A day to catch up with friends all over the place. I’ve booked two weekends in SF for February as there’s a protest march on February 16th I really want to be a part of. I’m thinking of volunteering for it. I’m also getting revved up about the possibilities that my thesis can offer, especially after watching a recent Bill Moyers special about hydrogen cars. It offered a spotlight on Arianna Huffington’s “When you drive an SUV, you fund terrorists” commercial campaign, and an evangelical association’s “What Would Jesus Drive?” campaign. This ties in with my thesis, and makes excellent background material. They’re shaping a visual language for certain mainstream elements. I think the WWJD campaign is more effective, though, because it doesn’t attack people personally.
Wicked googly
Lunch today was kind of awkward to me. It’s kind of weird to know all these people yet not live in the same city. I wish I could hang out with some of them more often.On the flight home, I (aisle) talked with my neighbor (window), an Indian. We discussed Kashmir, Dubya and the midterm elections. Then we talked about cricket and the World Cup. I still can’t figure cricket out, but someday I’ll know what a “wicked googly” is.
San Francis’doh
I’m not sure what to think about San Francisco today, or maybe I’m just having a bad day, or maybe it’s the contrived experience of a hotel room. I remember why I left here last summer – I just didn’t connect with anyone, and didn’t want to start from scratch. Still, it’s a good day to catch up on homework, but I wonder if I should have just flown back today. It would be cheaper than staying the whole week.
Gaviotas
Class felt more inspirational today. We’re discussing the Colombian experimental village of Gaviotas, our last reading. It’s nice to know there are alternatives, and leads me to a conclusion that we must offer mainstream America a realistic alternative if we are to succeed in changing people’s minds. It won’t happen quickly, but the key seems to stay away from emotions like bitterness and cynicism, and genuinely hope things get better. I’ve seen some heavy sadness occasionally during the weekend seminars. It’s warranted, but it reminds me that we have a life to live, and that while we undertake any mission, we have to take a step back once in a while to really enjoy the beautiful things that life has to offer.
Marketing Sustainability to the Masses
After much deliberation, I come up with a thesis: Marketing Sustainability to the Masses. It seems like so much green advertising isn’t directed at those who most need to hear or see it. I don’t know any of my regular joe friends in the Midwest who’d pick up a copy of Mother Jones or Utne Reader, much less use it to line their bird feeder. I think also of Michael Moore, who I believe to be our most mainstream left-advocating speaker, and his use of humor and “regular guyness” to achieve a point without coming off as a Tiva-wearing hippie. He breaks the left’s stereotypes. I like that. For the left to succeed in their goals, they’ll have to reach out to a wider audience by offering solid alternatives to business-as-usual. I hear a lot of complaining, but not much offering. James Carville calls it “framing the debate”. The debate for sustainability needs to be framed in such a way to favor the left, but come off in a new and better context in which to discuss these issues.
Hope’s Edge
I finished reading “Hope’s Edge” by Francis and Anna Lappe. It’s quite inspirational in that it tells hard stories, but offers hope near the end with positive solutions. In one case, there’s the Grameen Bank in India that has offered loans to over 2 million women (mostly divorced, a taboo in that country’s societal mores). It’s nice to read things about this, as it’s balancing in a big way the book about Detroit we’re reading for next month’s session.
The Modern City
I started classes today. There was an orientation – so many people, so many races and beliefs, so much knowledge. Our cohort weekend seminar is entitled ‘The Modern City’. We’re to read ‘Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in postwar Detroit’ – I can imagine that’s going to be a depressing read. I’m pretty well-versed on Chicago’s battle with racism and the older Mayor Daley’s attempts to separate races into their own neighborhoods. Of course, Chicago and its suburbs are sprawled all the way out to Rockford, a two-hour drive from the city when the traffic is light. The rings of suburbs show quite clearly the path of white flight.
Registration
Today I registered at New College of California for the Weekend BA Completion Program in Humanities. It’s hard to believe I’ve been to eight schools in the last 12 years, and I guess that lends itself to my flightyness and unwillingness to commit to anything for a long period of time. This feels right, though – standing in line with a group of people who are so much more racially, culturally and age diverse than anything I’ve encountered at my last school, Cornish. That consisted mostly of 20 – 22 year olds, and I felt like the older guy going back to school to rob the life force out of a newer generation, but in not so subtle a way that the baby boomers have gone after my generation.I’m Generation X. That’s so dated by today’s standards.