Volume I, Issue II
HIGHBRAÜ
WINTER 011
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The NexT FiFTy years
Volume I - Issue II - WINTER 011
Words
IMAGES
MARY ENGEL
CODY BARTZ 15
JESSIE FINKELBERG
13, 14 Adam Dee
8-9 Sasha KOEGLER
2 Jonah FINKELBERG
10-11 MELISSA LUKEZIC & YASMIN KANANI
9 BRONWYN FREY 8, 9
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John G
TALlULA MARIE
16 6-7
Aaron Theman
Eric Moulds
6, 11, 12 7
IAN WILLMS
Jacob J. Pries
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13-14 Elizabeth Scaramucci 12 VINCE STRICKLAND 2 DR. BYRON WILLISTON 4-5
Danielle McRorey 8, 9
Cover: Danielle Mcrorey Back cover: CODY BARTZ
Mark Ciesluk
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EDITORS
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Graham Engel
HIGHBRAUMAGAZINE.COM
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HOW WILL WE FEED OURSELVES IN 50 YEARS? Our future with food. BY VINCE STRICKLAND
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ave you ever seen the 1973 film Soylent Green, staring Charlton Heston? I watched it in grade 10 science class and it had a profound impact on me. The film is a futuristic extrapolation of the world in 50 years to the year 2022. The world is overpopulated, riddled with pollution, the oceans are dying and there is little to no arable soil left. There is no more winter due to the greenhouse effect and the finite resources of the Earth are drastically depleted. The poor population subsists on water rations and rations of a food supplement called Soylent. When I watch this movie and think about the current state of the world, I wonder how far we are from a reality such as this.
In this future, a jar of strawberries will cost you $150.00. A grocery list consisting of 1 tomato, 1 apple, 1 small head of lettuce, 1 celery stick and 3 jars of food totals $279.15. These fictional prices are incredibly inflated compared to the cheap food we have access to currently, so the question becomes: what are the hidden costs of this cheap food? How long will it take for these hidden costs to catch up with us and this fiction to become a reality? Our current conventional factory-farm
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system that sustains a majority of the Western population is depleting our soil quality, polluting our ecosystems and killing our waterways. It is all propped up by an unsustainable dependency on oil, manifested through all the various chemical inputs, machinery, transportation, processing and packaging. I fear that if we do not make some drastic changes soon we will be facing a food crisis in 50 years. If we can no longer rely on cheap oil supplies and do not maintain the capacity to produce our own food, how expensive will our food become? For those who are already living below the poverty line, will they starve in our streets? Will we see widespread famine? Will we be subjected to food rationing? Will we see food riots here in Canada much like the food riots in Argentina in 1989 and West Bengal in 2007, sparked by rising food costs and shortages? If fresh fruits and vegetables become luxuries, how will this affect our health and well-being? Factory meat production is one of the most unsustainable aspects of our current food system, with vast tracks of land being farmed to feed livestock. If you aren’t already a vegetarian, imagine being forced to become one because we can no longer afford to feed our livestock.
uckily we have access to a solution that utilizes our knowledge of nature: organic, ecological farming that enhances soil and significantly reduces our dependency on oil. Sourcing our food from local, organic growers sustains our local economy, enhances our land fertility and, with decreased transportation times, provides fresh, flavourful food. How does the future look using this model with an increased population and a greater urban density? A combination of rural farming and urban agriculture could provide the food we need in a sustainable, ecologically sound system that ensures our food security. Can you imagine living in a city in 50 years from now where roofs are turned into greenhouses? I envision each community having access to their own community gardens. New houses will be built with greenhouses attached and space allocated for edible gardens. We could have public parks with various heirloom apple and pear trees, berry bushes and large edible garden spaces. The rural farmers will bring their products into the city markets and will provide the urban population with fresh, nutritiously rich food products to supplement what they don’t already provide for themselves. A food future that enhances food security and sovereignty is one I would much rather experience than the alternative of high prices, rationing and forced dietary requirements. The food choices that I make today will help to determine which one of these futures I will experience.
Down on the Farm Adam Dee Roots of Nature Photography
THE DEMAND FOR MORE Concerned students speak. BY MELISSA LUKEZIC & YASMIN KANANI
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he first six years of a child’s life are absolutely imperative for brain development. It’s an early childhood educator’s job to ensure that the child/children with whose wellbeing they have been entrusted are not only being properly nurtured but also properly stimulated. We are fourth semester students in the Early Childhood Education (ECE) program at Conestoga College, and based on our experiences thus far, we are worried about the prospective futures of following generations. For a profession that has the honourable responsibility of educating children during their most vulnerable stages, we feel as if the standards for acceptance into the ECE program are weak at best. The requirements to get into the program are simple: there is no interview process, entrance exam, or admissions essay required - just a simple high school diploma. A simple essay for admissions stating your passion and ambitions in the field of ECE would be a good start to determine both whether or not someone has the ability to function as a student, and actual interest in the field, not just doing it because it’s easy, something we unfortunately have heard many students say - or that they feel it is their only option as a female student with no other areas of interest. Once admitted into the program, you are then required to pass a criminal reference check, obtain a CPR + first aid certificate, and show proof of up-to-date shots. So, now that these basic standards have been met, what is required to remain in the program? Well, from what we have seen this too is very simple. To pass an ECE class you must have a simple 60% average, and only a 50% for the liberal arts courses we are required to take. If you do not meet this very low expectation you are given the opportunity to complete a
make up assignment or test to boost your average. For some, this is still too difficult and they are given the opportunity to fail any particular class an infinite amount of times without question or concern. So, the question here is, how much do we value the developing brains - as well as the safety, the self-image, and general well-being - of our young generation if our standards for the people teaching them are subpar at best. We know that ages 0-6 are incredibly crucial for development, yet you don’t need a university education like you do for kindergarten and up, just the tolerance of two years of classes that feel insufficient.
