Kundaverde

The Republicans want Obama to fail because, or so they claim, they fear socialism… Isn’t socialism a form of cooperation versus capitalism based on competition? Who wrote true socialism is impossible as long as any form of capitalism persists in this world, de facto making socialism impossible? So the right wing shouldn’t have anything to worry about.

Coming out from a month long of Earth Day events, dreams of Terra reborn in a tanking economy are bitter sweet. If there’s a vision, where’s the cooperation, as it would seem each fair or event acts in isolation of each other. From electric cars to organic farming passing through green electronics, where’s the direction home?

In Fairfield County where I live, the most affluent chunk of culturally isolated suburbia, there must have been dozens of Earth day fairs scattered from schools to churches. Each with their own solar representatives, composting bin salesmen, green cleaner vertical marketing company, Prius driving, all well meaning.

I started thinking if we lose hope, if all hope was lost, if we all came to realize the damage we have done to Mother Earth was irrevocable, then how could a spirit of salvation and restoration keep fueling the green movement? It’s our concerted belief that we can affect change, turn back the clock, which fuels our desire to buy green products, support what we now call the green economy.

Without that belief, the whole house of card comes tumbling down, with a prevaling attitude of what’s the point, may as well enjoy the last drop of oil while there’s still oxygen in the atmosphere. That’s why it’s so important for all these green companies which have surfaced in the last few years, now members of such associations as Lohas, Sustainable Brands, B-Corporation… to put something back into the movement which gave their customer base the desire to buy their products.

We wouldn’t be wanting to wear organic cotton fabric if we didn’t also know and understand the impact of standardly produced cotton fibers. Consumers didn’t come to this realization on their own, they had help, from long, drawn out educational campaigns usually sponsored by poorly funded non-profits or renegade activists. Then slylish designers fill in the gap by providing garment that fit the social ethic advocated by these groups.

But what holds it up? What creates the culture which motivates the consumer to buy green? All new ways of doing things initiate a cultural shift… nothing happens in a vacuum. We’ve commercialized the environmental revolution, gave it brand names and social interaction, like Greendrinks and Wholefoods. Yet, who is bringing up the rear, making sure the momentum keeps growing?

I look back at the birth of the environmental movement in the mid-60′s, culminating with Earth Day in 1970 where millions of Americans took to the streets to express their concern for the state of the planet. We elected Jimmy Carter much like we did Barrack Obama, with that concern in mind. Yet, if you remember, Carter fell short of expectations, and was replaced with a conservative who tore down the solar panels he had installed on the White House.

We don’t want our next president to rip up Michelle Obama’s victory garden from the White House lawn. We want this spirit to stick, thrive and carry on. Well, to do that, we have to remember the roots of the environmental movement, and put back in. That was the Clamshell Alliance.

Had it not been for the anti-nuclear movement of the 60′s, there would not be solar and wind companies. For years the oil companies and the Utilities did their best to squelsh the growth of alternative sources of energy, because it spelled the end of their reign.  The progress in electronics and material sciences is such, that today, it’s cheaper to rely on alternative energy systems than conventional oil, coal or nuclear power.

Fashion has a lot to do with how we perceive the future… Fashion sets the trends, what young people wear on the streets this season, is usually found mass produced in stores the next. Peace signs, anti-nuclear logos, alien heads, metal crosses, certain things never go out of style. They remain strong in the hearts and minds of the subcultures who cherish these symbols as their own.

Green isn’t a subculture… if it is allowed to become that, the exclusive playground of an affluent elite, it will never trickle down where it needs to go most, to everybody. Even though I see many green stores, eco-boutiques, I see little evidence of sustainable concerns displayed by metal or hip hop or goth or country or the sports industry. That’s still in its infancy. For some reason, despite all the media and education, most Americans still don’t make the connection between what they buy and the air they breathe, the water they drink, the food they eat.

What usually happens in that instance is for new symbols to arise, which encompass all the different aspects of a cultural shift, replacing old paradigms with new ones… This gives rise to new spiritual and political leaders, who come to represent a need in the subconscious of the masses… Obama and Arnold are good examples… sadly, the machine that’s usually responsive to these emerging sentiments is broken, it only gives airplay to emotionally crippled pop stars and code red alerts. There’s only one Jon Stewart and he’s not enough.

