[Note: This file is a combination of 33 smaller files to form a 158 page book. It was edited with MS-Word using a Courier 12pt font to provide a perfect readable text file on the IBM via the "TYPE" command. This slight modification was done to provide a readable one-file document(for all computers) to those who have internet access. dmw@sioux.ee.ufl.edu-3/7/93] I WAS ROBOT (Utopia Now Possible) by Ernest Mann Within these pages you will learn how one Robot transformed himself into an almost free individual human being. You will also see how we can create a nearly Utopian world, on Spaceship Earth within one year. About the Author: The author was in business in Minneapolis for 20 years. He gained enough knowledge in Economics in Business College and in practice to retire in 1969 at the age of 42. Since then he has had the space to observe economics from a different perspective and has had 21 years of time to travel to many countries, read, observe, discuss, think, evaluate and form his own conclusions about the economic situation, politics, religion, life and individual freedom. This book is a gathering of some of the best issues of his free news letter, the "Little Free Press" in which he has shared his observations and conclusions since 1969. They have been revised to exclude most of the duplications and update notes have been added. The character in this book is real, and any resemblance to fictitious persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. No, No, No Copyright, 1990, Ernest Mann. No world rights reserved. Any part or all of this publication may be stored in a retrieval system, transmitted, or reproduced in any language, in any way, including but not limited to photocopy, photograph, offset, rotary or flatbed press, magnetic or other record, with the prior agreement and herein expressed written permission of the author. A Public Domain Book Little Free Press, 1011 6th Avenue NE apt 21, Little Falls, MN 56345 USA (612-632-1965) ISBN: 0-9620301-0-4 Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 89-80274 This book is dedicated to all little children. Let's create for them -- a decent world to grow up in. CONTENTS 1. Human Robot 2. Waste Burner Waste 3. Jailed 4. Missing Pieces 5. Truth 6. Meaning Of Freedom 7. Becoming More Free 8. World War III 9. Utopia Now Possible 10. Making Changes 11. Wanted: Volunteer Crew 12. What Can Farmers Do? 13. This Moment! 14. How To Become A Millionaire 15. The Problem And Solution 16. Talking To Myself 17. Like Being Squeezed? 18. Slave Management 19. Warbucks Family Memo 20. Warbucks Communique 21. Warbucks Leaving Earth 22. Out Of The Rut 23. Letter From Mother 24. More Electricity? 25. Life Can Be Beautiful 26. What Is Happiness? 27. Simplify? 28. Purpose 29. Good Life -- C. O. D. 30. Memoirs Of A Drop-out 31. Good Health Is Easy 32. Changing Games CONTENTS OF BOLD STATEMENTS A Song An Hour A Day Be Ruled Caesar's Circus Changes Check List Class Status Common Sense Constant Get Started Groups Help Wanted Hope Ignorance Laws Mind Newsletter One-Way Ticket Our Time Is Limited Pay System Prevention Priceless Economic System Progress Pyramid Seven Wonders Slave Attitude Ten Years Things Time To Live Time to Play Total License Triumph Two People Volunteers Volunteers Wars What Will Happen There is no enemy. Only ignorance --of a better Game to play. 1 HUMAN ROBOTS I vaguely remember a science fiction movie of "Flash Gordon" back in the 30's which showed all the workers in some city moving around like robots. The hero tried to talk with them but they didn't pay any attention. He then noticed that all the workers were wearing the same kind of helmet. He took off one worker's helmet. The worker seemed to come out of a trance and told our hero that while they wore the helmets they were literally slaves and had to do whatever they were told by their Master. In the book, "Brave New World," the people were given a drug called "soma" each day as they finished work. As I recall, this kept the people in a blissful unconcerned state of consciousness until their next work day. It has occurred to me that I have worn the helmet. Except my helmet was in my mind. I was getting soma too. I even paid to get it. Intake Time In my intake time I watched TV, listened to the radio, went to movies, listened to records, background music and tapes, glanced at billboards, read magazines and newspapers. During this time I also took one or more of the consciousness altering drugs. These addictive drugs included nicotine, caffeine, alcohol and sugar. Some people used harder drugs. The drugs may have made me more susceptible to the programming that I was receiving. My Programming My programming was achieved by many methods. First of all it is important to remember that most of the mass media is owned or controlled by big money people. They not only use the old methods such as; slanting, falsifying, exaggerating, omitting, monkey-see & monkey- do, loaded words, hypnotic music, etc., but are also now using many new subliminal methods1 of implanting ideas, opinions, fears and desires into our conscious and subconscious minds without our being aware of it. They were able to program me almost as effectively as computers are now programmed. Dependency I was dependent on these various programming media for my "entertainment." I thought I actually