Did Rage Against the Machine change the World?

You know what would be awesome - instead of voicing the problems we face in this world why not sing the solutions. I was am a big Rage fan, and even through singing and playing their songs I did not actually “hear’’ the message. One of my Favorite songs from them is “Bullet in your Head” - They had a message and they tried haring that message, but without an actual solution. All this does is create more anger and more Rage. 

It’s like “Yea man, I see that I’m being told what to do, the system got me, I’m angry about it,  thanks for letting me know”. I did not go a step further and ask myself “What can I do about it?”.  

So yes – this is a far better than the shit we hear on the radio and the message that RATM represented is still a millions time better than the Shit we call music these days, but in the end it did not change anything significantly – they did not have an impact in the world. 

They did however have an impact on the individual level, planting the seeds of questioning WTF is going on in the world so from that perspective it’s awesome – but they did not present any real solutions. They had the following they had the power, but they also did not know what to do to bring real change. 

From my perspective they did not understand the full problem. Yes, people are being manipulated and brainwashed in the name of capitalism and control and are being screwed “by the man” – BUT that is not the real problem. The problem is that all the problems we face in this world are created by US – we the people – Humanity. We created  the system, the machine so its time to top raging against ourselves.  It’s all the result of our human nature – what we see in this world is what we all created. It’s our Nature that is destroying us – we are our own worst enemy.

Human Nature is the problem. You change Human Nature you change the world. Now comes the real question: How do you change human nature?

 

Start with yourself.

Day 324: Complaining can be good for you

The thing about complaining is that it’s sooooo easy. Anybody can do it. We have all done it, looked at problems in our lives and complained about it, knowing full well that complaining about something is utterly useless.

So how  then can complaining be good for you?

www.desteni.org

Corruption: Sure we are pissed, But we Still allow it to happen

It happens everywhere and we all know it. But why is this still a thing? When you have large amounts of money and Power mixed with human nature what do we get? Corruption. It makes us angry seeing our taxes pocketed by politicians but what can we actually do to stop this?

http://www.defenceweb.co.za/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=23748:corruption-puts-strain-on-south-africa-budget&catid=54:Governance&Itemid=118

http://ec.europa.eu/anti_fraud/index_en.htm

http://www.transparency.org.uk/corruption/statistics-and-quotes

Day 312 - Disconnected from Nature Are Humans Unatural

I know, I know “ Not another environmental story “. There are so many already and you have probably heard it all before. BUT, If we do not find a solution for the increased disconnectedness we humans have towards Nature then Pretty soon there won’t be a Nature to talk about anymore.

Watch:

Back to Basics With Living Income Guaranteed

Its not so difficult to understand that Humans need water and food in order to live - but why are those not Human Rights?

 https://livingincomeguaranteed.wordpress.com/

Taking Leave may mean the End of your Job - Solutions?

 

 

“It’s like a bachelor party for your career! Or having someone buy you dinner and then assume that means he’s owed sexual intercourse! Anyway, apparently telling people to take a vacation before they come to work for you is becoming a thing now.

Writing this week in Slate, Will Oremus reports on this phenomenon, telling the tale of Jason Freedman, the CEO of a San Francisco-based commercial real estate search engine company called 42 floors. Freedman offers what he calls paid “pre-cations” to new hires, explaining, “It’s like, ‘Yeah, have a great time! And when you get back here, work your ass off.’” The point is, that sounds terrible.

As Oremus points out, we are already a vastly overworked nation. We put in considerably more hours than we did a generation ago — and most of us are doing it while facing what the New York Times last year called “flatlined” wages. A new study released last month revealed that Americans take only about half the vacation time they’re entitled to, missing out on the equivalent of “over 500 million” days off a year. Why? Because they’re afraid of repercussions, an anxiety reinforced by what MarketWatch notes is “company culture and lack of encouragement from management to take time off.” People are reluctant to take vacations for fear they’ll be revealed as expendable.” See more at http://www.salon.com/2014/10/01/the_pre_vacation_is_a_trap/

Well now, what a problem we have here. In the article above you can see how taking paid leave is something that most people simply cannot do, because it could mean the end of their job. Getting a job is a big problem in this world and when you do have a job you will do anything to keep it, because you need the money to survive in this world.

This gives employers power over the employees. There are many people looking for jobs, so if you are deemed replaceable you will simply be replaced. So if it means you have works your ass off every day and not take any leave then there is nothing you can do about it unless you risk getting fired. This leads to bad work situations and over worked, overstressed employees. This will only get worse unless something changes.

A solution that will end this fear and anxiety of losing a job if you take your leave which you are in fact entitled to would be the Living Income Guaranteed. This will give power to the employees and create a dignified work environment. With the minimum wage being double the Living income people will have enough money to live. This will stop the abuse of employees, because they could simply leave and find a better place to work so the employer will need to treat his employees with care to keep them working there.

