09-04-2018, 03:26 PM
(This post was last modified: 09-04-2018, 03:50 PM by Eric the Green.)
You are on the right track P. Brower as usual. But I do get a bit concerned when you say "the boom awakening" has been dashed. It will not be enough for the blue side to knock Trump and the GOP agenda. The blue side in order to win will need some inspiring ideals for the future, and to elucidate and articulate those in a charismatic way. That way all stems from the Consciousness Revolution and the Blue Awakening portions of it. The 1960s-70s awakening still beckons us, and still provides all of the inspiration for the future. We can advocate for good behavior, and try to practice it. We can knock the excesses of behavior and rhetoric of those days, and we knock the excesses of today. But those were not the essence of the Awakening.
The Awakening brought us the environmental movement, to protect the life of Earth not just in faraway places, but also in our midst; to clean up our air and water, preserve our lands and all their animals and plants, and to remember that we are a part of them and depend on them. And to reverse the fossil fuel pollution that creates climate change and all its dangers. This movement began in the 1960s, was powered by the Boomer Generation, and still is agenda item #1 today.
And this also implies that quality, not mere quantity of life, is uppermost. To be inspired, we must be presented with more than just bread; we want roses too. Beyond economics, there is ecology and our love of Nature and its life-giving properties, and there is spirituality and human potential too, and freedom and abilities of expression, and means to expand and liberate consciousness freely available. Without expanding our human abilities, our awareness of all spiritual dimensions and not just the physical, and our connection to all of life, we are just keeping our heads above water, and not growing into a society that respects that people are human beings, not just numbers; that life is about more than work. And at a time when work itself might be ending, the blueprints for a higher purpose of life, toward spiritual and creative evolution, and beyond physicalist reductionism and the darwinism that empowers racism, all need to be remembered and championed, and also the more-physical blueprints for cities and neighborhoods that are people friendly and which establish social connection and cultural richness, for jobs and work that are fulfilling, and education and health for the whole person. These trends of the Consciousness Revolution 2T are still the most relevant if we are to be inspired toward a future society, and not just bread and the mere endurance of existence.
The Awakening gave us the Great Society, toward greater economic and social equality for all races and peoples. We cannot be satisfied with a society that only benefits a few, justified by free enterprise rhetoric and trickle-down neo-liberal economics that only tinkles on us. The plans of Dr. Martin Luther King, LBJ and George McGovern from the Awakening still wait to be realized. A society geared only to the wealthy is not healthy. A fairer tax system, stronger unions, guaranteed wages and shorter hours for the same pay, social programs, Medicare for all, free or assisted fee college, these ideals from the Awakening are all still on the agenda. Trickle-down economics and hatred of social welfare as mere freeloading dependency for non-whites will not fly, as a few bosses hog all the benefits from a computerized economy that puts people out of work or sends all our jobs overseas. We must respect social protection as good for all of us, not just the poor.
But these plans were also scuttled by the war in Vietnam. The peace movement remains a strong legacy of the mis-named Boom Awakening, which the authors called the Consciousness Revolution. In spite of the Bush betrayals, the ideal of the Consciousness Revolution and its protests against the crime of the US Invasion of Vietnam is that war is unhealthy for living things, and is a horrible means to achieve anything. The ideal of the end of war is a great legacy of the Awakening, and together with the environmental movement, entitles the 2T of the 1960s and 70s to be called the Greenpeace Awakening. And we need peace at home as well as ending imperialism abroad, and that means that the gun control movement that began after the assassinations of RFK and MLK must finally succeed.
Democratic reforms are a crying need now too. We can't have a country of, by and for the people, if peoples' votes are suppressed, made irrelevant by gerrymandering, and scuttled by out-moded, slave-protecting features of our constitution; nor dominated and distorted by a political system built on and based on the money of rich special interests. Public-financed campaigns and the reform of lobbies dominating our congress need to be established. The voting rights act of 1965 must be restored. This too is an ideal from the Awakening (particularly after the Watergate Scandal) that needs to be pressed forward again now. As Matt Post said, "our country is sick with soullnessness, but make no mistake, we are the cure." We must restore morality to our country's politics. Just as in Lincoln's times, government of, by and for the people needs to be restored and built upon.
And sometimes social justice warriors may be irritating. But social justice is something to uphold. The great legacy of rights, and personal dignity, for all races and peoples, all sexes and sexual orientations, must continue to be expanded, and it is part and parcel of economic fairness, and democratic reforms. Economic and social justice cannot be separated, either way. The feeling of liberation which these people felt in the Awakening was truly inspiring, and must not be forgotten, and must not in any way be reversed. Our police must be respected, but our police must exercize respect, and be held accountable when they don't. And nowadays when immigrants are falsely blamed for our economic problems, and one race led by its new demagogue wishes to make its country "great" again, fairness toward these people too is essential if we are to restore morality as well as economic fairness to our country, whose immigration policies in the 1960s started us on the road to a truly-great multi-racial society.
