Week 10: FLEFF and Grassroots

Firstly, my apologies for falling behind on my blogging these past two weeks, I have been extremely preoccupied, but I will be incorporating those I have missed into Wednesday's blog, since I'm late with this one and am short on time.

I wanted to speak briefly about the film we saw last Thursday as part of the "Unnartural Causes" series. It was interesting to see how permeating the American military presence is in the Marshall Islands. I have never been all that interested in health issues, I'll admit I'm a bit squirmy about such matters, and my childhood was filled with doctors appointments and hospital visits for kidney infections that disappeared on their own as I got older, so I harbor some resentment towards the medical profession. However, whenever I hear about the spread of infectious disease due to external influences and the widespread inequalities perpretuated by militarization and globalization, I sit up and pay attention. I do not have the necessary knowledge to deal with the health matters themselves, but the root causes and the agents of change - in this case, negative - are the reason I went into this field, but they are also the reason this field can be so frustrating. Too often the sinister influence of American military and cultural imperialism can wear down the best of us, rendering us helpless against the awesome power of Western hegemons. But when we have access to films like this one, and to the resources - including people - who have experience dealing with these issues on the ground and in policy, I am reminded of the kind of positive role we could potentially play. When Dana, one of the attendees, spoke, I found myself looking at her askance, but her voice is one I have heard many times before: I care, but what can I do, that's the way the world is. It is balance. I disagree. It is the inbalance that I see permeating every nook and cranny of this planet, and perhaps balance is needed, but it certainly does not exist in the military bases on the Marshall Islands, or among immigrants fighting TB here as well after the effects of nuclear testing left Islanders with weakened immune systems, or in the country clubs that only Americans can attend on the Island that neighbors some of the poorest Marshallese. If that is balance, then my terminology is all off. But I doubt that.

So what do we do with this knowledge? I do not plan on conducting nuclear testing on any inhabited - or uninhabited - islands any time soon. I do not plan on employing immigrants in the near future, certainly not at unlivable wages, and I am unlikely to ever even visit the Marshall Islands. I do not have friends in power in Washington DC nor do I know how to maneuver through the stock market or convinve shareholders to stop supporting investment in countries like Sudan. I do not know how to bring the "information age" to the average Chinese citizens. I cannot end the war in Iraq, and I do not know how to mediate between Israel and Palestine.

In light of my apparent ineptness at changing the world, I have been asked on a number of occasions why I bother to try, and it was this insinuation in Dana's speech that was the hardest to combat. I do not know how to convince another human being that all human beings are worth the effort. I do not know how to make someone want to give more time or energy when I myself become worn down by "compassion exhaustion" as one friend called it. I do not know how to make it clear that I do not have an ulterior motive, I do not see how I gain except in that I would prefer to live in a world where there is greater equality and freedom and where humans treated each other with respect for one another's basic dignity and where human rights were more than an idea. I watch films like those shown in FLEFF and I am unsure how people can remain unmoved by the suffering of others. Yet I understand the deisre to assume powerlessness in that such a stance can allow individuals to pursue their own basic happiness. I cannot do that, and I am glad to watch films such as these because, though there will always be Dana's in the audience, there are also those who held the camera, who found the story, who felt it was worth telling, and those who are inspired by it. So here is to hope, and to grassroots activism, may we find strength in one another's dedication to the well being of humanity.

Can we say "idealistic"? I don't know what got into me today, but I guess that's my post for now.