Workers will feel supported and cared for by their employers, which will result in individuals that no longer feel pressured and enforced to only be a profit-making machine, but will feel happy and content to realize that their work is being truly remunerated and that their time and contribution to the corporation is being valued as the life-time investment it actually is. A well remunerated individual will create a happier and fulfilled society that is no longer afraid of not having sufficient money to feed their family, it will be the beginning of a new era of quality work that dignifies the lives of human beings that genuinely desire to improve their lifestyles.

Day 206: SA Matric Pass rate a shame for South Africans

 

The results came back for the 2013 Matric pass rate. Many articles and newspapers and even the president celebrates the fact that the pass rate is above 75%. This is apparent proof that the government has helped improved education in South Africa. What some may not realize is that over the past few years the government has decreased the pass mark all the way down to 30% - meaning that you only need 30% to pass an exam. So, by lowering the pass rate you increase the amount of people that passes Matric. Yet – even with only needing 30% to pass an exam 25% of pupils failed. About 1.2million grade 1 students were registered, but only about 550000 of those made it all the way to grade 12.

The question is what can you as a student do with a very low pass mark? Who would want to employ you? How are you going to get into universities? It is a big problem.

There are so many factors involved as to why students do badly in school. It could be the actual student not studying enough. It could be teachers that are ineffective or schools ill equipped to effectively teach children. The whole school curriculum across South Africa is not good enough.

The pass rate should be increased to 50%. This means if you do not know more than half of what you study – then you do not know it and should redo it. In the long run it will produce higher educated people. But the whole education system will have to be changed for this to work.

Another big problem is that even with very high matric marks, the chances that you will find a job is very slim.

Now there is a new proposal being suggested where no student can fail a grade more than once. So when you fail a grade a second time – you automatically pass to the next grade. Basically you can pass matric by simply failing twice. This is unbelievable, but this is something they want to implement which will mean we will have many people finishing their education – by knowing nothing.

The education problem is becoming worse – not improving at all. Everything that is being done by the government only makes things worse. It is time we find solutions to bring about higher educated students – and not settle for the bare minimum requirements.

SimCity 2013 – a Broken Game

 

Many years ago I played this awesome game called SimCity 200. It is a game where get a massive square plot and you, the Mayor, build and manage a massive city. You need to supply your city with power, water and other necessities in order to have a functioning city full of satisfied people. It was a fun game. I recently started playing the new SimCity – SimCity 2013 also called SimCity 5 and here are my conclusions of this game.

At first when I heard the news that there was going to be a new SimCity released I was excited. As far as City building games go Maxis always did a good job. I did not get the game when it was first released – mostly due to the DRM – must be always online to be able to play the game which is a new disappointing feature in the SimCity franchise. Also – there were massive problems with their servers when the game launched.

So, after several months and game patches later I decided to play the game. At first it was a good game, but then the more I played the more I noticed that the game is actually broken. Traffic makes the game unplayable – once your city grows big cars get stuck in traffic and the city falls apart, because the fire trucks can’t get to the burning buildings and the ambulances can’t get to injured Sims. People have been complaining about the traffic and the creators have released patches that did improve the traffic flow, but it is still not right. MAXIS released a blog called “State of SimCity” and had this to say about traffic:

“ Traffic was always meant to be a challenge; in fact, many of our team considered traffic to be a strategy game all on its own. But, in reality, traffic was behaving irrationally. We got the player feedback and fixed it.”

Traffic is not fixed. Another problem is trying to find a balance between available jobs and workers. I have tried to find a balance and have not succeeded. I have low wealth Sims leaving my city, because they can’t find work, at the same time I have low wealth work places complaining they need workers. It doesn’t make sense!

Great works also do not work that great. There are syncing issues with different city plots to the Great works were some city plots can’t see the great work. I have built the International Airport and it would say my city benefits with 600 high wealth tourist, but then I cannot find any high wealth tourists in my city even though it is primed for them. Many others have complained about this glitch.

The main issue with SimCity 2013 is the small plot size you get to build your city – it is far too small and should at least be double the size. It is a constant struggle to find space to plop your buildings and almost always you have to sacrifice/bulldoze parts of you City in order to place necessary buildings. The fact is that the map sizes must be larger to make SimCity 2013 an enjoyable experience. MAXIS had this to say :

“City sizes have been a constant point of conversation among our players since we released the game. The game’s original design focused on the density of an intimate urban environment. It was about intercity connectivity and the challenge of managing a region of cities instead of one metropolis in isolation.”

Unfortunately traffic makes it impossible for cities to interconnect. You end up having a massive traffic jam on the highway before the cars even reach your city, because there is only one road coming into your city. They designed the game to be interconnected, but the game mechanics keeps it from working properly. The sad disappointed here is that MAXIS revealed the fact that:

“ I confirm that we will not be providing bigger city sizes…”

No Bigger city sizes for SimCity 2013 ever. Very sad indeed. They are releasing DLC “Cities of tomorrow” where you build futuristic Cities and has a new feature where you can expand upwards into the sky, but not outwards like we all want. To me that seems very sneaky of them, knowing full well we want more space to build and then release this DLC that we have to pay for.