enjoyed the movies, TV, radio, etc., that I was being programmed with and for which I had to pay plenty. I thought I enjoyed the drugs on which I was dependent. You can't imagine how many barrels of coffee and show cases of sweet rolls I went through. I didn't know they were addictive. I had lost or had never learned the art of entertaining myself. I allowed others to do my thinking for me. I had very little time to figure out things. So I just did what was expected of me. I was a human robot. Merry-Go-Round I was 10 years a salesman and 10 years in business for myself. During most of that time I went blindly around that old merry-go-round of working, spending and trying to pay my bills by the 10th. There were many times I couldn't pay by the 10th and I would try to borrow money from the bank to pay bills. (You know what they said, most of the time -- "Ha, ha, ho, ho!") So I sorted the bills and paid only the most imminent and stalled the rest. One big bummer! Who has time to do any important profound thinking about life, pollution, wars, etc., at a time like that? My thinking time was totally occupied with finding a way to make a buck and trying to keep a reasonably happy family. I don't recall that I, even once, asked myself if I were happy or if I were doing what was for my own best good over the long run. A Rut I went pathetically around and around that wheel (endless rut) every month, always trying to get a little ahead of the game. It was not unlike a grave with both ends kicked out, like a robot programmed to work, spend and pay. Like, I was in the groove, man, but I didn't know how to remove my helmet. I didn't even know I had one. Background Music I think that I might like background music if I were not trying to talk or think, that is, providing I was sure that there was no mind conditioning in it. TV Kickout Somewhere along the line I got mad at my TV addiction and gave my set away. It was almost impossible for me to turn the damned thing off until the program was over or until I was exhausted. I'm now happy that I did this, especially since I've learned about the subliminals bombarding TV watchers. I don't need it. My subconscious must have told me to get rid of it. I rarely take in any of the other news media or movies any more. This leaves me with more time and inclination to do some thinking for myself. In fact, I would not even dream of voting for anyone to represent me and to make laws against me anymore. In Business I was taught in Economics class, in business college, the rule, "Charge all the traffic will bear. (and a little more so that you can come down)," that I must make a profit and the more the better. Then it sounded logical, so when I went into business it seemed quite natural to follow that old rule, so I did. I didn't stop to realize that everyone else would be using that same rule on me too. That for everything I would buy there would be someone trying to get all they could out of me. This kind of economics ferments trusts, monopolies and cartels. So those with the most, make the most. I didn't worry about the workers in foreign countries who made only a few cents a day on the imported products that I bought, until I visited some of those countries recently. Then I saw some of their living and working conditions. It made me start to think. I also realized that workers in the U.S.A. are exploited too, only on a different level and more subtly. My belief that everyone here had freedom of "choice of work" fell apart. I could see that most of us were doing work that we didn't like. Because we needed the money to pay the rent, food bills, etc., we had to take work at any place that was hiring, whether we liked the job or not. I didn't question whether the manufacturer of what I was buying, was polluting my drinking water supply, my fresh air supply or my food supply. I trusted government to protect those supplies for me. I trusted my city sewer disposal and my city water purification departments. It never once occurred to me that if we didn't pollute our water supply we wouldn't need the purification department. I trusted my city government many years ago when they said that it was hazardous to our health to put human waste on crop lands. I had forgotten the fact that my dad always put our human waste from our out- house, on our crop land. I forgot that I had seen the Japanese farmers doing this 30 years ago. Screwed Up We have been making great technical advancements. We have developed fabulous new techniques, alloys, compounds and methods that give products more strength, durability and all kinds of wonderful new qualities. But they sell us products that are always breaking down, wearing out and polluting more, e.g., cars won't start, they rust out in 3 years and start falling apart before you get them paid for and toys break before you get them home. We have wonderful mass production machines and tremendous crop yield seed varieties and excellent irrigation facilities, yet we are often told that there are shortages just before severe price increases, e.g., meat, sugar, oil and coffee. For some strange reason the prices never came down after the "so called" shortages were over. Prisons don't rehabilitate or cut down crime. They say there are crimes even when there is no victim. Laws are written by the big money people to protect