The RCU Agenda

“You never change something by fighting the existing reality.
  To change something, build a new model that makes
  the existing model obsolete.”
  ― R. Buckminster Fuller

Preamble
Hello all, I’m Muirén (muir + éan) and I’m self-funding participatory action research, equitable evaluation, and strategic planning, pursuant to incorporation of a cooperative community, one defined by cultural and economic solidarity, with decision support and community relationship management based on a vision of modelling, analytics, and sociocratic decision support within an interdisciplinary, ecological paradigm.

You are invited to study this summary concept of cultural and economic solidarity, and hopeful join in the research, equitable evaluation, and strategic planning, prerequisite to incorporation.

If you are a US citizen, much of this may sound like fringe culture, however, it is a proposition founded on evidentiary science, with successful, long-term precedents around the world.

To be clear, there are perhaps a thousand various sustainable cooperatives (not counting credit unions) across the US, while tens of thousands are operating successfully around the world, with the 300 largest reporting turnover of $2.14 trillion USD in 2020.

Thank you for now, and please make use of the underlined links for a deeper dive into terms that may seem unfamiliar. Without further ado, THE ABOUT.

Does Capitalism Make Therapy Useless? | Mickey Atkins

There’s a lot to unpack in today’s video and a lot of nuance we need to honor so stay with me y’all. We’re chatting about how capitalism, especially late-stage capitalism, leeches into everything and corrupts everything; what capitalism does to our mental health; the sexist and problematic history of the mental health field, and my perspective as a therapist about what our work is to address all of that.
― Mickey Atkins

Mental Health for All by Involving All | Vikram Patel

People by the hundreds of millions are deeply affected by poor mental health worldwide. Across the global north and south only a fraction receive appropriate care, with close to 90 percent going untreated from the instability caused by neoliberalism, with the commodification of healthcare pushing the costs of accessing therapists, psychologists, and psychiatrists hopelessly beyond reach.

We must re-prioritize mental health and fitness as critical social infrastructure, a necessity for any functioning liberal and engaged democracy. The democratization of medical education and practice, codifying and funding a system of learned, professionally mentored and accountable peer-based healthcare is a realisable goal.

In this 2012 presentation, Prof Vikram Patel outlines a now proven approach ― training community members to coordinate mental health interventions, empowering ordinary people to care for each other.
Transcripts for Mental Health For All By Involving all | Vikram Patel • TEDGlobal 2012

ICA Gender Equality Committee · 2023 International Women’s Day

The ICA Gender Equality Committee marks the 2023 International Women’s Day by calling for the full participation of women and girls in innovation and technology.

Under the theme DigitALL: Innovation and Technology for Gender Equality, the 2023 International Women’s Day focuses on the importance of a digital transformation that empowers women and girls by including them as agents of change and development.

Anchored in its values and principles, the cooperative movement provides an environment to more effectively bridge the digital gender divide and advance towards sustainable, inclusive, and empowered communities. Discover stories of cooperatives helping to bridge the gender digital divide here.

There’s Nothing Natural About Capitalism feat. Clara Mattei | TMR

Clara E. Mattei (https://claramattei.com), Assistant Professor of Economics at the New School for Social Research, joins the program to discuss the history of so-called ‘Pure Economics’ as an instrument of propaganda for implicitly normalizing capitalism as a natural, even universal part of life.

Her research contributes to the history of capitalism, exploring the critical relation between economic ideas and technocratic policy making. She recently published her first book, The Capital Order: How Economists Invented Austerity and Paved the Way to Fascism (University of Chicago Press, November 2022). It investigates the origins of austerity after the WWI crisis to understand its logic as a tool of reaction against alternatives to capitalism.

The Real Reason Behind Skyrocketing Egg Prices | More Perfect Union

Egg companies want you to believe that bird flu and inflation sent egg prices skyrocketing. But those claims completely collapse under scrutiny. The numbers aren’t there. The evidence actually points to a massive corporate price-gouging scheme spanning the egg industry.

UC Davis Seminar: Transportation Equity in California | Adonia E. Lugo, PhD

Full Title: Defining a Mobility Justice Research Agenda for Transportation Equity in California
Speaker: Adonia E. Lugo, PhD, Equity Research Manager, UCLA
Abstract: In 2017, the Untokening collective released the “1.0 Principles of Mobility Justice” and created a conversation around mobility justice in transportation planning practice. Lugo, the lead author of the principles, will comment on her work to define a research agenda rooted in mobility justice to advance transportation equity within the UC Institute of Transportation Studies system.

Bicycle/Race: Transportation, Culture, & Resistance (Scribd/Print/Kindle/Audible)
By Adonia E. Lugo, PhD • Equity Research Manager at the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies and a core organizer of The Untokening, and in May 2022, Governor Gavin Newsom appointed her to the California Transportation Commission.

Is Toyota’s Smart City Crazier Than NEOM? | Joe Scott

Saudi Arabia’s NEOM smart city project has gotten a lot of attention lately, but Japan has a handful of smart cities in development that are every bit as innovative and weird and… maybe problematic? Especially a project called The Woven City by Toyota. Let’s take a look at them.

Corporate Greed and Deregulation Fuel Threat of More Bomb Trains

Democracy Now! looks at the failures that led to the massive train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, that blanketed the town with a toxic brew of spilled chemicals and gases, fouling the air, polluting waterways and killing thousands of fish and frogs. Residents are suffering ailments including respiratory distress, sore throats, burning eyes and rashes, all with unknown long-term consequences.

Many say they do not trust officials who tell them it is safe to return to their homes. This catastrophe could have been prevented, had it not been for lax regulation and the outsized lobbying power of corporations like Norfolk Southern, says Matthew Cunningham-Cook, a researcher and writer at The Lever who is part of a team that is reporting on the disaster.

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