David DeGraw

How I Became an “Activist”

This piece is part of my training to get back into fighting form for the forthcoming Worldwide Wave. Think of it as hitting the heavy bag or a mental sparring match in preparation for scaling those divide & conquer walls and traps of negativity that hold us back. It’s also a form of self-exploratory therapy, a flowing stream of consciousness. Let me know what you think. What parts need improvement? What parts inspire you? Your critique will be incredibly helpful.
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How I Became an “Activist”

I don’t consider myself to be a progressive, libertarian, conservative, liberal, democrat or republican. I’m not a capitalist, communist, socialist or anarchist. I leave all those outdated labels to the academics and the divide and conquer propagandists. Those labels are all shortcuts to dismissal; they amputate critical thinking skills and shift the focus off of the substance of the message and the immense common ground we all actually share. Whatever political ideology or groupthinking box you surrender your freethinking mind to, we all have much more in common than we acknowledge.

We are freedom-seeking people who want to enjoy life. We want our kids, family and friends to grow up and live in a healthy environment with us, to have the freedom to follow our passions and fulfill our potential. We all want to live in a community that enhances our potential. So when I saw unhealthy outcomes surround me, I began to analyze them and look for root causes. This primarily led me to politics and economics generally, more specifically the creation of money, the global banking system and the corrupting influence of money in politics.

After doing intense research, I began reporting on my findings. I used to edit and write investigative reports exposing corruption in politics and economics. My focus on reporting what was happening without adhering to any one particular ideology or pre-existing groupthink led to the reports becoming popular on a wide diversity of sites, millions of people read them. I found fulfillment in exposing what I consider to be the root causes of problems that limit our potential. At the time, I felt people needed to know how corrupt our system had become. After awareness had spread - now you can’t jump on social media without seeing people posting on the corruption - continuing to just report on the corruption seemed to be a form of mental masturbation, merely a way to make an income. It seemed in just explaining the problems, the awareness was growing but not much at all was really changing. In fact, the suffering of those around me kept getting worse.

I became overwhelmed with a sense of futility. What is the sense in constantly reporting on the same people doing the same scandalous things? I began to feel like a person who was reporting on a serial killer. You report that this person killed that person, this is how they did it and this is how they will continue to do it. People say you are doing a good job and pat you on the back, but then when the killer strikes again, you report on it again, the cycle starts all over and the killer continues his spree. What is the point? At some point you have to stand up and do something about it. You can’t just keep reporting on it, you have to stop the killer. So I started organizing people. That’s how I became an “activist,” if that’s what you want to call it. I see it as being a freedom fighter. This will sound grandiose, and how effective I am at it is an open question, but ultimately I see myself as a person who fights for a society that increases enjoyment, fulfillment, empowerment and maximizes our potential.

I discovered that a small percentage of the population has $50 trillion in wealth. I also realized that the average person has no comprehension of how much money that truly is, and how just a mere fraction of that staggering amount of wealth could vastly evolve society, for the benefit of all. Once you understand the shortsightedness of this and fully realize the implications of this concentration of wealth, there really is no turning back. It is the greatest crime against humanity. Once you understand this massive injustice, and see the needless suffering of many of the people around you, the people you care about most, you begin to think how this could have ever happened. I’m all for personal responsibility, that plays a role, but this is clearly systemic, a system of exploitation is in place.

You start wondering how this system came to be, how it works. How did we end up with a system overrun with corruption and dominated by shortsighted greed? Then you begin to see how the mainstream media is truly the greatest weapon of oppression humanity has ever known. Even the most independent minded people vastly underestimate how propagandized and conditioned we all are. From cradle to grave, we are repetitiously programmed into a mental prison. The modern paradigm is built on relentless repetition. Repetitive thoughts fill our mental atmosphere, we are immersed in the climate of repetitive ideas. It’s what the advertising industry has always understood; nothing influences the mind more than repetition.

It’s bullshit on repetition and censorship by omission. The repetition drives us and the censorship makes sure we don’t veer off course and awaken our conscious thoughts for too long. The more important something is, the less it’s reported on in the mainstream press. The censorship that we have today is the most dangerous form. Not the censorship of explicit words, sex or violence, but the censorship of any thoughts outside of the prevailing corporate ideology. Any thoughts that deviate from the status quo are not allowed into mass consciousness.