I am sure there are many angry SimCity fans out there right now. I enjoyed SimCity 200, but the SimCity 2013 is ultimately a disappointment. The Game has so much potential to be excellent, but the game plays like an unfinished beta version. They released the game too soon with far too many glitches. Why? I do not know. Some say EA is to blame for pushing MAXIS to release the game early to make money, for profit. Whatever the reason – they gave us a broken, unfinished game that needed more time to get the glitches sorted. That is my conclusion of the game SimCity 2013.

Cant always get what you want - but if you try you'll get what you need...

 

There is a song that goes "You can't always get what you want, but if you try real hard you'll get what you need". Nope, not true.

With 3 Billion in poverty and billions more struggling to make a living even if you try really hard you can't even get what you need. You need food, a home and water at least to be alive yet many do not have these basic human rights. So the sentence is misleading.

Poverty doesn't  exist because people are lazy - there simply are not enough jobs available to make a decent living. People work hard - even to death just to able to feed themselves or their family. There are horrific jobs people are forced into just to make money. It always comes down to money or rather the lack thereof.

There is definitely enough food, in fact there is enough food being produced today globally to feed 12 billion people. That is a lot of food,  then why are more than 1 billion starving with a  food surplus enough for an additional 5 billion people? Well, the people do not have money to buy the food and so the food gets thrown away.

What about water? Companies like coca-cola that mass produce "diabetes-in-a-can" and other drinks require large amount of water and to get the water they claim lakes and rivers and what-not fencing it of and making it illegal for anybody else to get to that water. You have countries where people live right next to a water treatment plant, but cannot drink the water because they cannot pay for it. So they suffer.

Having a Living Income  would end all of this suffering. If people had money to buy the things they need like food and water and housing you would have no starving, no thirsty or homeless people. And that is one of the   principles of the Living Income Guaranteed proposal -  to make sure everybody has their basic human rights and actually  get what they need.   

Desteni Is a Principle - Not one Person

 

I have grown immensely ever since being part of the Desteni Process. There are many people part of this process and today I am going to give the spotlight on 2 people namely myself and Bernard.

I am sitting here looking for words to express how grateful I am for all the support I have received over the years from Desteni and Bernard, but no words really comes close. I have changed over the years – to go from a shy, silent type, with zero leadership skills to a person who works with people and has developed leadership and communication skills. This was something I thought I would never achieve in my life – being able to lead.

I have also developed a point of stability within myself. Before, I was so unsure of myself –always doubting myself and my abilities and mostly avoiding people. I had so much fear of the future and worried about it. The point of stability that I have is that I realized: no matter what comes my way – no matter what happens and no matter what I face – I am able to get past it, I am able to get through it. It may be difficult or something I have never faced before, but I trust myself that I am able to deal with it.

Now, you the reader may not fully grasp just how amazing this achievement is for someone like me, because you do not know who I was and how I was. I believed Self-trust was impossible for me, yet here I am. This is what Desteni is all about – YOURSELF! This is something that is greatly misunderstood by the cyberbullies and haters – I can attest to the fact that what they write are but opinions and beliefs based on …nothing substantial, because I write from over 8 years hands-on experience with walking and living the Desteni Tools as well as living with Bernard. I write from actual facts – with me as the living proof. I don’t know about you the reader, but I only go by facts.

The facts are these:

I have changed. I have developed a strength within myself that I never thought possible. And I did that myself. When you build something out of wood like a table you need tools, right? You will need a hammer and nails as tools to build this particular table. So once you are done building you say “I built this myself” – of course you could not have done this without the hammer and nails, you could not have built the table without the tools. This is what Desteni is – A tool to use to support and assist yourself to grow and build yourself. Who is Bernard within all of this? Here was a man that decided not to accept poverty, war, suffering , abuse and greed and all those fucked up things in this world as just something that is ‘acceptable’ / ‘the way life is supposed to be’ / ‘how humans have always been and will be’. See, we all simply say that suffering is a part of life – Bernard said it is unacceptable.

He lived his life investigating everything and kept what is good. He actually cared. Remember caring is not a feeling – caring is an action. He lived to find ways for all humans and animals to never suffer again. What he found as one of the problems is obviously humans – we cause the suffering of animals and to each other. So to change the world is to change the human and he started with himself. Then he shared what he found. He lived by a principle – to live according to what is best for all. People get confused when they read or hear “ best for all” – as if it is something alien and impossible. But it is simple – would you say that hurting another is what is best for all? No. Would you say that having water, housing and food is what is best for all? Yes

Desteni is a group of people living by a principle – not by one person. Bernard is dead, but that does not change Desteni – Desteni is a group dedicating our lives to find ways to change this world into a place where suffering and abuse is non-existent. People say it is impossible, because that is very easy to say. They say it is unrealistic, because it is easy to say that – then they do not have to change who they are or do anything to MAKE it Possible. I have done the Impossible for myself with the TOOLS of Desteni. Impossible is the words I’m possible. Living by a principle of what is best for all is probably the most difficult thing you can face – that is why people turn to slander, because they are afraid to live like that. So – if you are dedicated and have guts and actually care about the billions that suffer as you read these words then join us. I am the living proof and fact of how effective the Desteni tools are.

It is not impossible to end suffering and abuse.

Join us