One thing I hate about modern activists are their guilt tactics. Europeans and Americans ‘kill’ people in Africa, because we take away their resources.

First of all ‘guilt’ is not a very good motivation to help others. Guilt only creates anger and ignorance over time. We should CARE for our brothers and sisters in any country - but we should not feel guilt.

Second - we can’t disappear. Modern people consume a huge amount of resources. Sure you and I still can try to be a bit more modest and aware. Drive smaller cars, use public transport or buy only certain brands. But still our complex modern worlds need power for computers, commerce and traffic.

Third - we can only buy technologies that are on sales. To a certain amount we can vote with our wallets - and with tax. Yes, we developed countries still spent not enough money for better development, but we are not completely ignorant either.

Fourth - the ugly truth is that people die in shitty places all the time. Can we prevent every death? Nope. We can try to make living ‘nicer’ for all, but there is no remedy to the human tragedy.

Hamlet would have a cool dark gothic MySpace page today!

(Warning: stupid word creations ahead)

There is a lot of personal porn to be found on the blogosphere: death, breakups, terminal illness, angst, family affairs, war stories, fetishism, any kind of sexual encounter, romance or just plain everyday Weltschmerz.

Why this intensive openness and almost offensive sharing of pain? We has the web exploded with a gazillion video blogs, social bookmarking sites and even more cute baby pictures? Why do people pour their innermost secrets and feelings onto the blogosphere?

Writing as Therapy

Diaries are hardly a new invention. Blogs are evolved diaries. People have been writing their intimate thoughts literally for thousands of years. But diaries were always considered a private affairs, as personal reflection of life, emotions and ‘books of pain’ to cry into. My dear diary I feel like shit today …

I type, therefore I am.

But the age of personal intimacy is over. Overall society has opened up. With the ‘invention’ of psychology on one side and mass media on the other we much more understand how our psyche works. Writing is good! Sharing is even better! Crying is no longer only for girls and Britney Spears fans.

Expressing yourself to the global family is a good thing - no need to bottle it all up and keep not only a stiff upper lip. Let your emotions flow. Breath in, blog out!

The MeWe

But the desire ones own thoughts can hardly explain the incredible explosion of personal tidbits, video diaries, family blogs, instant messaging, social networking sites and all those nifty gadgets to share, collect, compare and publish the lifes of the ‘Always-On-Generation’?

Living in a box?

We actually face a total restructuring of our social fabric since the beginning of the industrial revolution. The classical family has been dissolving for almost 200 years.

But there is another important aspect to our modern society: the ‘tele-lifstyle’ has massivly changed our perception of life and speed of our socities.

The ‘Me’-Generation.

Since the start of the industrial age the ‘breeding collective’ is no longer necessary. It took only a short time to deconstruct the big family clan via the small modern family to arrive at the single parent. Today society takes much bigger part in raising children so woman can basically ‘breed’ by themselves. The big family clans support is no longer required for financial, legal, religious or moral reasons to get your clone up and running. No wonder we see such a huge explosions of single moms since the mid 80’s.

Old school family fantasies …

The result: most modern cities are filled up to 60% (or more) single people. Extreme individualism is no longer a choice, but the way kids grow up.

The ‘Me’-Generation has arrived.

More and more kids have no brothers, no sisters, no uncles, no aunties. They are grow up in a reduced family environment, while the social fabric is becoming ever more lose as well.

The Tele-Lifestyle

But also the way we experience and learn about our world has changed dramatically. We always had verbal communication and written reports to keep us informed, exchange ideas and archive knowledge to improve our chances for survival. But inventions like the telegram, telegraph, telephone, radio and most of all the television have radically changed our lifestyle and how we grow and connect as societies.

These new inventions enabled us to have a ‘tele-presence’ almost anywhere in real time on the globe. In contrast to the old slow days we can now experience live reports from the Hindenburg catastrophe, watch moon landings and the start of wars in shock and awe. We are ‘there’ without leaving here.

