharvest.com.

73% of Doctors Want a Public Option

September 15th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments
mahd_button

mad as hell doctors.com - Where the rubber gloves meet the road

For those who have doubts about where doctors stand on the public option, this recent survey of doctors should help.

New England Journal of Medicine: 73% support a public option

New England Journal of Medicine article

NPR:
NPR article

Watch The Ad That CNN is Refusing to Air

September 7th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

Since CNN is refusing to air this ad, I am posting it here.

Tell CNN to play this ad here

Senator Bernie Sanders on Public Healthcare

August 29th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

Worth watching:

 

Animation Video Explaining Why We Need Government-Run Universal Socialized Health Insurance

August 27th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

This is a good cartoon video titled ‘Why We Need Government-Run Universal Socialized Health Insurance‘. It explains why we need a public health insurance option or some sort of a government-run health system in the US.

The video compares Health Insurance to the fire department in a very effective manner. I’d like to add that fire departments used to be private and for profit in Chicago, then came the Chicago fire. After the Chicago fire the fire department was socialized to distribute risk and lower cost.

It’s ironic that nowadays fire department remain socialized, and work very well. We all expect the fire fighters to show up at a phone’s call, yet when your own body, your own intestines, brains, or heart are on fire (i.e. sick/ill) you cannot get the attention needed, since the system is so very broken.

Enjoy the video:

Animated by Andy Lubershane. More comics at http://www.earthlycomics.blogspot.com

Text transcript of the video:

Why we need government-run universal, socialized, call it what you want, health insurance.

We all know from basic civil class, or just being alive, that a lot of essential services are already government-run, universal, socialized, whatever you wanna call it.

Think water treatment, police, fire, postal service, coast guard, all those things you know are gonna be there for you, every single day without even thinking about them. We all pay our taxes and the government uses the money to pay for the things everyone needs just to get by.

Now, health care is just as essential as any of these services. Sure, a few of us may be lucky enough to make it through our whole lives without any medical problem but the rest of us depend on health care at some point in our lives just to get by. Besides its essentialness, there’s another reason health insurance is just like those government run, universal, socialized, whatever you wanna call them services, that’s this: There are very very few people that can afford to pay on their own the cost of health care when disaster strikes and they or someone they love gets really really sick.

So, we all need insurance, which basically means when we pool our money together enough so what when anyone of us gets really really sick there’s enough money in the pool to pay for that person to get better, that’s insurance.

But, who should we choose to manage the pool of our money and give out our money to the people who need it? Well, private insurance companies are the ones that we are using right now, but there’s a problem. On average, these companies take 10 – 20 cents out of every dollar we put in the pool.

Read more…

77 Percent Support “Choice” Of Public Option

August 23rd, 2009 Ethan Z. 2 comments

More than three out of every four Americans feel it is important to have a “choice” between a government-run health care insurance option and private coverage, according to a public opinion poll released on Thursday.

A new study by SurveyUSA puts support for a public option at a robust 77 percent, one percentage point higher than where it stood in June.

But the numbers tell another story, as well.

Earlier in the week, after pollsters for NBC dropped the word “choice” from their question on a public option, they found that only 43 percent of the public were in favor of “creating a public health care plan administered by the federal government that would compete directly with private health insurance companies.”

Rea more at Huffington Post

72 Percent of Americans Support a Government-Sponsored Health Care Plan to Compete with Private Insurers

June 24th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

Again, we the people have spoken.

A recent CBS/ New York Times poll found that 72 percent of Americans (50 percent of Republicans and 87 percent of Democrats) support a government-sponsored health care plan to compete with private insurers.

A clear majority of Americans — 72 percent — support a government-sponsored health care plan to compete with private insurers, a new CBS News/New York Times poll finds. Most also think the government would do a better job than private industry at keeping down costs and believe that the government should guarantee health care for all Americans.

Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/19/opinion/polls/main5098517.shtml

U.S. Has The Highest Child Poverty, High Fertility But Low Life Expectancy

May 22nd, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

According to a new report released by the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), happiness levels are highest in northern European countries.

Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands rated at the top of the list.

