Mandatory MDMA and shrooms for violent extremists -- I have to admit this made me laugh, but given the stakes and other options, maybe worth a try! I appreciate your efforts to think creatively about this horrid situation.
Exactly twenty years ago the great 20th century historian Tony Judt wrote a piece for the NYRB that completely envisioned todays Israeli reality with pained accuracy, and which essentially concluded, like Cypel, that Israel has become bad for the Jews. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2003/10/23/israel-the-alternative/ It's a brilliant, beautiful, tortured piece, and for writing it Judt was virtually excommunicated from the Jewish community, like anyone over the last 30 years who ventures out to say the obvious: that Israel will not survive in it's present posture of increasing militarism and messianic orthodoxy. It's obvious and at the same time it's unspeakable. Every voice that's attempted to raise that alarm has been instantly quashed and denounced; if you're not Jewish you're an anti-semite, and if you are, you're a 'self-hating' Jew--as Judt was himself accused by the AJC--amongst others--a powerful American Jewish organization that instantly published a booklet to send to all its wealthy members. That's the way the game has been played for a couple of generations.
The moment we're in is the precise result of the complete absence of discourse and criticism around Israel's increasingly racist, reactionary, and provocative policies towards the Palestinians, and its open policy of accepting that there will never be peace and there will always be war. It's called "Security Without Peace". It's no surprise that we are at the dead end; there was literally no other place we could arrive at. The Netanyahu coalition of ultra-orthodox walk around giving the middle finger to the entire Muslim world--and they don't think a whole lot more of the Christian world either, as a recent video captured of ultra-orthodox school kids spitting on a church in Jerusalem as they walked by. It's as though they are confused and think that there are 2 billion Jews and only 16 million Muslims or Christians in the world and not the reverse. At the same time, most American Jews have been kept completely in the dark as to how violent and, yes, insane the ultra-orthodox in Israel are in both their rhetoric and actions. Yet these are the people that are sitting in the driving seat right now, the ones who the government is most responsive to.
So no, Daniel, I don't accept this nonsense there is some legitimate reason, some rationale, some strategy for the present destruction of Gaza that American Jews or Americans in general need to consider to justify what they're doing. When you force hundreds of thousands of people to move, and reduce their habitats to rubble, that's, as far as most people can see, ethnic cleansing. Are you doing it because you're trying to 'look strong', or trying to push them out of Gaza which you always wanted to anyhow, or both? It doesn't really matter. Bottom line, what you're doing is completely beyond the pale, and it's tiresome that so many smart people are sucked into these empty discussions. The same forces that imposed this dead-end reality on us are those that are defining the conversations around Israel's behavior and its time to realize that they are, and have been, completely bankrupt for 30 years. Without that, there is no way to have a clear thought in your head.
I appreciate your perspective… I posted an Israeli friend’s response in another comment here. What’s your solution model but please read my friend’s comment first on why a ceasefire is not possible.
Yes, your Israeli friend repeats the notion that they will root out Hamas with this campaign. Somehow Israelis seem to feel that this is the case--probably because they must believe something, but they also know somewhere inside them that this is the greatest recruiting opportunity that Hamas, or the next terrorist organization by another name, will ever have. There is no rooting out Hamas. It cannot be done. Show us a military leader or analyst who actually believes that they can stop the Palestinians from regrouping in some fashion. It is vengeance and despair masquerading as 'reason', and it is precisely why there needs to be someone to restrain them because by your israeli friend's own reasoning, there is no end to where the Israel should go--right now. When have they shown the Arabs that they're 'strong enough'? Destroying Gaza doesn't really show strength--anyone could destroy an impoverished territory like Gaza that doesn't have a real army. If they really want to show their strength, they need to beat Hezbollah, or Syria, or Iran. I think the way Israelis are thinking right now is pretty unhinged, and they're asking all of us to buy into it.
Look, obviously it's an enormously complex landscape in the Middle East. I don't think you can simplify it, BUT there is an essential piece that isn't presented with clarity: the Israeli's have very little to trade for peace anymore. They are not willing to trade land for peace, to trade a livable future for the Palestinians for peace. They've made that clear. The only trading card they have is to NOT wage war, to NOT destabilize the region. That's it. At the same time they are promising that they will continue to expand their borders. I just don't think that those cards are ever going to achieve a real future for Israel.
By the way, your Israeli friend living here IS the future of Israel--once this settles down there is going to be a HUGE exodus of Israelis, most probably to the US. Many of the young lefties will leave, tilting the country even more to the right and the crazies. It's a continuing tragedy in slow-motion.
Right now Israel is smashing up any possibility of peace. The hatred and vengeance is out of control. The only way we can achieve it is by the US putting enough pressure to stop the carnage. Then maybe we can talk about a shared future. Sadly I don't really see a way out of this morass. I appreciate your attempts to try see a possible human future, but I cannot share your optimism.
Yet I think it is still important to consider the Israeli perspective that this show of force is absolutely necessary as they exist surrounded by enemies who believe in the “strong horse” doctrine and will pounce on any weakness. We are not seeing the situation from the Israeli perspective of constant existential threat, which is also legitimate. As for envisioning a positive outcome, it is not about hope but about an act of intentional will as collapsing into despair does nothing.
The Arab states and Palestine have been trying to accommodate Israel for decades. Israel is punishing and torturing Gaza far beyond what is necessary, and their actions are not enhancing the security of Israelis. On the contrary it is inviting catastrophe to Israel. Bombs and destruction are not the solution.
- Israel cannot appear weak. If we appear weak we will be attacked on all sides - West Bank, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Yemen and don’t forget the extreme Arab Israelis that could violently uprise if they feel like they have a chance. We already appear very weak with Oct 7 military failures + the pre Oct 7 internal turmoil. This is sad and tragic but Lebanon needs to know that if they try something there will be severe consequences. For us this is survival.
- The entire country is in PTSD. People burst out crying in the streets and supermarkets. My sister wakes up from every little sound at night thinking that someone is coming to rape and kill her kids in the most brutal ways. It’s easy to be an idealist and ask for a ceasefire from the safety of one’s San Francisco apartment. Everyone in Israel live less than an hour from a border and feel like they are NEXT. And pls don’t forget missiles are falling on Israel every day (they have been for years, pre Oct 7). 200k ppl displaced. Hostages.
- Hostages are a huge deal in israel (unlike US maybe where they don’t get a lot of attention). Everyone in Israel is a solider and we need to know “we” will come back for them. This is a terrible negotiation situation for Israel, see Gilad Shalit, but it’s immensely important for such a militant culture.
