I'm a little sorry for that question, because it's so nebulous and broad, and more for theorizing historically than thinking tactically. I just wonder where really lies the power and the best avenues to target for applying pressure for change? What's amazing to me is that in a couple key areas i think we are actually well within striking distance of MEANINGFUL reform. I would say banking reform is one area and is a crucial part in rolling back Corporate/criminal influence across the board in this country. (I'm way over simplifying-and over my head-but if the huge corporations do not have the disproportionate access to the credit and financial instruments that they have now, they will not have the means to grow and control at the rate they do at present. And drug lords really shouldn't be able to just take a meeting with their personal corporate banker (name know by the "authorities") to launder the money! While huge city/state/nation debts are no accident nor caused primarliy by public programs. They're created in significant part by the machinations of the financial sector to turn people and entire societies into debt slaves.) The numbers are certainly far beyond a public critical mass in support of breaking up the banks. I know people from tea partiers to folks living on the cusp of the grid to others as apolitical as one can probably be (across multiple economic classes), and they all hate the banks and want to see them cleaned up. While http://www.politico.com/story/2013/03/e ... 88565.html (i include this because while some reps. do it for mere show, i think she means it, won't back down and hopefully won't be bought off. And if her campaign is any indication, she knows how to shrewdly navigate political waters. So we can bet there are forces looking hard for a "WarrenGate". Besides it's womyn's history month and this womon has the potential to help make some serious history.) and more importantly http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/2 ... 82665.html What we need are solid organizing and coordination; certainly no little thing to be sure especially since populist leaders in this country are kept on very tight media and public leashes. But you put Occupy Wall St./Main Street peaceably but non-cooperatively out there in the streets with a coherent reforming message that happens to be on the agenda of congress along with local civic, student, business, ect groups into concerted action and it would pass! I'm not saying it's easy, but i do think it's very doable.

i do like to post websites of organizations working for reform and getting things done, so here is another group making shrewd moves to push for change.
http://www.occupythesec.org/projects/

(The Reagan years! So many people helped by Roosevelt and New Deal reforms voting for their dismantlement. Incredible. And "Reagan's children" and grandchildren are a hard brood to live with. As for the musical choices, if no one plays "Stairway to Heaven" it just won't be legit from a Midwestern perspective. I know it's a 70's song but it seemed like every year in the eighties some local H.S. used it for their theme.)

came across this interview with Alice Walker the other day. https://soundcloud.com/bbc-world-servic ... -walker-iv
(This is the poem she mentions. http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/09/2 ... ice-Walker )

(In Your Dreams, i do not know if you still checkout these threads, but a friend gave me a photography book to take a look at which made me think of you. Are you familiar with the fashion/art photographer Anne Menke and her latest book "See The World Beautiful"? There are some wonderful shots that are so detailed one can almost literally feel the environment, and her work aims to expose the roots of fashion in indigenous cultures.)

wrinkles, to revisit your Italian observations, and I love Italians and being in Italy as often as I can, the politics of that country are astounding. I have been in Italy on election day and have seen and heard old men arguing in the middle of the piazza, gesturing wildly to get their points across. They LOVE to debate.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/24/opini ... d=all&_r=0

I asked an italian friend of mine why their government collapses and reforms so often, and she reminded me that historically through the millenia Italy has been sacked and occupied over and over again and the people just ignore/pretend to go along with the new rulers and go on about their business. Illusion is everything and the basis of the concept "Bella Figura" that is so highly valued there.

and another aside, one of my best friends in high school used to listen to Stairway to Heaven every night before going to sleep as the last thing she did. She was very ritualistic about it.

no, no, no....Bella Figura is real; it's all the rest that's illusion! Italians know this in their bones. (but i don't because the other half is French. Makes for an excellent combination: a cynical dreamer; world-weary devotee of both the logical and the absurd; exuberant ennui - which is truly exhausting)


(quick vote. Thank goodness they didn't elect the Rottweiler's rottweiler. Maybe this fellow will call the office of the Inquisition off the sisters and their supporters, and get busy cleaning-up some of the curias own intrinsic morally evil behavior. i don't know if that i care is due to the Italian in me, but it is about la famiglia, who don't have to be italian at all.)

ahh a Franciscan. As a pagan person, its the closest we will get to any shared sense of common values until they put a true Marian in the Pope seat. St Francis wrote the Canticle of the Sun

http://www2.webster.edu/~barrettb/canticle.htm

Wouldn't it be cool if a pope crossed over and took the name Pope Mary? I suppose that would be blasphemous, like you wouldnt see a Pope Jesus.. What about Pope Mary Magdalene?

