by David Archambault II, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe. Originally published in the New York Times. Illustration by Kim Ryu Near Cannon Ball, N.D. — It is a spectacular sight: thousands of Indians camped on the banks of the Cannonball River, on the edge of the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota. Our… Read More Taking a Stand at Standing Rock
Last night I listened to the CBC broadcast of Payam Akhavan’s speech on his work as a war crimes investigator for the UN, and as a jurist at the Int’l Court of Human Rights at the Hague. Akhavan is a B’hai, and he is now on my list of spiritual teachers that I hold on… Read More Payam Akhavan: B’Hai Human Rights Jurist on Empathy, Interdependence
December 5, 2014 by Jordan McCurdy This post first appeared at In These Times. ‘This problem is happening so humanity can come together, rebuild, reconnect, recreate and rebirth a new world.’ When other kids were experiencing the travails of first grade, 6-year-old Xiuhtezcatl Martinez was concerned about threats to the world’s ecosystem. Martinez, now 14, is the youth director of… Read More The 14-Year-Old Voice of the Climate Change Generation
I learn from teachers. I refuse to follow gurus. Modern history is replete with accounts of gurus and spiritual communities that are rife with sexual abuse; drug and alcohol abuse; extreme coercion for financial support; deference to “advanced practitioners”; and devaluation of the devotee so that they become emotionally dependent on the community and the guru. … Read More Teachers, Not Gurus
SATURDAY, DEC 27, 2014 01:00 PM AST Rebecca Solnit assesses our poisonous fossil fuel dependency — and why we’re on the verge of a paradigm shift REBECCA SOLNIT, TOMDISPATCH.COM (Credit: Tod Klassy/Shutterstock) This piece originally appeared on TomDispatch. It was the most thrilling bureaucratic document I’ve ever seen for just one reason: it was dated the… Read More Rebecca Solnit: The Age of Capitalism is over
I spent the weekend learning about B.R. Ambedkar. What a brilliant man and powerful advocate for social justice for the Untouchables of India, for women, for labour, and the “depressed classes” the world over. I read his treatise “The Annihilation of Caste” [which I downloaded from Verso Books for less than $3], with commentary by Arundhati… Read More Dalit Buddhist Revolution: Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, We Salute You
“A migrant worker from Dublin, Dhammaloka was an autodidact, atheist and temperance campaigner who became known throughout colonial Asia as an implacable critic of Christian missionaries and a tireless transnational organizer of Asian Buddhists from Burma to Japan and from Singapore to Siam.” THE DHARMA BUM: The Untold Story of U Dhammaloka – The… Read More The Original Dharma Bum: Irishman U Dhammaloka