People are systematically bred to be consumers and wage slaves, merely cogs in a shortsighted, greed-addicted machine. That sounds harsh, but it is the truth. The modern paradigm is neo-feudalism. The statistics and facts, the proof is overwhelming on this. I don’t think of it as some dark conspiracy theory. There are dark conspiracies, but more than anything I see it as the outcome of the clash between human nature, civilization and technology. In my view, it really does come down to human nature. That’s why I think talking about capitalism, socialism and communism is a waste of time. All of those ideologies started out as systems people thought would enhance freedom and prosperity at the time, but after a while they all became outdated and started to limit freedom and descended into oligarchy. It’s the Iron Law of Oligarchy. Once people achieve freedom or success, they tend to get complacent and power then begins to concentrate and corruption and injustice is the outcome. You get what we have now, a paradigm that has outlived its usefulness. Things get too concentrated, corruption reigns and a critical mass suffers, then the masses rise up and freedom begins to grow again. This is an oversimplification of course, just a general ebb and flow that plays out to varying degrees.

The scary part though, this time around, our technological capabilities, our enhanced ability to consume and destroy; our shortsighted greed may have outpaced our long-term thinking, our humanity. That’s the pessimistic view. I’m feeling optimistic now though. As painful as the past few years have been, and as steep as the many challenges we face moving forward are, I feel an erratic sense of excitement and optimism about the future. It’s the old “darkest before the dawn” line. History has demonstrated that it only takes 3.5% of the population engaging in non-violent activism to create positive, significant and meaningful change. The awareness level, the awareness that things are moving in the wrong direction is so widespread now. More and more people are turning to activism of some kind. A few sparks will set the evolution ablaze.

Changing the corrupt political and economic system that is currently in place is not rocket science. Those in power want you to think that it is, but it really is very basic. We are almost at a critical mass on many fronts, just by people doing what they can in their personal lives “to be the change.” Being the change we need to see, in your personal life, is a needed first step that many people are now taking. What I’m after though is making those changes the cool thing to do on a mass scale, to infiltrate and subvert the propaganda system that has dumbed us down and shift it to an enlightening and empowering force. For all the exploitation and injustice within the modern system, it wouldn’t take much to alter it from a tool of exploitation to a tool of empowerment.

Media is becoming much more decentralized now, and that is a very healthy thing. However, we still have the 800-pound gorilla, the mainstream media Goliath dominating mass consciousness, so along with growing new media we also need to focus on ways to co-opt the dominant mainstream propaganda system. You then ask, “How can we make that happen?” In my experience, the best way to do that is to create a stir on the ground, to engage in actions that the mainstream media cannot ignore. Even if they do ignore them, if the actions are large and consistent enough, we can create so much buzz online now, it will further expose the mainstream media’s complicity in oppression and propaganda, and help speed up traditional media’s decline.

Another wave of mass protests and rallies on the ground, in public, in our communities will spark the shift in consciousness that it will take to push us toward a freedom that provides widespread health and prosperity. Activism is at the core a marketing strategy, its psychological operations. It’s a way of countering conditioned consciousness. You empower people by showing them that you are not going to just let corruption and injustices happen, you are not going to take it and they don’t have to either. You let people know that they are not alone. The mainstream media makes people feel as if they are suffering in isolation. The overwhelming majority of us are suffering in isolation. Once we break through the false sense of isolation and the feeling of futility that it creates, we will unleash the unstoppable power we have in numbers. It doesn’t matter how much money and weapons those in power have, they are weak compared to an awakened and organized nonviolent population. Without the consent and participation of the population, they have no real power. Once the majority realizes this, the handful of corrupt people who are presently running our lives will be quickly swept into the dustbin of history.