big money. Governments spend money like it was water. Many money-saving devices are kept off the market. Laws are written to keep down the little man. Nightmare My first reaction to my study of the overall picture, was that things are sure screwed, all backwards and muddled up, a regular nightmare. But on closer examination I decided that this is the natural trend that must take place under the present world-wide economic system. (The "Pay System," where people take pay or profit for their work and sell the product.) With this Game there can only be a few big winners and the rest must be big losers. (Survivors, but not winners.) Multinationals I understand that corporate trust agreements have given way to large corporate conglomerates which more easily corner national markets. These conglomerates have or are evolving into multinational conglomerates which are cornering the world markets. If we continue to use the present world-wide economic system, the multinationals will probably be cornering one market after another. Soon there may be no work or product that will not be under the direct or indirect control of the multinationals. This leaves me at their mercy. (Are corporations merciful?) I'll have to pay their prices and take whatever profit or wages they allow. This doesn't give me very good feelings. I Went Along Why did I allow these things to happen? First of all, I wasn't aware of much of the BS that was going on. Second, when I became aware I tried the usual things, e.g., writing to my congress persons, to the President and finally I worked in the Republican Party. (I had been a Democrat all my life.) All to no avail. Third, why didn't I drop out and stop participating in the consuming, polluting, exploiting and depleting of resources? Well, I thought I needed the income to pay for our house, food, clothing, auto payments, business loan payments, taxes, insurance, upkeep, entertainment, medical, vacation, etc. How could I have said, "No." to a boss or to a client and take the risk of losing everything I had? It seemed like I had no viable alternative. Fourth, I mulled over all these thoughts for some time before I decided on a partial way out. (I think this might be the point where many people have nervous breakdowns if they don't see a way out of the mess. Then they go to a shrink who tries to "fix" them, so that they can get back into the old rat race and run again. What a bummer!) Drop-Out After about 20 years of slaving in the race I was starting to get ahead a little. I started to take a little time to think about myself and my needs. I decided to get out of the race and sold everything I had when I was 42. Decided to take off for a few years. Figured I had learned how to make money and could do it again if I ever had to. I have been learning, growing and enjoying so much in the last 8 years that I doubt if I'll ever go back into the rat race. Save Money Since I have stopped taking in the programming I can walk through any of the big stores and never get a desire to buy any of their stuff (crap). What little I need I buy at rummage sales for just a few cents. I have no idea what's in style any more, and care less. Of course I can't buy second hand food but I'm eating more of the basic foods, i.e., the unprocessed foods; they are purer, cheaper and taste better. What more can I ask for? I got rid of my car because it was always eating my money and taking up a lot of my time. I now live close to where I do my thing, so I walk most of the time or bus to farther places. I don't spend much money so my small income (savings, actually) is sufficient for everything that I desire. Free Time and Purpose Not spending much money means not needing to use any time earning money, or using up much of my savings. This gives me more free time to look, listen, smell, feel, taste, think and reason. Sometimes I feel like writing and I do. I don't know if anyone will understand what I'm saying but it feels good to write it anyway. I have created a purpose for my life and it feels right and good for now. Eight years ago when I dropped-out, I asked myself, "What is the highest and best use that I can put to my mind, heart and body? What kind of work needs to be done the most? What can I do that will be for my own best good over the long haul?" My decision was to try to discover or to design a more perfect system of living together on this planet. I derive much happiness from my purpose (my work), and sometimes much agony when I can't seem to reach people. I work for free and I'm my own boss. I can quit anytime, and go back to my work anytime. I do my work as I see fit. I don't give a damn if my newsletter sells, because I give it away. Ha ha. If my ideas for freedom are valid, I expect people may use them. If the seeds that I plant are fertile, I trust that they will grow, and that some aware people will water them and cultivate them. If this happens we will all share in the harvest. Big Money People My guess is that the big money people who order the mind programming in the media, are in a dilemma themselves. They sometimes seem to be in a competitive game with each other. It's like they have ahold of the chain that holds a vicious bulldog (Power) and if they let go, someone else will grab it and go after them with it. So they don't dare let go of their power. The Priceless