- What is a “proportional response״ to gang-raping a young woman, cutting her breasts off and shooting her in the head while penetrating her?? I’m sorry for the horrific graphic description but this is what we’re dealing with. And hamas is flat out saying on video that they will do this again and again until the entire land is liberated. Nothing hurts more than seeing Americans/Europeans calling this “resistance”. As if the US or any western country would allow such *evil to roam in its back yard.
The heart breaks seeing the destruction and causalities in Gaza. I have American-Palestinian friends and I have no words for them just tears.
But to anyone calling for a ceasefire I ask - what’s the alternative? And it’s crickets on the other side. There is no good alternative. If you ceasefire Hamas will regroup and do this again in three years. This evil must be eradicated. People may not see it but we are fighting for Palestinian civilians too.
It’s fair to debate if the operation in Gaza will actually eradicate Hamas, but no one is actually having that conversation.
Not ignoring the many mistakes and injustices Israel has done (one of the reasons I don’t live there anymore is it was hard for me to live with the immorality of the occupation), to me this is a war of light and dark. The dark (China, Russia, Iran, extreme islam) is using the palestinian cause to destabilize the world and prevent the light from growing - democracy, equality, education, freedom. This is what we’re fighting for and Israel is on the front lines. ”
I tend to agree - feel we don’t understand the situation from here and Leftists are imposing a kneejerk interpretation.
What Israel is doing is not enhancing its security. You want security? Bombs are not the solution. Make peace. All the attacks from Lebanon are in response to the Israeli attacks on Gaza. Want the hostages back? Trade them for Palestinians held by Israel. Problem solved. A ceasefire is in the interests of Israeli security. What they are doing now is putting Israel in grave risk.
Once again, these are standard and easy to make Leftist cliches that may not actually correspond to the relative reality. I agree with you on an ultimate and idealist level. In fact Israel had to deal with the suicide bombing etc with ruthless measures and it worked. Similarly the killing of ISIS leaders ultimately worked to curtail the organization. So often in fact bombs and violence do work to stop aggressors in the short term. But that is cute you feel you can cut to the quick and easy “Problem solved.”
Yes, I agree this needs to be addressed at least by the Left, and it is not even acknowedeged, what does a ceasefire look like? Because its been over one month already anyway and it happens all the time so...
Sorry Daniel, but I think you give too much sway to Isreali propaganda. There are people who I find totally repellent, like Thomas Friedman, who is hardly a dove, but who are terribly troubled by this response of overwhelming response in Gaza. Why? Because it's pointless. It's cruel, it's doesn't move anything forward, and because he suspects that Netanyahu has no end game other than a complete shitshow in the Middle East that benefits no one--except maybe himself.
Think of it this way, if you accept the idea that 'a show of force is absolutely necessary', or the 'strong horse' strategy, what world do you have have--anywhere? Every leader in every conflict will take that bait. By that reasoning, then Putin should nuke Ukraine and make sure they KNOW he's serious because, after all, it's a region where 'a show of force is absolutely necessary', etc.
I’m saying that is how ordinary Israelis see it as well as their military. I don’t know whether it is true. But I do think they understand far more about the region, living immersed in it, than we do from a very safe distance.
Nov 17, 2023·edited Nov 17, 2023Liked by Daniel Pinchbeck
I like the sci-fi solution to this very real and seemingly impossible problem, but how about israel just goes back to the peel plan borders (as to give Palestinians a contiguous state), give Palestinians state sovereignty, help them to move into the 21st century (through technological trades) and make a UN deal (including all Arab states) that if the Palestinians transgressed and started another war, that there would severe international sanctions? I really can't imagine how the whole of the international community would not stand behind this plan and Palestinians would feel they have something worth losing (right now they don't).
This really doesn't have to involve mdma and lasers, just give the occupied people some dignity. The point being that Israel has to give up some things for any progress to happen. Make the deal so unlikely as to disarm even the most extremist supporters of the violent resistance.
To me the most realistic part of your proposal is the move away from old religious traditions and into more modern ways of connecting with the source. The fact that this epic battle happens to be between two very religious community is not a coincident. We in the west need to do what we can to reduce the influence of these outdated religions and stop giving them legitimacy through none-violent actions (i.e. look at Germans moving completely away from religion)
It would be hard to build a city from top-down directives. Furthermore, building the world's most advanced city would require inhabitants up to the knowledge and challenge.
Also, it goes against general psychedelic ethics, in my understanding, to force them upon others. I've never heard anyone propose that they be administered as a sort-of punishment. This could be a disaster because "set and setting" play such important rules. It's also just conjecture that doing this in succession could covert people to "pluralistic" from "parochial."
It is curious that people are so resistant to even entertain a different idea… just as a mental exercise why not imagine how the ideas could be positively added to and flourish? Even as a thought experiment
A friend, who lived in Israel, told me that it was Israel who built the hospital that Hamas hijacked for hidden operations. He says that the Gazans allowed this to happen, looking the other way. Likewise, there are already permaculture and land-based situations in Israel--were many people were interested in joining those?
In integral theory, civilization and its fruits--such as higher consciousness movements, peace and prosperity, pluralism--rest upon stable structures of law and order, which also then help to develop rationality and modernism, which give individuals a world-centric awareness, which lays the foundation for increased pluralism, compassion, freedom. It's those structures, both inner and outer, that seem to be needed reformed right now.
I'm not necessarily resistant to your ideas--I'm reading them with consideration. But I'm also joining the thought experiment.
Nov 17, 2023·edited Nov 17, 2023Liked by Daniel Pinchbeck
Thank you for another thoughtful , mind expanding essay. How did the influential folks from the Jewish community respond to the psychedelic aspect of your plan ? Also Noosphere is a vision that started with Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Have you read him? Regarding what will free humanity from Wetiko the mind virus ( see book Dispelling Wetiko) at our critical stage in history is the great work set before us. A tremendous amount of religious , philosophical and political conditioning as well as historical multigenerational trauma must be "deprogramed" . The saving grace is that whatever means are employed to do so, love, wisdom and compassion are inherent at the core of every human being. Human beings who have not been enslaved to serve particular ideological masters . How do we deprogram ourselves? Here are some other ideas. We must get out of our heads, through meditation, reflective Socratic questioning, a Goethian phenomenological approach to science and education. We need to foster in children and adults a sense of self and identity not based on thoughts, beliefs or affiliations but actions etc. In my World view there'd be compulsory education in General Semantics and every child would receive a Waldorf Education. I think there would be advantages to Steiner's threefold social order being actualized across the globe as well as his views about making money a perishable commodity. The fundamental structures of all the institutions that exploit humanity for financial , industrial , political , religious or military advantage must be repurposed, once humanities minds are freed. However it seems like none of these things will be done volunteeringly so a I suspect we will like alcoholics have to hit rock bottom first and experience the total failure of everything we were programmed to trust and rely on occurs. In the meantime we can strive to maintain our humanity through the catastrophes that lie ahead. Individually we can create Noospheric consciousness through group practice . Say for instance through collective chanting (and planting ) Nam Myoho Renge Kyo - to invoke every being's Buddha nature and to call out for help from all Bodhisattvas throughout space and time. May they come to our aide like you have Daniel.