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n our experience as current students, we feel that two classes on child development is simply not enough. We feel that a lot of the program is focused on classes that are filler: Health & Wellness (there is no need to be teaching students who are 17 years and older how to take care of themselves), The ECE Professional (an entire class devoted to writing resumes exclusively for the ECE field), Philosophy of Education (we feel that we didn’t learn anything from it), and others. Taking applied writing skills last semester was an incredibly frustrating experience as we predominately focused on paragraph writing - which begs the question: Why is it that ECE students can’t write a paragraph by their third semester in college? What happened to our strong writing skills that allowed us to be admitted into the program initially? Further proof of this lack in standards are evident to all students on a regular basis through our placement requirements. Every semester students are placed in an ECE centre to observe the philosophy of that centre, how they implement curriculum, and basically how they go about helping children develop. Unfortunately,
what we are taught in class does not always coincide with the practice of the centre we have been placed in. So after taking a class where you are taught a certain way of acting, nurturing, and helping a child, you must turn around and do the complete opposite within your placement centre in order to obtain good marks from the ECEs in that centre. Many times we have heard students say in class that their placements do things that go against what we have learned, and they are simply told to do what they must. What is the point of re-enforcing negative practices to students? Why force them into a placement that knowingly goes against what is considered appropriate by the college?
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ue to such low expectations, we will end up having educators who are not adequately qualified to contribute to the growth and development of a child. As our classes progress, we feel that we see evidence of this more and more. If we continue to let these people not only into the program, but through the program successfully,what will our daycares and schools be like in the next 50 years? While we’re no longer children, we are still agents of the future and can change things. We realize that the college is a capitalist institution like any other, but admitting nearly anyone into the program for greater tuition fees is basically admitting that money comes before the well-being of children. Where do we draw the line and say, “NO! Our children are the future and we want higher standards of education and higher expectations of qualifications!” Not just anyone with the minimum level of achievements required to be accepted to the program should then be passed along as an early childhood educator. As frustrating as our college experience has been, we are grateful as it’s giving us the push that we need to take charge and work towards changing the world of education for the better. Due to this we are hereby initiating the demand for more.
To help or learn more: thedemandformore@gmail.com
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THE MANY CHALLENGES OF CLIMATE CHANGE What role will Canada play in a warmer world? BY BYRON WILLISTON, PHD
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n October 2009, 76 Tamil refugees from Sri Lanka arrived in Vancouver harbour aboard the Ocean Lady. Then, in August 2010, nearly 500 more Tamils - passengers on the Sun Sea - docked, this time in Esquimalt, B.C. The arrival of all these people, and their subsequent attempt to remain in Canada as refugees from their war-ravaged country, sparked a sometimes heated debate among Canadians about how we should deal with this sort of situation. This event can be seen as a small precursor to the reality that likely awaits us in a world in which the effects of climate change become increasingly apparent and more dramatic. According to some estimates, in the next fifty years the world could see anywhere between fifty million and one billion climate refugees, people driven from their homelands by severe climatic disruptions. And since high-latitude countries like Canada will probably not be subject to the sorts of ravages that will befall mid-latitude countries (especially those in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia), it will surely become a very attractive destination for climate refugees. How will we react when these desperate people, in their tens or hundreds of thousands, turn up on Canadian shores? This is one among many wrenching questions with which we will undoubtedly have to grapple in a world transformed by climate change. For according to the best science we have, our world is about to become significantly warmer, a fact some believe could threaten human civilization. How did our species come to this dangerous point? Anthropogenic climate change results from human activities increasing the atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases, a process which alters the energy balance of the climate system. Car 4
bon dioxide is the most important greenhouse gas, though methane, nitrous oxide and water vapour are also salient. These gases work as a kind of blanket over the Earth: they allow incoming radiation from the sun but absorb, and therefore trap, some of the infrared heat radiating back from the Earth. This effect is what allows for life on Earth: our planet possesses a delicately poised concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Too great a concentration of greenhouse gases and the planet would be too hot to support life; too little and it would be too cold to do so.
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ver since the work of the 19th-century scientists Jean-Baptiste Fourier and John Tyndall, we have known about the absorptive power of greenhouse gases. But in 1938 the British engineer Guy Callendar showed that there is a causal connection between the combustion of fossil fuels and the atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases. Fossil fuels are rich repositories of carbon. They are the remnants of plant and animal life on Earth, compressed and stored beneath the surface of the Earth over the course of millions of years. When we haul them out and burn them, we release their stored carbon into the atmosphere where it acts as a warming agent. Since Callendar’s time our understanding of this causal relation has improved dramatically. In its latest (2007) report on climate change the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) notes that it is “very likely”— which they define as above 90% certain— that increased global average temperatures over the last half-century are due to “the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations.” Whereas atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide stood at about 280 parts per million
(ppm) in pre-industrial times, they stood at 379 ppm in 2005 and are now close to 390 ppm. Human induced climate forcing comes primarily from the coal, oil and natural gas we burn for three broad purposes: electricity and heat, transportation, and industry. Together these uses comprise nearly 55% of the CO2 we emit. A good deal of emissions are also produced—in the form of both C02 and the very powerful greenhouse gas, methane (CH4)—from land use changes, industrial processes and, especially, agricultural production. The result of all of this activity is what the IPCC calls “unequivocal” warming of the climate system, evidenced by increases in global average surface temperatures and ocean temperatures, melting of snow and ice and rising global average sea level. Indeed, paleoclimatic information has revealed that the warmth of the last 50 years has not been seen for at least the previous 1,300 years. The last time the polar regions were warmer than they are now (about 125,000 years ago), reductions in polar ice volume caused a sea level rise of 4 to 6 metres. We are now going to see a rise in temperature of 1.1 to 6.4 degrees (Celsius) this century. This may sound small, especially to those of us living in a cold climate like Canada’s. But think of it this way. The difference between global average temperatures in the midst of the last ice age and now is about 5 degrees, and there is of course a profound difference between these two climates with respect to human habitability. We have set in motion equally profound changes in the opposite direction, changes that are now very likely to occur with astonishing rapidity. What harms might be caused by a temperature rise like this? The phenomena of most concern to scientists are warmer and more frequent hot days and nights over most land areas, an increase frequency and severity of heat waves, heavy precipitation events, an increase in drought affected areas, an increase in the intensity of tropical cyclones and hurricanes, and an increased incidence of extreme high sea level.
