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Local Future
Organizer Welcome!
Local Future is an attempt to help people together toward a new future, focused on all things local. It is inevitable, given the realities of peak oil and decline, climate change, overpopulation, biodiversity loss, and all of the varied symptoms of our failed global culture. Luckily, we have time to work together, at the local level, to transform this unsustainable global culture into sustainable local cultures. It may not be easy, but it is the challenge we face, and we can either succumb or rise to the occasion. Please join me in this effort to help individuals and communities move forward into this undiscovered country. The idea for Local Future originated many years ago. The first major step was when I read "Animal Liberation" by Peter Singer. I was surprised and shocked that animals were treated so poorly. I was even more concerned that I was part of the problem and that in my ignorance, I was acting in a way contrary to my beliefs. I choose to stop my direct participation in the factory farm industry by becoming vegan. While this may sound extreme to some, it was the only way I could reconcile my personal beliefs of compassion with my new understanding of modern corporate animal industry. This decision marked a turning point, after which a wide world of new ideas opened up, one where we are but one among millions of species that are part of Earth. The second major step in my awakening was my car accident. I was a passenger, the car was cruising down the freeway, and the next minute, we were rolling sideways down the road at 75 miles per hour. For a few seconds, I could see that my life had come to an end. My perspective suddenly changed. I realized that my life up to that point was not as much as it could have been. I thought to myself, "I had better get cracking, because this life thing is pretty fragile". I was amazed and delighted to come away from the wreck alive, and virtual unharmed. For some, these two events may not have had quite the impact as they did for me. Perhaps my history in teaching and in being part of introspective seminars and retreats, including the Courage to Teach program based on Parker Palmer's work, helped prepare me to start getting active in my community. Then, the third big event. During a lonely, quiet, long drive home, I began thinking about gas prices, and how rising prices disproportionately impacted those with less money. I did some Internet research, and ended up finding out about peak oil. It was like "Animal Liberation" all over again. I was sort of in shock. Here was another huge major truth about the world, that everyone should know about and understand, and yet it was practically an unknown concept. In the year that followed, I researched and wrote about peak oil using the Wikipedia under my Americanus account; I read several books on the topic, including "The Party's Over" and "The Long Emergency". I attended conferences such as the U.S. Conference on Peak Oil and Community Solutions and the ASPO-USA World Oil Conference. I even organized film screenings and designed a custom audio-visual presentation and talk based on my research and understanding of peak oil. I spoke about peak oil to several large groups. In July of 2006, I delivered a short 2-minute presentation to nearly 10,000 fellow educators at the National Education Association's annual meeting. This was followed in August by my very best presentation, which integrated the themes of peak oil, climate change, globalization, animal welfare and a sustainable value system. On the Internet, I started writing and publishing. My Xanga blog, Michigan Teacher, provided a place to write a couple article that students could read. I kept a list useful articles at New Culture at del.icio.us, a fantastic social bookmark site. I published videos at YouTube and Google Video under New Culture, based on a peak oil talk of July 2006. I also published various items to the Energy Bulletin, a site of up to date peak oil and sustainability news. That same summer, I designed the very first version of this web site, to help flesh out the concepts of an organizational path to local community sustainability. My writing that I'm most pleased with are published on Live Journal at Value System. Here, I've detailed very personal struggles with understanding the complexities of peak oil, and the bigger picture of what we can all do, now that peak oil is shattering our illusions and dreams for a magical technological future. After a one year speaking hiatus due to various unbreakable leadership commitments, the Local Future nonprofit organization officially launched in January 2008 with a flagship film event, and is now on track to host the first ever "International Conference on Peak Oil and Climate Change: Paths to Sustainability". It has been a fantastic journey, and it has only just begun. I invite you to join the Local Future effort, whether officially, or in your own way. This journey to the future is fraught with challenges, but working together, in community, we can face them, and weather the storms that have been brewing in the background for thousands of years. Thank you for visiting this site, and best wishes to you on your own journey into the undiscovered country of the future. Best wishes, Aaron Wissner P.S. If you would like to read my writing, watch my videos, or email me, see below:
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Copyright © 2008 Local Future |
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What follows is a short story of my journey, and how this Local Future nonprofit
organization was born.