These are sweet and fanciful ideas, Daniel, but practical?.You yourself are dismissing wholesome but more quotidian proposals for their impracticality. It makes me curious whether you have ever materially supported Palestinian rights and/or a viable two-state solution. Not that I am a great exemplar for that. I've made a few donations and speak out for these causes. Are you competing to be imaginative and enlightened or are you really trying to put a stop to the settlements and the hate it inspires? If Jewish Americans spoke up in favor of Palestinian human rights, US policy could turn a corner. I'm not sure you're taking this seriously enough. Not that I'm doing enough. But I wonder if we should pursue peace the way we did for South Africa.
Why won't a two state solution work? If the settlers were forced out of the West Bank, then there is something to talk about. It's just been a consciously destroyed possibility over the last twenty years, made impossible to consider about here by Israel, AIPAC, the Jewish organizational leadership and others.
The problem is that everyone simply ACCEPTS that dealing with the settlers is impossible, (making it necessary to consider the truly outlandish notions here which are not bad ideas, just spectacularly unlikely) as the only possibilities. But I think it's remarkable the way it's regarded that everything in the world is possible, that anything can be moved--except the settlers. Don't you think that's odd? I actually think you don't see the degree to which you accept the conceptual box that has been very effectively created and nurtured here.
Because deep in the heart of the a Palestinians and other Arab Muslims they simply refuse for there to be a Jewish state in the Middle East, particularly after the wars they have lost and the need for vengeance, satisfaction of Pride, plus the underlying religious eschatological reasons.
That's very much the false narrative that has become standard 'knowledge'. There was, for example, the Saudi Initiative in 2002 that offered peace from all the major Middle Eastern countries for a return to the pre-1967 borders. It was rejected instantly by Ariel Sharon. There was no exploration on what was regarded at that moment as a significant breakthrough, and it was simply erased from the official history. It's just bullshit to say that there are no terms the Arab world would accept, and that they've never offered anything. The proper question is what are the terms of peace and whether they're terms you're willing to live with. For the last 30 years the Israelis have taken the open position that they will not give up the West Bank and that they can always drive a better deal. First their position was maybe we can just give up a sliver of the West Bank, and increasingly, as more settlers have moved there and become more emboldened, their position is: we will give up none of the West Bank. I'm not suggesting that a peace plan is a simple or easy process, but at this point it's clear that the Israelis are committed to an expansionist future and consequently completely uninterested in peace terms that would be remotely acceptable to the other side. But let's not confuse that with the statement that 'peace is not possible'.
What a beautiful and visionary attempt at a solution to the Israel/Palestinian crisis! I have heard no other real efforts at a solution and I hope this one gets shared far and wide.
Bold suggestions. Very bold. But none of them include Palestinians in the driver's seat, as it were. I find it almost impossible to imagine any idea that doesn't have, at its centre, creative-critical-active participation of Palestinians from conception to execution. Though it is, of course, fine to create starting points for speculative imaging.
Your first - rather utopian - suggestion of a city-of-the-future sounds like an interesting premise for a science-fiction story (akin to Kim Stanley Robinson's Ministry of the Future scenario-thinking - this could be a good way to flesh out the idea and explore the intersections of geo-politics, ethno-politics, climate change, etc.) Tactically-speaking, i wouldn't include the suggestion of something extraterritorial (in "neighbouring Arab countries." Pretty much a non-starter and also so inflammatory as to provoke instant dismissiveneness). And, while Gaza is an interesting suggested location, anything that ignores the context of occupation/siege also risks it being treated as essentially an extraterritorial solution. Your next three ideas, it seems to me, would each require top down (i.e. elite or professional, if not authoritarian) administration and implementation. Imaging these being popularly accepted would even be a stretch for sci-fi scenario thinking. But who knows? Your fifth idea is wicked clever and could be an interesting project in and of itself - though, no doubt, complications would ensue. I'd include it in some scenario-thinking. As for your sixth suggestion (also your fourth, to some extent) it seems that the key to these is getting to "generally understood and accepted." What would be the path to that?
As for a "mutation or transmutation of human consciousness", about which you've written a lot (I loved your Quetzalcoatl book) i'm not holding my breath - at least apropos of negotiating ways forward. While I can imagine something like that happening (or perhaps simply hope that it comes to pass), it doesn't seem like something that we can plan on and certainly not wait on to get started on something. My work, as i've mentioned before, is in popular education which, as Highlander Education Centre in Tennessee sometimes says, is about changing the world 30 people at a time - small group dialogue and mutual learning. I'm currently reflecting my my 40+ years of doing this work and thinking about the power of small group dialogue which seems slow and a little microscopic. But imagined at scale - something that brings people together from both sides, as it were (and there are lots of precedents in Israel/Palestine), couldn't something like that grow exponentially? What if we created some process like the Mont Fleur Scenarios that played a role in the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa - discussing and crafting possible stories of a peaceful future. In such a process, all of your ideas could be workshopped, as it were. But, perhaps more significantly, i think that if we can facilitate (if not accelerate ) the imagined "mutation or transmutation of human consciousness," (if not merely create the conditions to observe if it is happening) it is through small group (i.e. 15 to 60 participants) dialogue processes. And, by dialogue, i'm drawing on the works of Buber, Freire, Boehm, Bakhtin, Starhawk, (as well as practices like NVC, restorative justice, and so on).
