Pot smoking not harmful to lungs
Smoking up to a joint per day doesn’t seem to decrease lung function, according to a study. In fact, occasional marijuana use was associated with slight increases in lung airflow rates and increases in lung volume.
(via socialuprooting)
US to Start ‘Trade Wars’ with Nations Opposed to Monsanto, GMO Crops
The United States is threatening nations who oppose Monsanto’s genetically modified (GM) crops with military-style trade wars, according to information obtained and released by the organization WikiLeaks. Nations like France, which have moved to ban one of Monsanto’s GM corn varieties, were requested to be ‘penalized’ by the United States for opposing Monsanto and genetically modified foods. The information reveals just how deep Monsanto’s roots have penetrated key positions within the United States government, with the cables reporting that many U.S. diplomats work directly for Monsanto.
The WikiLeaks cable reveals that in late 2007, the United States ambassador to France and business partner to George W. Bush, Craig Stapleton, requested that the European Union along with particular nations that did not support GMO crops be penalized…
The ambassador plainly calls for ‘target retaliation’ against nations who are against using Monsanto’s genetically modified corn, admittedly linked to organ damage and environmental devastation. Amazingly, this is not an isolated case. In similar newly released cables, United States diplomats are found to have pushed GMO crops as a strategic government and commercial imperative…
Perhaps the most shocking piece of information exposed by the cables is the fact that these U.S. diplomats are actually working directly for biotech corporations like Monsanto. The cables also highlight the relationship between the U.S. and Spain in their conquest to persuade other nations to allow for the expansion of GMO crops. Not only did the Spanish government secretly correspond with the U.S. government on the subject, but the U.S. government actually knew beforehand how Spain would vote before the Spanish biotech commission reported their decision regarding GMO crops.
Monsanto has a history of creating plants that can easily be pollinated and survive better than their natural competitors, then suing small farms when the successful (and patented!) crop finds it’s way onto their fields. Allowing them high level legal access to legislators and policy-shapers in the government is a recipe for oppression. When one company owns all the food that the western world has access to, does anyone really doubt that they’ll abuse their power?
(via socialuprooting)
It doesn’t mean everyone has to do direct action. But even if we’re not personally on the front lines, we have to support the people who are willing and able to do what’s necessary by standing between fossil fuels and what’s left of our planet. Massive civil disobedience is one tactic that could do that. There are also others. Industrial culture is in fact very vulnerable as it’s utterly dependent on an infrastructure of oil, gas, electricity, and highways. Our planet needs us. She needs us to think like healers and act like warriors. And if you think that’s a contradiction, then get out of the way.
—Deep Green Resistance (via cultureofresistance)
(Source: reconnect-restore-rewild, via socialuprooting)
Lack of awareness of the basic unity of organism and environment is a serious and dangerous hallucination. For in a civilization equipped with immense technological power, the sense of alienation between man and nature leads to the use of technology in a hostile spirit—to the “conquest” of nature instead of intelligent cooperation. The result is an erosion and destruction of the environment.
—Alan Watts
(Source: thegreatearth, via socialuprooting)
The (timber) industry tends to call the environmentalists ‘radical’. The reality is that 95% of the standing native forest in the United States has been cut down. It’s not ‘radical’ to try and save the last 5%, what’s radical is logging 95%.
—
Bill Barton, Native Forest Council
from If A Tree Falls : A Story Of The Earth Liberation Front
(via cultureofresistance)
(Source: themattsmith, via socialuprooting)
The founder of the gulabis is the fearless Sampat Pal Devi, 40, who was married off at the age of 12 to an ice-cream vendor and had the first of her five children at 15. The gulabis, whose members say they are a “gang for justice,” started in 2006 as a sisterhood of sorts that looked out for victims of domestic abuse, a problem the United Nations estimates affects two in three married Indian women. Named after their hot-pink sari uniforms, the gang paid visits to abusive husbands and demanded they stop the beatings. When obstinate men refused to listen, the gulabis would return with large bamboo sticks called laathis and “persuade” them to change their ways. “When I go around with a stick, it’s to make men fear me. I don’t always use it, but it helps change the mind of men who think they are more powerful than me” says Pal. She has assumed the rank of commander in chief and has appointed district commanders across seven districts in Bundelkhand to help coordinate the gang’s efforts.
Pal’s group now has more than 20,000 members, and the number is growing.
this seriously always makes me cry & actually inspires me to LIVE.
^ and this is why I blog.
14 Defining Characteristics of Fascism, as outlined by Dr. Lawrence Britt
