Post by Roger Christain on Jun 8, 2006 10:36:24 GMT -5
This is a June 2006 Gleamings for the Ithaca Community News
ICN is going to publish a well-being directory in August. This summer, ICN is branching out beyond the Internet to publish the print "Ithaca Well-Being Directory." It will be a small booklet with information on where to find alternative and holistic health care practitioners, healers, herbalists, good, healthy food and more. Advertising costs less than other regional directories and offers more for those who pick it up.
Look for copies distributed around town in August! For advertising rates, please email elizabeth@ithacanews.org.
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EDITORIAL: Diversity is not just a feel-good word
Last week, I attended the First Annual Diversity Roundtable, sponsored by the Tompkins County Diversity Consortium, and held at the Hilton Garden Inn. The Diversity Consortium is a coalition of local governmental, educational, and civic groups working together to make Tompkins County a more inclusive place for all of its citizens.
The idea behind the Diversity Roundtable was for the Consortium to show the community ways in which our county leaders and agencies are working on diversity issues, and ways we can improve. Lynette Chappell-Williams, Chair of the Roundtable, told me the goal of the conference was to "broaden the discussion and to see where we can share resources."
The Roundtable began with keynote speaker Ayanna Epps, who is a conflict resolution mediator with the Department of Justice. She spoke about diversity within a business model and how businesses and communities function in similar ways. There was also a panel presentation by some of the leaders in our community, and several break-out sessions designed to get people talking about the issue of diversity.
For me, the first sign that this was going to be a long day was during the keynote address. Epps first made the case that we need to honor diversity in our businesses because businesses are the lifeblood of the community. Fair enough. But when she went on to offer up all the various dollar figures of how much each racial, ethnic and gender category spends on consumer goods, she lost me. So now we need to honor diversity because African-Americans have a lot of spending power?
There's something deeply unsettling about viewing diversity through the lens of capitalism, as though it's only in our best interest to be inclusive because of how our money flows. Sorry, but I happen to think that people are valuable because of their unique contributions to societytheir ideas, their talentsand not because of how wealthy they can make some [mostly white] corporations.
Has diversity simply become a feel-good word we can use to pat ourselves on the back every time an African-American is promoted in the corporate world? I am not trying to diminish the importance of true inclusiveness in the business world. I am very much in favor of Affirmative Action, of businesses taking steps to recruit, train, and promote people of color, and for our country to implement real policy changes that create a more financially equitable society. It's just that something real gets lost in the discussion when we focus exclusively on business matters and forget the hearts and minds of who we are really talking about: people.
Malcolm X was instrumental in explaining the notion behind so many white people's good intentions, that too many think they need to raise African-Americans up to their standards, as though Caucasians have the market on morality and the good life. Quite the contrary, there is much that white people can learn from people of color. Sometimes whites just need to shut up and listen.
I have to admit I'm tired of endless talking about the issue. I want to see some real policy changes, not just in our businesses and schools, but in our communities, in our relationships with each other, and in our hearts and minds. I am fairly certain that most attendees at the roundtable conference feel the same way, and that many of the attendees are working for real change. But I don't think we're going to see real change until people start talking about the flip side of diversity: racism.
White people need to stop acting like they know what people of color need and want, and start listening. I am not sure exactly what the process for that kind of open dialogue would be, but I do know this: it needs to start with discussions about race and racism, and it needs to be open, honest and real.
Equality is not about all of us being the same; it's about all of us having our unique needs met, and being able to celebrate our differences in ways that remind of us of our common humanity. Before we can pat ourselves on the back for celebrating diversity, I think we need to experience some healing from racism, both personal racism that we've experienced in our lives (whatever color we are), and institutional racism that has kept so many from achieving their goals and living their dreams.
To that end, I've been participating in an open dialogue about racism, held every Tuesday in Ithaca in a downtown home, called Unraveling Racism. The group is relatively new and so far still in its initial learning stages. One thing I hope to see happen is a larger group form out of this weekly discussion, where we get into the heart of who we are and who we aspire to be as a human family, and to find ways of demonstrating that commitment to diversity in some real and tangible ways, including business, government and education, but mostly in our everyday lives, and in our personal relationships with our neighbors and friends.
