mastodon 4.5.18He/They. Democratic Movement Educator/Organizer. #SolidarityEconomy #Cooperatives #Commoning #MondragonUniversity #GEO #Jinkore #rollingearth #farm_club
So glad I reached out to a farmer/organizer friend for advice on a challenging co-op organizing question. She doesn't have a lot of co-op experience but is a longtime grassroots organizer. She asked excellent questions and that helped me focus on the key issues. I had done the same for her a week ago.
#cooperatives #organizing #care_work
Freshened up the straw mulch under the heirloom tomatoes. They're susceptible to diseases and often come out cracked and and scarred, but delicious. On this farm we stay on top of pruning and trellising and it makes harvesting so much better, even though I need a ladder...
#sun_mountain_farm_club
If you are in NYC on October 7th, a documentary I co-directed decades ago - Domsey An Grèv - is being shown as part of the Nou Akoma Nou Sinèji festival.
NOU Schedule – Dominicans Love Haitians Movement
https://dominicanslovehaitians.com/nou-schedule/
Will Shuster: Un Hombre
The shadows caught my eye.
Tabling at the cooperative farmers market. I made purslane pesto to give away.
#sun_mountain_farm_club
Put out the word to some local friends to see if they want to go in on an Equal Exchange order. Running low on co-op coffee beans. Glad to see Palestinian olive oil is back.
https://shop.equalexchange.coop/collections/olive-oil-medjool-dates/products/organic-olive-oil-500
Opened up Pedagogia da Solidaridade to a random page (94):
Walter de Oliveira: E tudo isso, perda de esperança, fatalismo, e consequentemente ausencia de luta, apatia, falta de solidaridade, são úteis para a perpetuação da realidade como está, das estructuras sociais injustas, da opressão.
...
Paulo Freire: Por que a globalização tem que implicar na total impossibilidade de transformar a realidade? Será possivel que a tecnologia tenha que possuir tanto poder sobre nós, apesar de nós a termos criado? Torna-se uma excelente questão para ser formulada, se os robos de amanhã estarão comandando os seres humanos que os criaram, no submetando a seu poder. As respostas a estas questãos não podem ser previstas pela tecnologia. Terão que vir de nós, seres humanos, utilizando nossas consciencias críticas. ... O problema da tecnologia, então, não é tecnologico, mas político.
Good GEO.coop collective meeting tonight. I was reminded of this really interesting report created by the ICA Youth Committee in 2021?
https://globalyouth.coop/en/coopspring/introduction-what-it-how-use-it
Picked five bags of corn and some onions for a farmer in Avondale who had a heat stroke episode a few weeks back. Beautiful peaceful morning.
#sun_mountain_farm_club
Good #NoKings turnout in Colorado Springs. Always a joy to see a huge black pickup roll by with FUCK TRUMP flags flying.
I am a fan, subscriber, and contributor to the new @GEO_Collective@social.coop print journal.
Maybe my favorite part of cooking beans is going through and removing bits of clay that inevitably find their way in. This is a mix of Anasazi and Pinto beans. (Can you find the clay bit?)
I want to share easy, attractive worker co-op educational materials with my co-workers to help people prepare to write bylaws. I just looked at Start.coop and LA Co-op Lab. Both are good, the former uses a "canvas" model to guide people through the relevant questions. The latter offers beautifully designed guides that you can see online. But I am hesitant to use either because I think they make assumptions (e.g. a board/member structure) where they should just ask questions. That's why I was so excited by How to Create a Solidarity Enterprise by @luisrazeto@social.coop. Having used that text, I can say that the approach works and creates real cooperators. The challenge is to make it pithy and pretty, without sacrificing depth...
Just sent off the final chapter of #cooperative_enterprise_and_Market_Economy by @luisrazeto@social.coop to GEO's constant web gardener @GuerillaOntologist@social.coop
This is an odd book. Its central proposition – that the market is to be “perfected” – looks like some kind of Chicago School fantasy but turns out to be a call for radical social, economic, political and cultural transformation. What appears to be a proof of the economic viability of the cooperative enterprise, turns out to be an argument for the potential of cooperativism, as part of a larger movement of movements, to constitute a force capable of overcoming the crisis of the State by re-founding political democracy on new, distributed and democratic foundations.
The bear cubs are play fighting in the field across the street while mama lounges and keeps watch.
Just had a great conversation with @leogaggl@social.coop and @lynnfoster@social.coop about value flows, recipes, cooperation, MRV, OFN, DFC and more! Another aspect of the fediverse, and especially social.coop, that I have come to relish and count on.
Please forward.
There is conversation about a proposed gathering of collectively/cooperatively/democratically run Mastodon instances.
As @natematias@social.coop has pointed out, this conversation needs to start with #bipoc, #lgbtqia+, and other people who have been (and continue to be) attacked in social media spaces.
If you are running a #Black, #BIPOC, #LGBTQIA+ or other instance, does a gathering of collective/cooperative instances seem useful to you?
https://app.element.io/#/room/#democratic-fediverse:matrix.org
Happy #Internationale Workers Day!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGZHPjowC28
Another good day on the farm, mostly bed prep., spreading compost, tilthing, laying drip tape. #sun_mountain_farm_club
Good to remember that Venezuela is also home to one of the most successful cooperative networks in the world: #Cecosesola, demonstrating the capacity of the people to "run" their economy.
We got our greeting cards from Papeton Printing Cooperative. Art and logo by my coworkers Jenny and Al. Hoping to raise more money this year. Other farm news: looks like I will be on BCS duty soon, prepping vegetable beds. I've heard those two wheeled tractors are a handful.
#sun_mountain_farm_club
Joyeux Germinal!
"Encore, encore, de plus en plus distinctement, comme s’ils se fussent rapprochés du sol, les camarades tapaient."
Easter daisy in bloom near Cañon City
Does anyone know what legal entity is used by La Via Campesina? I assume it is some form of Association under Belgian law, but I don't know.
@GEO_Collective@social.coop is running a #poetry slam as a fundraiser on May the fourth. It's really about the #solidarityeconomy, but bring what makes this life worth living for you!
(Why May 4th? That's the date of the worker demonstration at #Haymarket Square in Chicago that May Day commemorates.)
Tickets: https://www
eventbrite.com/e/grassroots-poetry-slam-tickets-1984979006643
More about GEO: geo.coop
Here on the front range, the bears are back and scruffy.
My friend Sam Farber on the state of US - #Cuba relations.
Samuel Farber | The Art of the Deal, Havana Edition
https://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2026/april/the-art-of-the-deal-havana-edition
Baby steps. First @geosocialcoop@social.coop poetry "slam" (more like a hug?) was a joy, and meaningful in interesting ways -- the choices of poems, the flow, the reactions, the laughter. Many people read their own work, which was great.