“I am disgusted to report that TED has indeed hidden my “War on Consciousness” presentation and Rupert Sheldrake’s “Science Delusion” presentation on the TEDx Youtube channel. Both videos are now marked as private and so no member of the public can now view them or make up their own minds about them. If this is how science operates, by silencing those who express opposing views rather than by debating with them, then science is dead and we are in a new era of the Inquisition.”
- Graham Hancock

TED’s response here

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The first of a series of ‘Rebel Bass Sessions’, THTC hit up McDonalds in Leicester Square to provide a little bit of free entertainment and much needed ecological incite.

Rapper Leon Rhymes is accompanies by beatboxers Pikey Esquire, BeatFox and Marv ILL.

It all went off when the police arrived. The cameras continued to roll, but we have decided to launch the follow up footage in a separate clip.. Check THTC’s channel and subscribe for more of the same: www.thtc.co.uk

Filmed and edited by Theo Martindale of Sindica.

The post THTC Beatboxers take on McDonalds appeared first on EcoHustler.

Power by West sampled remix.

[At the big conclave/street gang meeting, Cyrus, the boss of the street gang appears]

Cyrus: [yelling] Can you count, suckers? I say, the future is ours… if you can count!
[a couple of soldiers cheer for Cyrus]

Cyrus: Now, look what we have here before us. We got the Saracens sitting next to the Jones Street Boys. We’ve got the Moonrunners right by the Van Cortlandt Rangers. Nobody is wasting nobody. That… is a miracle. And miracles is the way things ought to be.

[Few more soldiers cheering for Cyrus]

Cyrus: You’re standing right now with nine delegates from 100 gangs. And there’s over a hundred more. That’s 20,000 hardcore members. Forty-thousand, counting affiliates, and twenty-thousand more, not organized, but ready to fight: 60,000 soldiers! Now, there ain’t but 20,000 police in the whole town. Can you dig it?

Gang Members: Yeah.

Cyrus: Can you dig it?
Gang Members: Yeah!
Cyrus: Can you dig it?

Gang Members: YEAH!

[shouting and Cheering]

Cyrus: Now, here’s the sum total: One gang could run this city! One gang. Nothing would move without us allowing it to happen. We could tax the crime syndicates, the police, because WE got the streets, suckers! Can you dig it?
Gang Members: YEAH!
[shouting and Cheering]

Cyrus: The problem in the past has been the man turning us against one another. We have been unable to see the truth, because we have fighting for ten square feet of ground, our turf, our little piece of turf. That’s crap, brothers! The turf is ours by right, because it’s our turn. All we have to do is keep up the general truce. We take over one borough at a time. Secure our territory… secure our turf… because it’s all our turf!

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The post The Square Root of One Percent appeared first on EcoHustler.

Riders in London (credit: Matt Mellen)

For twenty years, in an increasing number of cities around the world, cyclists have united on the last Friday of the month to take over the streets. Known as Critical Mass, these mobile, social and celebratory events involve a sufficient number of bicycles to dominate road space; a safety in numbers approach comparable to giant shoals of fish or flocks of birds.

Refueling (credit: Matt Mellen)

The self-organizing nature of such phenomena, where group behaviour emerges spontaneously through the interaction of individuals, is part of the thrill for riders. They move from being solo and vulnerable to becoming part of a surging, whooping herd.

Emily Woodhouse at the South Bank (credit: Matt Mellen)

“The whole ethos of the ride is that it is spontaneous, organic, and non-hierarchical,” says Emily Woodhouse, an environmental anthropologist at Imperial College and a regular on the London events. She sees cycling as a positive force for good in the world. “Critical Mass is a direct action expressing how I want the world to be.”

For many participants, this global, cycling phenomenon is an important and highly symbolic gesture in support of a switch to human-powered mass mobility, which they believe could contribute to making cities healthier, happier and freer flowing. For others, it has simply been about the fun of the ride.

The first Critical Mass took place in San Francisco in 1992 and it has since spread to hundreds of cities around the world, with the London event sometimes attracting up to 2,000 cyclists. The highest attendance at a critical Mass event was in Budapest in April 2008, where an estimated 80,000 cyclists took part. All the rides have a local flavour but share the same sense of camaraderie, purpose and fun.