Outside of Europe, New Zealand and Canada also made the top 10. The U.S. did not.

The U.S. ranked the highest for child poverty and obesity among the western nations polled.

Other Very Interesting Findings include:

Adult height: Americans are not getting taller. The United States is the only country in the OECD where men and women aged 45-49 are no taller than those aged 20-24 years old, indicating no improvement in health and social conditions determining gains in height.

Health care: The United States spends the most per capita on health care, but despite their high levels of health spending the Unites States has relatively low life expectancy.

Net National Income: The United States is one of the richest countries in the OECD. In 2006, the United States had a per capita National Net Income in excess of USD 35 000. Only Luxembourg and Norway were higher.

Fertility: The United States has a much higher fertility rate than most other OECD countries of 2.1 children per mother, compared to an OECD average of 1.65.

Child poverty: Child poverty has fallen since the mid-1990s but one in five US children still live in poverty, a rate exceeded only in Poland, Mexico, and Turkey

Social protection: The United States is the fourth lowest in the OECD in terms of income shares of public social spending. However, when tax breaks for social purposes and private social spending are also considered, social spending in the United States rises above the OECD average of 28% to 31% of income.

Eating time: Americans spend around an hour and a quarter eating every day, slightly more than only Canadians and Mexicans but less than half the eating time spent by the French. Despite this limited time spent eating, their obesity rates are the highest in the OECD.

Leisure time of men and women: American men have nearly 40 minutes more leisure time than women per day.
Find the report here: http://www.oecd.org/document/24/0,3343,en_2649_34637_2671576_1_1_1_1,00.html

Let me ask you,

  • Are we a nation of Me’s or a nation of We’s?
  • How can one justify that it is more important to have a fetus develop into a baby and then be born than to give that new born baby and child health coverage or keep them from poverty?

We may make more money per capita in the US but we spend most of it on health insurance and other ‘fees’ – These are what I call hidden taxes.

These hidden taxes go to corporations not to benefit other citizens; they suck money up the ranks to make the rich richer, making huge profits and paying CEO’s millions of dollars that are basically denied health care reimbursements to you.. In other words, money from your pocket to theirs.

Taxes are used by governments (i.e. we the people) to benefit the population at large, these fees are simply how some corporations (after lobbying congress) dip their hands in your pockets and ’steal’ your money.

Read more…

What I Learned About Being Happy

April 15th, 2009 Ethan Z. 8 comments

impmsgWont you say that the pursuit of happiness is one thing that is programed in most of us?  Not counting mentally unstable individuals, its safe to assume that we all want to be happy. The interesting thing though is how little we know about what it takes to be happy or satisfied. We often seek happiness only to create suffering.

I use the words ‘happy’ and ’satisfied’ interchangeably, the way I see it they are the same. Suffering also needs to be clarified here, suffering encompasses any of these: stress, negative emotions, misery, pain, etc.

Why is the list below so long (80+ topics)? Well, after getting a pulmonary embolism last week, a potentially lethal medical condition, I decided to write down a list of ideas and concepts that are dear to me in one post and to push them out on the Internet. This article is essentially my message to the world; I was planning on writing an article for each of (or a combination of) the topics listed below; as you will notice some article have already been written; however, who knows if I’ll live long enough or if I’ll ever have the time to write articles on all these topics.

The list below is a compilation of things I learned or developed (through thought processes), philosophies, beliefs and ideas that I consider dear to my heart and I do live by.  I do not want to take credit for any of the topics below, these were passed on to me through people, nature and other life events. I only learned them, tried to sincerely live them, and now, wrote them down. I believe that the more of these that you embrace the more satisfied and happy you will become.

Please share your tips for happiness by leaving a comment.

