disobedience (doc)
2016 – 41 min doc on disobedience
Climate change is real, and it’s up to the will of the people to reverse its adverse effects. This is the argument that drives Disobedience, a persuasive and handsomely produced documentary from the activist organization 350.org.
The film makes this thesis known from its earliest frames as it places a critical eye on the actions undertaken at this year’s United Nations Climate Change Summit in Paris.
via.. http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/disobedience/
[director Kelly Nyks.. googled and found: https://vimeo.com/154471865
watch this doc.. they interviewed noam over 5 yrs…]
notes/quotes/highlights:
3 min – more needs to be done…. disobedience… seeing the people and the movements stepping up to close that gap..
4 min
hoda baraka (@hodabaraka) (Global Communications Director http://350.org ): oil.. gas.. coal need to be kept in the ground.. we can’t wait for the politicians to catch up with that understanding.. so people are basically taking things into their own hands and doing what needs to be done on the ground
batangas philippines
lidy nacpil (http://en.wikipilipinas.org/index.php/Lidy_Nacpil) (http://wecandeclaration.org/lidy-nacpil/):
Lidy Nacpil is a leftist economist and activist. She is currently the international coordinator of Jubilee South, a network of jubilee and debt campaigns, social movements, people’s organizations, communities, non-governmental organizations, and political formations in more than 60 countries across Asia, Africa, and Latin America. She also serves as the vice-president of Freedom from Debt Coalition (FDC), which is the oldest organization working for debt cancellation since 1988. She is also a member of the Development Group for Alternative Policies and 50 Years is Enough Network.
what is legal is not necessarily just.. we cannot simply confine ourselves to what the law offers for us ..to demand a different world.. i remember a time when just to distribute flyers about oil was against the law.. things remain the way they are because we allow it.. the moment we not allow it ..we take away our consent.. then change happens very
public consensus always oppresses someone (s)
5 min
edsa revolution 1986
lidy: in 1986 we were able to oust the dictator marcos…we create change through empowerment of people.. because we believe that’s the only change that will last
6 min
peti enriquez (https://stories.breakfree2016.org/life-in-ashes-ea726d8d7758#.2tiu9ho74) (secretary general bukal): listing all the benefits they said they would get from this type of energy.. while looking at the land/community.. and no benefits existing.. you don’t see any of it
i’m turning 60 soon.. i was 22 when these industries began taking over.. i’ve been fighting for so many years.. and now there are more of us.. how could i lose hope now.. i am not alone
wow..
peti: the citizens of the world are calling for the shut down of these power plants..
7 min
archbishop ramon arguelles (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramon_Arguelles):
Ramón Cabrera Argüelles (born November 12, 1944) was appointed Archbishop of the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Lipa in the province of Batangas, on the island of Luzon, Philippines, on November 26, 1993. He is best known for urging a boycott of a Madonna concert.
ramon: we allow our nature to be destroyed by selfishness.. and the progress that has been achieved is only for the few…. what is globalized is materialism/consumerism/lack of care for others.. what must be globalized is concern for one another.. the whole world is our responsibility.. everything that we do.. we are responsible.. most changes in society come from ordinary people who band themselves together and embrace the same vision..
8 min
alberta canada
naomi klein: the laws of nature and the laws of economics are in conflict at the moment.. either everything changes because the climate changes and it changes our physical world..in ways that we can barely fathom..or we change our economy in fundamental ways… but the idea that there is some middle road.. where we continue on pretty much as is.. that’s actually not available to us..
9 min
vancouver bc coast salish territories
cameron fenton (@camfenton) (canadian tar sands campaign manager 350.org) (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/author/cameron-fenton): vancouver .. being eyeballed to be a significant export point.. for a lot of fossil fuels.. (talking/showing of kinder morgan pipeline)
rueben george (http://www.eaglequetzalcondor.com/staff-view/sun-dance-chief-rueben-george/) (eagle and condor ness): kinder morgan makes 13 mn a day.. gave offer.. that could get us out of poverty.. or we could fight them.. 100% consensus.. we chose to fight them…. this is home.. we haven’t left.. for 1000s of yrs.. 85% of our diet.. came from the waters behind us (polluted)… they asked.. why didn’t they take the money.. they need it.. we don’t need it more than our land..