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he impact on human societies will be profound. There will be increased landslides, avalanches and mudslides in
Tailings Pond, Alberta Oilsands, September 2010 - Ian Willms
areas where rain will increase; increased drought and attendant crop failure where rain has diminished. Indeed, there will likely be increased desertification across the world, especially in the Mediterranean and American Southwest. A rise in sea level of between 10 centimetres and 1 metre would cause the displacement of millions of people living in coastal areas. Whole island nations - like the Maldives and the Solomon Islands - will disappear. The loss of significant portions of habitable land in a low-lying country like Bangladesh - 20% of whose habitable land is just above sea level - could cause millions of refugees to pour across India’s eastern border with that country. Since India may itself be struggling to cope with water shortages due to the drying up of the glaciers that feed rivers like the Brahmaputra and the Indus, it will simply not be able to cope with this sort of influx. Regional conflicts like this will flare up all over the world and could in some cases lead to war, possibly between countries equipped with nuclear weapons. These scenarios only scratch the surfaces of the harms that we are in store for. In short, as philosopher James Garvey puts it, because of climate change “there is going to be a lot of death in the future. It is difficult to say with precision
how much of this damage will occur in the next fifty years. What we are most likely going to have to cope with is a series of disasters unfolding into the distant future. But the next fifty years is crucial because this is when we make our decision about whether or not we are willing to mitigate the effects of climate change by reducing our greenhouse gas emissions. The alternative is to fail to do this and then simply to adapt to the new world we have brought into being. In that world, everything will depend on our ability to adapt to the new climate regime. There are many dimension of adaptation: social, political economic, and so on. But the political aspect may be the most worrisome.
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hink again of the challenge posed by the large-scale influx of climate refugees. Countries like Canada - blessed, or perhaps cursed, as we are with long coastlines and a relatively comfortable climate - will, as I said, be an attractive destination for refugees. Imagine the pressures this will put on immigration policy. Will we allow all these desperate people in? How? What work will they be able to do here? What about the ethnic and cultural tensions this policy might bring into play? Can we count on the bulk of Canadians to embrace all these people warmly? So suppose, on the other hand, that we de-
cide to seal our borders. How will we pay for the significantly ramped-up security burden this will impose on us? How we will patrol our vast coastlines without transforming the country into a police state of truly Orwellian proportions? These are stark choices and maybe some more benign future awaits us. The problem is that right now we are sleepwalking into a future that is almost certainly going to be radically transformed by climate change. From what philosophical sources will we draw our inspiration in such a world? One of the key questions for us will concern the scope of political power. In the immigration scenario just canvassed, there may be less room for the cozy liberalism - with its roots in Kant’s cosmopolitan ideals - to which we have become accustomed in the West. In negotiating our way through a world with new and more intense dangers, will we be forced to turn decisively away from this philosophical paradigm, and look instead to the darker vision of a Hobbes or a Lenin? Or, worse still, will we be too busy simply surviving to worry about providing our societies with philosophical foundations? That is one way of saying that we are facing civilizational collapse.
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ESSENTIAL MOVES IN ANARCHIST MOVEMENTS FOR THE NEXT FIFTY YEARS Future considerations of a growing population. BY TULLULA MARIE
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few weekends ago, I had the pleasure of attending the second North American Anarchist Studies Network (NAASN) conference. I was exposed to many great ideas, some new and some not. All of the ones I mention here, within the framework of highlighted essential guidelines suggested by panelists, I believe are central to continuing a healthy anarchist movement, as well as any social justice movement worthy of its name. People were packed into the room of the opening plenary, entitled ‘The Past, Present and Potential Futures of Anarchism.’ The vital lesson I took from this discussion was something I found echoed throughout the weekend: personal freedom leads to responsibility, whether within a collective or in individual activism. One of the most inspiring and useful things I heard was an example of fighting where you’re at, something that would be mirrored in panels yet to come. The speaker mentioned how the migrants’ rights organization No One Is Illegal has removed borders at the local level by successfully keeping immigration officials out of various shelters for women fleeing or experiencing violence. They have created a safer space for migrant and undocumented women, and are resisting the state not through grandiose actions but through what is truly the meaning of resistance: creating spaces where the state has no power. Acknowledgment of obstacles and aiming for meaningful and reasonable change is part of the recipe for revolution. I next attended a workshop entitled ‘Practical Strategies for Anarchist Writing’ given by a warm and knowledgeable presenter. I found every piece of advice 6
they gave applied not only to writing, but also to organizing. Once again, I heard: work where you’re at. Honour your capacity and and set goals you know will challenge you but are still within range of achieving. Know who your real allies in editing and in life are, those who will answer your questions honestly and thoughtfully. What really lingered in my mind was the examination of inspiration and of knowing when to stop, two notions that are often painted with a capitalist brush. Vast and wild amounts of inspiration don’t need to be present to do good work, and stopping before you’re dead means taking care of yourself and knowing when you’ve achieved your purpose. Writing and organizing both need thoughtful and measured attitudes; plunging them into frenzies of indecisiveness sometimes can’t be helped, but should be avoided.
but definitely not enough) was mentioned by panelist Liat Ben-moshe and this, for myself and many others I later conversed with, defined the discussion. She spoke about how she didn’t blame the organizers of the conference, but she loudly and rightfully pointed out the need for more accessible, open and safe spaces, in addition to debunking the myth that inclusion is equal to accommodation: the two notions are parts of a whole, and one cannot be replaced with the other. If anarchism is limited to rugged individualism, responsibility towards others is also restricted and a body gets sucked into the strict regime of identity and its isolating dictates on connecting with the community at large, leaving little space for analyzing collective needs. Accommodation and inclusion are distinct notions and are indisputable parts of living, and must be made central and unquestionable in the movement, not something to be fought for on the basis of identity. Anarchism cannot let itself end at D.I.Y. : we must D.I.T., do it together.