There is no longer a delay between events and the reports we receive. We can see and hear events as they unfolded - we are tele-present. The first time in human history you can participate in events far away from physical existence.

We loves our TV!

The television transports us within one news broadcast to a dozen places. Death in Iraq, a naked celebrity in Hollywood, a cute polar bear in Berlin. Been there, seen it, taped it.

With telephones and video conferences we can interact with people all over the world.

All these forms of communication are cheap and available to almost anyone these days. With cell phone armed with cameras and Internet access anyone can broadcast from anywhere. You can be everywhere without leaving home - you can establish a tele-presence with a mouse click, flipping on the TV or by dialing a simple number.

Amazing - especially when we remember that our grandparents just started with radio and the telegraph. No TV, no telephones, no computers, no cell phones, no Internet, no Google, no eMail, no video cameras.

The new ‘We’

But the new Tele-Presence had another effect. People shared mutual memories of events they haven’t been. A mass event  without a crowd.

Billions of people watched the first moon landing or listened to it on the radio without being there. There was no crowd on the moon - but billions shared that moment with intense involvement.

These are the new virtual ‘We’-Moments.

We now have gazillions of shared memories, emotions and experiences although we have never made them together. This is the new collective memory, the new ‘We’.

When you talk with others about global ‘tele-events’ (like the moon landing) you share deep down images, emotions, associations. These are like emotional ‘bookmarks’ we can use to connect and link our lifes. And these bookmarks are global ingrained in the individual and collective memory.

Almost as good as being there yourself - only safer …

For example: the images of 9/11 were burned live into our collective memories. We all can recall these images, we all shared that moment.

But not only such sinister moments connect us. It is amazing how TV shows, movies and advertising have created a huge library of moments and associations in our global psyche. Captain Kirk is as much a modern ‘We’ moment as Sesame Street or using ‘The Force’ (TM).

We are all Waltons now.

TV shows like the Waltons, Friends and almost any other soap opera are our new surrogate families. We learn from their lives and share their experiences we often can no longer get from our own social networks and often non-existent families. Like in ancient times we model our behavior on our virtual gods and role models.

The new ‘We’ has many fathers, mothers, lovers, relationships, enemies, brothers and sisters. ‘We’ lives and feeds on real and virtual events. It doesn’t matter if JR, John Lennon or John F. Kennedy gets shot, it all influences the ‘We’ psyche.

Everyone is a broadcaster on the Intranets

If TV has taught us anything it is the mechanism of sharing moments and exposing yourself to an global audience.

The web finally gives us the tools to link our lifes into the global psyche. We add to the ‘noize’ of the human condition.

The ‘Me’ digitally melts with the ‘We’.

Our minds spent more and more hours each day in other people’s lifes - real ones and virtual ones.

Am I connected or what?!

We participate in ‘tele-lifes’, ‘tele-families’, ‘tele-news’ and ‘tele-gatherings’.

It is no surprise that new types of websites or functions have developed: the YouTube’s on one side and the MySpace’s on the others. They serve two important functions: collecting and sharing mutual ‘We’ moments - and establishing your own global ‘Me’ tele-presence. We peek into other people’s ‘Me’ and compare our ‘Me’ to them - to see how much ‘We’ there is.

Via blogs and sites like StumbleUpon as well as social networks or social bookmark collection we put out our ‘Me’s: these are the websites I like, these are the videos & moments that are part of me, these are the pictures I can identify with, this is how I date and mate, these are snapshot from my ‘real’ life, these are my buddies, this is how I vote, these mp3s are part of my life’s soundtrack.

I am a well connected diversified prosumer individualist …

Come here, click me, compare me, link me, read me, watch me, email me, IM me, bookmark me.

This ‘Me’ is part of our ‘We’.

Blogschmerz

So is it any surprise that you can read, hear and watch almost any aspect on the global ‘We’? How much of your ‘Me’ can be found there? How much time do you spend in your many ‘tele-lifes’, avatars and online nicks?

Ah the simple life: no windows updates, no spam, no config.sys and no Paris Hilton!

