Image by Stephen Melkisethian via Flickr
Austerity fightback on Nov 17, 2014
Ian Angus, author and editor of www.Climateandcapitalism.com discusses the need to build a movement based on socialist principles to counter and supplant the destructiveness of capitalism.
Ian is introduced by Richard Fidler, who writes and blogs at http://lifeonleft.blogspot.ca/
Recorded in Ottawa on November 16th, 2014, this event was organized by Ottawa Ecosocialists: http://systemchangenotclimatechange.org/ and the Socialist Project: http://www.socialistproject.ca/
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Q&A
see also:
There’s no such thing as too many people (must-read)
see
Richard D. Wolff: Capitalism’s Stunning Contradiction, Part 1
Chris Hedges: Voices of Hope in a Time of Crisis
Rise Up America, Rise Up! by Mohammed Mesbahi
Naomi Klein: This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate (must-see)
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It’s good to hear these valuable Canadian perspectives, questions, observations and responses…after the voices of the most intelligent have been so completely muffled by the prevalent corporate diktat of the past 30 years ~ dating back to the disastrous trade agreements that effectively destroyed Canada’s cultural independence from the US.
Canada is quite remarkably unique in so many respects ~ especially in the way its diverse immigrant populations have interacted with the indigenous cultures (…like the differences between the Eastern Acadian “Cajun” and the Quebecois for example….) but more particularly, its natural affinity with Arctic cultures around the pole. The most obviously significant being Russia, of course.
The tangible borders of our consciousness of the known world are shifting dramatically these days. Canada has a central role to play in this key-line socio-political transformation, because of its dependant “extractive” history and its colonial territorial experience.
My own view is that eco-socialism and radical ecopsychology (cf Andy Fisher’s work for example) are supremely important socio-political tools in this respect.
We do need to join up our thinking and disentangle the many discursive threads of so many diverse, potentially confusing, narratives; and poetry is a great means to do this.
One of the most insightful Canadian “mind-readers” is Margaret Atwood, who was, like Harold Bloom, a youthful student of Northrop Frye.
Her work is profoundly inflected by the native landscape and expresses the poignancy of the European encounter ~ so some of her early poetry is therefore deeply apt and accessible.