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fter a hectic lunch, I went to a talk that was given on expanding the anarchist critique of gender and (dis)ability. This discussion brought up an incredible amount of good theories to potentially apply to movements, including but not by any means limited to: pushing anarchy forward through queercripping the movement; mapping privilege and willful blindness; the rigidity of capitalist and patriarchal society when allocating resources versus its laxness when applying condescension; and concrete methods of altering situated and embodied knowledge like using three-dimensional mind maps, and long conversations split into different formats. The room, like much of the weekend, was filled to the point where people in the hallway were leaning their heads through the open doors. The lack of proper accessibility in the building (there was some,
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Skullface - Aaron Fattori
fterwards, it was time for the ‘AntiColonial Anarchism and Indigenous Resistance’ panel. The topics of the speakers flowed into one another seamlessly, and it was in this panel I believe I learned the most. The idea of whiteness as a pattern of inclusion and exclusion later helped me identify the same pattern in both sexism and capitalism. Contrasting the ideas presented by separate speakers of indigenous resistance as a flashpoint for the anarchist movement and alternately the wrongful interpretation of said resistance as anarchist
belief has directed me to start a process of examination of my motivations and expectations involving indigenous solidarity work. What I think will intrigue me most in the coming weeks is the fact, articulated by Shaista Patel, that while the two often go hand-in-hand there is a significant difference between oppression and colonization. This thought begins to answer many questions for me, concerning diversity of tactics, how I deal with people in my daily life, and sexism/racism/privilege.
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he closing plenary had been changed, due to an unfortunate occurrence at the event’s social. Break-out groups dealt with some difficult topics, such as assault and accountability within a movement most of us like to think is anti-oppressive. People left the closing discussion with a renewed sense of community and the inherent personal responsibility that comes with belonging to one. I believe that ending the conference on a note of contention and solution was a beautiful way to illustrate my conception of the future of anarchism: compassion for yourself and your comrades, who, admitting it or not, have also experienced the violence patriarchy, capitalism and their inherent racist, sexist and ableist traits inflict; a determination to move forward with respect for these wounds in mind; and a dedication to not inflicting the same damage on the people in our community. It is up to us to look inside ourselves, use the knowledge we find there to sustain our struggles for liberation and share with it each other in various ways. The next 50 years are going to be crucial to the survival of many forms of life on earth, including human beings. We, individually and collectively, can take steps to remove ourselves from systemic oppression every day. It is up to us to look inside ourselves, to use the knowledge we find there to sustain our struggles for liberation, and to share it. Yes, it is that simple.
QUEERCRIPPING (verb) To encourage environments and organizations to be more conducive to queer and differently-abled dynamics
DISPATCH FROM BORA BORA - MARCH 2062 Futurenews from our Polynesian desk. BY ERIC MOULDS
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he Island Commune of Bora-Bora announced today that it would make it legal for elderly cruise-ship passengers to throw their bodies into the ocean from registered Bora-Borean cruise ships. “It just makes sense,” says Yves Timi, chief administrative officer for the Tourism Division for the Leeward Islands. “Some time ago, the rate of inflation outpaced the average income in North America, so we have an entire generation, the first children of the babyboomers, who can’t stomach leaving those funeral costs for their families. So, they leave a letter in their rooms and jump off the back of the ship. While cost-saving suicide may come as a shock to many, it appears to be a logical progression of North American culture. Fear of financially crippling their families is leading many to seek new and cost-effective methods of disposing of their corpses.” Marine Biologist Terii du Roi says that it may actually serve as a boon to the local Black Tip Reef Shark Population; “Since the onset of global warming, the ocean temperatures have made the acidity of the Coral Reef ecosystem the Black Tips rely on too high to sustain their normal food-chain; the seniors are something like a subsidy for the creatures, providing an artificial option for the sharks to sustain themselves with.”
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rior to federal crack-downs, it was not uncommon for Canadian seniors to commit arson in hopes that insurance investigators would provide pay-outs to surviving relatives. Another strategy involved ‘natural
deaths’, where seniors would shuffle out into the wilderness in efforts never to be seen again. This practice was banned at the request of wildlife officials and local police, who became overburdened by the all-too-frequent discoveries of partial corpses and nibbled-on limbs. “It was a gruesome time to work in the National Parks service,” says Dean Baker, now retired formercoordinator for Parks Canada. “I guess jumping into the oceans seemed like the next-best solution. I figure it’s like Mark Twain said: When they were younger, they could remember anything, whether it had happened or not. But their faculties are decaying now, and soon they shall be so they cannot remember any but the things that never happened. It is sad to go to pieces like this, but we all have to do it.”
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n 2035, when the legislation making planned suicide legal was first proposed, cruise lines operating in the district voiced concern over legal liability. Citing ‘nightmare scenarios’ where the ship would see a ‘grey exodus’ of Canadian, American, and Quebecois seniors launching themselves from the stern, there were concerns that the companies could be held liable by surviving family members, or those seniors themselves who decided to fight off the sharks and live, albeit severely maimed. “We encourage all seniors embarking on this course of action to please, talk to your families first. With this new legislation we are now unprosecutable.” The legislation finally passed last Thursday, the 4th of March 2062. 7
THE FUN STUFF The next 50 years will be exciting and productive ones for the sex toy industry. BY JESSIE FINKELBERG
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or the gentlemen, male masturbators will be developed that contract realistically and produce their own lubrication. The exact make-up of this lubrication will be held as secret, though there will be many disturbing theories.
Sexxx - Danielle McCrorey
Collage - Bronwyn Frey
oys made of jelly will be completely obsolete, with wider acceptance of sex toys also leading to wider education about sex toy materials. People will finally be properly informed about the short life-span and unsanitary, porous quality of jelly and boycott it altogether, smartly choosing safer and less grosssmelling materials that don’t “sweat” as the materials for objects they apply to their genitals.
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0 years from now, the two camps of phallic toy-looks will have each reached extremes. Makers of realistic dildos and vibrators at the present time are finding great success in dual-density toys that better mimic the squish factor of a real live penis. In the future, toys will have up to 25 layers for a more-real-thanreal feeling that will threaten all but the most open-minded of men. But perhaps the most game-changing development of realistic toys will be the inclusion of a projector in the base of dildos that will project a hologram of the rest of the man. Users will have a choice of 3 men and 3 women for their hologram. Earlier models will be static and leave more to the user’s imagination, while later models will move and seem to speak, aided by speakers also mounted on the toy’s base.
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n the spirit of “more is more”, doubleended dildos will be combined with double penetration, leading to doubleended double penetration dildos, alarming four-pronged affairs resembling snakes with no head but four tails. Such a product will not often be used by the general public, but will immediately develop a following as a staple of certain hardcore pornographic videos.