The corrupt know how powerful nonviolent direct action activism is in the current environment because the propaganda system is collapsing. Propaganda doesn’t work very well when people can’t pay their bills. There is presently a critical mass of aware citizens; all we need is a few consistent sparks. That’s why the police state cracked down so harshly on the Occupy Movement. Occupy was on the verge of becoming a serious popular uprising. We were creating a powerful sense of community. People participating felt like they had a voice and the solidarity and support of a compassionate community. That is a key element that is missing from the oppressive and dehumanizing corporatization of society. We were creating a subculture of transformation that people could easily become part of. Thousands of these camps quickly sprung up and they were driven more by a sense of community than they were any one particular political agenda. We overcame the divide and conquer propaganda by just involving anyone, regardless of what their propaganda driven political beliefs, perspectives and preconceptions were. By focusing on the community and subcultural aspects, we were a lot closer to sparking a revolution and inspiring a significant societal evolution than most people realized.

All it took was about 300 people deciding that they were going to peacefully occupy a small park in New York, and a few instances of police brutality against these nonviolent people. That small action dramatically changed the political debate and sent shockwaves throughout the world. We can do something like that again, and we will soon. I’m very confident that we now know several effective ways to do it.

The bottomline, in my view, we need to make people see how they are looking at life through the rearview mirror. They are basing their view of the present situation on their understanding of past situations. Thanks to the conditioning process of the mainstream media, most people don’t understand the paradigm shift that has occurred. They don’t fully grasp how much wealth there really is. They underestimate the technological capacity we now have to distribute wealth, resources and services much more efficiently and effectively. The capacity for evolution and change, due to the advancement of technology, can deliver us a very dramatic shift toward mass freedom, more substantially and swiftly than anything that has been experienced before. We can make it happen. The modern oligarchy is collapsing. Another small uprising will trigger the needed mass support to finally make the advancements in society that we should have made a generation ago.

So that’s why I’m an “activist” now. We need to infect people with radical positivity. We need to inspire and empower people to snap them out of this propagandized and beaten mindset that they are repetitiously imprisoned into. We need to jam the repetitious low frequency conditioning that contracts mass consciousness. We need to expand awareness and transcend conditioned consciousness by lighting sparks of freedom and empowerment, by setting brush fires in the mass mind. We can show people that another world is not only possible, it’s happening.

That’s what the Occupy Movement briefly did for the people who took part in it. It was a consciousness-expanding phenomenon. All these free radicals appeared inside the conditioning machine. They shined brightly within the dreary environment of people’s oppressive daily lives. Occupy was a splinter in the mind that slightly shifted mass consciousness. It cracked open the window and let a flickering light in. Occupy was the opening act, the awakening wave. For those of us who are paying attention, there is clearly another wave forming. That’s why I’m now focusing on the Worldwide Wave of Action. A Worldwide Wave of Transformation is coming this spring. We are on the cusp of an unprecedented evolutionary leap forward. I’m not talking about a utopia; I’m talking about a dramatic increase in empowerment and freedom. That’s what this is all about.

The more you take action, the more empowered you feel. You don’t need to have all the answers and some precise predefined outcome agreed upon beforehand. Change and evolution have never come about that way. You just need to stir things up, create a nonviolent groundswell and positive change will organically arise. Out of action, answers, solutions and a sense of purpose and fulfillment emerge. Your positive actions become contagious, you begin to radiate at a powerful frequency. You become infectious in the most positive way. Don’t take my word for it. Try it out for yourself.

by David DeGraw

Worldwide Wave Begins to Take Shape

When I pressed play on the new Anonymous Worldwide Wave of Action video, the voice of Martin Luther King rang out crystal clear with a message that could not be timelier, “We have come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.”

Just then, I thought someone had dropped acid into my coffee, maybe I was still overly weary from my cross-country trek, or perhaps I slipped into a vortex and was transported into a new dimension. As Dr. King said, “I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom,” he became distorted and morphed into an Anonymous masked man. I had fallen down the rabbit hole and entered Wonderland, as Anon MLK declared, “Let freedom ring!”

From there, an Anonymous voice took over and delivered much of the now well-known Worldwide Wave call to action. Our Anonymous friends certainly know how to keep it creative, fun and fresh. The Worldwide Wave has already inspired several other videos (see some here, here, here & here) and has just launched a new organizing site at WaveOfAction.org.

