We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Friday, December 4, 2015

Syrians Who Fled ISIS’s Capital Say They Were Trapped By Fear And Desperation

Click here to access article by Mike Giglio and Munzer al-Awad from BuzzFeed News

The authors provide a very graphic report of migrants fleeing from an ISIS held territory in Syria which could very well serve as an illustration of why migrants are now flooding into Europe from the Middle East. While terrorist incidents in Paris, San Bernadino, Boston, etc capture headlines in the West, people in this region experience terrorism daily either from terrorist organizations or attacks from Russian and Western bombing raids.