11th Hour Review – Grist

The environmental webzine Grist has a good review of the 11th Hour. 

If this film gains popular exposure and acceptance, the impetuous to change our society will never be stronger. I’ve been in the streets on this fundamental issue for many years, this may be the thing that brings the soccer moms and senior citizens out there with the us 20-somethings too.

Speaking with Nadia, she philosophized that real change may not happen until this is seen as a human rights movement. Comparing this movement with the civil rights movement, and the amount of social unrest and cohesion which propelled that through the laggard politicians of the day.

This movie is transideological, caring about the quality of life for the future of humanity should never be wrapped up transient and petty politics, religion, or business. When sustainability is not built into these institutions, they do not exist for long on this earth.

Well, perhaps your reading of this review shows someone a little over-enthused on the subject. I contend that watching this movie will give you exactly this empowered sense. As Bill McDonough says we get to imagine what it means to “re-design design itself.” This is really the context of the movie, the path that humanity must walk if our culture is to survive.

 Reposted from www.11thhouraction.com/blog

from Joe Costello

Paul Hawken’s “Blessed Unrest”

Paul Hawken has some wondeful thoughts in “The 11th Hour,” his book is reviewed here: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/05/books/review/Sullivan-t.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

 

“Blessed Unrest” is about a movement that no one has noticed, not even the people involved. “The movement,” as Paul Hawken calls it, is made up of an unknowable number of citizens and mostly ragtag organizations that come and go. But when you do see it, you understand it to include NGOs, nonprofit agencies and a seemingly disparate range of people who might describe themselves as environmental activists, as well as people who might not describe themselves as anything at all but are protesting labor injustices, monitoring estuaries, supporting local farming or defending native people from being robbed of the last forests. There are a few billionaires, working hard to give their wealth away, and there are even some Christian evangelicals, who have decided the earth is not theirs to trash, but the movement is mostly about shared beliefs, even if those beliefs are unproclaimed. “Life is the most fundamental human right,” Hawken writes, “and all of the movements within the movement are dedicated to creating the conditions for life, conditions that include livelihood, food, security, peace, a stable environment and freedom from external tyranny.”

 

“Sustainability, ensuring the future of life on earth, is an infinite game, the endless expression of generosity on behalf of all,” he says. Hawken, it seems, is hoping for a miracle, which by definition is possible only because it’s impossible. At the very least, knowing that other people are thinking along those lines makes such a thing seem a little more likely.

 

Reposted from www.11thhouraction.com/blog

 

from Joe Costello