I, who am nobody, support most of this.. Where I disagree is in the global consciousness movement. I get it, I grew up in that thought pattern, I first came to Sufism through the universalist message. I've realized since the many levels of Western European assumption (and Imperialism) that underlies that project. Religious studies are very aware of pastiche nature of the new age movement where spirituality is decoupled from cultural context and sold as safe commodity as long as it doesn't threaten the status quo of free market capitalism. This is where the Muslim critique, for all the issues they have to contend with as well, have a point. One world spirituality where people are forced to live in a society where things like pornography, drug party culture, etc. are seen as harmless free market choices while spirituality is simply an inward journey, is a Western imposition., This is where China, the ME, Africa, Russia etc. have all broken away from the West's insistence of it's model of enlightenment being the One World Savior. Instead enlightenment will be within the confines of these cultures and the societies they envision. They have much work to do, but they criticize the West's insistence for moral superiority. We have more mass shootings and depression than any where else in the world. Our prozac'd, over medicated, alcohol and valium driven culture has no right to tell anyone about human happiness. However I am for the Global Consciousness movement as long as it doesn't think it is a one size fits all solution. It's a uniquely Western phenomenon.
It's like how I don't trust depressed philosophers.
But I like all your other suggestions. Good work on those.
Also check out Examplers of our times (https://www.theexemplars.com), for more works on why Muslims become Muslims. At this point I've suggested many works and people beyond just Ziauddin Sardar for you to read. Please don't start writing about why people believe in the Quran without a serious literature review and field work because.... Man, people write phd thesis on these things after years of work studying history, talking with people, and reading texts and up to date literature reviews. Ive been keeping up with academic texts on these issues in Islam for 20 years, from William Chittick to Ovamir Anjum's recent translation of "Ranks of the Divine Seekers." There is an academic standard to this subject
Regarding the mass shootings: look at Australia, Canada, UK for cases where mass shootings are not a thing, because this is a country specific historical issue (rather than a western moral issue). Also not sure one can make whole sale generalization regarding depression and western moral values.
Spiritualism is not something the western cultures have started, all religious cultures have offshoots of Spiritualist. The individual nature of this endeavor is its main advantage. The forced societal version practiced in the ME, China, Russia (with communism), etc (all authoritarian, most corrupt regimes in the world btw) should tell you all you need, i.e. the use of religious to control and rule over people rather than the promotion of a moral society. Individual freedom of thought is what gets us happiness.
We all don't need to move towards a single global consciousness movement, but sticking with the old and outdated religious movements is also not going to solve any problem. We need independent indigenous modernization of each of these religious communities (i.e. need for more religious reformation), helped by new ways of looking at the world through philosophies like Analytical idealism, etc and possibly psychedelics.
I keep saying that reform is slowly happening in Islam, the Muslim world of 20 years ago is not quite the same as it is now, maybe not fast enough, but I feel I keep coming across calls for "reform" without anyone engaging with modern Muslim Movements. Islam already had its own form of mixing logic and spirituality, it is through that that it currently experiencing slow reform. There is a colonalist mentality that states that these indigenous cultures don't have the breadth of their own native experience in culture to be able to reform without needing ready made Western philosophies. I promise that the muslim breadth of experiencing reality rivals any of the great view points for experiencing reality in profound states of being. Heck, my most powerful LSD trip ever was while doing Salat and I started hyperventilating and having flashes of Ali and a divine banner of light that is constantly attacked in our egotistic realm on earth and the martyrs who claim to that light even if they get killed for it. But also realizing the nature of reality these states don't justify every opinion or cultural baggage that comes with the religion either. But also jettison too much of the unknowable clockwork practices that connect you to that stream via turning it into new age universalist mush, you lose the connection. It demands a more defined nuance engagement.
Spiritualism is a weird one, from modern academic studies on Sufism, I don't think these simple categories really work. There are many western axioms that are just now being addressed in academic works on religion, like the word "mysticism.' They come from a Christian World view.
Anyway thanks for your info. I am not set in stone on every point and agree Muslims also need much reform.
thanks for sharing! Reading this vision was very inspirational in some way. Seems like starting these initiatives in this region of the world makes sense. I like that you list taking mdma. Actually, the first time I took Extasis, back in 1996, I remember from that experience thinking that Israel and Palestine leaders should take mdma, and that this was the missing link, ha! Wanted to ask you, when you say Israel as "maintaining itself as an ethno-nationalist state with an assured Jewish majority, Israel would agree to give Palestinians the right to return to their ancestral lands for one month or perhaps several months a year..." I was wondering what this means to you exactly as 'ethno-nationalist' because to me I think one of the issues with Israel now is that it's defined by its religion. Instead I think Israel maybe should shift a bit to being more neutral and more inclusive? or more low key in some way? where judaism is still a big influence in the region but just doesn't have to be the it all. I don't know, obviously I'm not an expert, just something I had thought about a while back. And I love the idea of the velvet apocalypse!
Minor point, but your lead sentence says settlers are on the border of the west bank. Actually, they are scattered all over the west bank, gobbling up more every day.
I do plan to respond to your very fascinating suggestions.
this interview was so clarifying for me, not that I agree with many aspects of it except when accepting that WHEN IF we are trapped in a particular paradigm, then well, this path is obvious and necessary. Just as for instance, we, when coming from a context of traumatic childhoods, develop intricate, weird, extreme, blind, fearful defenses that have a logic from the point of view of the child and DID help us survive, but when adults they wreck havoc our lives and of those who love us.
This reminded me of the old Yippee plan to lace the drinking water of the USA with LSD. Couldn’t hurt in this situation. I must admit, my usual optimistic self is feeling stymied with this conflict. Without justice and self determination we are lost.
"To overcome all local, tribal, and national identities and affiliations: Isn’t this what the messianic tradition of all the monotheistic religions point toward? In that case, what are we waiting for?"
No one actually wants this watered down whitewashed fake version of the truth. Differences exist. So what. It's not about overcoming our identities to attain a monolithic universal identity. Individuality and universality exist at the same time. Its way deeper than what this quote says above.
I also don't understand why you think using the Apocalypse as a way to describe what's happening now is any less valid than my ability to connect current things happening in the world to the larger time scales of Kali Yuga.
When I was explaining that to you one day, you told me that I sounded like a religious zealot and it was very rude. It's okay for you to do it though. This is why I can't always take your arguments seriously because they are conditional based on your own biases.
But I think it's cool that you're attempting to envision something in your niche.
Mandatory MDMA and shrooms for violent extremists -- I have to admit this made me laugh, but given the stakes and other options, maybe worth a try! I appreciate your efforts to think creatively about this horrid situation.