The Counter-awakening, i.e. the red and white awakenings, the Reaganomics and the Trumpisms, meanwhile deserve to be abandoned, just like the views of tories, confederates and the FDR haters were abandoned once the struggles of the 4T were over. The new true-blue greenpeace ideals from the Awakening need to be established as the new consensus.
The Fourth Turning is all about making the ideals of the previous awakening into institutional realities. This must be done, and to do that, the Consciousness Revolution in all its facets must be upheld and respected.
The Awakening brought us the environmental movement, to protect the life of Earth not just in faraway places, but also in our midst; to clean up our air and water, preserve our lands and all their animals and plants, and to remember that we are a part of them and depend on them. And to reverse the fossil fuel pollution that creates climate change and all its dangers. This movement began in the 1960s, was powered by the Boomer Generation, and still is agenda item #1 today.
And this also implies that quality, not mere quantity of life, is uppermost. To be inspired, we must be presented with more than just bread; we want roses too. Beyond economics, there is ecology and our love of Nature and its life-giving properties, and there is spirituality and human potential too, and freedom and abilities of expression, and means to expand and liberate consciousness freely available. Without expanding our human abilities, our awareness of all spiritual dimensions and not just the physical, and our connection to all of life, we are just keeping our heads above water, and not growing into a society that respects that people are human beings, not just numbers; that life is about more than work. And at a time when work itself might be ending, the blueprints for a higher purpose of life, toward spiritual and creative evolution, and beyond physicalist reductionism and the darwinism that empowers racism, all need to be remembered and championed, and also the more-physical blueprints for cities and neighborhoods that are people friendly and which establish social connection and cultural richness, for jobs and work that are fulfilling, and education and health for the whole person. These trends of the Consciousness Revolution 2T are still the most relevant if we are to be inspired toward a future society, and not just bread and the mere endurance of existence.
The Awakening gave us the Great Society, toward greater economic and social equality for all races and peoples. We cannot be satisfied with a society that only benefits a few, justified by free enterprise rhetoric and trickle-down neo-liberal economics that only tinkles on us. The plans of Dr. Martin Luther King, LBJ and George McGovern from the Awakening still wait to be realized. A society geared only to the wealthy is not healthy. A fairer tax system, stronger unions, guaranteed wages and shorter hours for the same pay, social programs, Medicare for all, free or assisted fee college, these ideals from the Awakening are all still on the agenda. Trickle-down economics and hatred of social welfare as mere freeloading dependency for non-whites will not fly, as a few bosses hog all the benefits from a computerized economy that puts people out of work or sends all our jobs overseas. We must respect social protection as good for all of us, not just the poor.
But these plans were also scuttled by the war in Vietnam. The peace movement remains a strong legacy of the mis-named Boom Awakening, which the authors called the Consciousness Revolution. In spite of the Bush betrayals, the ideal of the Consciousness Revolution and its protests against the crime of the US Invasion of Vietnam is that war is unhealthy for living things, and is a horrible means to achieve anything. The ideal of the end of war is a great legacy of the Awakening, and together with the environmental movement, entitles the 2T of the 1960s and 70s to be called the Greenpeace Awakening. And we need peace at home as well as ending imperialism abroad, and that means that the gun control movement that began after the assassinations of RFK and MLK must finally succeed.
Democratic reforms are a crying need now too. We can't have a country of, by and for the people, if peoples' votes are suppressed, made irrelevant by gerrymandering, and scuttled by out-moded, slave-protecting features of our constitution; nor dominated and distorted by a political system built on and based on the money of rich special interests. Public-financed campaigns and the reform of lobbies dominating our congress need to be established. The voting rights act of 1965 must be restored. This too is an ideal from the Awakening (particularly after the Watergate Scandal) that needs to be pressed forward again now. As Matt Post said, "our country is sick with soullnessness, but make no mistake, we are the cure." We must restore morality to our country's politics. Just as in Lincoln's times, government of, by and for the people needs to be restored and built upon.
And sometimes social justice warriors may be irritating. But social justice is something to uphold. The great legacy of rights, and personal dignity, for all races and peoples, all sexes and sexual orientations, must continue to be expanded, and it is part and parcel of economic fairness, and democratic reforms. Economic and social justice cannot be separated, either way. The feeling of liberation which these people felt in the Awakening was truly inspiring, and must not be forgotten, and must not in any way be reversed. Our police must be respected, but our police must exercize respect, and be held accountable when they don't. And nowadays when immigrants are falsely blamed for our economic problems, and one race led by its new demagogue wishes to make its country "great" again, fairness toward these people too is essential if we are to restore morality as well as economic fairness to our country, whose immigration policies in the 1960s started us on the road to a truly-great multi-racial society.
The Counter-awakening, i.e. the red and white awakenings, the Reaganomics and the Trumpisms, meanwhile deserve to be abandoned, just like the views of tories, confederates and the FDR haters were abandoned once the struggles of the 4T were over. The new true-blue greenpeace ideals from the Awakening need to be established as the new consensus.
The Fourth Turning is all about making the ideals of the previous awakening into institutional realities. This must be done, and to do that, the Consciousness Revolution in all its facets must be upheld and respected.