12 min
cameron: it is in a lot of ways a battle between the story of the old and the story of the new… we’ve seen disobedience go from a few.. to a mass movement following the fossil fuel industry
seattle washington – may 16 2015
sarra tekola (http://www.thestranger.com/slog/2016/06/07/24173466/seattle-activist-sarra-tekola-runs-into-bill-clinton-in-los-angeles-curses-him-over-crime-bill): kayak protest…
13 min
sept 28 2015
ricken patel (@ricken_patel) (exec director avaaz – https://www.avaaz.org/page/en/) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ricken_Patel):
Ricken Patel (born January 8, 1977) is the Canadian/British founding President and Executive Director of Avaaz, a major global civic organization with the world’s largest online activist community, including over 40 million subscribers.
Patel was voted “Ultimate Gamechanger in Politics” by the Huffington Post, and listed in the world’s top 100 thinkers by Foreign Policy magazine. He was also named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum, referred to as “the global leader of online protest” by The Guardian and listed as one of People Magazine’s most eligible bachelors.
[..]
In 2007, Patel founded the online campaigning organization Avaaz – with the stated goal to “close the gap between the world we have and the world most people everywhere want”
this.. on closing the gap.. for (blank)’s sake…
ricken: civil disobedience is a powerful tool in social justice work.. the law.. it’s not sacred.. and to challenge it shakes our consciousness.. if you can take that radical action in a way that genuinely speaks to everybody else.. then you not only have their attention..you have their inspiration.. and you build movements that way
keystone pipeline protest – aug 20, 2011
ricken: 1\ prep – calibrate what you are asking for so you can win it 2\ choose strategy.. a tactic/target.. that can successfully grab public attention 3\ flawless execution.. the media will look for every opp to de legitimize you.. one misstep.. on e act of violence.. it’s over..
14 min
bill mckibben: i’ve never been to the white house… but the ability to chain myself to the outside of the white house.. turned out to be important..and empowering.. and anyone could do it… most of us don’t have huge sums of money.. all of us have a body that we can .. put in the way….. i want to say very clearly.. that civil disobedience is but one tool in the activist tool box.. it’s not the first one that you should reach for and if you use it all the time.. like any other tool.. it’s going to get dull.. that said.. civil disobedience has a roll to play
15 min – bill: nobody should have to go to jail about climate change.. in a rational system that would be the last thing that would happen.. but because the way power is distributed in our world.. sometimes we have to
ricken: one of the central threats to democracy today is the corporate capture of govt… we are up against tremendous resources.. and those resources are smart.. the corp goes straight to the politician that’s going to be on the committee that’s going to pass the law that they want to pass and threatens their re election at exactly the right time.. the strategies of global corps on climate change was partly to recognize that they had a trump card w the us govt… they could stand in the way of global action by blocking american action
16 min – ricken: there’s a level of state failure in the us.. the legislature is bought and paid for by oil co’s and other co’s… we have to roll back corp capture of our govts if we want to try and fix these problems that conflict directly w their industry bottom line
or just do/be/live a completely other way.. where all the rolling back ness isn’t necessary..
bill: there’s nothing radical about anything we’re talking about .. radicals work at all co’s.. if you are willing to get up in the morning and make your fortune by altering chemical composition in the atmosphere.. and willing to do it when scientists have told you what would happen.. and once you’ve seen it happen.. once you’ve watched the arctic start to melt.. if you’re willing to do that.. then you’re a radical.. and our job is to try and check that radicalism..
17 min
neela banerjee (@neelaeast) (https://insideclimatenews.org/author/neela-banerjee): on exxon oil.. wanted to be on cutting edge.. they knew of what would happen
bill: when scientists told exxon what would happen.. they made all their rigs climate proofed.. but .. they did not tell the rest of us
neela: 87 – exxon joins global climate coalition.. which sounds very green .. but wasn’t.. in fact.. they were put together to fight any policy reaction to climate change
bill: exxon .. hiring execs from tobacco industry to try to make same argument that the cig guys had made… it was effective
19 min
michael mann (@MichaelEMann) (director: earth system sci center) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_E._Mann): on what’s happened to atmosphere et al.. it’s unclear that human beings.. living things.. can adapt to change that quickly
amy goodman… drought… pushing ie: syria .. over the brink and into civil war
20 min – the record 1 mn refugees and migrants crossed into europe in europe’s worst refugee crisis since ww2
21 min
berkley free speech movement..
got to put your body upon the gears and upon the wheels
civil rights movement
marshall ganz (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Ganz) (harvard – https://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/faculty-staff-directory/marshall-ganz): social movements are diff from ordinary politics in that they are not about how to divide up the goods.. but about what a good is.. it enters a domain that goes beyond immediate self interest into what’s required of us as responsible human beings
indian independent movement
ricken: the secret of civil disobedience is moral clarity.. ghandi said.. i am a human being first.. and a citizen of my country second.. he targets the fact that indians aren’t allowed to make their own salt.. and has a massive salt march.. across india .. to the coast.. where he bends down and picks up sea salt.. how could someone possibly prevent you from doing something like that…he’s taken the weakest point of his opponent and targeted it to generate the most moral clarity
22 min
diff forms of civil disobedience shape the basis of the abolition movement
mlk: it’s time for us to say..if you don’t do something about it.. we have no alt but to engage in (?) and more drastic forms of civil disobedience in order to bring the attention of the nation to this whole issue in selma alabama
a nother way.. because you know the people enslaved to B are scrambling.. we just can’t see/hear.. and so when we fight it.. their defense is to puff up more..