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he green movement will continue to pick up speed while acceptance of sexual topics in general expands as well, the two eventually colliding in the creation of solar-powered sex toys. Embarrassment will have long faded from the public mind and no one will feel at all shifty setting their toys out in the sun to power up. Those afraid of thieves will use a windowsill rather than a back deck.
DEDP - Bronwyn Frey
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Carnal Hologram - Danielle McCrorey
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lavoured lubes will be developed that change flavour over time, Ă la Willy Wonka candies. This will be a fad for only a short period of time, after which it will only be interesting to high school students.
Diagram - Jonah Finkelberg
Lube - Bronwyn Frey
ossibly one of the most popular developments in the next 50 years will be vibrating tongue implants that make obsolete both vibrating tongue piercings and vibrating tongue rings that attach to the tongue with a stretchy strap. The implants will be very small and unintrusive, placed under the tongue, near the webbing. Turning it on will be done by moving the tongue in a particular motion that is complicated enough to rarely be done accidentally, but easy enough to learn with practice. Charging will be a matter of placing a small battery-like powering object under the tongue directly next to the implant for roughly an hour. Although warnings will be given constantly about refraining from overnight charging, many rebellious and stupid folk will accidentally swallow their powering object by refusing to heed such warnings.
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he non-realistic camp, meanwhile, will have developed insertable toys that barely resemble male genitalia at all. Present day toys of this kind often aim to provide the best g-spot-stimulating curve ever. Most notable will be the invention of a silicone compound that is safely mouldable by the layperson and therefore customizable for each woman to mold the perfect shape for her body. Once the preferred shape is created, the application of a setting compound will make the toy firm and usable. A reversing compound will allow further molding to take place, making this toy fairly all-purpose. Worry within the industry that such toys will hurt sales because of their ingenious re-usability will eventually be the catalyst for scandal as companies purposely alter the toy’s make-up so that it needs replacing every two years.
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he Hitachi Magic Wand will continue on as it always has, with a no-nonsense image and a strong cult following. There will be, and already is, competition from other massage wand makers, but 50 years from now Hitachi will still be the trusted name. The innovations will happen in the realm of the wand attachments: intensity-seekers will develop a urethral sounding attachment that forever changes the lives of those who use it. A vibrating cock ring attachment will be devised but quickly discarded. And of course, fans of the double-ended double-pronged dildo will fashion an attachment of that device only weeks after the dildo hits the market. 9
ally dependent idea. It means nothing unless we assume there is actually a world that exists outside of our mind and that is ultimately something we have no rational way of establishing with any degree of certainty. We collectively live our lives and make vital decisions based on an assumption of proportions much more significant than anyone really cares to recognize. To many, taking these considerations seriously may seem ridiculous. After all, we’re here, right? Or at least having the experience of being here. So why not just enjoy the ride? There’s a perfectly good story to explain it all anyways. The big bang. Evolution. Consciousness. Me.
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nd this is all true. But if we fully acknowledge the possibility that we might be creating this experience just as a dreamer creates a dream - and integrate that possibility into the frameworks governing our sense of self - we have a very real potential of discovering that we are capable of much more than we conventionally believe. Paying heed to the possibility that we might be the authors of our reality could very well be the only way to verify the truth value of the proposition. So why do we hold ourselves back from such
exploration, denying to ourselves that the mind is deep like the ocean and we have the capacity to swim far beneath the waves? All paradigms are eventually either transcended or crumble to the ground, and presently a critical mass of contemporary thinkers are describing in scientific or metaphysical terms precisely what mystics and sages have been suggesting for thousands of years. A rising wave of influential intellectuals are embracing a paradigm shift and celebrating the process of transcending the rationalist, scientific materialist worldview in order to embrace a more holistic foundation for self-awareness of which rationalism makes up but one of many parts. The seeds of the post-rational revolution have been planted in our present-day world. An awareness is rising through an ever increasingly publicized human willingness to explore the possibility that we are creating the very world we believe has created us, that what we truly are is the source of what we experience. Two significant players in this paradigm shift are Ken Wilbur and Amit Goswami. Wilbur is consistently evolving a holistic philosophy that integrates the four quadrants of our being: the individual and
collective internal, the “I” and the “We”, and the external correlates of both of these, the “it” that we call the physical self and the “its” that are culture’s physical correlates – the objects of society. Goswami, a quantum physicist turned “Quantum Activist” is direct in explaining that Consciousness must be more fundamental then matter because matter, prior to manifestation, exists only as waves of possibilities and there must be a chooser who chooses from these possibilities. This reversal of the conventional interpretation of the mind as a byproduct of sense perception sees Consciousness as the ground of being and both Wilbur and Goswami assert, just as the mystics have asserted for thousands of years, that this Truth can be verified through experience. One must simply be open to investigating the possibility. One must be willing to quiet one’s mind and look into the eyes of passing strangers.
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he post-rational revolution is coming and let me be clear: IT WILL DESTROY NOTHING! As we move beyond rationalism and the belief in a concrete world we will not look upon scientific materialism and say “Behold! There is the offender!” for it has done nothing wrong. Let me be clear: There was a big bang! There is a world outside of your body! We have evolved from a primal stew over the course of billions of years! But these facts are only facts within a specific context, a lens we call scientific materialism. Fundamentally, our material story is just a narrative being held in a mind. The evolution of consciousness entails transcending the useful but limiting paradigm of scientific materialism and integrating it into a more holistic understanding of what we are. Post-rational means going beyond rational while recognizing that rational still has its place. To move into a post-rational paradigm means to recognize that truth depends on context and some contexts are more fundamental than others. Matter does exist. But it may just be an idea. Editor’s Note: The preceding views do not necessarily reflect the views of the staff or advertisors of Highbraü magazine, whose editorial policy is to maintain (admittedly, potentially naïvely) that a physical reality exists prior to and independently of the notice of any conscious minds. We remain friendly towards alternate theories of reality, but in our official opinion you are, in fact, here.