Exactly twenty years ago the great 20th century historian Tony Judt wrote a piece for the NYRB that completely envisioned todays Israeli reality with pained accuracy, and which essentially concluded, like Cypel, that Israel has become bad for the Jews. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2003/10/23/israel-the-alternative/ It's a brilliant, beautiful, tortured piece, and for writing it Judt was virtually excommunicated from the Jewish community, like anyone over the last 30 years who ventures out to say the obvious: that Israel will not survive in it's present posture of increasing militarism and messianic orthodoxy. It's obvious and at the same time it's unspeakable. Every voice that's attempted to raise that alarm has been instantly quashed and denounced; if you're not Jewish you're an anti-semite, and if you are, you're a 'self-hating' Jew--as Judt was himself accused by the AJC--amongst others--a powerful American Jewish organization that instantly published a booklet to send to all its wealthy members. That's the way the game has been played for a couple of generations.
The moment we're in is the precise result of the complete absence of discourse and criticism around Israel's increasingly racist, reactionary, and provocative policies towards the Palestinians, and its open policy of accepting that there will never be peace and there will always be war. It's called "Security Without Peace". It's no surprise that we are at the dead end; there was literally no other place we could arrive at. The Netanyahu coalition of ultra-orthodox walk around giving the middle finger to the entire Muslim world--and they don't think a whole lot more of the Christian world either, as a recent video captured of ultra-orthodox school kids spitting on a church in Jerusalem as they walked by. It's as though they are confused and think that there are 2 billion Jews and only 16 million Muslims or Christians in the world and not the reverse. At the same time, most American Jews have been kept completely in the dark as to how violent and, yes, insane the ultra-orthodox in Israel are in both their rhetoric and actions. Yet these are the people that are sitting in the driving seat right now, the ones who the government is most responsive to.
So no, Daniel, I don't accept this nonsense there is some legitimate reason, some rationale, some strategy for the present destruction of Gaza that American Jews or Americans in general need to consider to justify what they're doing. When you force hundreds of thousands of people to move, and reduce their habitats to rubble, that's, as far as most people can see, ethnic cleansing. Are you doing it because you're trying to 'look strong', or trying to push them out of Gaza which you always wanted to anyhow, or both? It doesn't really matter. Bottom line, what you're doing is completely beyond the pale, and it's tiresome that so many smart people are sucked into these empty discussions. The same forces that imposed this dead-end reality on us are those that are defining the conversations around Israel's behavior and its time to realize that they are, and have been, completely bankrupt for 30 years. Without that, there is no way to have a clear thought in your head.
I appreciate your perspective… I posted an Israeli friend’s response in another comment here. What’s your solution model but please read my friend’s comment first on why a ceasefire is not possible.
Yes, your Israeli friend repeats the notion that they will root out Hamas with this campaign. Somehow Israelis seem to feel that this is the case--probably because they must believe something, but they also know somewhere inside them that this is the greatest recruiting opportunity that Hamas, or the next terrorist organization by another name, will ever have. There is no rooting out Hamas. It cannot be done. Show us a military leader or analyst who actually believes that they can stop the Palestinians from regrouping in some fashion. It is vengeance and despair masquerading as 'reason', and it is precisely why there needs to be someone to restrain them because by your israeli friend's own reasoning, there is no end to where the Israel should go--right now. When have they shown the Arabs that they're 'strong enough'? Destroying Gaza doesn't really show strength--anyone could destroy an impoverished territory like Gaza that doesn't have a real army. If they really want to show their strength, they need to beat Hezbollah, or Syria, or Iran. I think the way Israelis are thinking right now is pretty unhinged, and they're asking all of us to buy into it.
Look, obviously it's an enormously complex landscape in the Middle East. I don't think you can simplify it, BUT there is an essential piece that isn't presented with clarity: the Israeli's have very little to trade for peace anymore. They are not willing to trade land for peace, to trade a livable future for the Palestinians for peace. They've made that clear. The only trading card they have is to NOT wage war, to NOT destabilize the region. That's it. At the same time they are promising that they will continue to expand their borders. I just don't think that those cards are ever going to achieve a real future for Israel.
By the way, your Israeli friend living here IS the future of Israel--once this settles down there is going to be a HUGE exodus of Israelis, most probably to the US. Many of the young lefties will leave, tilting the country even more to the right and the crazies. It's a continuing tragedy in slow-motion.
And because it has worked in the past.
Right now Israel is smashing up any possibility of peace. The hatred and vengeance is out of control. The only way we can achieve it is by the US putting enough pressure to stop the carnage. Then maybe we can talk about a shared future. Sadly I don't really see a way out of this morass. I appreciate your attempts to try see a possible human future, but I cannot share your optimism.
Yet I think it is still important to consider the Israeli perspective that this show of force is absolutely necessary as they exist surrounded by enemies who believe in the “strong horse” doctrine and will pounce on any weakness. We are not seeing the situation from the Israeli perspective of constant existential threat, which is also legitimate. As for envisioning a positive outcome, it is not about hope but about an act of intentional will as collapsing into despair does nothing.
The Arab states and Palestine have been trying to accommodate Israel for decades. Israel is punishing and torturing Gaza far beyond what is necessary, and their actions are not enhancing the security of Israelis. On the contrary it is inviting catastrophe to Israel. Bombs and destruction are not the solution.
Hi Paul, this is from an Israeli friend:
“ Sharing POV of an Israeli, if helpful:
- Israel cannot appear weak. If we appear weak we will be attacked on all sides - West Bank, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Yemen and don’t forget the extreme Arab Israelis that could violently uprise if they feel like they have a chance. We already appear very weak with Oct 7 military failures + the pre Oct 7 internal turmoil. This is sad and tragic but Lebanon needs to know that if they try something there will be severe consequences. For us this is survival.
- The entire country is in PTSD. People burst out crying in the streets and supermarkets. My sister wakes up from every little sound at night thinking that someone is coming to rape and kill her kids in the most brutal ways. It’s easy to be an idealist and ask for a ceasefire from the safety of one’s San Francisco apartment. Everyone in Israel live less than an hour from a border and feel like they are NEXT. And pls don’t forget missiles are falling on Israel every day (they have been for years, pre Oct 7). 200k ppl displaced. Hostages.
- Hostages are a huge deal in israel (unlike US maybe where they don’t get a lot of attention). Everyone in Israel is a solider and we need to know “we” will come back for them. This is a terrible negotiation situation for Israel, see Gilad Shalit, but it’s immensely important for such a militant culture.
