7
Free Women
In the face of many obstacles, we meet a courageous group of women who have organized to change their world.
Throughout India, women are forming 'self-help groups' (SHGs) to combat the many issues facing them. With the great help of Vani Chenguttuwan, we spoke at length with the SHG in Kalugumalai, in the state of Tamil Nadu, about their successes.
Many of these women's organizational successes came after intensive work with the DHAN Foundation and its Kalanjiam Community Banking program ('Wealth' in the Tamil language).
These organizations provided on-the-ground support for the women, micro-finance for small-business start-ups, and extensive education in crafts production and marketing - traditional skills enhanced by good business practices.
Produced by PierreTerre.com as part of our public service programming.
What's Behind the Dollar?
Money - where does it come from? Money expert James Bernard Quilligan, Executive Director of the Center for Global Negotiations, describes where U.S. money comes from, and why, even today, all U.S. money comes from the private Federal Reserve Bank, not from the U.S. Treasury. The U.S. currency is to backed only by debt, but this was not always so!
Find out where all that money comes from, with author Krista Keenan.
Genie in a Bottle: UNLEASHED
An amazing, award-winning video (v2.0) by (then) child-filmmakers Stephen and Trace, about nuclear weapons.
Please watch with your children, please forward so children see this wonderful short film, re-broadcast with permission from Trace's Mom.
Stephen and Trace (now much older teenagers) were disappointed in the amount of information their school taught about the U.S. bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. So, they decided to find out more all on their own! Now they share with you what they found.
Leo Burke Explains the Commons - #Commons Education Series A
Professor Leo Burke of the University of Notre Dame describes the commons and the benefits of a commons viewpoint in this interview recorded in Berlin, Germany at the commons conference sponsored by the Heinrich Boll Stiftung (Heinrich Boll Foundation) in late 2010.
Students interested in the commons should also read the following article about Professor Burke by another well-know commons expert, Jay Walljasper:
A World that Works for Everyone
By Jay Walljasper
Original article in Notre Dame Magazine:
http://magazine.nd.edu/news/27932-a-world-that-works-for-everyone/
PUBLISHED: WINTER 2011-12 POSTED IN: CAMPUS & COMMUNITY AND CURRENT AFFAIRS
You would expect Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business to focus its teaching on making profits from the world as it is instead of asking students to explore how to fundamentally change it.
Becoming Human Again: Occupy Wall Street and the Restoration of Caring - #Commons
The Occupy Wall Street protests have uncovered what we had refused to see, and asked us to re-look at what had been taken for granted:
We have a good world when we take care of each other, recognize our interdependence, and correct the injustices that erode the fundamental goodness of our society.
Filmed in Late October 2011, we found so many extraordinarily articulate Occupy Wall Street-ers who were willing to say what needed to be said: that we are better when we do not allow a tiny few to degrade the quality of life for many.
Cameras:
Bunker Seyfert
Heather Craig
Production Assistance:
Krista Keenan
Interviews:
Kevin Hansen
Consensus Democracy at Occupy Wall Street #OWS #Commons
Consensus Democracy - How do the Occupy Wall Street protesters reach decisions in a very diverse group?
We filmed at the Occupy Wall Street protests recently. One of the wonderful things to emerge in these protests has been the Consensus Democracy approach: broad, highly inclusive, community-focused and introspective - everyone has a voice. This form of decision-making is similar to older forms - for example, Quaker Letters - used to find central commonalities among diverse groups.
Consensus Democracy is very powerful. When decisions are reached, you know that the vast majority agree; and that essentially all in the group will accept the result. There is a lot of listening required: deeply understanding the others' points of view and priorities - good skills for us to re-learn now, especially in U.S. politics!
Common Healing - trailer v3 #Commons
Twelve Benefits of a Commons-Based Approach. During the process of filming the documentary Common Healing, it has become clear that there are many benefits from re-looking at difficult, immovable situations from the ancient perspective of the commons.
Thomas Greco Explains the Debt-Basis of Modern Money - #Commons Education Series A
Banks create money by making loans. Author and money expert Thomas Greco uses simple analogies to explain how this process works. He also explains how Direct Credit Clearing offers a simple, legal, and effective means for eliminating the need for bank-derived debt using the 'credit commons' approach.
Greco explains how the debt-based money system (within which we unconsciously operate) creates an inevitable cycle of boom-and-bust, because interest payments on debt, in aggregate, inevitably outstrip the value of goods and services.
The resulting urgency to repay debt creates some of the catastrophes of our time: unsustainable usage of resources, overharvesting trees, mining to much, too fast, building houses too often - all to pay-off not only legitimate costs, but also illegitimate bank fees that do nothing productive in the economy.
Not Hotter, Not Drier, Not Here.
New Mexico is one of the hottest, driest States in the US. Because of global warming, it is getting a lot hotter, a lot drier.
Especially in the United States, we need to pass bold, comprehensive clean energy and climate legislation. 1Sky.org is leading in the US - join the movement. Take action. Make history, especially for the already-dry southwestern US, where conditions are worsening. In Mexico City this year, the United Nations COP16 event will try to extent this work to a global treaty
Ask your freinds and other citizens to take action.
Educate yourself.
Motivate yourself.
Change the world.
Support Our Work
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News
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- Global Village Construction Set - #Commons 311
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