For anyone who's interested in the meetings, please contact Caleb or Sareanda at 277-1799.
Ten Thousand Villages available to speak to groups about fairly traded oriental rugs. Between now and August, members of the Ten Thousand Villages staff and board are offering to give presentations about "fair trade," the oriental rugs and the Pakistani people who make them, to community groups. To schedule a presentation, contact Mike Westlund, Manager at the Ten Thousand Villages store at 256-0616 or Patrick McMahon at pqmc@aol.com or 351-4760.
Sustainable Tompkins Monthly Gathering June 8, 6:00-8:30 pm, Cooperative Extension, Conference Room B, 615 Willow Ave. This month's topic: INTERGENERATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A PATHWAY TO COMMUNITY SUSTAINABILITY. Meeting will begin with a potluck and sharing. Participants are encouraged to bring people of all ages. This is a chance to get to know - and collaborate with - others who also wonder how best to engage in crucial issues and hopeful solutions that directly affect ALL of us. More info: Elan Shapiro, 275-0249, or elansla@ecovillage.ithaca.ny.us. Sustainable Tompkins is a coalition of citizens, community organizations, elected officials, educators and professionals from diverse fields, all working to promote a more sustainable community. www.sustainabletompkins.org
Build An Urban Ecosystem, Sunday, June 11, 111 Monroe St. Presented by the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute, this monthly skill share series takes place in the Northside neighborhood. FLPI will demonstrate quick and easy ways to transform urban lots into healthy, yielding ecosystems. The event includes a discussion of design strategies as well as plenty of hands-on activities. Topics: Permaculture in the City, Urban Composting, Garden Primer, and Urban Design.
In the evening there will be a community potluck and an open discussion titled "Taking Down Fences" where neighborhood residents will gather to discuss their dreams for creating a cooperative city. We will first give a short presentation on designing neighborhoods, followed by a Town Hall style meeting with open discussion. All are welcome.
Cost is $25 dollars for workshop. Ithaca's Northside residents can attend for FREE. The potluck and discussion is FREE.
Potluck will be held upstairs of Autumn Leaves, 115 The Commons. Registration required. Please register online or send name, address, phone, and email to register@fingerlakespermaculture.org. www.fingerlakespermaculture.org
FOREST GARDENING with DAVE JACKE, June 17 and 18, at the Cayuga Nature Center. Presented by The Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute. Dave Jacke is coming to the Finger Lakes to offer an inspiring and practical workshop on the vision, ecology, design, and stewardship of forest gardens: perennial polycultures of multipurpose plants in small-scale settings. Dave Jacke (http://www.edibleforestgardens.com) is a well respected teacher and designer who recently released "Edible Forest Gardens," an extensive two-volume book on the subject. More info: www.fingerlakespermaculture.org
Unique Eyewitness Report from Baghdad TONIGHT
An American lawyer will present a personal, unique view of life in Iraq at an open gathering at the Unitarian Church Annex, tonight June 7, 7:30 pm. Beth Pyles, of Parkersburg, WV spent 5 months since last fall in Iraq, with the Christian Peacemaker Team (CPT). She lived outside the comparative security of the Green Zone as she worked with Iraqis whose family members had been imprisoned, often by US forces, and helped them to locate their relatives and to make contact with them. She also had conversations with the US military as they shared their views on what's happening in Iraq and in their own lives.
During the gathering she will discuss such matters as:
What's it like living among ordinary Iraqis?
How does one deal with the daily violence?
How can there be a role for nonviolence among all that violence?
What did she see and hear that's never on our media?
What was it like working there while 4 members of CPT were held captive?
How did the death of one of the captives affect all the others?
What does CPT think about the soldiers who saved the lives of the other three?