Who would have thought that a car as expensive and luxurious as the Tesla would in fact become the people’s car? In the Tesla rests the dream that if, as a people, we invest enough into the company, it holds the promise of one day providing a real alternative to oil and an end to war? Tesla was an amazing genius who without we wouldn’t have electricity in our homes. Naming the company Tesla was a stroke of genius.

We all need heroes, riding on white horses, men and women in uniform, the powerful emotions of a great story to incarnate hope and make it real. In design we feel what the French call “elan vital” or erupting force… the love and energy which takes a seed from the ground and grows a tree in full bloom. Design… fashion, architecture, science fiction, languish in the puppy round eyes of a beautiful woman with a desperate heart. We’re all suckers for a good yarn.

So don’t give up, it might look hopeless, we may never eat tuna again, we may never be able to swim in an ocean empty of deadly jelly fish, we may have screwed up the ecosystem beyond redemption, but something else will emerge from this. Perhaps a very regimentated, military society, trying desperately to keep enough balance in the world so the atmosphere doesn’t just fly off as if losing the roof over our heads.

This Earth day was different… but the problems remain the same, the same old intrenched institutions are still holding on to their broken down slogans, their unions, their corporations, the trillions spent on dead end bottomless pits of waste and obscene top secret projects. Every day another layer is peeled back to reveal the insanity of man during the cold war years.

This realization is waking us up, we feel dirty and sad, we want to make amends to the rest of the planet for the hell we put it through… this while old vestiges are still hanging on for dear life as the house of shame crumbles. Under the layers of scum appear a diamond that had been so repressively hidden, the promise of unlimited clean energy in harmony with the universe. An energy akin to that of love, it’s the same thing, what fuels us fuels our planet, flowing electricity.

How we produce that electricity from now on, and how we use it, cherish it, respect it, as an expression of life itself, will make all the difference in the world as to whether or not our species will make it another generation. Its Kundalini rising… the merger of intentions to create a common ground for all people. That’s what I want to see in fashion photography, in architecture, in automotive design… a steampunk future, restoring the old with the new.

We’re too spaced too far apart… all the components of this new generation, this new look, this new vision. For some reason subcultures stopped growing, stopped merging, started feeding on their own remnants, leaving the world of innovation to pencil pushing geeks with no sense of style or function. Suddenly all this has to change. New temples are springing, sucking the energy from old forms… leaving behind empty shells devoid of meaning.

Manhattan needs to come together and unite, to assure its energy, its food, its survival. Mayor Bloomberg has it all down, except for one missing piece, the mayor of New York needs to come out in opposition to the relicensing of the Indian Point nuclear power plant on the Hudson. Tonight is Pete Seeger’s 90th birthday, celebrated in grand fanfare at Madison Square Garden. All his life, this man who grew a child of the civil rights movement, has wanted the Hudson river restored to its pristine shore, the way we found it when we stole it from the Native Americans.

The one thing the fashion industry can do, is to rally in support for Pete’s dream, and ask the mayor of New York to please tell Obama, the NRC, the federal government, to reconsider its blanket policy of rubber stamping operating licenses for aging nuclear reactors in such densely populated areas. It’s not worth the risk, not when we have Light Emitting Diodes to take over the slack with their extraodinary energy efficiency.

If there’s one message the fashion industry needs to come away with this Earth day season, it’s to go back to the roots of the environmental movement, put back in, and that’s No Nukes… shut down Indian Point. Help us, help Riverkeeper, Clearwater, IPSEC, Rock The Reactors, NIRS, and so many other organizations working so hard to put an end to the contamination, possibly the number one cause of soft tissue cancers.

We may not have saved the ocean, but we can maybe still save the genome. We won’t if we continue to allow poisonous radioactive isotopes free reign in the atmosphere at the hand of a disrespectful nuclear culture, either military or civilian. It’s not asking for much, for sustainable designers, modeling agencies, photographers, fashion editors to come out vocally to express their support for the anti-nuclear movement.

Let that be our contribution to Earth Day.