My workshop at unSCHOOLING OPRESSION conference

I am sooo excited about the upcoming unSCHOOLING OPRESSION conference on November 5-10. The summary reads:

unSchooling Oppression is both a critical examination of the various forms of oppression within traditional schooling models and a hopeful exploration of liberating educational alternatives.Six evening presentations will feature speakers on a broad range of topics, each concluding with a period for questions and discussion. Subjects shall include the historical roots and purposes of traditional schooling; power, authority and oppression; institutional violence; systemic racism; freedom and deschooling; alternative models for learning; and much more. The speakers will be traveling to Ottawa from around Canada and the USA The conference will also include a series of daytime workshops organized by members of the university community and local organizations on various issues that they consider relevant to the themes of education as oppression, and education as liberation. The conference will conclude with a caucus, wherein conference attendees will have the opportunity to brainstorm together a way forward in applying some of the ideas presented during the conference. Our goal, as conference organizers, is for this event to catalyze a new movement of projects and campaigns here in Ottawa to directly address the issues presented. We hope you can be a part of this.

For more info, see their blog and Facebook event. I will be giving a workshop on Wednesday, the details:

Healing Oppression with the Circus Arts
a peaceful and creative approach to physical education
Wednesday November 7th
1:30-3pm @ U of O's Institute for Women’s Studies (143 Séraphin-Marion), room 205

A workshop on the value of the circus arts as a non-authoritarian, non-violent, self-directed, and creative form of physical education. First I'll tell you the story of how and why I got into the circus arts. Then I'll talk about why we should challenge sports as the predominant and sometimes only model for physical education in schools. Then, I'll share some of the benefits of the circus arts, and lastly, I'll give a little interactive demonstration where participants can learn how to juggle,play baton, and spin poi.

This topic is very important to me, and in fact, sharing physical creativity is how I intend to make a living eventually. I'm applying for the YMCA's youth entrepreneurship program to realize this intention (whoo-hoo, I could get paid a decent wage to realize my dream of getting paid to play). Because this venture would be a sole proprietorship, I don't feel like staring a business is against my political views because profit only comes into play when you start making money off of other people's labour. Maybe one day my project will outgrow myself, and at that time I could help start an edutainment co-operative, but first thing's first...

Considering this, I've decided to do some in-depth research on the topic. I have bookmarked the links in my unschooltalk del.icio.us tag, so for more background info, check it out.

Healthy food for kids

A week ago I was in Mark Laham's Yin Yoga class and I was really feeling it quite intensely, but what gave me and even stronger and longer-lasting emotion was something that he said about the youth of today and their unhealthy lifestyles when he was talking about his attempts at teaching some teenage boys . I'm not really exposed to these children who have grown up in what I consider a "toxic culture" very often anymore, so it's not in my face very much, but I often feel this extrordinary weight of knowing just how unhealthy our society has become. With recent stories in the CBC news like School food not making the grade, says report I think it's pretty obvious that the toxic culture has run wild. One of my goals in life is to share information and practices with youth that are healthy and empowering (i.e. the circus arts and eventually, yoga).

Healthy food is and interest of mine as well, and I feel blessed have had parents that were health-concious. So, when I saw the episode of one of my favourite podcasts ever, Deconstructing Dinner, entitled Organic Daycare, I excitedly queued it up as the soundtrack to my dish-washing session. I was quite enspired by the featured initiatives (described on the page), especially that of the Alligator Pie Preschool program, where young children were taught how to grow organic vegetables, and how to cook them, with guests from various cultures explaining how to cook the dishes from their respective homelands. Ahhh, I love it ! It's very much akin to this idea I had of creating some internet videos where I would be a kooky character that would teach kids how to cook healthy meals. Due to my high standards, I've decided to put this one on the back burner, so to speak, until I learn more about acting (and cooking), but it may just bubble up in the future.

But for now: parents and caregivers, if you're looking for a great place to introduce your kids to healthy food, the Simply Raw Potlucks are very child-friendly place to start, and the next one is a Halloween costume party !

Conspiracy theory .... what's the use ?

So, after writing about the conspiracy theory story, I was feeling rather vulnerable, considering that this blog is connected to my Facebook account, and even my mom reads it. Also, I am working to become a child care giver, and I don't want parents to think that I'm going to "brainwash" their kids; I want to be as honest and upfront with parents as possible about the values I am willing to impart, and I never wish to betray their will towards their kids. I have no desire to convince children that the world is a scary evil place that's out to get them. In fact, I'm a rather strong believer in "pronoia"(coined by John Perry Barlow, founder of the EFF) and exemplified in Rob Brezny's book Pronoia Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.

But, here, I'm not looking to deny my belief in such theories, but maybe just give them a little contex. I still hold to the belief that certain conspiracy theories have truth in them (for example, the theory that our government is dumping loads of wierd chemicals into our air supply using jets that cast what are known as "chemtrails" seem undeniable after watching the movie Aerosol Crimes).

Rather, I ask myself, what is the use of entertaining these possibilities ? Well, I think that one reason I might want to entertain them is to prove that our government is not to be trusted, and that we as a socially responsible people need to invent new ways of organizing our society. For me, that means building communities that are more self-sufficient. So much of our time and our needs are tied up in our governments and the global economy, and to me that is a precarious place for those people -- many/all of which I love -- to be in. That is because I believe that our governments and our economy are unjust and unsustainable. To entertain the notion that our economy is unsustainable, one might want to watch Money as Debt, or even The Money Masters (which I haven't got to yet).

BUT, it occurs to me that rousing people to take action our of fear, using scare tactics, is really an attempt to enslave minds, to convince them that there's no other choice if we want to survive. And that will ultimately lead to the same situation which I am attempting to overcome, that in which citizens do not have control of the decisions that are being made on behalf of us. So with that, I'd like to entertain some inspiring realities out of LOVE for their manifestations....

Pronoia and conspiracy theory

The bad news: a group of secret elites called the Illuminati are operating on the higest levels of societal control to oppress the masses, and in fact extinguish most of the worlds population. The SARS epidemic was engineered by them to wipe out a large amount of the Chinese population. All of the major financial institutions which control the money supply are controled by them. They have ocupied presidency of the U.S. most of the time. Yes, sounds crazy, but read on...

The good news: a Chinese secret society of six time's the size of the Illuminati is threatening the members of these conspirators with a grand ultimatium: immediately cease their attempts to manifest an armageddon on earth, or face sudden death, one by one.

To for a quick read on the story, check out Chinese Secret Society Challenges Illuminati. If you want to get the full details, listen to this interview, and be ready to be blown out of the water.

I've learned a lot about the politics of oppression since I came to Ottawa, but I never really dug into all of the conspiracy theory stuff thus far. I guess the stuff that they don't hide has been appaling enough. But a friend of mine has done a lot of research on these kinds of things, and he's the one who passed me a copy of this interview. While laying in my bed listening to it, at first, I was rather boggled and disoriented, being one who finds it difficult to keep track of stories, people, placess, times, and all of the links, and not having much of a background on the topic. But I was patentient enough to sit through my discomforts, partly due to the fact that I have high esteem for the person who passed it on to me, and he conveyed sincerely a grand importance in it.

Eventually I calmed down enough to lie down in my bed, which is when the interviewee started telling "the good news". Such a grand sense of relief came over me, I felt radiant with energy. At one point, I was cheering with joy. But I didn't loose my sense or responsability in healing, in fact, just the opposite. I know that once they "gouge the eye of the pyramid out", there's going to be a lot of mess to clean up... and that's where the metaphor of alchemy serves us well.