Anyway, just thought you'd appreciate seeing a little piece of Perth activism. Plus, there's a dvd you can buy and show!
Regards, Mike B)
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Hi Members and Supporters,
We had such a good film screening on Sunday, that I wanted to communicate the success with you all by writing a short report.
If you are interested in buying a copy of the dvd, the web address is www.communitysolution.org/cuba
Regards,
Annolies
Community and Socialist Networks Grow at Power of Community film Screening
40 people attended a Perth Hills branch Socialist Alliance film screening of The Power of Community – How Cuba Beat Peak Oil on July 30.
The audience was very diverse and came from all over Perth. Some were local SA members or contacts, others came from City Farm organic growers’ market where we sell GLW every Saturday, others were bio-dynamic growers, permaculturalists, and anti-nuclear activists, many of whom travelled considerable distances. A number were Cuba supporters – a few from the Australia Cuba Friendship Society and a man who had lived there for many years. One CFMEU member came with his teenaged daughter all the way from Kwinana.
The film tells the story of how Cuba confronted its own peak oil crisis with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the impact of the US economic blockade. Faced with the real prospect of mass starvation, Cuba converted its export-based, industrial agriculture to organic agriculture, including Permaculture and urban community gardens. The country rethought transport, importing and manufacturing close to 2 million bicycles and developing innovative public transport solutions. Education became decentralised with the country developing 50 universities in place of 3. These changes and more were achieved through “sheer political will”, in the words of one of the interviewees, and the benefits have been better health and a stronger sense of community.
Last year our branch showed The End of Suburbia about the peak oil crisis, which graphically illustrated the dire consequences of harder-to-access and more expensive oil. It foreshadowed the collapse of civilisation as we know it (a return to barbarism without a socialist alternative). The beauty of this film is that it offers an alternative and shows it actually functioning, despite the problems that Cuba still faces.
An argument against socialism that gets thrown at me time and again is that greed is part of human nature and we can never overcome it. This film is a good illustration of how collective effort can find solutions in problems and put them into practice. The very changes have strengthened co-operation and neighbourliness. Even private growers (about 50% of producers – the rest are co-ops and state farms) donate resources freely back to the community.
The discussion centred around how we could implement some of the changes shown in the film. Someone suggested growing our own vegies. Another person quickly added that it was important to take a collective approach as opposed to an individualistic one. Networks were set up between the Network of Concerned Farmers (anti GM), permaculturalists and bio-dynamic farmers, with a couple promising articles for GLW.
2 people joined SA at the event, one of whom was long-term supporter Madeleine, and the other was Geoff, the CFMEU member, who will be part of the Freo branch.
We also added 10 people to our contact list.
Conclusion: this film makes the links between socialism and sustainability. It is anti-nuclear by implication because it demostrates how alternatives can work well. It also has the capacity to draw a crowd and to get people thinking and talking to each other.
Read "Penguins in Bondage": http://happystiletto.blogspot.com/
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