23 min
ceasar mcdowell (@clmcdowell) (interaction institute- president: http://interactioninstitute.org/people/ceasar-mcdowell/) (mit: https://dusp.mit.edu/faculty/ceasar-mcdowell):
Ceasar’s current work is on the development of community knowledge systems and civic engagement. He is also expanding his critical moments reflection methodology to identify, share and maintaining grassroots knowledge. His research and teaching interests also include the use of mass media and technology in promoting democracy and community-building, the education of urban students, the development and use of empathy in community work, civil rights history, peacemaking and conflict resolution.
ceasar: at core of activism is one simple thing and that’s voice.. so many people in the world.. their voice is actually just not heard... civil rights movement had a grounded belief in the most important thing for people to do.. was allow people on the ground to be able to shape the direction and to be the front of what was happening.. it was about building the capacity to org for action.. and mobilizing the public to show up in support of an action..
a nother way.. hosting-life-bits via self-talk as data
marshall: the effect of civil disobedience is often to raise the cost of business as usual.. to disrupt the normal processes/procedures.. which makes it more costly to resist change than to agree to it
anti apartheid movement
african american people are realizing that apartheid means nothing else but oppression and exploitation
24 min
ferrial adam (@ferrial_adam) (africa & arab regional team leader 350 dot org) (http://www.greenpeace.org/africa/en/News/Blog/Ferrial-Adam/): civil disobedience brings a spotlight to the violence and oppressive states of industries… the civil diso in africa during apartheid yrs defied all apartheid laws.. really strong because happened .. everywhere… everybody found aspects of apartheid laws that affected them and then used some kind of mech to defy it… it takes time..and you have obstacles.. but i really don’t think there’s any fight we cannot win.. if.. we have the numbers
how about something deep enough for 7 bn (ginorm small numbers) to resonate with
25 min
izmir turkey
former mayors talking about pollution from coal industrialization.. and ie: human chain protests.. 60km long.. et al.. power plant causing cancer.. deformities.. we’ll keep that 90s spirit alive..
29 min
united farm workers movement
you cannot pretend that we do not exist.. you can not claim ignorance to our problems because we are here
30 min
marshall: what power means in the context of social change is of course the story of david and goliath… wait a minute.. i’m a shepherd not a warrior.. takes off armor.. only when he discovers his own resources.. not those of his opponent… as the foundation of his strategy.. that things begin to shift
so a and a.. already in all of us.. not competition.. money.. et al..
31 min
lusatian coal mining region, germany
tadzio müller (climate justice activist, ende gelände): not just bad for the climate.. also terrible for people’s health… germany produces more.. we see the dirtiest of all the fossil fuels being dug up.. and of course.. it is the central driver of climate change.. which is a central driver of.. conflict/hunger/destitution/deprivation.. around the world…. this stuff has to be left in the ground
32 min
proschim, germany
tadzio: this little town called proschim produces 100% of its own electricity from renewables and still exports stuff into the grid… like this village is actually the future we need.. here you have agriculture.. biogas.. solar power.. you have a functioning community.. and this is the frontline in the struggle against the madness in the profit driven extraction… the govt has slated proschim for destruction.. because there’s coal underneath it.. what we’re seeing here is the future being eaten by the past.. fossil fuels are the past in more than one way.. they are the past of capital/energy/our relationship to nature..
33 min
haidemühl, germany
tadzio: folks lived here.. a few years ago.. this was their life… the govt said.. you can’t be here because we’re going to dig this up because there’s coal.. underneath.. they had grown up here they were planning to maybe die here… these kinds of images.. that’s why we’re doing this.. the folks here being evicted from their homes because we cannot stop destroying the environment.. this cannot go on
tadzio: all the political work that you’re doing when you’re mobilizing for a big disobedient action will ultimately be for nought… if the action isn’t a success in tactical terms.. as it was .. last year..
may 16 2015 – ende gelände action.. garzweiler lignite mine, rhineland, germany
34 min
tadzio: our goal is not to fight the police.. our goal is to get around them.. they’re not our enemy.. our enemy is the lignite production..