Karta Healy, founder of TheBicycleLibrary​.com and a veteran of many Critical Mass events in cities including Portland, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Paris, sees the urge to unite with others and show solidarity against the dominance of the car as a major motivation for riding. “It’s an empowering way to feel justified as a daily cyclist in your city,” he says.

Karta Healy in his London HQ

‘The Mass’ is diverse, composed of people of all shapes, sizes, colours and affluence, bound together by the shared love of self-propulsion and the desire to reclaim the streets and celebrate their freedom of movement. There are often mobile sound systems creating a party atmosphere and for many the ride will end in a favourite park or pub.

The meeting spot in London is in front of the Royal Festival Hall on the South Bank at about 6:30pm. The air buzzes with excitement as friends reunite. Drinks are cracked open, bikes admired and tales of surviving on the city’s mean streets traded. Soon the crowd swells like water behind a dam and the air is filled with a crescendo of dinging bells.

Anticipation gives way to urgency and the cracks in the dam appear as the first riders head up the ramp to the Imax cinema roundabout and off into the heart of the city. The hive-mind has been engaged and without an agreed route or leader, the peloton surges forth to find its way to an unknown destination.

Once beyond the safety of the South Bank participants find themselves in a sometimes-hostile environment of hooting cars and bemused pedestrians. ‘Corkers’ physically block the traffic allowing the giant, mobile herd to roll across London on streets freed from the normal congestion of fossil fuel-powered machines. For some motorists this seizing and holding of space is an inconsiderate and illegitimate protest.

The Joy of Corking (Credit: Matt Mellen)

The response of the Metropolitan Police has varied. For many years the Met would provide a phalanx of police outriders on bicycles who would actually stop the traffic. However, tactics changed in 2006 and police no longer accompany the rides; a development the riders I spoke to suggest may have led to an increase in confrontations with drivers.

However, the police presence has also been controversial. Emily Woodhouse reports a bad experience, saying she was pushed over by a policeman, but she feels strongly that cyclists should avoid confrontations.

“Critical Mass is a more powerful force for social change as a completely positive, non-violent, carnival-type phenomenon,” she says. “That kind of atmosphere promotes cycling and dialogue between people.”

A difficulty for the police was the seeming lack of structure to the rides, with no single organisation behind the events, no spokespeople and no agreed route. But for many taking part, it is exactly this freewheeling, collaborative spirit that draws them in.

Many participants are increasingly encouraging the rides to become more explicitly positive, with a message based around the improved lifestyles that cycling could bring about for city-dwellers. Setting an example for the way forward, a new Leicester ride has been described as “a two-wheeled charm offensive,” with a different theme and dress code every month.

Approximately 2% of journeys in London are by bicycle. Copenhagen, in comparison, sees almost a third of all journeys in the city being taken by bicycle. It is also consistently rated as one of the world’s happiest places to live.

These two statistics will be seen as directly linked by many participants of Critical Mass. And after twenty years, as this global phenomenon continues to grow, the riders are more determined then ever to congregate in the name of fun, friendship and freedom, spontaneously collaborating to create streets without cars.

The author in a stylish hat (Credit: Tom Amos)

Critical Mass @ Buckingham Palace (Credit: Matt Mellen)

Bike Salute @ Buckingham Palace (Credit: Matt Mellen)

You might also like:

• Riders of Rohan Assemble! here
• Fresh Air Flash Mob Debrief here
• Flash mob 4 fresh air here
• The Solution to Pollution here
• Why bikes shouldn’t have to follow the rules of the road here
• A Critical Mass of dissent… on wheels here
• The Royal Wedding goes CRITICAL here
• Regulators…mount up! here

The post 20 Years of Critical Mass appeared first on EcoHustler.

2012: Time For Change is a documentary feature that presents ways to transform our unsustainable society into a regenerative planetary culture. This can be achieved through a personal and global change of consciousness and the systemic implementation of ecological design.

www.2012timeforchange.com

Teaser:

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