And remember: we are the Neanderthals of the global ‘We’ lifestyle. Our iPods, cell phones and laptops are pretty limited and primitive. Our Wikipedia’s, blogs, galleries and online footprints are not even one generation ‘deep’.

There is no firewall against ‘We’. ‘We’ are ‘We’.

PS: This post was inspired by my exchange with Judefa and Edosan - so it’s only logical I dedicate this posting to those great beings. So Judefa and Edosan this one is for you - thanks for your inspiration!

Transform Mousetivism into Activism and browse Pledgebank. It’s a website to start your own little revolution or activism to change this to a better world. I like it’s idea and simple social mechanism: I’ll try to better myself - if other people join me. Excellent! This is how society should work - from the ground up to promote ideas and action - instead of top down.

When do you make your pledge?

Overpopulation is still one of our biggest problems. Humanities growth is unsustainable for our own good and the rest of nature. This becomes especially clear in the case of the global water crises. Here some insights from the ‘old’ (2004) BBC special report Planet under pressure. Check part 2 ‘running dry’ for some gruel news.

But I am afraid nothing has changed in the last two years - the poor are still thirsty:

* One billion people without access to clean drinking water
* 2.6 billion without adequate sanitation
* Rapid urbanization increasing pressure on water resources
* 30-40% of water ‘lost’ through illegal tapping and leaks

(Source: UN World Water Report)

If you are really interested you should also read the recent BBCs comment page regarding the water crises. We need conserve water, stop overpopulation and the total commercialization of water supply. Water is a common good, it needs to be protected, but not overpriced so it becomes unaffordable for the poor.

Before 1914 the world was already starting a global society without any political systems to divide them.

Then Franz Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, was assassinated by a terrorist which started the first half of the great war from 1914 till 1945. It took half a century to restore the global society to the same flow of goods and people like before 1914. It took Europe another World War to finally start the European Union.

Are we now having a new global war thanks to 9/11? Instead of communism and capitalism will we have a competition between Islam Fundamentalism vs. Western Democratic Idealism?

Our global society is still very young and unstable - are these the wars to unite us? Is the horror of war the only way to break down national differences?

BBC News: Child mortality ‘at record low’

Ok, I am a bit cynical here. It is good that less kids die, but it’s about time we tackle overpopulation seriously. We literally eating away our planet and humanities growth is unsustainable.

It sounds kind of stupid: but what’s the point of saving babies if they face a miserable life? Clean water is already a scarce resource in many developing nations, while the west wastes food for energy production.

While Europe is shrinking and the US stable, the rest of the world is still growing …

BBC Video about rising food prices in China.

The production of bio fuels is driving up prices for food - as well as the growing demand of the awakening giants India and China. There are two billion stomachs to fill and they no longer just eat a bowl of rice.

One aspect of global climate change and peak oil has been hardly discussed in public: food supply.

We highly depend on oil for food production, fertilizer and obviously distribution. We continuously kill huge amounts of livestock, because of diseases like the birdflu, but also more and more farmland is unusable, because of climate change or environmental problems (I am looking at you China).

Africa, who could produce loads of food, is shut out of most markets, because of protectionism in the US and EU.

So expect ever higher prices for food for the coming winter.

BBC: Mobiles for the ‘world’s poorest’

Forget the 100 Dollar Laptop - the good old mobile phone is proving to be a techno tool for change. Cell towers are cheaper and easier to install then landlines over huge ‘empty’ areas. Cell phones themselves are easy to learn and use without much literacy and they can also recharged with solar energy or little electricity.

Most of all it simply helps people to communicate and start a business. This is especially important in rural areas in Africa were basics of simple communication and even often transportation are lacking. With a cell phone news travels fast … and some progressive speed is something Africa and the poor can use.

In that context: if you have an old cell phone or if you upgrade in the near future donate your that thing to wirelessrecycling.com. And there are many other organizations that can use your mobile for other purposes.

See also Africa’s mobile entrepreneurs