Journal of a Futurist 30 September 2008
THE CREDIT CRISIS AND THE COLLECTIVE UNCONSCIOUS
On September 11, 2008 I received an “Impending Event Alert” from the Arlington Institute, an NGO that specializes in contemplating global futures and trying to influence rapid, positive change. On the whole it’s pretty straight, like its founder John L. Petersen, though this might be a disguise. His bio includes stints at the National War College, the Institute for National Security Studies, the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and the National Security Council staff at the White House. Petersen has long had an interest in “wild cards”, or high impact surprises, and his three week old email seems uncannily prescient.
“Here at the Arlington Institute, we have worked with real pre-cognizant dreamers who have had experience with intelligence services and we have subsequently learned about the hundreds of case studies of individuals who had explicit dreams about the 9/11 affair (people jumping out of burning high rise buildings, etc.), beginning some six months before the event. We have been intrigued with the notion that the human collective unconscious somehow anticipates large impending perturbations. Well, in the last two days I have received four independent, explicit indications from far removed friends suggesting that something very substantial and disruptive is going to happen to the U.S. within the next 60 days or so. If these warnings manifest themselves in an event of the significance of something like 9/11 then people all over the world should begin to experience dreams and other intuitions, suggesting that something extraordinary is about to happen. So I’m asking you to participate in an experiment with us. If you, or someone you know, experiences any kind of significant suggestion (dream, intuition, etc.) that something big and disruptive is about to happen in the coming weeks, send us a note and tell us about it. We’ll compile them all and see if we can find patterns or pointers toward an actual future event.” Here’s his email. dreams2008@arlingtoninstitute.org
Has the meltdown been foreshadowed in a million dreams? Last night as I drifted to bed, the mass media kept banging away about the “inevitability” of the Wall Street bail out being accepted, and how it’s all that’s left between prosperity and annihilation. On the edgier blogs, it was the opposite spiel. A gang of crooks fleecing the taxpayer, martial law imminent, links to protests on Wall Street, which were ignored on the news. Hard to know what to believe. “It is a final irony that the most conservative Republicans have voted down what they call an ‘un-American socialist measure’, writes Renate Ogilve. What socialism never managed is now becoming a new and astonishing capitalist phenomenon: nationalisation by default. History is not dead, it is alive and has a sense of humour.
THE MENACE OF RAMPAGING THIRD WORLD TEENS
Now we have three perilous events unfolding at once; the neo-colonial homicidal invasions, financial meltdown and the acceleration of global warming. Plus an idiot in the White House and two risky aspirants, a rookie and a war criminal. Why does dropping bombs on the Vietnamese qualify a man to be President? The US military have published heir latest Modernization Strategy (by Lieut Gen Stephen Speakes), which hails a future of "perpetual warfare”, one driven by a fear of "population growth in less developed countries which will expose a 'youth bulge'. "This will present the US with further "resource competition" as rampaging Third World teens "will consume ever increasing amounts of food, water and energy". The army’s strategy? A new, networked 'Future Force Warrior’, who will deploy among the target population and operate simultaneously several remote, unmanned ground and air weapons systems, such as the ones currently murdering women and children in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. This is a failed future scenario of business as usual, including the business of killing.
This is not a time to be led by Generals. This is a time to listen to the boundary riders, the ravers, the eco warriors, the planetary citizens, the poets, the innovators, the bridge builders… no matter how crazy eyed, out of fashion or ahead of the pack. Wild ideas can open minds in times of lies and confusion and debt. Here are two videos – one old, one new – which resonate with America’s honourable, long nourished spirit of freedom, adventure and – dare we say it ? - an awakening