There actually was a "Pope Joan" until they discovered she was a she.

Actually this fellow is a Jesuit trying to send a positive message (and perhaps so far he is succeeding a little, but i sure hope he's about more than just symbolism.) But Jesuits have potential. Usually hardcore intellectuals who also must get out there, get dirty and work with every-day people. (one of the pilgrimages they have to do fairly early on in their vocations is go out on their own without means and live as a person without a home for at least a month) And yes, if this fellow were to be so good as to call himself Pope Francis Mary it would begin to pay back all those sisters who back in the day were being saddle with names like Mary Francis, Mary Alfred, Mary Clarence, etc.

As an aside, i ran across an article today that made me think of you and all New Yorkers. I won't post it here, but it was about the NYPD being the seventh largest military force in the World!!, their spying and their stop and accost practices. (i recall the article saying the yearly budget for the force was over 4 billion.)You know, there's the myth and there's the reality.

Tropidyke, i know some folks who would love to debate you over the actual existence of Pope Joan, but i don't see why they should have too much of a problem with it (if it's not true that is, which i honestly don't know one way or another), when they are perfectly willing to resort to all sorts of legends, myths, allegories and stories to get their points across at times.

my bad.. I wasn't raised catholic.. I had to investigate the differences between jesuits and franciscans. Subtle but important..

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index ... 650AAHwpKA

And yes.. Law enforcement on steroids.

YESTERDAY the NYPD had the dubious distinction of surpassing 5 MILLION stop -and-frisks since Bloomberg became mayor in 2002. That's more stop-and-frisk encounters than the COMBINED populations of Baltimore, Boston, Denver, Seattle, Detroit, San Francisco, Washington D.C. and Pittsburgh.

What's worse, about 4.4 million of the stops, or 88 percent, were of completely innocent people as they didn't result in an arrest or a ticket. More than 86 percent of people stopped were black or Latino.

I have to be careful about becoming too pedantic, but i think it's a little funny he would take the name of a rival orders patron Saint. (Though, maybe he's really referencing Francis Xavier and the S.O.J. are keeping that quietly between themselves. No offense to Xavier, but he just wouldn't send the same archetypal message.) I have to take a little umbrage with the reference you gave, though. Everything constantly changes over time and the Jesuits exercise pretty good scholastic integrity and many of them have actually prominently/publicly pushed for "liberal" theological reforms (and ended up punished/silenced under J. Ratzinger for it). Not this new Pope, though. One couldn't become a cardinal in these last 40 years unless he very tightly towed the party line. On the whole, i think a Jesuit mentality could help the situation. Frankly, they need to send in the marines to clean up the curia and its bank (but imagine facing such a huge change of life and job when you're 74.) However, evangelizing and proselytizing (as opposed to just trying to help people) i think are wrong. They'd be much better off trying to reach the hundreds of thousands of catholics leaving the institutional church for reasons of good conscience and revisit their antiquated use of "Natural Law" for their arguments/pronouncements.

A few years ago at the festival i was chipping trails for an afternoon with 2 womyn, one of whom was pagan and we spent the afternoon hearing her tells us about her beliefs and practices. Very interesting and enlightening. By the time she was done, i thought her religion/philosophy sounded almost as much like a science as a religion, which i think is a very good thing.

Which part wrinkles? The quote? Was I oversimplifying? It does still seem a little ambiguous if St Francis of Assisi or Francis Xavier was the intended point of reference. Most people associate the jesuits with education. This is true.

Anyone remember the all female rock group Pope Joan that gigged around the festival circuit in the late 80's/early 90's? I can't find any evidence of them existing on the internets.. They existed pre-internet. ( I just had an existential question pop into my head.. about existence pre internet akin to the "if a tree falls in the woods," question..)