What is CPT doing in Iraq anyhow? Aren't they making life worse for the US soldiers?
see page two - There are limits in this ProBoard
ICN is going to publish a well-being directory in August. This summer, ICN is branching out beyond the Internet to publish the print "Ithaca Well-Being Directory." It will be a small booklet with information on where to find alternative and holistic health care practitioners, healers, herbalists, good, healthy food and more. Advertising costs less than other regional directories and offers more for those who pick it up.
Look for copies distributed around town in August! For advertising rates, please email elizabeth@ithacanews.org.
---------------------
EDITORIAL: Diversity is not just a feel-good word
Last week, I attended the First Annual Diversity Roundtable, sponsored by the Tompkins County Diversity Consortium, and held at the Hilton Garden Inn. The Diversity Consortium is a coalition of local governmental, educational, and civic groups working together to make Tompkins County a more inclusive place for all of its citizens.
The idea behind the Diversity Roundtable was for the Consortium to show the community ways in which our county leaders and agencies are working on diversity issues, and ways we can improve. Lynette Chappell-Williams, Chair of the Roundtable, told me the goal of the conference was to "broaden the discussion and to see where we can share resources."
The Roundtable began with keynote speaker Ayanna Epps, who is a conflict resolution mediator with the Department of Justice. She spoke about diversity within a business model and how businesses and communities function in similar ways. There was also a panel presentation by some of the leaders in our community, and several break-out sessions designed to get people talking about the issue of diversity.
For me, the first sign that this was going to be a long day was during the keynote address. Epps first made the case that we need to honor diversity in our businesses because businesses are the lifeblood of the community. Fair enough. But when she went on to offer up all the various dollar figures of how much each racial, ethnic and gender category spends on consumer goods, she lost me. So now we need to honor diversity because African-Americans have a lot of spending power?
There's something deeply unsettling about viewing diversity through the lens of capitalism, as though it's only in our best interest to be inclusive because of how our money flows. Sorry, but I happen to think that people are valuable because of their unique contributions to societytheir ideas, their talentsand not because of how wealthy they can make some [mostly white] corporations.
Has diversity simply become a feel-good word we can use to pat ourselves on the back every time an African-American is promoted in the corporate world? I am not trying to diminish the importance of true inclusiveness in the business world. I am very much in favor of Affirmative Action, of businesses taking steps to recruit, train, and promote people of color, and for our country to implement real policy changes that create a more financially equitable society. It's just that something real gets lost in the discussion when we focus exclusively on business matters and forget the hearts and minds of who we are really talking about: people.
Malcolm X was instrumental in explaining the notion behind so many white people's good intentions, that too many think they need to raise African-Americans up to their standards, as though Caucasians have the market on morality and the good life. Quite the contrary, there is much that white people can learn from people of color. Sometimes whites just need to shut up and listen.
I have to admit I'm tired of endless talking about the issue. I want to see some real policy changes, not just in our businesses and schools, but in our communities, in our relationships with each other, and in our hearts and minds. I am fairly certain that most attendees at the roundtable conference feel the same way, and that many of the attendees are working for real change. But I don't think we're going to see real change until people start talking about the flip side of diversity: racism.
White people need to stop acting like they know what people of color need and want, and start listening. I am not sure exactly what the process for that kind of open dialogue would be, but I do know this: it needs to start with discussions about race and racism, and it needs to be open, honest and real.
Equality is not about all of us being the same; it's about all of us having our unique needs met, and being able to celebrate our differences in ways that remind of us of our common humanity. Before we can pat ourselves on the back for celebrating diversity, I think we need to experience some healing from racism, both personal racism that we've experienced in our lives (whatever color we are), and institutional racism that has kept so many from achieving their goals and living their dreams.
To that end, I've been participating in an open dialogue about racism, held every Tuesday in Ithaca in a downtown home, called Unraveling Racism. The group is relatively new and so far still in its initial learning stages. One thing I hope to see happen is a larger group form out of this weekly discussion, where we get into the heart of who we are and who we aspire to be as a human family, and to find ways of demonstrating that commitment to diversity in some real and tangible ways, including business, government and education, but mostly in our everyday lives, and in our personal relationships with our neighbors and friends.