35 min
tadzio: i’ve been doing civil disobedience action for 17-18 yrs now.. it’s very hard to get a sense of empowerment.. to actually really feel in every fiber in your body that you can make it.. we can actually stop this
imagine.. if we did that toward.. we can actually start this..
tadzio: the moment we were running toward these diggers.. and we saw that they were all shut down.. i remember this moment of just ah.. we’ve done it.. it was an unbelievable moment of personal and collective empowerment in struggle that all too often seems brutally hopeless…let’s see if we can do this again.. we think .. we can..
naomi: if you say you can’t deal with climate change w/o a revolution in values.. a revolution in the way think.. people will say.. well we don’t have time for that kind of thing.. the truth is what we don’t have time for is continuing to try the same thing that hasn’t worked for two and a half decades..
lidy: we continue to be inspired by ordinary people having the courage to stand up against corp interests.. even against govt policies that would bring harm to their communities
marshall: hope is belief in the plausibility of the possible.. as opposed to the necessity of the problem..
36 min
ferrial: we don’t have the tanks and we don’t have the armed forces.. non-violence and civil disobedience is me making my voice heard against a powerful force that is holding us back..
bill: keystone turned out to be a great victory because people all over the world look up and said.. you know what.. you actually can beat big oil
tadzio: it may seem impossible right now.. to prevent climate chaos.. but social movements have shown.. that the limits of the possible.. are there to be moved..
ricken (?): my hope is that we come out the other side of this with a global sense of a new power
ceasar: what we need are new ways to do new things..
something not yet tried..
lidy: to practice civil disobedience is necessary to be able to pursue a better life for our people
37 min
naomi: it’s quite possible that a more radical approach will bring rapid change
ricken: it’s straight math.. how many people are active and engaged on this issue.. how hard are they pushing.. how coordinated are they.. it’s the people who are engaged that determine *what govt does.. and all we have is a choice to make as to whether we’re going to be one of **those people or not..
imagine we’re not interested in *what govt does.. let’s just live a nother way.. make govt irrelevant
perhaps better.. we’re **each us.. rev of everyday life ing.. rather than defending..
bill (?): science is pretty dark.. things are changing pretty fast.. but i am absolutely sure there is gonna be one hell of a fight..
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ie while watching this doc..Elvis Summers
6 min – people that are pissed at ie: homeless/tiny house situation.. every right to be.. but re direct that anger.. my whole issue/cause.. is that something needs to be done right now
10 min – on taking tiny homes same time announcing 2 bn plan .. councilman: beginning to make a diff.. a diff that’s long overdue
elvis: everything that they’ve been doing.. just doesn’t work.. it’s just circles.. of bureaucratic.. holds .. and wait times.. and you know.. 40-50 yrs.. where’s the housing..?
putting people on hold ness.. B and b ness
mayor: no los angelian just live on streets.. although appreciate creative ideas.. can’t support ie: elvis summers tiny houses.. until the city has more time to study the issue
elvis: business as usual for me.. i’m going to keep building/helping these people.. if people want a beautiful/positive community.. you have to build one.. you can’t just sweep stuff under the rug and pretend it doesn’t exist… if i can’t get thru to the city to open their minds.. and create change with me.. i’ll do it myself then…and with all the support that i do get and everybody that does want to come and contribute.. i’ll get private land.. we’ll build small communities.. we’ll save these people’s lives..
disobedience ness
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and right after watching this doc.. harry and norm convo
31 min – n: suppose people like you.. sanders ness. .constructed a program for hope and change.. it would win these people back.. many of the trump voters could have voted for sanders.. if there had been the right kind of activism/org..
program for hope and change: a nother way
38 min – h: group of young black students in harlem asked me what i was looking for.. what i’ve always been looking for: where resides the rebel heart.. without the rebellious heart.. [people who understand that there’s no sacrifice too great to retrieve that which we’ve lost..] we will forbever be distracted with possessions and trinket and title.. one of big things that happened.. when black people began to be announted by trinkets of this capatalist society.. big time players.. head of corps.. they became players in the game of our own demise
39 min – h: i’m looking at victories we’re having.. ie: standing rock.. our native american brothers stopped the engine for a moment.. is really a call for us to be reminded that the engine can be stopped.. and therein i find solace.. i find the capacity to do/create things that will make a difference..
h: people have to be more adventurous.. the heart has to find greater space for rebellion..
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be you. 