Oct. 30, 2009
FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH: A Call for Strategic Action
By Christopher Worth
Special to Huntingtonnews.net
Appalachia: Awakened. The call to action has come. We can no longer sit on our laurels and wait for change. The bureaucratic system has failed the common people from the eastern shores to the California coast, but none more-so than the geographical location called Appalachia. Nationally, the call is spreading. Our president used that bugle call to get elected. The resounding word is change. As a thinking person, I almost regret penning that word, because the word itself means nothing without action. But then again, the action itself means nothing without the word to give body to strategy. So this week, my call is not simply for "simple change," but I call for strategic action. Last week's article was resoundingly reflecting on ideas of escapism for me. Everyone needs a moment like that from time to time, but this week, in reflection, I realised that the only true escape is via engagement.
Let's talk about two ways to galvanize. One is through strategy. Strategy, as I understand it, is a laying out of plans to enhance resources; through the enhancement of resources, finding ways to engage in physically enacting change. The underlying foundation for setting a strategy is to somehow record it, make it tangible, and have all members involved able to invest in it. The second focus for true engagement is action. Now, be careful, because we've used this word several times in this article, but here I will flesh it out more fully.
Action, when thinking about engagement, is understood by many people as a physical reaction against something or a physical reaction embracing something. I am thinking of the sit ins during the civil rights movement and marches against mountaintop removal. These physical acts are important. They leave a mark on the emotional and intellectual landscape. It is my belief that physical action can impact a situation to the point of changing the situations paradigm. With that said, I'm going to talk about two events that have happened within the past two weeks here in Huntington, WV.
One is CreateWV. An intellectual deluge of great ideas, and lots of talk, with buzzwords like "change," and "renewable energy," yet it was sadly too expensive for many to be involved with. For West Virginia, change has never come out of the bureaucratic system. It has barely been supported by an intellectual class of intelligencia, but the real class who has forced change in this great state are the workers. You must understand that I am not downing intellectualism, but I think America has learned that you must share ideas...you cannot SELL ideas. If a concept is for sale, it will soon be abandoned, because the true engagement is in the hands and the feet and the voices of workers, artisans, and students. CreateWV was out of reach for so many that whatever idea they proposed will not be able to find its feet because there isn't any physical engagement. There isn't any true application of CreateWV's ideas.
Not that I have to point this out (or that I haven't already), but the element that is missing within ideas of what CreateWV is or could be is an idea of application. Now, that's not to say that local groups like Create Huntington aren't doing their part, but I think as an overall state movement, CreateWV has to rethink who they want to engage, and they have to engage them on the physical level. The idea has to move beyond the drawing board. Now, I acknowledge that this is easier said than done, but that's why this column is called "For What It's Worth."
The second gathering that happened here in Huntington happened just this past weekend, hence why I am writing this article later in the week. I needed time to digest what Power Shift is about. As I said in the beginning of the article, there is a call for change, and Power Shift as a nation-wide movement is trying to respond to what is not just a national crisis, but also is an international one. The same buzzwords that I listed before were alive and well in the halls of Power Shift, but the difference was that Power Shift Appalachia's organisers said "Everyone come. Share what you have to bring to the dialogue and we'll feed you three meals a day." They didn't only feed the participants, they were sensitive to the vegans and the vegetarians. That says a lot to me as I am a vegetarian.
Now, before you close down this article because you think "Oh, the hippies are crawling out of the woodwork..." understand that as I observed the conversations, I did not see any one subculture. I saw instead leaders; I'm not going to call them future leaders. I think to call them future leaders is to isolate them from the power that they have. The voices coming out of Appalachia Power Shift (both the young and old) are defining our structure, and they're doing it NOW. We are Obama's architects for America's new age.
There are holes even in this group, though. Nothing is perfect. So many of these individuals have been pushed to the point of extremism. Their vocabulary is action first, strategy a very distant second thought. So as I became hoarse screaming about strategy this past weekend and many of the participants looked on me like I was trying to stifle their action, I thought of CreateWV and how loaded with language/strategy they are and not with action. With this, I realised that many factions in Power Shift here in Appalachia were ready to blow up the Parliament and pick up the pieces later. For what it's worth, I ask "Where are those pieces going to fall?"
There are voices like mine within Power Shift Appalachia calling for strategy, and those voices need to be magnified because they will be heard. In conclusion, the time is now to bring strategy and action together. We can no longer keep the language of strategy within the hands of the elite, and we cannot continue to jump from one action to another as the foot soldiers and the architects for truly applicable change.