Economic System will remove all the teeth from this bulldog. Then they can "let go" and relax a little with the rest of us. They seem to be working together some too. Big money is going strong in Agribusiness. They are taking over land like it is going out of style. They already seem to have a corner on the market in meat, sugar, coffee and oil. Whenever a product doubles in price over night, you can be pretty sure that they have cornered that too. It is inevitable that they will continue the game until they can set all prices wherever they wish and the same with wages. What freedom will this leave for me and you? If we wait until then to try to make change it will probably be too late. Most people will by then be so thoroughly programmed (brainflushed) that they will believe with Pollyanna, that, "Everything that happens is for the best." ----------------------------------------------------------- z z z Help Wanted z z z Electronics Inventor Project: Subliminal Sound Detector Build a gadget which will detect and convert to audible sound those hidden subliminal messages which are present on radio, TV, stereo and tapes as reported in the comprehensive book, "Subliminal Seduction" by Wilson Bryan Key, Signet. Key says, on page 163, that subliminals are fairly easy to plant in sound and visual media. He said that it is nearly impossible to consciously locate them. He said that subaudible effects can be planted at low volume intensities, at various speed harmonics and at either high or low frequencies -- all he said, are unheard by conscious perception. Project: Subliminal Light Detector Build a gadget to detect and make visible the low intensity light messages used on movies and TV. (See above book, page 23.) Why ? 1. Open up another Pandora's Box like the Watergate scandal. Reveal how the big corporations are mind conditioning us subliminally. Help people see for themselves what the Pay System is doing to them. Teach people how human robots are being made. It will not only be amusing and revealing but also mind blowing to be able to hear and see some of the subliminals. 2. Or make yourself a bundle of money by selling the gadgets. 3. Or publicize the blueprints (schematics) and let people solder together the detectors by themselves. December 27, 1976 Ernest Mann 1Subliminal Seduction, Wilson Bryan Key 2 WASTE BURNER WASTE A Basic Government Rule: "Don't get rid of the problem -- ADD TO IT!" For example: Build an expensive waste burner plant. Instead of; putting a ban on all disposable containers. (This solution wouldn't cost the taxpayers anything -- so naturally, it won't be considered.) Instead of; creating an economic system that wouldn't require advertising. (Like the Priceless Economic System.) Just think of the percentage of the contents in your garbage can or dumpster that is just advertising. Think how thin the newspapers and magazines would be without advertising. Just look at the Profit the Industrialists will make when they sell the waste burner plant to the government and how much more they will make every year from its maintenance. Profiteers Promote Waste! The Little Free Press newsletter has been pointing out for years, that people are just spinning their wheels trying to stop a bad situation by working against the symptoms of the problem. They will build that burner plant some place, no matter how many people demonstrate against it! So, why not use our time and energy to help set up a system in which no one can Profit from doing bad and wasteful things to our planet and its people? Waste The Hennepin County Government is building a multimillion dollar incinerator in downtown Minneapolis. This huge incinerator is the first of its kind and has never been tested, according to the "Stop the Incinerator Coalition." It is starting to draw many opponents. Most people would rather they pollute the air 50 miles out of town, but not right here where we can see it coming out of the stacks. Do these people think that the air stands still out in the country? Do they not care that it will pollute our food source area? It takes a few years to discover the poisons that eventually find their way into our food. Some of the opponents say we should expand our recycling plants and try to reclaim more of the trash. Of course this is more sensible than the burning, but it's still avoiding the basic cause of the problem, so, instead of stopping the drilling in the bottom of our boat it merely deals with plugging up the holes in a less destructive manner. Why do we always just deal with the immediate problem? When will we "wise up" and build a system which will not include the "basic cause" of our problems? Let's eliminate the reason why we drill holes in the bottom of our boat! Then we won't have to continuously plug them! Straw man? Is this garbage incinerator just another straw man set up to burn the awakening people's energy? When was the last straw man set up for the Minneapolis radicals? Was it the domed stadium near our downtown? Did people burn up lots of energy; thinking, arguing and demonstrating against it? This is surely a "Straw man" set-up. Any city planner could have told them of the impossibility of the loop location from a traffic situation alone. (you know of the traffic jams we already have in the loop) What will it be like with the hundreds of garbage