Posts with Category Glocal

Human Rights Day at Indiana State

I bet you can’t name all 25 articles of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I bet you didn’t even know that there aren’t 25 articles, but 30. Ha! Got ya! I certainly couldn’t until I looked them up while researching WHERE AM I GIVING? 

75 years ago the United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights drafted by a  committee of world leaders chaired by Eleanor Roosevelt. The declaration consists of 30 articles of basic rights and fundamental freedoms. However “basic” and “fundamental” they may be, many people across the world and even in the United States are denied them.

Each year Indiana State hosts a day where speakers and students reflect and discuss human rights….

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Good People: Eric Henry (Entrepreneur, Farmer, Candidate, Local Citizen)

KelseyTimmerman · 31: Eric Henry (Entrepreneur, Farmer, Candidate, Local Citizen)

Eric Henry’s T-shirt business and North Carolina community were turned upside down by NAFTA. Ever since, he’s focused on the triple bottom line: people, planet, and profit. Eric is a champion for his community, cooperatives, chickens, electric cars, local economies, farmers, and now he’s seeking to represent all of these interests in the North Carolina House of Representatives.

Show notes and links:

 

Eric’s campaign 

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Good People: A Doughnut Economy

What does an economy of living within the means of our planet look like? Welp, according to economist Kate Raworth it looks like a doghnut. Kelsey and Jay are joined by John Motlotch and Scott Truex of the Sustainable Communities Institute for a discussion on Raworth’s TED Talk.

Topics we discussed and relevant links:

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Good People: The ripple effects of giving money

Give a man a fish? Teach a man to fish? But what if he doesn’t want to fish? Joe Huston, The CFO of Give Directly, joins Kelsey and Jay to discuss giving money to the poor and the positive ripple effects it makes in a community.

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Show notes: 

GiveDirectly.org
GiveWell’s report on Give Directly
How do cash transfers impact people who don’t receive them? (post and link to paper)
Review of evidence of direct cash transfers
Research Give Directly shares on site
Hand to Mouth: Living in Bootstrap America book by Linda Tirado…

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It’s HUGE to Feel small

 

I laid on the bottom of the ocean and stared into space. 

The surface of the water was so still and flat that it ceased to exist. The light of the stars traveled unimpeded trillions of miles, through the Earth’s atmosphere and 20 feet of water. 

I held my breath, the sound of my heartbeat joining the primordial hum of the Atlantic. 

I pushed off the bottom. Underwater like in space one is weightless.

That night off the coast of Key West, I slowly kicked towards constellations, no difference between air and space. I swam into eons and lightyears, not an observer of the universe but part of it. 

I stood in my…

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Is the Pope wrong about beggars?

Pope Francis

This week Pope Francis offered what to do when we pass beggars on the street: We should give to them without a thought. We should look them in the eye and maybe shake their hand. To give without engaging is robbing them of their human dignity.

The Catholic News Service reported on the Pope’s comments:

People who don’t give money to the homeless because they think it will be spent on alcohol and not food should ask themselves what guilty pleasures they are secretly spending money on, Pope Francis said.

“There are many excuses” to justify why one doesn’t lend a hand when asked by a person begging on the street, he said in an interview published the day before the beginning of Lent.

But giving something to someone in need “is always right,” and it should be done with respect and compassion because “tossing money and not looking in (their) eyes is not a Christian” way of behaving, he said.

Is he right?

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UK class reminds me to never be afraid to do stuff I’m not good at

A class at the University of Kentucky took some of the themes I write about in Where Am I Wearing? and turned them into art.  It’s awesome when something you made inspires other people to make things, but that’s not what I love most about this project.  That would be the fact that many of these students weren’t art majors.

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The Burden of Wealth

The wealth of the world’s 85 richest people equals the wealth of the world’s poorest 3.5 BILLION.

That stat, released in a recent OxFam report that is covered in this Guardian story, blew my mind.

$ of 85 = $ of 3,500,000,000

I first heard the stat yesterday while driving our 2005 Pontiac G6 to The Arsenal for my daily CrossFit humbling at 5:45 AM. Immediately I thought of those 85 people and what it would be like for them to hear that stat while being flown in their solid gold helicopter, or whatever, on their way to their basketball workout with Michael Jordan, or wherever. How would they feel?

If I were them, how would I feel?

Burdened. That’s the word that jumps to mind. The…

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I voted for my self-interest and the common good

I understand when people vote for their self-interest over the common good. However, it really makes me sad when people vote against both.

Today I believe I voted for both my self-interest and the common good. It’s nice when they line up like that.

There was only one item on the ballot. Muncie City schools are struggling and have to pass a referendum to increase property taxes to keep the buses running next year. I voted YES for the raise.

My self-interest

My taxes will go up somewhere between $70-$150/year at the most if it passes. If it doesn’t, I figure living in a school district that doesn’t offer busing will cause my home value to drop significantly more than that. Also, I’ll have a daughter in school next year, and where is…

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