Message to the world, brought to you by Wholeness Blog:

  1. Appreciate and delight in the smallest things and the simplest things.
  2. Plan the future but don’t get obsessed about it. You can plan so much, but when something unplanned happens, then it is what it is, collect yourself and move on.
  3. Many unexpected things may happen, sometimes things are what they are, sometimes they are not. Know which is which.
  4. If you are faced with bad news, a bad reality, you will have to first accept it before you can deal with it. Some people go through denial and other moods, but you cannot move forward until you accept reality.
  5. Take what you have and go along with it. Make the best with what you have.
  6. See the positives and the lessons in everything  you experience.
  7. Don’t see the obstacles and the so called ‘negative’ things, you will only pull yourself away from living a better life.
  8. When you dream or plan, be free, explore all the possibilities, identify your dream as if no restrictions exist at all. Then, add the restrictions, examine which are real and which are self imposed, then create plans.
  9. There is no good or bad. A few things are absolute good or bad, the rest are all in between, they are shades of gray. Even in your life, what you see as bad, may actually be good, your evaluation of something as bad is your own opinion, your own view, and your view is influenced by your mind set. (Read this on the good and bad).
  10. Keep your mind OPEN to seeing the good in everything.
  11. Stop and notice nature, birds, the wind, beaches, rain, smells, grass, dew drops, plant leaves, etc.. and see the beauty and life in them.. See the good in them.
  12. See the good in you, all you’ve done, all you’ve overcome, the past events and challenges you lived through. Appreciate what you’ve managed to do and deal with. See how all these things made you who you are now and how they made you more mature and stronger.
  13. Respect yourself. If you don’t no one will.
  14. Love yourself. If you don’t no one will.
  15. See the good that you have, your healthy blood, brain, eyes, ears, oh so many things that you are fortunate to have.
  16. Demand respect of others, BUT give it back.
  17. Treat others as you wish to be treated.
  18. Make peace not war, in your mind, in your heart, with others, with nature and with everything.
  19. Appreciate what you got. Do not take anything for granted. We got countless of things that should not be taken fro granted, for instance: Your house, the roads, the water, sewers, the food, the highway system, having fuel, electricity, the sun, the clean air, the money you have, your job, pets, rain, the night sky, green plants, fruits and on top of them all your health.
  20. Remember, so many people are not as blessed as you are.
  21. Read more…

Yet Another Food Recall — Salmonella In Pistachios

April 1st, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

pistachios2_ip791

Here we go again with another food recall. On Tue Mar 31, 2009 a California pistachio processor issued a nationwide voluntary recall due to potential salmonella contamination.

Thus far, several illnesses have been reported by consumers that may be associated with the pistachios, the FDA said.

The pistachios are roasted and tested for quality, it is believed the cross-contamination occurred at the processing / packaging plan.

The FDA is advising consumers avoid all pistachio products

The last food recall due to salmonella contamination outbreak was with peanuts and peanut butter that has sickened more than 690 people in 46 states. The company in the news then was Peanut Corp. of America, the company behind the current outbreak is Setton.

Both Setton and Peanut Corp. of America are bulk provider of nuts to food manufacturers and wholesalers. That means that the contaminated pistachios could have ended up in a variety of processed foods, including ice cream, cookies, candies and trail mix.

I try to purchase and consume (i.e support) organic and small farm products when I can, I do not support large scale commercial factory farming and food processing.

When are we going to learn than small farms and smaller food manufacturers will provide better quality and be more socially and environmentally friendly?

News articles:

http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=103267

http://cancer.about.com/b/2009/04/01/fda-issues-pistachio-warning.htm

http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssFoodDistribution%20&%20Convenience%20Stores/idUSN3139386420090331

http://www.oregonlive.com/business/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/business/1238034318314750.xml&coll=7

Injustice And Hunger – What If It Was Me?

March 31st, 2009 Ethan Z. 2 comments

I would like to present these notions to you, do you agree with me?

Any injustice, anywhere, in the world is too much to tolerate.

Any sick person is one too many. Any hungry person is one too many.

Any hateful crime anywhere in the world is as bad as a hateful crime against me.

Any poor and helpless person on the planet, is just one minute away from being me.

Anything that I would hate on myself I hate on anyone else, if not for moral reasons then at the least because this person could have been me.

What if it was Me?

Join Earth Hour Tomorrow Saturday 3/28/2009 At 8:30 PM

March 27th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

no_light_bulbTomorrow, March 28, 2009, at 8:30 PM local time  is Earth Hour.

You can join in easily, all you have to do is turn off  all your lights for one hour!

