Make your voice heard: Vote.

This summer’s Orion Magazine had a fabulous article in it by Derrick Jensen.  He posits that “personal change doesn’t equal social change.”  Let me explain a little further.  The idea that changing all of our light bulbs to compact fluorescent bulbs or turning the tap off while we brush our teeth is going to *actually* ease the destruction of the earth is grossly overemphasized in our culture.  Simple living, on an individual basis, won’t actually turn around global warming, the loss of water supplies and the degradation of the natural world (“More than 90 percent of the water used by humans is used by agriculture and industry” not by individual homes).    What WILL start to make a difference is stopping the industries that actually do the most harm, stopping the bigger “machines” of our world, taking a political stand.

Jensen asks, “would any sane person think dumpster diving would have stopped Hitler, or that composting would have ended slavery?”  His point being that we need to think on a bigger scale, we need to look beyond just our personal car use and beyond our individual food choices and start getting involved in public transportation issues and what our local schools feed the children of our communities.  These sorts of venues make much larger chunks of change possible.

I’m certainly not saying that we shouldn’t turn the darn lights off in our houses when we’re not using them.  I’m all about feeding my family locally grown food, living with only one car and showing Abby the merits of composting.  What I am saying is that it’s time to get vocal folks.  It’s time to voice opinion, to start listening to local and national and international leaders!  It’s time to demand leaders who will fight for what you believe is right for your community.

I’ve spent the last few months working on my city council election.  Our deputy mayor is up for re-election and I’ve found myself in the midst of monitoring her website, placing campaign signs around town and generally spreading the word that she needs our support.  Dipping my toes into the local political stream has left me stunned.  I am simply amazed at how many people have *no* idea what is happening in our small city.  What’s more distressing to me is how many people just don’t care.

This is all to say that I really hope you vote today.  Non-Presidential year elections have a much lower turn-out than Presidential election years.  I was shocked to see that even last year’s Presidential election only brought out 56.8% of the voting age population, and 2006, a non Presidential year brought a measly 37.1%!!! (Thanks Marc for pointing out those numbers).  We have this fabulous right to tell our leaders what we want for our country, a right that a whole heck of a lot of people fought really hard for.  I really feel like it’s my privilege and duty to exercise that hard-won right.  I feel even more compelled to ask anyone I can to be sure and exercise their right also.

So, yes, by all means *do* recycle that soda can of yours, but more importantly, please vote for leaders that are going to hold industrial America responsible for producing that can in the first place.