WORD OUT! The Blog to Build a New Society

(apologies to Jan Wong for "mixing" her book title with my headline!)

When I was in Vancouver last weekend, I had serious red mitten envy. Those fancy red mitts with the white maple leaf and Olympic rings were everywhere and on everyone! From the Prince of Wales to Oprah, those toasty little beacons of Canadian patriotism were fluttering everywhere I could see - except on the ends of my arms. I had black gloves, how boring.

Despite my envy though, I just didn't feel right buying the mittens. Obviously, the contract to produce this many mittens must have been with a developing country (they are made in China) and probably under doubtful conditions as these economies of scale always seem to benefit the developed country. $10 for a pair of mitts purchased at The Bay probably does not translate into a very good weekly wage for whoever put them together in China. Also, I don't need another pair of mitts, red and trendy not withstanding.

Just where have those mitts come from? What factories manufactured them? Google search results just let me know that most Canadians didn't realize Canada doesn't mass produce anything like 2 million red mitts and were shocked and disappointed to find their mitts not made in Canada. I guess most Canadians don't read their labels very often or understand the global manufacturing world. I tell my son that somewhere in China there must be cities dedicated to teddy bear making (and probably mitt making too now!). Has anyone found information on the source of this red woolly tide that is sweeping the nation?

But never fear, for those of you constrained by your ethical buying consciences, I have found a slightly more ethical source of red woolly Olympic mittens! The Canadian Red Mittens Shop! The Red Mittens Shop is a 100% Canadian website, designed and built by a Canadian family on Vancouver Island, B.C., Canada.

Here is how it all got started:

We watched on TV as millions of Canadians were disappointed to find that the fabulous red mitts, with the charming little white maple leaf surprisingly tucked into the palm, were NOT AVAILABLE. We decided to launch this friendly, helpful little 'hand knit' website to gather up all the mittens that were still for sale somewhere, so that people could get their mitts on a pair of those red mitts! So far, as of Feb 20, 2010, over 2000 people from ALL OVER THE WORLD have managed to find themselves a pair. We never expected to be hosting an international website, but it soon became apparent that the whole world was shopping for a pair of the Canada red mittens. It has been our greatest pleasure to have been contacted by mittens shoppers from every country, sometimes not in English or French. We have a great MAC computer that translates any language for us - that is really cool! It is opportunities like these, where a Canadian heart is warmed to a full blaze. How wonderful to 'meet', via the internet, every day citizens of planet earth and have the chance to say to them with a big 'web style' Canadian smile, ":-D "Sure thing! I'll can give you a hand with that!" :-D"

All advertising revenues from the site are going to support the Special Olympics Games on Vancouver Island.

If that still isn’t ethical enough for you (all these mittens were still made in China after all) for $5.00, you can download the knitting pattern by Canadian knitter Rachel Bearse, and make your own red (or perhaps purple) mitts, from homespun sheep wool dyed in beet juice!

Welcome back to the good work. I have been reading the usual line up of predictions for the coming decade and summaries of the year past but my favourite post comes from the Post Carbon Institute - 10 things that will inspire your imagination, 5 things that will fire your indignation and 1 thing you can do to create a better future. With entries from Richard Heinberg, Rob Hopkins, Bill McKibben, Stephanie Mills and James Howard Kunstler, how can you go wrong? You can read the entire post here.

What were your New Year's Resolutions? What are your plans for helping our planet in 2010? We love to hear what our readers are doing. You can share your ideas in the feedback section below.

I love this video of the finalists in the Project Green Search model competition by Ecodivas TV. (reposted here with permission) Glamourous gals getting down and dirty in the dark!! The first person the winner of the competition thanks in her acceptance speech is Mr. Mud, for the tomato!

Project Green Search is an annual modeling competition looking for the new face of green fashion. Participants have all the glamour and style of fashion modeling, only with an added eco-friendly flaire.

This year's contest organizers were looking for the model who could, "Take a stand, get noticed, align modeling endeavors with personal beliefs, be an advocate for the environment, animal welfare, fair trade, and human rights. Be the poster girl for what is ok to sell…and what is not."

And who was this new poster girl for the environment? Rachel Avalon. Rachel is an expert in vitality, balance, detoxification and green living certified by the American College of Health Sciences. She plans to spend 2010 campaigning to further raise awareness for environmental concerns, animal welfare, and other important issues as the new "it" girl of the green revolution.

Wondering what those seed bombs were they were talking about? Want to break out into some guerrilla gardening of you own? David Tracey's Guerilla Gardening: A Manualfesto is the place to start!

"Your imperfections, your weakness, your faults -- [in your art] they become your strengths."
-- Lily Yeh

Internationally celebrated artist Lily Yeh shared with us her journey to Rwanda to participate in the Rwanda Healing Project, where she helped survivors construct a memorial to the victims of genocide in their region. She shared her great fear of the responsibiity of reclaiming the remains and safely creating a final resting spot for the bones. The final collaborative creation that emerged was a beautiful monument honouring and remembering those who had died. She describes art as "taking that which has been broken and creating something new and beautiful."

"It is time for every adult to kick some educational ass."
-- Matthew Fox

Matthew Fox, renowed religious reformer and educator, spoke about the fact that 40-60% of boys of colour in the US do not complete high school. He asked us, "Does this mean that all those boys are dumb? Or does it mean that we adults who have created the system are dumb?" European education is too heady. It leaves the body out and the heart out. True learning happens when your beauty and your joy come through, all the rest is details.

