Testimony of a wise man

Tom Engelhardt published a remarkable article on tomdispatch.com, which really stands out from the usual postings on this blog. The article was written by Ernest Callenbach in the weeks or month before he died of cancer on April 16th, and is clearly meant as a final manifest or testament. It is titled: Epistle to the Ecotopians, it is a masterpiece and it should be read by as many people as possible.

http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175538/tomgram%3A_ernest_callenbach,_last_words_to_an_america_in_decline/

The article appears or is linked to on many other websites, just to list a few:

http://www.allvoices.com/news/
http://sigalonnewsviewsalt.soup.io/
http://topics.treehugger.com/
http://mostlywater.org/
http://www.energybulletin.net/
http://warincontext.org/
http://carolynbaker.net/
http://blogs.worldwatch.org/
http://transitionus.org/
http://seculardiscourse.wordpress.com/

[I will have a closer look at these sites as soon as I have time.]

Ernest Callenbach writes nothing in Epistle to the Ecotopians than is not known already by most of us but it is reassuring, that he voices the same sentiments that we have and that his observations and analyses have led him to the same conclusion that we made. We have to thank him for summarizing his observations and conclusions in an easily understandable and perfectly constructed text.

His other texts and his books (especially his novel Ecotopia) are also worth reading, Some texts are on his website

http://ernestcallenbach.com/Home+contact.html

I for myself will read his text Epistle to the Ecotopians several times carefully and rewrite or expand some of my earlier blog post in his spirit. The posts Hope, Priority List, You want to save the world?, Essential questions are main candidates for a rework.

Following his appeal to organize, I also will try to increase my personal contacts face to face or via electronic communication and I will try to find discussion forums on blogs and social media where relevant issues are addressed.

Until now I made the experience that discussions on social networking sites or in comment threads are seldom fruitful because the prevailing web culture of boasting and showing off drowns the soft voices of reason. Forums that are public and accessible by anybody will more than often see “cock fights” or “flame wars” instead of a collective and cooperative development of ideas and visions.

Hence my personal appeal to the readers: Please let me know, if there is a place where I could fit in.