The first phase of the Worldwide Wave is set to begin on the anniversary of King’s assassination, April 4th, and run through July 4th. The organizing site has a Post Actions function that allows people to easily share what they are planning to do, along with a map that shows active locations. To get the ball rolling, they have featured a few action campaigns that will run throughout the full three-month cycle:

1) Worldwide Wave Launch gatherings will be held on April 4th at Zuccotti Park and former occupation sites throughout the world.
2) On Mondays – Thursdays, they are calling for Move Your Money Bank Rallies. They are asking people to show up at local bank locations and Federal Reserve sites to encourage people to move their money to community banks and handout information on alternative currencies and new economic systems.
3) Every Friday they are planning Money Out Marches to local City Halls calling for a Constitutional Amendment to get money out of politics.
4) On Saturdays, they are calling for “social events in support of solutions.”
5) On Sundays, they are calling for mass meditations and prayer sessions “in support of ushering in a new paradigm.”

Getting money out of politics and participating in alternative economic systems, with a meditative spiritual layer this time around, are the initial priorities. In my opinion, an increased focus on rallying around solutions, as opposed to just protesting what we are against is a necessary step. I also think a spiritual component is a much needed addition to radical activism. However, as the call to action states, this will be a decentralized crowdsourced movement open to all willing to engage in a wide diversity of nonviolent tactics. These actions are clearly just the beginning. It will be interesting to see what actions people will post and how this evolves. As their homepage says:

“Be the change. What are you waiting for? This is your movement! Let's create a culture of transformation. Share an action or event that you are organizing. Whether it's a large-scale demonstration or a small personal act, tell the world what you are doing to be the change we need to see... (Post Your Action Now)”

The campaign is obviously influenced by the Anonymous and Occupy/99% Movement. Reference to a “Global Spring” that builds on the foundation of these movements provides a powerful opportunity for them to regain momentum and recapture mass consciousness. Considering that the social conditions, economic inequality and corruption of the political process have become even more severe than they were in 2011, when the Occupy Movement was born, these movements will have the chance to apply their battle-tested wisdom and regain their influence on the cultural zeitgeist.

The timing seems right. Many more people are now aware of the injustice and exploitative nature of the present system. Even the new Pope is now reciting from the Gospel of Occupy, and Gartner, the respected technology research firm, has predicted, “A larger-scale version of an Occupy Wall Street-type movement” in 2014. New research also demonstrates that it only takes 3.5% of the population to create significant change. Poll after poll proves that we have the overwhelming majority of people behind us. The facts are already on our side.

To get the more passive people involved, to win their hearts and minds, it will be helpful to have a more positive, inspiring, fun and festive approach. Creating a more compassionate and inclusive culture of transformation is what it’s all about. Radical positivity in the face of such corruption and exploitation, with an overwhelming number of things to be negative about, is definitely not easy to pull off.  As the call to action puts it: “Keep moving forward with an indomitable will, a compassionate spirit and radiate a positive attitude. Moods are contagious. Be passionate and have fun!”

After a winter of planning and organizing, the coming Spring will be ripe for a powerful mass movement to emerge. The latest Wave of Action video states, “If we begin preparing now, a massive spring offensive will lead to a summer of transformation, a fall of the empire and the birth of a new era.”

That may sound like naïve wishful thinking, but the facts demonstrate that it is absolutely possible. If we can just show maturity by organizing and coordinating in a slightly more coherent and unified fashion, we will be unstoppable...  and our corrupted leaders know it. The more the endangered oligarchy desperately tightens their grip, the more people will rebel and fight for freedom.

The tipping point is near! A critical mass is now engaged, the wind is at our back, the tide is turning and a Wave of Transformation is rising up over the horizon.

See it, feel it, know it, embrace it and become one with it.

“United we will blaze a contagious nonviolent wave of action through mass consciousness.
United we will signal the end of the old world.
United we will usher in a new paradigm.
Now is the time!”

You can find a Wave of Action Facebook page here, a Twitter account here and an EvolveSociety group here.

If you are planning any actions or doing anything in your personal life “to be the change,” be one of the first people to jump on the new Wave of Action site and post your information here.

by David DeGraw