trucks from the city and county converging in the loop all day and night long lining up to unload! This alone makes the loop placement impossible, but it is very impressive, and will anger more people to burn up their energy in tearing down this elaborate straw man. In the end the Elite will probably compromise by building four plants. One on each corner of the county. Would the "Elite" rather see the "thinking" people spend their bio- computer (mind) time fighting another straw man, or have them use that time to discover the fact that they are "wage slaves" and that they don't really have to put up with this shit any more? It seems to me, the radicals are taking the bait; hook, line and sinker. They are throwing up another defensive action to stop the masters from whipping us. (Undoubtedly with the aid of some highly paid government or corporate agent provocateurs.) Seems to me we would get more progress in the direction of our own liberation by taking an offensive action. It is not possible to gain ground by defensive actions. Gaining ground only follows offensive action. Let's begin this action by pointing out the "basic cause" of the pollution. Let's examine the rubbish cans and dumpsters and see what's in them. Besides the disposable containers, you will find products which were made for PROFIT, i.e., not to last. Things which were made with built-in planned deterioration and planned obsolescence. Why were they built that way? To make more PROFIT! If the objects were well designed and constructed many of them would last a 100 years instead of one or ten. We all know this! But we don't do anything about it. We think that this creates more jobs so we are quiet. We don't stop to study the fact that if we were using a People oriented system instead of the Profit oriented system we would strive to eliminate work by building only beautiful long lasting things which were easy to repair with universal parts. People who enjoy tinkering with these things would be happy to do the repairing. In a sane system we would not use these "things" as status symbols. We would not think it necessary to throw away our old and replace it with whatever is now in style. In a priceless system, I think, we would try to create shorter working shifts for the essential jobs, then more people would get a chance at playing with the wonderful fun machines that we invent for production, but no one would have to work very long hours. In our present Profit motivated system we can't have much fun running these machines when some slave driver boss is constantly causing stress as he/she attempts to make more Profit. Before this Incinerator Straw man is disposed of in one way or the other, it is my guess that many thousands of good intelligent people will add their energy (and money) to this drama, on one side or the other. It is also my guess that if just 10% of these thinking people would put their creative energies behind an offensive action directed at creating a Profitless Society, they would succeed. Once we are operating a priceless economy there would no longer be a "reason" to do destructive things like; polluting, waring, starving or stealing. We will eliminate most of the world's present major problems with a priceless economic system. So why not put some energy behind creating one? Computer Teach an old dog new tricks? You can! I just taught this 61 year old dog to run a computer. I had forgotten how much fun it is to learn something new. (I have had many great highs in teaching myself to run this IBM clone that I have.) They say the Macintosh is easier to learn on, but it costs about twice as much. My clone has a 640K RAM and a 30 meg. HD and a 5 1/4" floppy drive. The Epson LQ850 24 pin printer is fun too. I started with the Ability software program but that just wouldn't do what I needed so I got the Microsoft Word, Windows and Aldus Pagemaker. I don't know which was greater, the joy or the agony in learning these programs. If I hadn't thought I had a great use for the computer I might have chucked it all. As it was, the computer outfit cost about the same as the typesetting would have for my book. And now I'll have the computer to use for the word processing of my future writing and my newsletter. It also feels like I am joining the great leap forward in progress that the world is now taking. I can understand and use some of its new technology. Wow! The jump forward is far greater than the leap from the quill to the typewriter, but I'm still glad I learned to type back in '43. I think we will never get senile in our old age if we keep adding interesting new input into our minds. March 20, 1988 Ernest Mann ----------------------------------------------------------- [For people interested in doing their own book - - I did the typesetting on this book with my IBM XT clone computer with the "Microsoft Word" word processing program and my Epson LQ850 24 pin dot matrix printer. I used a Sans Serif proportional spacing 12 point font (which actually measured only 10 pt.) (sans serif fonts stay clear even after several generations of copying). Finally, the printing company reduced it to 78%, which makes it 8 pt.] "An ounce of prevention, is worth a pound of cure." 3 JAILED When a government has its police put "good" people (I happen to know that I'm a good person) in jail, it may be time