Join the rest of the world and turn off your lights for 1 hour only.

Turn out.   Take action. Be part of this historic event.

You don’t really have to sign up on the Earth Hour website. This is but a small personal action to show support to our mother Earth, it can also be fun ;)

Some of the things you could do during this hour include a romantic candle light dinner, going on a walk or meditating! ..

Find out more here:  http://www.earthhourus.org/

We Are The Evil – Watch Carl Jung Interview

February 16th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

Does Evil exist? This article has an excerpt from an interview with Carl Jung and he is seen clearly saying that man is the origin of evil. That is, humans are the origin of all evil.

Some very interesting questions to ask yourself after you watch this interview:

  • What makes a person Evil, their thoughts or their actions?
  • We can all agree that the only evil species on this planet is Humans, correct?
  • Why are we evil?
  • Not to diminish the badness of ‘evil’, but can we break evilness down to attributes such as selfishness and stupidity as the prime causes for evil thoughts and actions?

Many people, including Carl Jung, say that “we are the evil” on this planet..

The conclusion here is, if you fear evil then fear people.

Read more…

Vatican, Shame On You!

January 26th, 2009 Ethan Z. 1 comment

In the last few hours, with unusual speed, the Vatican has condemned Obama’s Jan. 23 repeal of the ban on U.S. funding for foreign family planning aid groups who support abortion services. This rule was first enforced under Regan, then Clinton repealed it only for Bush to reinstate it, now Obama is repealing this rule again.

This rule basically says that US funds will not be given to any international organization or any non profits that support the full scale of family planning that includes abortion, this rule tells other countries how to handle their own people’s family planning and removes funding from any groups that select to support abortion. As a result most the money goes to groups that are religious or teach abstenance and the money does not go to all the rest of the mainstream and sensible groups that offer a full range of family planning but just happen to support abortions as a womans choice.

It is “the arrogance of someone who believes they are right, in signing a decree which will open the door to abortion and thus to the destruction of human life,” Archbishop Rino Fisichella was quoted as saying by the Corriere della Sera daily.

To you, Vatican and Archbishop I say Shame On You!

Our creed in the US is the constitution. The real arrogance is for the US to think that we have the right to tell other nations how to do their family planning based on our own religious views. We in the US have a separation between church and state. Neither you nor anyone really knows when ‘life’ starts in a human being. Under our constitution we have the right for privacy, women deserve the right to make their choice.

To you Vatican I say, stay out of our union

To those of you who advocate abstinence and are anti abortion I say please stop the hypocrisy. If you want to avoid abortions then teach family planning and improve sex education, do not go after a dream called abstinence because no one is abstinent, face reality, wake up! People who only use abstinence for family planning end up being ignorant, and ignorance leads to unwanted pregnancies. Want to reduce abortions then teach people how to use condoms and support sex education.

Further, how come you say that you care so much about “kill babies” but once these same “babies” are born you don’t care if they get health care or if they live in poverty? Shame on You!!

To Obama I say, Kudos! Thank you for restoring the power to our constitution!

Recent news article

Senior Vatican figures criticise Obama
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2009/0126/1232923365952.html

The Vatican Slams Obama Over Abortion
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1873904,00.html

Read more…

ADD Is Not A Disorder!

January 24th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

I don’t think that ADD is a disorder nor a disease. I know many parents may disagree with me, however I believe that I’ve done enough research to reach this conclusion.

I started a discussion thread here. Feel free to join the discussion and contribute your opinions/experiences.

I know a few that agree that ADD is not a disorder or a disease, one example that comes to mind is Thom Hartman an author on the subject of ADD/ADHD.

I strongly oppose drugging children that are diagnosed with ADD or ADHD, If I had kids I won’t let them go on “medication” to treat this “disorder”.

Mood altering drugs, in my opinion, are not medications, and ADD is not a disorder, simply a personality type.

Oceti Sakowin: The People of the Seven Council Fires – Trailer

January 17th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

Watch Trailer:

Watch the trailer for the documentary entitled “Oceti Sakowin: The People of the Seven Council Fires” below.