Spaceman - Aaron Fattori
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WHAT IF YOU’RE NOT REALLY HERE? A clarion call to the post-rational revolution. BY SASHA KOEGLER
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know you’ve had that dream before. You were with that lover you’ve never been able to forget, drenched in sweat and saliva, your chests pressed with no passion left to invest in that embrace, exhausted and exhilarated and still gushing, like lovers on fire. The air was still saturated with the humid, intoxicating odours that are passion’s presence as you finally broke that embrace and left and the winter air turned sweat solid on your face. You were headed for the subway. Suddenly frozen rain was falling and you were running down the stairs to the underground, descending into a world beneath a world, adamantly pushing forwards through time and space as if an instant of stillness might wake you from your dream of temporal governance. And as the heavy hand fell on your shoulder you felt the blade its counterpart held pierce through your back before your flesh even opened up to receive it like a living sheathe waiting to be consummated in death. You never saw your assailant’s face. He was a voiceless, featureless cloak: A phantom. He went for your wallet and fled and you tried to crawl forward but it was like the signal wouldn’t translate from your mind to your body and you were paralyzed and bleeding out and there was no one else there. And then you woke up. Maybe that wasn’t your dream. Maybe your dream was different. Maybe it was the feeling of falling through the air and the way your stomach rose up into your throat as your parachute opened and caught the wind like a catcher’s mitt. Maybe it was the way the water felt between your toes as the dolphin rode that tidal wave with you on its back and showed you the meaning of ecstasy. The objects of the dream aren’t what matter to what we’re talking about. The ob 10
jects are just the “its” of the dream, bodies and physical systems of matter in perpetual interaction. What we’re interested in is the “I” of the dream, the internal happenings of the dreamer, the experience. It is the experience of experience that I want to talk about.
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hat all of our most poignant dreams have in common is that they feel real. No, our dream worlds may not reflect what we colloquially call “reality” but they feel real internally. We believe in our dream-passion, we feel our dream-adrenaline, we fear for our dream-lives. When we are living the experience of a dream reality the dream is “reality”. What’s funny about this is that we don’t remember that it’s actually us creating the “reality” we experience in the dream. We disconnect from that fundamental part of our self that is creating the dream-experience and identify merely with a transient object that has arisen within the experience, a projection of a body that we have made, forgetting that EVERYONE in the dream is really us. What does it mean that we forget we are dreaming when we dream? What significance does it have to our day to day lives? And why is it that we don’t even reject, but outright deny the relevance of the possibility that we might be dreaming right now? Descartes understood the relevance of philosophical scepticism in its most primal form when he pointed out that he very well might be asleep under his covers as he believes himself to be sitting next to the fire writing his meditations. Plato used an analogy of men chained in a cave, only ever exposed to their own shadows, knowing this shadow reality to be the ultimate one... until they escape their shackles. The film The Matrix tells a similar story, one in which we live in
a digital simulation while our true bodies are being exploited elsewhere. Contemporary philosophers will often talk of the brain in the vat scenario in which one has no way of knowing that while he thinks he is skiing in the rockies or riding an elephant while juggling zucchinis, he is actually a brain in a laboratory vat being externally stimulated to have such an experience. What all of these analogies have in common is that they demonstrate that we have no way of knowing if what we are experiencing as our physical self is actually an accurate representation of our most fundamental identity. There is no reference point available to us upon which to structure a test that would determine if what we call “reality” is actually real. We simply do not know if we can trust what we call our perceptions. This is a fact. It’s not so much that we have rejected the possibility that what we call reality might actually be an illusion. Rejecting the possibility would inherently acknowledge its relevance and so what we have done is slyly ignore that we are actually aware we might presently be “dreaming”. We’ve built a self-defining-framework that doesn’t integrate this possibility and couched a worldview within it. We’ve slid the potential for existential uncertainty under a carpet that we are ceaselessly vigilant never to step on. And that’s because we have a story about what we are and people don’t like to part with their stories, even the ones that might misrepresent the facts.
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ur physical story tells us that fifteen billion years ago a great explosion gave birth to a universe and by chance single-celled organisms were born on our planet and a series of subsequent genetic mutations led to the evolution of consciousness. This is a good story. It’s a rational story. It makes sense... but only within a given context. For much like we have no reference point upon which to build a test that would verify the authenticity of our conscious experience or what we call our perceptions, we also have no ultimate reference point from whence to derive any stable understanding of what physical even means. We create ALL the meaning we find in the material reality we perceive outside of ourselves. The word physical is just a symbol that represents a contextu-
THE NEXT FIFTY YEARS A glance at America. BY ELIZABETH SCARAMUCCI
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order fences separating the nations known as Canada, Mexico and the US are patrolled by trigger-happy nationalists who still pretend theirs is the “home of the free”. Immigration, however, is now mostly in reverse. Americans are dying to get off of the sinking ship. Right wing factions began to move into the mainstream as people grew tired of the increasing government control over their lives, unhappy with their day to day monotony. Radical groups increasingly arm themselves in the pursuit of “protecting the Constitution” and the country from undesirable immigrants, who
are scape-goated as the source of all ills. Left-wing radicalism has also flourished in response, as the two parties inch further and further away from each other and find themselves increasingly at odds. The right wing agenda won out at the crucial moment when the eastern world and parts of the southern hemisphere were developing new technologies and investment policies, whereas money in the US was diverted endlessly into the vast military complex and away from all infrastructures. The population, heavily indebted, found themselves with no jobs as companies continually outsourced to more profitable and more technologically advanced locations in other parts of the world. Higher education became completely unaffordable, except to the elite few, driving more and more people into any low-skilled labour they can find.
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s the anti-immigration policies worsened, migrant farm workers found themselves locked out, resulting in the price of food sky-rocketing as Americans were forced to take over the work on the dwindling farm-scape that once existed in their country. Food is almost all genetically modified with termination seeds, and farmers are forced to buy their seeds from corporations at rates that slowly make it
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Facefucked - Aaron Fattori
unaffordable to sell produce any more, especially now that government subsidies were rolled back in liberalization policies. Hoarding causes food shortages and roaming gangs of armed thugs frequently raid cities and towns. In response to these raids, many towns have barricaded their borders and have armed vigilante patrols for protection. The army, looking to cut costs, privatized the majority its services out to corporations, who became increasingly uncontrollable and often led raids of their own on their own soil. Foreign invasions increased, alongside heavy resource extraction and “terrorism” spread to become more mainstream in response. Attacks are frequent stateside.