"The pain for our world and the love for it are two sides of the same coin." Joanna Macy

Internationally renowned Buddist teacher, eco-philospher, systems theorist and scholar Joanna Macy invited us to consider the three stories of our present time.
1. Business as Usual, which provides us with comfort and security. It doesn't ask much of us in return, only that we consume, obey, and ... shut up.
2. The Great Unravelling - all that we see around us that is going terribly wrong.
3. The Great Turning - of which all of us are a part. The promise of this dark age are the gifts that we get from the uncertainty .

Chief Almir Narayamoga showed us his traditional lands in the Amazon rainforest through a partnership with Google Earth. This couragous chief has a $100,000 dollar bounty on his head -- and eleven previous Chiefs have been assassinated along this journey to saving the Surui ancestral forest lands. When asked if introducing the internest to his people was dangerous to them, he replied, "What isn't?" He has entered into partnerships with the Prince of Wales Rainforest Foundation and Google among others to obtain carbon credits in return for the oxygen created by his people's 600,000 hectares of rainforest. We wondered, is this preservation of the rainforest or the newest wave of colonialsim? At least, as I said to Ingrid, when it all goes to hell in handbasket, they'll still have somewhere to live...

Destiny Arts Youth Performing Centre did a dance and spoken word performance drawing on Annie Leonard's short film, The Story of Stuff, the video phenomenon written and hosted by Annie Leonard. Annie said when they undertook the project, the team felt that 50,000 views would mean they'd succeeded ... as we sit here at Bioneers, the film has hit over 7.3 million views, worldwide.

As she travelled the country promoting the film, she says she learned three things. First, most alarmingly, that people are forgettting how to be engaged citizens. She said she could not count the number of times at the end of the film, someone in the audience would stand up and ask, "What can I buy differently to help change this?" Political action does not equal shopping.

She also learned that a small -- but vocal and visible -- group of people are extremely threatened by her work. Most memorable was an attack by Glen Beck, who accused Leonard of undermining western culture with her work ... and most shockingly, of promoting "social justice" ... "Damn right, Mr. Beck!" was her response.

And finally, she learned, she is not alone. Millions of people around the world care deeply about our crazy consumptive lifestyles and are so grateful to her for creating the video.

The Bioneers gathering is housed at Marin Center, the exhibition grounds in Marin County - infamous for Marin County Hot Tubbers and proud of it, according to Charles McGlashan and Jim Farley, presenters of the Marin County award. "In only in five years' time, our hot tubs will be powered by 100% renewable power sources."

On the first day of Bioneers we were sincerely welcomed by Greg Sarris, Chairman of the Federated Indians of Grafton Rancheria, who thanked us for the work we are doing to restore not only his homeland but all of our shared commons. Bioneers cofounders Kenny Ausubel and Nina Simons shared with us their stories of enlightenment and despair, inspiring and motivating us all to forge ahead and continue the work for change.

Nina Simons described a life-changing experiecne she recently had, helping a participant at one of her workshops survive an asthma attack, far from medical help. She said, "I always knew about the cancers, the diabetes, the asthma that was being inflicted on communities by our toxic industrial processes but I was removed, through my affluence, from truly experiencing it." When she held her friend and felt her suffering, she said she overwhelmed with sadness as she physically adsorbed the pain and suffering that was being inflicted on so many.

Michael Pollan presented an assessment of the state of the local food movement. He said we'd come a long way, but "we don't want to pat ourselves on the back too much, because there's a long, long way to go." Too true! I ducked outside for a brief break and encountered a trio of bioneers happily snacking on their take-out McDonald's meal.

Ironically, Michael Pollan used a McDonald's double quarter-pounder with cheese to show us how much oil is embodied in that delectable treat. He poured an astounding 26 ounces of crude oil into drinking glasses -- the amount required to produce that one single sandwich. You can read more here on Triple Pundit.

In the afternoon, I took in a presentation from William Ryerson, Joshua Fouts and Rita King, on using media for social transformation. William Ryerson has been very successful using entertainment education programs in Africa to change behaviours related to family planning and HIV. Joshua Fouts and Rita King presented a video of their experience in Second Life - an online virtual community. Their hypothesis is that experiences in a virtual community can influence real-world behaviours in much the same way as cultural exchanges in the real world. In addition, they claimed that the freedom from set cultural perceptions allows players' online avatars to engage in experiences they would be excluded from in real life due to preconceived notions and prejudices or taboos. Rita said, "We wanted to find out how people would behave if they could act any way they wanted." During the question period, she did explain that the Second Life site originally had a utopian vision of a community completely free from regulation, created by users from what they wanted to bring to it. However, our universal human foibles asserted themselves and people wanted to bring to the site porn, gambling and other activities illegal under international law, such that it is now governed by a terms-of-use agreement.

Andres Edwards, author of The Sustainability Revolution: Portraits of a Paradigm Shift , and the upcoming Thriving Beyond Sustainability, and Vinit Allen of the Sustainable World Coalition (authors of the upcoming Sustainable World Sourcebook) dropped by the booth throughout the day. We completed the day with a very Bioneerish session of red wine, jazz and animated discussion about the state of our world and the future.