Read more…

The People of the Seven Council Fires – Documentary Summary pt4

January 17th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments

This is part 4 of the series of articles entitled “The People of the Seven Council Fires – Documentary Summary“. Find part one here, part two here, part three here.

This article is about Family and the new way of life the Oyate were forced into.

Relationships are very important to the Oyate. If you were an Oyate you can make new relatives, by adopting someone as a relative, as a mother, son, sister or brother.

Social structure

The social structure is one of an extended family.

The men assume the role of the protector, provider and leadership.

Women

Women maintain the household. Women are viewed as nurturers & educators.

Women educate the children until a certain age, when boys go with men mentors and women stay under the womens’ mentorship

Grandmothers are usually the educators of the young

Women owned the house and tipi

Ethnic Cleansing

The Lakota were men of peace, lived in balance with creation and addressed all creation as relatives, they were relatives with the white buffalo

The Lakota was the last of tribes to resit the US military, odds and numbers were against them and eventually they worse faced with a new way of life.

Treaties were made and broken. Land was taken. People were forced into farming, and into boarding schools that were basically functioning in a Catholic school system. Further, families broken apart and separated, men and women and children separated.

Their roles were taken away. The women could no longer teach and nurture their children who were taken away from them; the men had no buffalo to hunt and mentoring to give.

The rationale for the boarding schools was, as Carlisle founder Richard Henry Pratt often said, to “kill the Indian and save the man.” But the actual reason was economic: By taking away the children, the U.S. government was able to take away and maintain control of the Indian land base.

Alcohol & drugs came into their lives when reservations started; the buffalo was replaced by rations as part of a government ration system.

The Oral tradition ended; now Cathlic nuns taught children and provided the children protection, someone else was providing for the children.

It was against the law to be Lakota from 1880 to 1978 !!!

In the 1950’s 100% of the Lakota denied their indiannes and they did not speak in Lakota.

Read more…

The People of the Seven Council Fires – Documentary Summary pt3

January 16th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments
28 support poles around the sundance arbor

28 support poles around the sundance arbor

This is part 3 of the series of articles entitled “The People of the Seven Council Fires – Documentary Summary“. Find part one here, part two here.

This article talks about numbers. Numbers are sacred to the Oyate people.

The Number Seven

The numbers 7 and 4 are sacred thus are integrated in everything.

Seven (7) is used for social units or the structures of things
Four (4) is used in ritual
4 multiplied by 7 = 28.

The number twenty Eight (28) combines both ritual and social. The Oyate have 28 sundance lodges (or 28 support poles around the sundance arbor – sorry I’m a little confused about this particular one), 28 divisions in circle, and the months have 28 days (since they are lunar months)

The number 7 can be broken into 1, 2 and 4 , giving each of these numbers some significance.

Stay tuned for part 4 which will talk about Family

This series of articles are categories under “Religion / Atheism” and are tagged with “Ancient”.

End of part 3

Note: These articles were written in recognition and in high respect to those who inhabited these lands before me, to those who coexisted and protect the land, and to their spirituality, culture and legacy. My small contribution to bringing the truth out about what happened to the original inhabitants of North America.

Stop The Genocide In Gaza!

January 9th, 2009 Ethan Z. 4 comments

I have kept my mouth shut for a long time but what’s happening in gaza now qualifies as genocide in my opinion. Humanitarian aid cannot be prevented in any war zone, if you can call this a war. These people are living in a large prison, a very large concentration camp (not my words – The Senior Vatican Cardinal said the Gaza Strip had been turned into a “concentration camp”). Why destroy schools? Why kill civilians? Why kill innocent children? Why destroy government infrastructure? Why fight hate with more hate? This will only lead to lawlessness, more misery, more hurt, more extremists, and more f*ing war!  

When will people learn that War and aggression will not create peace!

Hate will not eliminate hate

THIS IS FUCKED UP!

IS THIS SELF DEFENSE?

PLZ

STOP  KILLING

YOUR  FELLOW

BROTHER & SISTER

HUMAN   BEINGS!

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Eliminate Hate With Love

January 8th, 2009 Ethan Z. No comments
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
American Civil Rights Leader