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nvironmental disasters have increased, with tsunami, hurricanes, and other extreme weather heightening in intensity and frequency. Nearly onethird of the global population has been killed, injured or displaced by these new weather patterns and the rest has moved inland to safer areas, slowly moving away from heavily consumerist lifestyles out of necessity. The “sustainable” revolution came too late to positively affect climate change, though most forward-thinking countries now rely on alternative power sources entirely. It’s still not enough, as these technologies still require limited metals and minerals for their manufacture. The UN has all but dissolved, following the US’ lead of refusing payments for bloated services. There are now several new cooperation pacts between powerful countries which include statements of nonaggression and pacts of economic trade, replacing old alliances and organizations. Many debtor countries joined together in refusing to pay back the IMF, World Bank and international creditors, amid mass rioting and revolt within their countries. The joint effort ensured there was little the international organizations could do to stop them. New advances on older technologies are being discovered each and every day in some parts of the world, though relatively few entirely novel technologies have been discovered. The world is on the brink of change, but half of it is still playing catch-up to the technological advances of the more powerful countries.
AN INVITATION TO THE FUTURE In the future we’ll all be village people. BY JACOB J PRIES Dear Friend:
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ow often have you found yourself discussing with friends (or strangers) our collective plight and western civilization’s destructive impacts and the downward trajectory of our society? When the talk inevitably turns to possible solutions there seem to be few ways left to alter our course and get on track living happy, ethical, just, full, peaceful, good lives. We seem stuck in a situation beyond our control, powerless to shift our society which is, seemingly, intent on destruction. These conversations spin into a dream of finding ways to ensure a strong culture of peace amidst a crumbling, myopic, consumerist dystopia. A dream to not waste our unparalleled opportunity and privilege, to not let life just pass us by and then complain that things aren’t the way we want them. Through conversations, they are growing into a collective dream of a place, a town perhaps, somewhere we could live in fullness with others with a similar vision, a similar desire to live intentionally and sustainably in community. These dreams are a challenge to find balance between what we want and those is possible. We may want to live radically different lives, but not be far away from loved ones who may be at a different place
on their path. We are often surrounded by a culture that is prohibitive to selecting paths that are ethical, fulfilling and good, given all of the norms and forces which push us into living less than good lives. We all have deeply coercive stories that we tell ourselves, that we are told about ourselves, that keep us within the
Flora Fauna no. 5 (map) - Cody Bartz
normative framework of a coercive culture. We are given the option of heaven, but the constructs, the stories we tell our selves, individually and collectively, hinder our attempts at living good lives. Should we not surround ourselves with a culture that encourages good living?
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ow do we achieve what we dream of? How do we make our reveries realities? We need people to come together with common purpose and vision. We need folks to give a solid, collaborative
push, to take our efforts and results to the next level. We require a physical place, a deeper physical culture and foundation, to allow/facilitate/nurture a cultural shift toward lives that are not facilitated by oppressive and exclusionary systems, to make it easy to mature to Humanity 3.0. We need somewhere to rally our efforts, somewhere to inspire each other, somewhere to grow, to challenge our selves to be even more expressive, dynamic, centred, supported, rooted beings. To live out loud (live full lives) in balance. We need to make it easy for others to engage in the actions and expressions of a better world. We need to do this in a place where our actions will have long lasting impacts, where we can celebrate our achievements and where people are actually interested in figuring out how to do better. Instead of each of us moving to separate places out in the country or in cities, across Canada or in a different parts of the world (places where we aren’t ever going to have all of our needs met), how about we build an oasis in the very places that need the transformation the most, where people are dying as a result of our toxic culture, where we kill others because of the toxic nature of our norms. Instead of spreading out, let us find a place together. Not in a commune; we can learn from the mistakes of those who have preceded us in order to make our intentional community stronger. We could buy one small piece of land and then slowly turn it into a place where a dozen or so people would live. However, this will not do enough to achieve the necessary deeper cultural shift. We need something bigger, more open, more inclusive, more diverse, broader reaching. Somewhere with a history to grow from and with an infrastructure to build off of.
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e need to take over a town.
It could have some good buildings, perhaps an old church, a couple civic buildings. It would be proximate to transportation corridors and near (but not too near) centres of power. It may be close enough
should be close to some wilderness, perhaps a greenbelt, or conservation area. It might have good soil (although in need of restoration after decades of chemical inputs and erosion). It would be in an area with access to fresh water. It would be a place in need of restoration work, both in the ecosystems and human systems.
We’re taking over this town. Slowly buy up the land in and around the town. Shift the culture and institutions of the town, change the norms and customs of one place. Tear up the roads and plant gardens. Make it easy for people to live ethical lives, easy to build eco-friendly dwellings. A place where it is easy to find work that is enlivening rather than draining. A place that will foster and attract ecologically-friendly businesses, projects, and research. Where the healing arts are actually encouraged and schools are holistic. Where solar and wind power are central. Where creative expression, music, art, and activism are rooted in the community and shine out across the surrounding lands. Where we are integrated into the natural systems. Where we are moving toward a closed loop system with mostly local organic based food that We grow, with our children. And we will see our children growing.
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ur town will encourage healthy individuals (healthy persons, emotionally, physically, spiritually), healthy communities (dedicated to living life in collaborative, creative, mutually supporting and curious ways), healthy systems of governance (decisions made by the people), healthy economies (maximization of non-monetary systems and minimization of debt), and healthy ecosystems (deep connection to watershed and biosphere). Our town should be large enough to be vibrant. It is unlike most rural towns. It is an answer to our current dilemmas. It is the coming dawn. It can become a destination for like minded people to put their energy together to create something that is seriously lacking in this part of the world: a community based on shared vision where a culture of peace is nurtured, expressed, radiated. Shift the culture and institutions and it will 14
shift people and the future/history. We can be creating spaces that actively consider others, where we build our communication skills, interpersonal skills, and engage with everyone from a place of compassion. Where we reclaim holidays and nurture traditions of reverence and inclusivity. Baby boomers are leaving a vacuum (in terms of property and power) and we can build on the antecedent generations foundations and learn from their mistakes. We can also provide services that they will need (homes for the aged), where they can live with dignity. What a better way to learn from them, tap into a resource base, and ensure inter-generational living, which is a key component in diverse and healthy communities.