No, you weren't oversimplifying; my beef is with yahoo's description of Jesuits always being staunch defenders of the "Official Doctrine". Historically, they've certainly had their moments, but at least during my lifetime quite a few Jesuits have caught serious heat and had to undergo some painful personal sufferings for speaking out in opposition concerning teachings dealing with homosexuality, the priesthood, contraception, liberation theology, and academic freedom/integrity. (Fordham University is a good example of their independence. That (quasi) Jesuit school has an on going reputation for inviting in scholars and theologians the church hierarchy have sanctioned, though i'm sure they get all sorts of pressure not to do it. And the Jesuit "America Magazine" often published critical, well argued theological articles before Benedict had its previous editor removed and one of his own men put in.) They're by training very critical thinkers, and do often turn that questing and questioning mentality on their own theological beliefs. There aren't that many Jesuit Cardinals (they don't tend to be institutional "climbers" in that sense) but one very prominent one gave a blistering public interview a few years back about how insular and socially backward the catholic hierarchy and some of its teachings are, and how they desperately needed reform. Not surprisingly he only felt able to do this, though, when he was retiring and close to death. Non catholics probably aren't aware of just how active the CDF -previously called the office of the inquisition- has been under Ratzinger/Benedict on harassing people over issues that are not fundamental teachings. And this has people at all levels very riled up. (i personally would be worried about having a Marian in a position of setting over-arching doctrinal power. To a catholic mentality, if someone (particularly a man) disproportionately venerates the "BVM", that basically puts all other women in a completely no win, subordinate, inherently flawed position. I think Marians would actually be less likely to see women as empowered leaders in the catholic church than Jesuits. But the reality of the situation right now is, if someone in authority wants to end up on the quick tract to excommunication all he or she has to do is say publicly "women priests"; which doesn't mean people from the ground up don't talk about the possibility all the time. And threaten though they may, between the shortages and sexual abuse/cover-ups, it's a topic that is not going to go away. Last poll i saw, the treatment and leadership roles available to womyn were third on the list of what people are hoping this Pope will look into reforming.)

All those harassing stop and frisks! It's terrible that they can get away with such blatant racial profiling.

No sooner than you invoke the "quick track to excommunication" path, this shows up..

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/21/opini ... inion&_r=0

It will have to be men that change and that argue for the change, like this dude. His consciousness was influenced by women's experiences-and seeing women as equals, and he is stepping up to do the right thing.

I think much of society would fundamentally change for the better if women were allowed the priestesshood in the catholic church. As a pagan person, there are fundamental flaws in the doctrine, for example; the virgin birth is the biggest, most oppressive lie that was ever perpetrated on the human race, but that just me..

Oh yes, i very much had Father Bourgeois in mind when i wrote that. (He is also a long time activist speaking out against the School of the Americas.) But he's def. not the only one to suffer. (Many Americans probably know that catholic religious sisters have been attacked for their views on this as well.) There's also a particularly flinty priest over in Ireland receiving the same treatment because he just won't do the one thing Benedict demanded - which is keep quiet over the draconian lack of due process when people of good conscience disagree with practices concerning justifiably questionable doctrines. (Under Benedict not even the poor old Devil's advocate was allowed his time in church courts anymore.) If i sound harsh toward the supposed arch-traditionalist, who abdicated, excommunication is a very serious threat to make, especially to someone who has lived his or her life in some sort of vowed service. His abusive actions in doing this to people were both a sign of weakness and highly vindictive.

I don't know if i think all that much of society would fundamentally change for the better, but i sure think the catholic church would.(Actually, to be accurate, there are already ordained RC womyn priests. The hierarchy just fights mightily to keep this quiet. And the new Pope could probably defuse the whole sorry situation if he would just collegially advocate for womyn deacons. This shouldn't and ultimately won't suffice, but for now it would be a wise way to show he is listening to people, a "traditionalist" and trying to deal with shortages in a positive manner.) But with 1.2 billion members, i think if this organized religion would get it's act together advocating for social justice and dignity for all, then societies could be mightily changed. And i wouldn't be able to agree with you about the "virgin birth" being the biggest, most oppressive lie ever. I'd have to lean more toward the "greed is good" myths and convoluted social Darwinism which comes from them. Or maybe the tribal and racial superiority myths that seem to be completely natural to all human mentalities. They serve important purposes, but not so much in a world full of the weaponry we have now. Plus, Artemis, wouldn't you agree that the "virgin Birth" is an ancient pagan belief that the hybrid religion of Catholicism appropriated and adapted to better appeal to non-Jewish people back in the day? (I'm not saying it's not part of RC now, but that it's roots are pagan in nature, as much of Catholicisms teachings and images still are.)

It's good to hear someone else mention the correlation between pagan and catholicism - Birth of the son or "birth of the sun" at winter solstice - etc.

(Oh, yes. I'm really more interested in history, psychology and comparative religion than pushing any specific belief; and there is plenty of paganism in catholicism which i personally think helps to humanize and positively diversify it, though some of its entrenched ideas about human sexuality are coming from those roots as well. For anyone interested in such topics, the interviews Bill Moyers did with Joseph Campbell back in the 80's which led to the PBS show "The Power of Myth" are quite excellent.)

if The New York Times (or any of the supposed news sources of merit) were to actually print stories about what this country is really like, i think we would see far more coverage like these articles:
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2013/03/ ... archs.html
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the ... _20130317/