“We the People are more powerful than we dare to believe!” Paul Cienguegos
COME provides a comprehensive, sustainable framework for coalition building and a powerful set of non-hierarchal tools based on the way natural systems function—because after billions of years of remaining in dynamic equilibrium, Nature is the ultimate resource to educate, support, and guide our efforts toward a sustainable, life-supportive paradigm.
So… let’s COME together!
COME's guiding axiom is that true justice cannot exist without sustainability, and without justice there will be no peace. Corollaries are:
1. No food chain, no food.
2. Neither democracy nor an economy can exist on a dead planet.
3. Alleviating root causes will free up time and resources currently dedicated to slapping band-aids on single issue symptoms (the wounds of empire).
4. There is a pragmatic, scientifically validated, spiritually meaningful alternative to business as usual, and it can improve quality of life.
The why
The main impetus behind COME is disabling the arsonist behind all the single issue fires; digging up the diseased root instead of pruning branches; addressing the underlying cause of the disease instead of remaining content (or believing it's the best we can expect) to slap band-aids on symptoms.
Pick your favorite metaphor. And realize that it makes no difference whether you consider yourself on the political left or right... or undecided.
The root cause of our personal, social, and environmental woes is systemic. It has almost innumerable tendrils. But they all emerge from a paradigm based on force-based ranking hierarchies of domination, and a disconnection from the natural world (which includes ourselves, each other, and our communities). The pathological sense of the other that has become a cultural norm is not possible otherwise. Neither would be the insane clinging to addictive substitutes for natural expectations of fulfillment.
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Building the coalition network
Garnering support for COME is, in many ways, more difficult than for many organizations. We don't have a photogenic single issue or victim to tug at your heartstrings. Our number one roadblock is denial.
Pretty much everyone, from the anti-war movement to right-wing demagogues, want to pretend that life as we know it couldn't possibly come to an end just because we're destroying our life support system to protect economic growth, and that everything will turn out just fine as soon as we get the economy that's causing all the problems back on track. Or as soon as a new technology magically appears. Or as soon as the laws of physics are contravened. Whichever comes first.
The single issue fires are easy to see, and they impinge on many of our culturally recognized senses. They must be put out, and there are more excellent groups in full fire-fighting mode than can be listed here.