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ill we be successful? It is a process, not a destination and if we don’t bother trying, giving it our all, we will never know. The dream may seem out of reach, but it is out of reach only if we disregard our potential and dis-empower each other, our selves, and human-
Flora Fauna no. 3 (map) - Cody Bartz
ity as a whole. We can draw blueprints that will inspire others and cre ate replicable systems. All things are possible.
This invitation to the future is the continuation of hundreds of conversations and hopefully a spark for more conversations and action to come. It is a beginning. Our dream is more likely to become reality if we talk openly about, and act-ually be, this world we want to see. The challenges to a better life are innumerable yet the more we work together, the easier it will be. Let us gather together and get strategic and figure out how we can actually get there. Lets start with a town and grow from there. Sincerely, ________________________
YOUR HEALTH CARE: WHO’S THE GOVERNOR? A concerned mother and citizen suggests yesterday to tomorrow. BY MARY ENGEL, RN ET
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ou are a generally healthy person with normal intelligence and no long term chronic health problems. You stubbed your toe on a board that was sticking out while you were walking in your socked feet. Now it’s 3 days later and the throbbing is becoming intense…you think to yourself ‘it will go away soon enough’. But your shoes are starting to feel tight with swelling and when you look at it the whole toe is red, a redness which is starting to spread up onto your foot. Wow - now what do you do!? Well by this time you would probably take yourself off to the ER or some other medical treatment (hopefully you would!) But my question to you is why haven’t you taken care of your body yourself? Just two
short generations ago our grandparents didn’t seek out medical attention unless there was something terribly wrong that they weren’t able to manage themselves. They knew that an injury as above needed a soak in warm salt water to draw out the inflammation and then, if there was an opening of the skin, an ointment was used to protect and cover it to keep dirt and debris from getting in; with this repeated for a few days the injury would be gone. They didn’t have money to spend on medical bills or being off of work. There was no health insurance or paid sick days.
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e have become complacent in the regulation and operation of our bodies and health. We have taken for granted that this well oiled machine of
our bodies will not need maintenance and responsibility. Now, with our more sedentary lives and the proliferation of electronics with programs and data being fed to us, we have taken a back seat and settled into having someone or something telling us or showing us what we should be doing. Even though this information is gleaned, are we trusting it to enhance our health? What happened to growing up learning a common-sense approach to how the body works, and how to take care of it? No wonder the life expectancy of this generation is actually LESS than that of the previous one. Chronic illnesses like diabetes and high blood pressure are starting with people in their 20s! The long term effects of heart disease - circulatory problems - nerve damage - kidney damage - liver damage - will all cause life altering changes that deter you from a full, active life. Unless we start taking charge of ourselves and acting proactively, our health care system will not be able to manage our chronic illness needs. Over the past 30 years I have watched, as a nurse in the health care system, how we have lost the pluck to take charge of our progress in health maintenance. What can you do?
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CANADIAN DRUG LAW ABUSE & REFORM Where are the Harper government’s priorities? BY BRANDON HEY s counter intuitive as it may seem, the decriminalization of all illicit substances proposes an approach to the prevalence of drug-use and drug-culture which actually enables those most tormented and affected by their addictions to have access to the help they need… [The] RAND Drug Policy Research Center, based in the United States, published a study that found therapy and treatment to be 10 times more cost-effective than interdiction for cocaine usage. Such news is bad for the business of those whose job is to maintain and profit from the continued and progressing prohibition of unregulated drugs. Those who profit may be agents in the various forms of law enforcement (DEA, RCMP, CSIS), pharmaceutical companies, those associated with the military industrial complex, and the movement to privatize prisons in the United States and Canada…. Here in Canada overall crime rates have been reduced by 30% since the 1970’s, but this reduction in crime is being positively matched by the proposed increase in prison infrastructure and the enforcement efforts that come along with it. Proposed mandatory minimum sentencing laws would dissipate the ability of judges to offer 2-for-1 credit for time spent in pre-trial detention, meaning lengthier sentences for inmates in prisons and longer court trials, putting a greater demand on the time of judges, lawyers, probation officers, officers of the court, and others in the employ of the prison system – which ultimately means a greater cost to the taxpayer. The Conservative government of Canada proposed an extra $2,000,000,000 be spent over the next five years making room in the prison system for offenders imprisoned as a result of mandatory minimum sentencing laws; their watchdog warned that these schemes will instead cost over $6,000,000,000… 16
Bewildered - John Gosselin
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t seems incredible that America’s deluded persistence in the ‘Tough on Drugs’ approach remains despite it being shown to be a costly and disastrous failure. The Harper administration, through their funding of an expansion of the prison system to the tune of upwards of $6 Billion and through their persistent attempts to undermine the research and opinions of those in a position to know about the Insite safe injection site, demonstrate their commit-
ment to this same ‘Tough on Drugs’ agenda. The next fifty years of drug policy in Canada, if they follow in the footsteps of the United States, will see the mistakes of their last fifty years repeated, only this time, they will be stamped ‘Made in Canada’. For many, it seems that this was once a crucial difference that set us apart from our southern neighbours. What should be most nerve wracking for people is not only that these tactics prove a complete disregard and insult to the fruitful work of scientists and experienced policy makers whom have all shown the overwhelming benefits of ending prohibitionist approaches. In addition, the addicts and users continually reprimanded by thesystem are only outmatched in detriment by the sum total loss in terms of human flourishing and the prevalence of sciencebased thought that occurs due to the condoning and legislation of such practices. If we are to make any change at all for the better, perhaps we should take a hint from those countries which have learned from the lessons of history so that we can grow in ways that are less attached to our southern neighbour’s influence. While being attached to history’s biggest prohibitionist may be disadvantageous for the harm reduction plot, it could serve as an incentive for greater communication and idea sharing between countries already with a decriminalized status and those in countries without but who desire them. For the next fifty years, we will need a greater degree of dedication; ultimately, only time will tell.
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Abandoned Factory, Toronto, 2010 - Ian Willms / Boreal Collective
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