for me to reassess its value. I can think of nothing that government does for its citizens (who make less than $50,000 per year, i.e., 98.6% of us in the U.S.A.) that we couldn't do cheaper, better and more efficiently with private enterprise. This includes the police force. At least we could fire them, if they turned on us with harassment. They wouldn't dare harass us if they feared being fired. After being locked up, from about 4:30 to 11:30 pm, on March 21, 1988, in the Hennepin County jail in Minneapolis, I again realize a little bit of how degraded the police can make a human feel. Just to be confined and not allowed to come and go as one wishes, to be treated with a total lack of respect. To be presumed guilty and a dangerous criminal. To be finger printed (get this -- 4 complete sets of fingerprints) is not a good feeling, and to be threatened with violence by the very attitude of the policemen (policewomen too) is not exactly a good feeling. I tended to lose respect for most of those individuals (?) in uniform. However, I must try to understand the fact that these employees are "acting" under the direction of their superior officers who take orders from their Chief, who takes orders from the Mayor, who takes orders, not from the voters or the Aldermen, but from the big money people. I must not fall in the trap of using these police personnel as the scapegoats for my anger. I must put the blame where it honestly belongs -- on my own shoulders. As long as I'm ignorant (or lazy) enough to continue to play their Pay System Game with them, I must expect events like this to continue and worsen. This is just the way it is and always has been. This is the way the "Money Game" is played. So if I don't like this Game of "them with the most money" ruling, I'll need to start a new Game for myself! If I hire a person to do a job for me and they turn on me, I feel I have a right to protest to that person or persons in some effective way. Writing to your congressmen/women is not an effective way. Try it, if you don't believe me. However if you slip a million dollar campaign check in with your complaint, I suspect they might at least think about what you have to say. I believe I have a right to fire them and hire someone else to rule me or do the job myself. I have found that I can do the job myself. We have been hiring politicians for 200 years or more to protect us from each other. Now that I have taken some time to travel this country and several foreign ones I have come to the conclusion that most of those other people are really good people and that I don't need any protection from them. What I need now, is protection from my own politicians and the police persons and the armies they have hired. If you give someone a little Power over you -- watch out! Power corrupts! They keep adding more power to that. Soon you have an invisible dictatorship. That is what we have today in the U.S.A. and in many other countries. Some countries have very visible dictatorships. Democracy is supposed to be GOVERNMENT by the majority! Ha! It is actually dictatorship, by those with the most money. Money is a tool used to dictate Power. Government is Dictatorship by those who control the money. Knowledge can liberate us from dictatorships! Knowledge of a way to live, produce and distribute goods and services without using MONEY, barter or work credits. Living with less money helps to liberate me from this dictatorship. Superstition is also a tool used to dictate Power. Knowledge of the untruths inherent in superstition has liberated me from this dictatorship. Jail Learn'en What did I learn from this demonstration and jailing? First of all I haven't been in either one for many years. I thought I had learned from the Vietnam War era that they are a waste of my energy and that there are more beneficial ways to spend my time and creativity to help make change than participating in demonstrations or be jailed. Is demonstrating something we do when we first get angry with government? I went to this one only to pass out some of my anti-waste burner literature. I was doing this and happened to be near what turned out to be a front line. The cops appeared and with their long police clubs started poking young people who were sitting peacefully. Anger took over my feelings and I stepped up to the line and told the policemen to stop doing that. Two of them were gentlemen and stopped. Then a tough looking tall cop instantly appeared from behind their line and told me to get off the street. I told him "NO! This is my street and I have a right to be here!" Well, he grabbed me by the shoulder and said to come with him or he would knock me down. (I was unable to see a badge number or name tag on his uniform, so I asked him his name and he said it was Sergeant Wonderful. Can you believe this?) He was big enough to do it, so I went along and was stuffed into a small van which was soon filled with young people and one older man like myself. At least two had been tear gassed. One in his mouth and eyes and was suffering. We were kept in the van for a long time and I was worried that we might use up all our oxygen as the van seemed to be air tight. Later I asked the drivers and they did open a window for us. This all happened only minutes after our march reached the Minneapolis Federal Building. I had not heard