- What is a “proportional response״ to gang-raping a young woman, cutting her breasts off and shooting her in the head while penetrating her?? I’m sorry for the horrific graphic description but this is what we’re dealing with. And hamas is flat out saying on video that they will do this again and again until the entire land is liberated. Nothing hurts more than seeing Americans/Europeans calling this “resistance”. As if the US or any western country would allow such *evil to roam in its back yard.
The heart breaks seeing the destruction and causalities in Gaza. I have American-Palestinian friends and I have no words for them just tears.
But to anyone calling for a ceasefire I ask - what’s the alternative? And it’s crickets on the other side. There is no good alternative. If you ceasefire Hamas will regroup and do this again in three years. This evil must be eradicated. People may not see it but we are fighting for Palestinian civilians too.
It’s fair to debate if the operation in Gaza will actually eradicate Hamas, but no one is actually having that conversation.
Not ignoring the many mistakes and injustices Israel has done (one of the reasons I don’t live there anymore is it was hard for me to live with the immorality of the occupation), to me this is a war of light and dark. The dark (China, Russia, Iran, extreme islam) is using the palestinian cause to destabilize the world and prevent the light from growing - democracy, equality, education, freedom. This is what we’re fighting for and Israel is on the front lines. ”
I tend to agree - feel we don’t understand the situation from here and Leftists are imposing a kneejerk interpretation.
What Israel is doing is not enhancing its security. You want security? Bombs are not the solution. Make peace. All the attacks from Lebanon are in response to the Israeli attacks on Gaza. Want the hostages back? Trade them for Palestinians held by Israel. Problem solved. A ceasefire is in the interests of Israeli security. What they are doing now is putting Israel in grave risk.
Hi Paul,
Once again, these are standard and easy to make Leftist cliches that may not actually correspond to the relative reality. I agree with you on an ultimate and idealist level. In fact Israel had to deal with the suicide bombing etc with ruthless measures and it worked. Similarly the killing of ISIS leaders ultimately worked to curtail the organization. So often in fact bombs and violence do work to stop aggressors in the short term. But that is cute you feel you can cut to the quick and easy “Problem solved.”
Yes, I agree this needs to be addressed at least by the Left, and it is not even acknowedeged, what does a ceasefire look like? Because its been over one month already anyway and it happens all the time so...
Sorry Daniel, but I think you give too much sway to Isreali propaganda. There are people who I find totally repellent, like Thomas Friedman, who is hardly a dove, but who are terribly troubled by this response of overwhelming response in Gaza. Why? Because it's pointless. It's cruel, it's doesn't move anything forward, and because he suspects that Netanyahu has no end game other than a complete shitshow in the Middle East that benefits no one--except maybe himself.
Think of it this way, if you accept the idea that 'a show of force is absolutely necessary', or the 'strong horse' strategy, what world do you have have--anywhere? Every leader in every conflict will take that bait. By that reasoning, then Putin should nuke Ukraine and make sure they KNOW he's serious because, after all, it's a region where 'a show of force is absolutely necessary', etc.
I’m saying that is how ordinary Israelis see it as well as their military. I don’t know whether it is true. But I do think they understand far more about the region, living immersed in it, than we do from a very safe distance.
I like the sci-fi solution to this very real and seemingly impossible problem, but how about israel just goes back to the peel plan borders (as to give Palestinians a contiguous state), give Palestinians state sovereignty, help them to move into the 21st century (through technological trades) and make a UN deal (including all Arab states) that if the Palestinians transgressed and started another war, that there would severe international sanctions? I really can't imagine how the whole of the international community would not stand behind this plan and Palestinians would feel they have something worth losing (right now they don't).
This really doesn't have to involve mdma and lasers, just give the occupied people some dignity. The point being that Israel has to give up some things for any progress to happen. Make the deal so unlikely as to disarm even the most extremist supporters of the violent resistance.
To me the most realistic part of your proposal is the move away from old religious traditions and into more modern ways of connecting with the source. The fact that this epic battle happens to be between two very religious community is not a coincident. We in the west need to do what we can to reduce the influence of these outdated religions and stop giving them legitimacy through none-violent actions (i.e. look at Germans moving completely away from religion)
It would be hard to build a city from top-down directives. Furthermore, building the world's most advanced city would require inhabitants up to the knowledge and challenge.
Also, it goes against general psychedelic ethics, in my understanding, to force them upon others. I've never heard anyone propose that they be administered as a sort-of punishment. This could be a disaster because "set and setting" play such important rules. It's also just conjecture that doing this in succession could covert people to "pluralistic" from "parochial."
It is curious that people are so resistant to even entertain a different idea… just as a mental exercise why not imagine how the ideas could be positively added to and flourish? Even as a thought experiment
A friend, who lived in Israel, told me that it was Israel who built the hospital that Hamas hijacked for hidden operations. He says that the Gazans allowed this to happen, looking the other way. Likewise, there are already permaculture and land-based situations in Israel--were many people were interested in joining those?
In integral theory, civilization and its fruits--such as higher consciousness movements, peace and prosperity, pluralism--rest upon stable structures of law and order, which also then help to develop rationality and modernism, which give individuals a world-centric awareness, which lays the foundation for increased pluralism, compassion, freedom. It's those structures, both inner and outer, that seem to be needed reformed right now.
I'm not necessarily resistant to your ideas--I'm reading them with consideration. But I'm also joining the thought experiment.
Thank you for another thoughtful , mind expanding essay. How did the influential folks from the Jewish community respond to the psychedelic aspect of your plan ? Also Noosphere is a vision that started with Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Have you read him? Regarding what will free humanity from Wetiko the mind virus ( see book Dispelling Wetiko) at our critical stage in history is the great work set before us. A tremendous amount of religious , philosophical and political conditioning as well as historical multigenerational trauma must be "deprogramed" . The saving grace is that whatever means are employed to do so, love, wisdom and compassion are inherent at the core of every human being. Human beings who have not been enslaved to serve particular ideological masters . How do we deprogram ourselves? Here are some other ideas. We must get out of our heads, through meditation, reflective Socratic questioning, a Goethian phenomenological approach to science and education. We need to foster in children and adults a sense of self and identity not based on thoughts, beliefs or affiliations but actions etc. In my World view there'd be compulsory education in General Semantics and every child would receive a Waldorf Education. I think there would be advantages to Steiner's threefold social order being actualized across the globe as well as his views about making money a perishable commodity. The fundamental structures of all the institutions that exploit humanity for financial , industrial , political , religious or military advantage must be repurposed, once humanities minds are freed. However it seems like none of these things will be done volunteeringly so a I suspect we will like alcoholics have to hit rock bottom first and experience the total failure of everything we were programmed to trust and rely on occurs. In the meantime we can strive to maintain our humanity through the catastrophes that lie ahead. Individually we can create Noospheric consciousness through group practice . Say for instance through collective chanting (and planting ) Nam Myoho Renge Kyo - to invoke every being's Buddha nature and to call out for help from all Bodhisattvas throughout space and time. May they come to our aide like you have Daniel.
