In which authors Riki Ott and David Cobb lead a community dialogue vis a vis action against the US Supreme Court's recent ruling on the personhood of corporations. Tonight the actual persons are taking over! Let's hear your voice.
END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20120517T154103Z DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20100317T010000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20100317T030000Z UID:http://www.orcabooks.com/event/matt-hern-common-ground-liquid-city-essays-defense-urban-future-march-16th-6pm URL;VALUE=URI:http://www.orcabooks.com/event/matt-hern-common-ground-liquid-city-essays-defense-urban-future-march-16th-6pm SUMMARY:MATT HERN \\"Common Ground in a Liquid City\: Essays in Defense of an Urban Future\\" March 16th at 6pm DESCRIPTION:
If we want to preserve what's still left of the natural world\, we
need to stop using so much of it. And\, says veteran environmental
activist Matt Hern\, cities are the best chance we have left for a truly
ecological future . . . but what does it take to make a "\;truly"\;
sustainable city?
Common Ground in a Liquid City is a fun and engaging look at the future of urban life. Hern takes us on a journey through over a dozen urban centers\, from Vancouver to Istanbul\, Las Vegas\, and beyond\, exploring the history and current composition of cities around the globe and highlighting the elements of each that make it livable.
Each of Hern's ten chapters focuses on a central
theme of city life\: diversity\, street life\, crime\, population density\,
water and natural life\, gentrification\, and globalism. What emerges in
the end is an appealing portrait of what the urban future might look
like--environmentally friendly\, locally focused\, and governed from
below.
Matt Hern is an inveterate city dweller and an
environmental and education activist. The editor of Everywhere All the
Time\: A New Deschooling Reader and the author of Deschooling Our
Lives and Field Day\, he founded Vancouver's Car-Free Day and is the
director of the Purple Thistle Center for alternative education. These
days\, he lives in Vancouver with his partner and daughters and lectures
widely around the globe.
Drawing on declassified documents and extensive first-hand research\, The Politics of Cocaine takes a hard look at the role the United States played in creating the drug industry that thrives in Central and
South America. Author William L. Marcy contends that by conflating
anti-Communist and counternarcotics policies\, the United States helped
establish and strengthen the drug trade as the area's economic base.
Increased militarization\, destabilization of governments\,
uncontrollable drug trafficking\, more violence\, and higher death tolls
resulted. Marcy explores how the counternarcotics policies of the 1970s
collapsed during the 1980s when economic calamity\, the Andean guerrilla
insurgencies\, and Reagan's anti-Communist struggle with Nicaragua and
Cuba became conflated as part of the War on Drugs. The book then
explores how the U.S. invasion of Panama and narcotics related violence
throughout Andean region during the 1990s led to the militarization of
the War on Drugs as a way to confront narcotics production\,
narco-traffickers\, and narco-guerrillas alike. Marcy brings to the
reader up to the end of the George W. Bush administration and explains
why to this date the United States remains unable to control the flow
of cocaine into the United States and why the War on Drugs appears to
be spiraling out of control. The Politics of Cocaine fills in
historical gaps and provides a new and controversial analysis of a
complex and seemingly unsolvable problem.
We have a problem with Stuff. With just 5 percent of the world's population\, we're consuming 30 percent of the world's resources and creating 30 percent of the world's waste. If everyone consumed at U.S. rates\, we would need three to five planets!
This alarming fact drove Annie Leonard to create the Internet film sensation The Story of Stuff\, which has been viewed over 10 million times by people around the world. In her sweeping\, groundbreaking book of the same name\, Leonard tracks the life of the Stuff we use every day--where our cotton T-shirts\, laptop computers\, and aluminum cans come from\, how they are produced\, distributed\, and consumed\, and where they go when we throw them out. Like Rachel Carson's Silent Spring\, The Story of Stuff is a landmark book that will change the way people think--and the way they live.
Leonard's message is startlingly clear\: we have too much Stuff\, and too much of it is toxic. Outlining the five stages of our consumption-driven economy--from extraction through production\, distribution\, consumption\, and disposal--she vividly illuminates its frightening repercussions. Visiting garbage dumps and factories around the world\, Leonard reveals the true story behind our possessions--why it's cheaper to replace a broken TV than to fix it\; how the promotion of "\;perceived obsolescence"\; encourages us to toss out everything from shoes to cell phones while they're still in perfect shape\; and how factory workers in Haiti\, mine workers in Congo\, and everyone who lives and works within this system pay for our cheap goods with their health\, safety\, and quality of life. Meanwhile we\, as consumers\, are compromising our health and well-being\, whether it's through neurotoxins in our pillows or lead leaching into our kids' food from their lunchboxes--and all this Stuff isn't even making us happier! We work hard so we can buy Stuff that we quickly throw out\, and then
we want new Stuff so we work harder and have no time to enjoy all our Stuff. . . . With staggering revelations about the economy\, the environment\, and cultures around the world\, alongside stories from her own life and work\, Leonard demonstrates that the drive for a "\;growth at all costs"\; economy fuels a cycle of production\, consumption\, and disposal that is killing us.
It is a system in crisis\, but Annie Leonard shows us that "\;this is not the way things have to be."\; It's within our power to stop the environmental damage\, social injustice\, and health hazards caused by polluting production and excessive consumption\, and Leonard shows us how. Expansive\, galvanizing\, and sobering yet optimistic\, "\;The Story of Stuff "\;transforms how we think about our lives and our relationship to the planet.
END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20120517T154103Z DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20100328T213000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20100328T233000Z UID:http://www.orcabooks.com/event/orca-writes URL;VALUE=URI:http://www.orcabooks.com/event/orca-writes SUMMARY:Orca Writes! Sunday\, March 28th at 2\:30pm DESCRIPTION:
Our first writing group was a huge success! Thanks to all of you who made
it. For those of you who couldn't come\, you are welcome to join at any
time. Orca Writes is the fourth Sunday of the month from 2\:30 to 4\:30. Our goal is to foster a writing community where writers of all
styles and levels can connect and find support.
This month\,
we'll experiment with tools for generating new work\, and we'll also
explore writing from various perspectives. Please bring a photo or
picture.
If you have any questions\, our e-mail for all book club and writing group related things is orcapod@orcabooks.com
END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20120517T154103Z DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20100331T010000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20100331T010000Z UID:http://www.orcabooks.com/event/melissa-febos-whip-smart-march-30th-6pm URL;VALUE=URI:http://www.orcabooks.com/event/melissa-febos-whip-smart-march-30th-6pm SUMMARY:MELISSA FEBOS \\"Whip Smart\\" March 30th at 6pm DESCRIPTION:While a college student at The New School\, Melissa Febos spent four years working as a dominatrix in a midtown dungeon. In poetic\, nuanced prose she charts how unchecked risk-taking eventually gave way to a course of self-destruction. But as she recounts crossing over the very boundaries that she set for her own safety\, she never plays the victim. In fact\, the glory of this memoir is Melissa's ability to illuminate the strange and powerful truths that she learned as she found her way out of a hell of her own making.
After she appeared on the NPR\, it got real hard to keep copies of Whip
Smart in stock. She's got moxie! Don't miss it.