What Would You Fight and Die For?
An Israeli soldier climbs on an armored vehicle in a field at a gathering point near Kibbutz Mefalsim, southern Israel, just outside the Gaza Strip, Thursday June 29, 2006. Israeli troops rounded up dozens of ministers and lawmakers from the Palestinians’ ruling Hamas party on Thursday, while pressing a military campaign in Gaza meant to win the release of an Israeli soldier held by Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip. (Oded Balilty / AP)
Operation Summer Rain.
Sounds lovely, peaceful, positive.
Operation Summer Rain – Apache helicopters dropping bombs on Gaza, tearing the eardrums of babies and small children, bombing basic utilities like a power center and a water plant. Rain or pain, penned in by an occupation wall, apartheid is alive and well in Israel.
Occupation Wall in Abu Dis – Photo via ISM
People are dying, suffering, huddling and terrified. Children suffer as the collateral damage of both side, but in Palestine, there is no relief, no vacation, no room to breathe. Will an entire nation of people be genocided and removed, new shiny houses built on illegal lands, over the unmarked graves of the innocent and unarmed?
I am not Jewish or Muslim. I am not a Christian or Buddhist. I am in my soul a pagan, a natural child of the earth. If one being suffers, we all do. I truly believe this, and am willing to fight endlessly for peace and change. If that puts me in the crosshairs, so be it. I am unafraid and resolute. My freedom is a gift and my responsibility to it requires I stand and shout for those lamed and silenced.
Palestinian Girl in front of Occupation Wall – Photo via ISM
I keep running into the plague of privilege here in the US – those with means and no soul, troubled by nothing but impatience to get that next bump of coke, that next piece of high end consumerist crap, that next gas guzzling vehicle with rims and leather. I keep meeting those who’s agenda is sprinkled with a dash of meaning, but the depth is lacking; its a shade of consciousness as means to sell something – a product, a record label, a person, a film. Co-opting a political stance that is easily abandoned when the dollars distract and the egos inflate with self-importance.
I say means, for those who are even living in “artistic poverty”. The means to create and broadcast is a wealth not available in many places around the world. This nation of spoiled children, from the leadership down, is disgusting in its waste of a chance at effecting REAL POSITIVE CHANGE in the world. The right and good thing – skewed and politicized, traded and mixed with the blood of the innocent and naive.
Patriarchal and punitive, even those “coming up” flip the switch, and visit the same pain in a trickle down fashion. Working in hip-hop has shown me the real ugly side of opportunity. Buying up bling and draping dark skins in diamonds confuses and frustrates me – how the elite support the slavery of their brothers and sisters in the Conflict Mines and indentured servitude in India.
When the underdog becomes the alpha dog, the same power structure exists. Look at hip-hop, look at Israel, look at the Western world – one-upmanship is the way of things, the Tao of social destruction.
Where are our revolutionaries and freedom fighters? What are we collecting and hording wealth for? Where is the conversation about the greater good, the universal peace and why is it marginalized and maligned as “hippie speak”?
Palestinians releasing doves near Occupation Wall in hopes of peace – Photo via ISM
I fight with words and images, with conversation and music. These weapons – soul, heart, intellect, curiosity, truth, justice, creativity – these are freely available to those seeking, reaching, teaching and expanding their consciousness into the greater sphere of the universal and elemental.
The winds of change are strong. A worldwide correction is coming. It’s of our own making, environmentally, socially, economically, fundamental and fierce. The feminine principle has been dying off and the ideas of peace are sold as wristbands and pendants, but not absorbed into the skin and the soul. Buying off guilt with a bit of philanthropy is like a band-aid on a gunshot wound. The gush of reality bleeds and pools at our feet, while we reach for that next piece of mind with anxious, entitled greed.
Children, wake up. Your mess inflicts misery and your souls are empty. The party is over and its time to grow up.
Peace,
Melissa
Enjoy Eurprhates – Break Yourself – speaking on the inner and outer revolution, and the pioneers who led the way.