These are sweet and fanciful ideas, Daniel, but practical?.You yourself are dismissing wholesome but more quotidian proposals for their impracticality. It makes me curious whether you have ever materially supported Palestinian rights and/or a viable two-state solution. Not that I am a great exemplar for that. I've made a few donations and speak out for these causes. Are you competing to be imaginative and enlightened or are you really trying to put a stop to the settlements and the hate it inspires? If Jewish Americans spoke up in favor of Palestinian human rights, US policy could turn a corner. I'm not sure you're taking this seriously enough. Not that I'm doing enough. But I wonder if we should pursue peace the way we did for South Africa.
I don't think two-state solutions will work at this point. Or one state solutions, or no state solutions. So here is an alternative.
Why won't a two state solution work? If the settlers were forced out of the West Bank, then there is something to talk about. It's just been a consciously destroyed possibility over the last twenty years, made impossible to consider about here by Israel, AIPAC, the Jewish organizational leadership and others.
The problem is that everyone simply ACCEPTS that dealing with the settlers is impossible, (making it necessary to consider the truly outlandish notions here which are not bad ideas, just spectacularly unlikely) as the only possibilities. But I think it's remarkable the way it's regarded that everything in the world is possible, that anything can be moved--except the settlers. Don't you think that's odd? I actually think you don't see the degree to which you accept the conceptual box that has been very effectively created and nurtured here.
Because deep in the heart of the a Palestinians and other Arab Muslims they simply refuse for there to be a Jewish state in the Middle East, particularly after the wars they have lost and the need for vengeance, satisfaction of Pride, plus the underlying religious eschatological reasons.
That's very much the false narrative that has become standard 'knowledge'. There was, for example, the Saudi Initiative in 2002 that offered peace from all the major Middle Eastern countries for a return to the pre-1967 borders. It was rejected instantly by Ariel Sharon. There was no exploration on what was regarded at that moment as a significant breakthrough, and it was simply erased from the official history. It's just bullshit to say that there are no terms the Arab world would accept, and that they've never offered anything. The proper question is what are the terms of peace and whether they're terms you're willing to live with. For the last 30 years the Israelis have taken the open position that they will not give up the West Bank and that they can always drive a better deal. First their position was maybe we can just give up a sliver of the West Bank, and increasingly, as more settlers have moved there and become more emboldened, their position is: we will give up none of the West Bank. I'm not suggesting that a peace plan is a simple or easy process, but at this point it's clear that the Israelis are committed to an expansionist future and consequently completely uninterested in peace terms that would be remotely acceptable to the other side. But let's not confuse that with the statement that 'peace is not possible'.
Just because you say “that is a false narrative,” doesn’t make it a false narrative.
What a beautiful and visionary attempt at a solution to the Israel/Palestinian crisis! I have heard no other real efforts at a solution and I hope this one gets shared far and wide.
Bold suggestions. Very bold. But none of them include Palestinians in the driver's seat, as it were. I find it almost impossible to imagine any idea that doesn't have, at its centre, creative-critical-active participation of Palestinians from conception to execution. Though it is, of course, fine to create starting points for speculative imaging.
Your first - rather utopian - suggestion of a city-of-the-future sounds like an interesting premise for a science-fiction story (akin to Kim Stanley Robinson's Ministry of the Future scenario-thinking - this could be a good way to flesh out the idea and explore the intersections of geo-politics, ethno-politics, climate change, etc.) Tactically-speaking, i wouldn't include the suggestion of something extraterritorial (in "neighbouring Arab countries." Pretty much a non-starter and also so inflammatory as to provoke instant dismissiveneness). And, while Gaza is an interesting suggested location, anything that ignores the context of occupation/siege also risks it being treated as essentially an extraterritorial solution. Your next three ideas, it seems to me, would each require top down (i.e. elite or professional, if not authoritarian) administration and implementation. Imaging these being popularly accepted would even be a stretch for sci-fi scenario thinking. But who knows? Your fifth idea is wicked clever and could be an interesting project in and of itself - though, no doubt, complications would ensue. I'd include it in some scenario-thinking. As for your sixth suggestion (also your fourth, to some extent) it seems that the key to these is getting to "generally understood and accepted." What would be the path to that?
As for a "mutation or transmutation of human consciousness", about which you've written a lot (I loved your Quetzalcoatl book) i'm not holding my breath - at least apropos of negotiating ways forward. While I can imagine something like that happening (or perhaps simply hope that it comes to pass), it doesn't seem like something that we can plan on and certainly not wait on to get started on something. My work, as i've mentioned before, is in popular education which, as Highlander Education Centre in Tennessee sometimes says, is about changing the world 30 people at a time - small group dialogue and mutual learning. I'm currently reflecting my my 40+ years of doing this work and thinking about the power of small group dialogue which seems slow and a little microscopic. But imagined at scale - something that brings people together from both sides, as it were (and there are lots of precedents in Israel/Palestine), couldn't something like that grow exponentially? What if we created some process like the Mont Fleur Scenarios that played a role in the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa - discussing and crafting possible stories of a peaceful future. In such a process, all of your ideas could be workshopped, as it were. But, perhaps more significantly, i think that if we can facilitate (if not accelerate ) the imagined "mutation or transmutation of human consciousness," (if not merely create the conditions to observe if it is happening) it is through small group (i.e. 15 to 60 participants) dialogue processes. And, by dialogue, i'm drawing on the works of Buber, Freire, Boehm, Bakhtin, Starhawk, (as well as practices like NVC, restorative justice, and so on).