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FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH: A Call for Strategic Action
By Christopher Worth
Special to Huntingtonnews.net
Appalachia: Awakened. The call to action has come. We can no longer sit on our laurels and wait for change. The bureaucratic system has failed the common people from the eastern shores to the California coast, but none more-so than the geographical location called Appalachia. Nationally, the call is spreading. Our president used that bugle call to get elected. The resounding word is change. As a thinking person, I almost regret penning that word, because the word itself means nothing without action. But then again, the action itself means nothing without the word to give body to strategy. So this week, my call is not simply for "simple change," but I call for strategic action. Last week's article was resoundingly reflecting on ideas of escapism for me. Everyone needs a moment like that from time to time, but this week, in reflection, I realised that the only true escape is via engagement.
Let's talk about two ways to galvanize. One is through strategy. Strategy, as I understand it, is a laying out of plans to enhance resources; through the enhancement of resources, finding ways to engage in physically enacting change. The underlying foundation for setting a strategy is to somehow record it, make it tangible, and have all members involved able to invest in it. The second focus for true engagement is action. Now, be careful, because we've used this word several times in this article, but here I will flesh it out more fully.
Action, when thinking about engagement, is understood by many people as a physical reaction against something or a physical reaction embracing something. I am thinking of the sit ins during the civil rights movement and marches against mountaintop removal. These physical acts are important. They leave a mark on the emotional and intellectual landscape. It is my belief that physical action can impact a situation to the point of changing the situations paradigm. With that said, I'm going to talk about two events that have happened within the past two weeks here in Huntington, WV.
One is CreateWV. An intellectual deluge of great ideas, and lots of talk, with buzzwords like "change," and "renewable energy," yet it was sadly too expensive for many to be involved with. For West Virginia, change has never come out of the bureaucratic system. It has barely been supported by an intellectual class of intelligencia, but the real class who has forced change in this great state are the workers. You must understand that I am not downing intellectualism, but I think America has learned that you must share ideas...you cannot SELL ideas. If a concept is for sale, it will soon be abandoned, because the true engagement is in the hands and the feet and the voices of workers, artisans, and students. CreateWV was out of reach for so many that whatever idea they proposed will not be able to find its feet because there isn't any physical engagement. There isn't any true application of CreateWV's ideas.
Not that I have to point this out (or that I haven't already), but the element that is missing within ideas of what CreateWV is or could be is an idea of application. Now, that's not to say that local groups like Create Huntington aren't doing their part, but I think as an overall state movement, CreateWV has to rethink who they want to engage, and they have to engage them on the physical level. The idea has to move beyond the drawing board. Now, I acknowledge that this is easier said than done, but that's why this column is called "For What It's Worth."
The second gathering that happened here in Huntington happened just this past weekend, hence why I am writing this article later in the week. I needed time to digest what Power Shift is about. As I said in the beginning of the article, there is a call for change, and Power Shift as a nation-wide movement is trying to respond to what is not just a national crisis, but also is an international one. The same buzzwords that I listed before were alive and well in the halls of Power Shift, but the difference was that Power Shift Appalachia's organisers said "Everyone come. Share what you have to bring to the dialogue and we'll feed you three meals a day." They didn't only feed the participants, they were sensitive to the vegans and the vegetarians. That says a lot to me as I am a vegetarian.
Now, before you close down this article because you think "Oh, the hippies are crawling out of the woodwork..." understand that as I observed the conversations, I did not see any one subculture. I saw instead leaders; I'm not going to call them future leaders. I think to call them future leaders is to isolate them from the power that they have. The voices coming out of Appalachia Power Shift (both the young and old) are defining our structure, and they're doing it NOW. We are Obama's architects for America's new age.
There are holes even in this group, though. Nothing is perfect. So many of these individuals have been pushed to the point of extremism. Their vocabulary is action first, strategy a very distant second thought. So as I became hoarse screaming about strategy this past weekend and many of the participants looked on me like I was trying to stifle their action, I thought of CreateWV and how loaded with language/strategy they are and not with action. With this, I realised that many factions in Power Shift here in Appalachia were ready to blow up the Parliament and pick up the pieces later. For what it's worth, I ask "Where are those pieces going to fall?"
There are voices like mine within Power Shift Appalachia calling for strategy, and those voices need to be magnified because they will be heard. In conclusion, the time is now to bring strategy and action together. We can no longer keep the language of strategy within the hands of the elite, and we cannot continue to jump from one action to another as the foot soldiers and the architects for truly applicable change.
Share This Story:
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