Now Is the Time For Non-Violent
Earth Revolution

By Glen Barry

25 September, 2007
Earth Meanders Blog

Now is time for non-violent Earth Revolution.That begins by stopping ancient forest logging, ending burning of coal and reducing aviation.

There are times in human history where obligations to truth, humanity and being take precedent over personal safety, consumption and comfort. Now is one such moment. The time has come for non-violent, direct societal and personal revolutionary action to save the Earth.

For the Earth, humanity and our sister species to survive and flourish; awareness raising and reformist greenwashing must give way to wide scale civil disobedience adequate to peacefully bring about sufficient social change to save the Earth and all being. This meander calls for all bright green environmentalists to emphasize aggressive ecological truth telling, non-violent direct action and a life of rich voluntary simplicity.

These are not new ideas. The world is rife with small groups strategically placing their minds and bodies between faltering ecosystems and predatory Earth destroyers -- sitting in trees, occupying and shutting down coal plants, aggressively and truthfully petitioning and confronting governments, and taking other meaningful and effective direct actions. These must be built upon and intensified to actually end Earth destroying activities with long and damaging histories.

I propose that an initial revolutionary strategy to save the Earth, and maintain ecological patterns and processes required for all life, should focus upon protecting and restoring ancient natural ecosystems, ending the use of coal, and stopping the growth in aviation. These actions are needed as a minimum urgent response to avoid cataclysmic global ecological collapse.

Tactics at this point should be based upon non-violent direct mass action. More specifically, the Earth revolution must initially seek with all haste to stop all ancient forest logging, prevent the construction of new coal plants that emit into the atmosphere, and close down the private jet business. This is not to suggest that there are not other shifts in policy required to live sustainably within the biosphere’s constraints, or that these alone are sufficient. However, use of coal and loss of forests are the two greatest historical causes of climate change and ecological decline, and aviation the fastest growing.

As you peacefully battle for the Earth, prepare yourselves and loved ones for the difficult times of ecological collapse and desired regeneration ahead. Even as you commit your being physically to defending Gaia, buy a remote piece of land to love and be one with. Educate yourself and begin to practice homesteading, permaculture, animal husbandry, composting, organic gardening, ecological restoration, agrarian democracy and more.

Oh Goracle, lead us into action. Oh Titanic play actor, demonstrate sacrifice. I am speaking truthfully to you in a manner that these well informed leaders ensconced in climate changing luxury will not: to the streets in disciplined direct action, as you live well and simply, sacrificing for the Earth!

As the pendulum naturally swings and the climate and forest destruction apologists temporarily regain the upper hand, now is the time to re-intensify our efforts. Tremendous inroads have been made by Mr. Gore, Greenpeace and other establishment reformists; yet the momentum has stalled because they are unwilling to fully speak and personally act upon inconvenient truths. There are too many of us, consuming too much, that will need to sacrifice and dramatically change our ways of living if there is to be a future Earth for our children.

This personal essayist has previously considered and rejected revolutionary violence at this time in the struggle for Earth being. Upon reflection, I do not believe that such an approach would now be effective and indeed may be counter-productive. Mass non-violent action must first be given a real chance. Should this fail, other options may later be necessary.

Our era lacks meaning beyond oneself, close family and friends, and our immediate experiences and consumption. I believe this is why we see such high levels of personal and Earth destructive activities. How much stuff is enough? Virtuous global citizens that truly understand and incorporate into their life the urgency of the global ecological crisis are called upon to make sacrifices including living more simply and risking their physical selves to resist ecocide.

Let the media remain impartial in the face of planetary death. Let the politicians putz and whine as they feed themselves from the fossil fuel industry’s trough. Given the failure of existing institutions and leaders to sufficiently respond to the ginormous global ecological crisis, let’s you and I and our brothers and sisters join together to do what must be done to stop the Earth destroying growth machine and return to oneness with the Earth’s land, air, water and sea. I implore you to be the change required for planetary survival.

from Countercurrents

Rory's Comment: While agreeing with this writer that there is now an urgent need for what he calls non-violent revolution I must point out that Glen Barry, like many Americans, is totally ignorant about the meaning of revolution and how they come about. Historically, most revolutions were not violent or, if violence occurred it did so on a relatively small scale.

Where revolutions are brought about by peoples' movements rather than military juntas (in which case they are not revolutions) they are invariably peaceful. Violence is invariably caused by the reaction of the ruling status quo which responds violently as it did against the peaceful demonstrators outside the Czar's palace in 1905. Another case of similar violence was the Amritsar Massacre where the British General Dyer opened fire on a group of 20,000 Indians demonstrating peacefully.

The British did it again in Derry on Bloody Sunday only thirty years ago and, as I write, the Burmese military junta are firing on unarmed crowds. The other classic dirty trick governments use and for which the British are notorious (eg Operation Banner in Ireland) is to use their secret services to cause Black Ops atrocities and then blame them on the other side. After WWII, a US-led NATO implemented Operation Gladio in Europe to commit similar atrocities in friendly countries like Italy and blame them on the Red Brigade.

There is good reason to believe that western governments continue to use Black Ops and entrapment to conduct atrocities against their people and to blame them on the current enemy, Islam. Major examples of these are 911 in New York, 77 in London, the Madrid Bombings and recently, Glasgow. These are accompanied by a series of show-trials, the latest being in Scotland against Mohammed Siddique.

Similar bombings go on daily in countries like Iraq and Afghanistan, caused by USUK secret services or those working for them.

The best example of a phony terrorist organisation, created by the West and blamed on an equally phony Bin Laden is, of course, Al Qaeda (the Database) which was historically created by the CIA. Britain's then Foreign Minister, Robin Cook, who resigned over Blair's decision to drag Britain into the Iraq military adventure died mysteriously "of a heart attack" while hill-climbing on Ministry of Defence land in the Scottish Highlands ... just after revealing to the House of Commons that Al Qaeda was a CIA creation.

Glen Barry should be reminded that the greatest terrorists of all are our own governments which, as the anarchists correctly identified, in the guise of the state is the enemy of the people.