I, who am nobody, support most of this.. Where I disagree is in the global consciousness movement. I get it, I grew up in that thought pattern, I first came to Sufism through the universalist message. I've realized since the many levels of Western European assumption (and Imperialism) that underlies that project. Religious studies are very aware of pastiche nature of the new age movement where spirituality is decoupled from cultural context and sold as safe commodity as long as it doesn't threaten the status quo of free market capitalism. This is where the Muslim critique, for all the issues they have to contend with as well, have a point. One world spirituality where people are forced to live in a society where things like pornography, drug party culture, etc. are seen as harmless free market choices while spirituality is simply an inward journey, is a Western imposition., This is where China, the ME, Africa, Russia etc. have all broken away from the West's insistence of it's model of enlightenment being the One World Savior. Instead enlightenment will be within the confines of these cultures and the societies they envision. They have much work to do, but they criticize the West's insistence for moral superiority. We have more mass shootings and depression than any where else in the world. Our prozac'd, over medicated, alcohol and valium driven culture has no right to tell anyone about human happiness. However I am for the Global Consciousness movement as long as it doesn't think it is a one size fits all solution. It's a uniquely Western phenomenon.
It's like how I don't trust depressed philosophers.
But I like all your other suggestions. Good work on those.
Also check out Examplers of our times (https://www.theexemplars.com), for more works on why Muslims become Muslims. At this point I've suggested many works and people beyond just Ziauddin Sardar for you to read. Please don't start writing about why people believe in the Quran without a serious literature review and field work because.... Man, people write phd thesis on these things after years of work studying history, talking with people, and reading texts and up to date literature reviews. Ive been keeping up with academic texts on these issues in Islam for 20 years, from William Chittick to Ovamir Anjum's recent translation of "Ranks of the Divine Seekers." There is an academic standard to this subject
thank you, nobody, I am glad you like my proposal! - D
I should have probably just left it at that but you know..... Coffee
Disagree so much with all of this.
Regarding the mass shootings: look at Australia, Canada, UK for cases where mass shootings are not a thing, because this is a country specific historical issue (rather than a western moral issue). Also not sure one can make whole sale generalization regarding depression and western moral values.
Spiritualism is not something the western cultures have started, all religious cultures have offshoots of Spiritualist. The individual nature of this endeavor is its main advantage. The forced societal version practiced in the ME, China, Russia (with communism), etc (all authoritarian, most corrupt regimes in the world btw) should tell you all you need, i.e. the use of religious to control and rule over people rather than the promotion of a moral society. Individual freedom of thought is what gets us happiness.
We all don't need to move towards a single global consciousness movement, but sticking with the old and outdated religious movements is also not going to solve any problem. We need independent indigenous modernization of each of these religious communities (i.e. need for more religious reformation), helped by new ways of looking at the world through philosophies like Analytical idealism, etc and possibly psychedelics.
We are not going to agree but thats ok.
China and Russia don't use religious control, but idealogical but I get your point. The question of if people are more depressed in modern society is up in the air (https://theconversation.com/so-many-in-the-west-are-depressed-because-theyre-expected-not-to-be-79672).. Definitely right now one would be quite depressed living in Gaza.
I keep saying that reform is slowly happening in Islam, the Muslim world of 20 years ago is not quite the same as it is now, maybe not fast enough, but I feel I keep coming across calls for "reform" without anyone engaging with modern Muslim Movements. Islam already had its own form of mixing logic and spirituality, it is through that that it currently experiencing slow reform. There is a colonalist mentality that states that these indigenous cultures don't have the breadth of their own native experience in culture to be able to reform without needing ready made Western philosophies. I promise that the muslim breadth of experiencing reality rivals any of the great view points for experiencing reality in profound states of being. Heck, my most powerful LSD trip ever was while doing Salat and I started hyperventilating and having flashes of Ali and a divine banner of light that is constantly attacked in our egotistic realm on earth and the martyrs who claim to that light even if they get killed for it. But also realizing the nature of reality these states don't justify every opinion or cultural baggage that comes with the religion either. But also jettison too much of the unknowable clockwork practices that connect you to that stream via turning it into new age universalist mush, you lose the connection. It demands a more defined nuance engagement.
Spiritualism is a weird one, from modern academic studies on Sufism, I don't think these simple categories really work. There are many western axioms that are just now being addressed in academic works on religion, like the word "mysticism.' They come from a Christian World view.
Anyway thanks for your info. I am not set in stone on every point and agree Muslims also need much reform.
Wanted to share this article! https://www.vice.com/en/article/4a3b79/israeli-palestinian-ayahuasca-ceremony
thanks for sharing! Reading this vision was very inspirational in some way. Seems like starting these initiatives in this region of the world makes sense. I like that you list taking mdma. Actually, the first time I took Extasis, back in 1996, I remember from that experience thinking that Israel and Palestine leaders should take mdma, and that this was the missing link, ha! Wanted to ask you, when you say Israel as "maintaining itself as an ethno-nationalist state with an assured Jewish majority, Israel would agree to give Palestinians the right to return to their ancestral lands for one month or perhaps several months a year..." I was wondering what this means to you exactly as 'ethno-nationalist' because to me I think one of the issues with Israel now is that it's defined by its religion. Instead I think Israel maybe should shift a bit to being more neutral and more inclusive? or more low key in some way? where judaism is still a big influence in the region but just doesn't have to be the it all. I don't know, obviously I'm not an expert, just something I had thought about a while back. And I love the idea of the velvet apocalypse!
Minor point, but your lead sentence says settlers are on the border of the west bank. Actually, they are scattered all over the west bank, gobbling up more every day.
I do plan to respond to your very fascinating suggestions.
this interview was so clarifying for me, not that I agree with many aspects of it except when accepting that WHEN IF we are trapped in a particular paradigm, then well, this path is obvious and necessary. Just as for instance, we, when coming from a context of traumatic childhoods, develop intricate, weird, extreme, blind, fearful defenses that have a logic from the point of view of the child and DID help us survive, but when adults they wreck havoc our lives and of those who love us.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4wLXNydzeY&t=1662s
This reminded me of the old Yippee plan to lace the drinking water of the USA with LSD. Couldn’t hurt in this situation. I must admit, my usual optimistic self is feeling stymied with this conflict. Without justice and self determination we are lost.
"To overcome all local, tribal, and national identities and affiliations: Isn’t this what the messianic tradition of all the monotheistic religions point toward? In that case, what are we waiting for?"
No one actually wants this watered down whitewashed fake version of the truth. Differences exist. So what. It's not about overcoming our identities to attain a monolithic universal identity. Individuality and universality exist at the same time. Its way deeper than what this quote says above.
I also don't understand why you think using the Apocalypse as a way to describe what's happening now is any less valid than my ability to connect current things happening in the world to the larger time scales of Kali Yuga.
When I was explaining that to you one day, you told me that I sounded like a religious zealot and it was very rude. It's okay for you to do it though. This is why I can't always take your arguments seriously because they are conditional based on your own biases.
But I think it's cool that you're attempting to envision something in your niche.