For anyone who's interested in the meetings, please contact Caleb or Sareanda at 277-1799.
Ten Thousand Villages available to speak to groups about fairly traded oriental rugs. Between now and August, members of the Ten Thousand Villages staff and board are offering to give presentations about "fair trade," the oriental rugs and the Pakistani people who make them, to community groups. To schedule a presentation, contact Mike Westlund, Manager at the Ten Thousand Villages store at 256-0616 or Patrick McMahon at pqmc@aol.com or 351-4760.
Sustainable Tompkins Monthly Gathering June 8, 6:00-8:30 pm, Cooperative Extension, Conference Room B, 615 Willow Ave. This month's topic: INTERGENERATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A PATHWAY TO COMMUNITY SUSTAINABILITY. Meeting will begin with a potluck and sharing. Participants are encouraged to bring people of all ages. This is a chance to get to know - and collaborate with - others who also wonder how best to engage in crucial issues and hopeful solutions that directly affect ALL of us. More info: Elan Shapiro, 275-0249, or elansla@ecovillage.ithaca.ny.us. Sustainable Tompkins is a coalition of citizens, community organizations, elected officials, educators and professionals from diverse fields, all working to promote a more sustainable community. www.sustainabletompkins.org
Build An Urban Ecosystem, Sunday, June 11, 111 Monroe St. Presented by the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute, this monthly skill share series takes place in the Northside neighborhood. FLPI will demonstrate quick and easy ways to transform urban lots into healthy, yielding ecosystems. The event includes a discussion of design strategies as well as plenty of hands-on activities. Topics: Permaculture in the City, Urban Composting, Garden Primer, and Urban Design.
In the evening there will be a community potluck and an open discussion titled "Taking Down Fences" where neighborhood residents will gather to discuss their dreams for creating a cooperative city. We will first give a short presentation on designing neighborhoods, followed by a Town Hall style meeting with open discussion. All are welcome.
Cost is $25 dollars for workshop. Ithaca's Northside residents can attend for FREE. The potluck and discussion is FREE.
Potluck will be held upstairs of Autumn Leaves, 115 The Commons. Registration required. Please register online or send name, address, phone, and email to register@fingerlakespermaculture.org. www.fingerlakespermaculture.org
FOREST GARDENING with DAVE JACKE, June 17 and 18, at the Cayuga Nature Center. Presented by The Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute. Dave Jacke is coming to the Finger Lakes to offer an inspiring and practical workshop on the vision, ecology, design, and stewardship of forest gardens: perennial polycultures of multipurpose plants in small-scale settings. Dave Jacke (http://www.edibleforestgardens.com) is a well respected teacher and designer who recently released "Edible Forest Gardens," an extensive two-volume book on the subject. More info: www.fingerlakespermaculture.org
Unique Eyewitness Report from Baghdad TONIGHT
An American lawyer will present a personal, unique view of life in Iraq at an open gathering at the Unitarian Church Annex, tonight June 7, 7:30 pm. Beth Pyles, of Parkersburg, WV spent 5 months since last fall in Iraq, with the Christian Peacemaker Team (CPT). She lived outside the comparative security of the Green Zone as she worked with Iraqis whose family members had been imprisoned, often by US forces, and helped them to locate their relatives and to make contact with them. She also had conversations with the US military as they shared their views on what's happening in Iraq and in their own lives.
During the gathering she will discuss such matters as:
What's it like living among ordinary Iraqis?
How does one deal with the daily violence?
How can there be a role for nonviolence among all that violence?
What did she see and hear that's never on our media?
What was it like working there while 4 members of CPT were held captive?
How did the death of one of the captives affect all the others?
What does CPT think about the soldiers who saved the lives of the other three?
What is CPT doing in Iraq anyhow? Aren't they making life worse for the US soldiers?
see page two - There are limits in this ProBoard