any glass break. One of my friends was not far behind and he didn't hear any glass break either. So the police must have jumped the gun and started this violence before the agent provocateur had a chance to break the glass door with the bowling ball. Maybe he was a lousy bowler. Meanwhile, I and 45 others got arrested for disorderly conduct! If it is disorderly conduct to protest the actions of my employees (the policemen and the President) then it is high time we change the GAME we are all playing -- to a game where we won't need police persons and Presidents. Who needs all this harassment? I sure don't! If I have to drop whatever I'm doing and go out into the streets and demonstrate every time government does something WRONG, I'll be spending all my time (life) in the streets. Everything that government does is wrong! What a waste. A trillion dollars a year waste and rising! I think demonstrations do little or no good anyway. Except maybe to awaken more people to the fact that we people have some rights too. The Elite have always allowed their slaves to scream and complain when they whipped them. So what's new? Is that freedom -- to be allowed to scream while being whipped? Life is not all; OBEY, OBEY, OBEY! We have rights too! But we will have to TAKE them! No one is going to give them to us. Individual freedom is something that each individual must take for him/herself -- or they won't ever get it. However, if they prefer to be slaves, they have a right to be! Wake Up! Wake Up! We don't have to put up with this shit any more!!! If we wake up and start doing our own thinking we will soon see that in the present world-wide PAY SYSTEM we are nothing better than slaves. At work we must do as we are told, i.e., OBEY! Or we get fired, quickly! Isn't that what slavery is all about? Today, you obey, or get whipped with the dollar bill! You know this -- "When you take pay, you must obey!" So first, if you can admit you are a slave when you take pay, then you are ready to look for a way to produce and distribute the world's goods and services. Let's look for a way where it won't Pay or Profit anyone to do bad things to us or our old spaceship, Earth. Motivate 'em? Would the following rewards motivate us to work if we didn't get pay or profit? 1. What will happen to wars when no one can make a profit from starting one any more? 2. What will happen to pollution when there is no longer more profit in polluting than in reclaiming and recycling all waste? 3. What will happen to starvation when there is no longer a profit in using much of our best land for non-food cash crops and for not growing anything to collect government soil-bank cash subsidies? 4. What will happen to theft when everything is free? (94% of the people in prisons and jails are in for stealing.) 5. What will happen to taxes and government when we discover the fact that we will have no need for them? 6. What will happen to money, barter and work credits when everything is free? 7. What will happen to people's health when there is no more stress from job and money worries? 8. What will happen to family life when there is no more stress from job and money worries? 9. What will happen to products when designers cooperate to create only the very best, instead of compete to produce the most planned obsolescence and planned deterioration? In a Nutshell Let's get down to the nitty gritty of the whole plan. 1. Would you, as an individual, like life better if you could have any products or services you wanted and as much as you wanted, free of charge? 2. Would you like it better if you could work at any job you wanted, with free on-the-job training, with a bunch of happy contented people? 3. Would you like it better if all schooling was voluntary and free and you could learn as much or as little about anything you chose, free of charge from volunteer teachers who loved their jobs and students? 4. Would you like to work at a job where the "boss" and other employees treated you really well because the more help they had, the shorter shifts they could create for everyone? 5. Would you feel more FREE if you could quit your job at any time and still get everything you wanted, free of charge? 6. Do you think that you would do your share of work to make such a free system possible? Do you think most of your friends would? We have been programmed to believe that no one else would do their share, so most people think that this priceless system would not work. But do a little thinking and research on your own. Start asking people if they could envision a job that they might actually enjoy doing, if they had free choice and free training available and freedom at work to make their job into an even more enjoyable way to spend part of their life. The dull and dangerous jobs we can easily relegate to automation and robots. If there are some people who will not work, we will still be better off in the Priceless System because it will not cost us anything to give out welfare. Those people can just pick up what they want like the rest of us do, only they will not get in on any of the fun and creativity and good feelings we get from our work. They may not want to miss playing with some of the fun machines that we will work with. (I'm finding the computer to be a fun machine. I'm told, some people get paid to run 'em.) How to: How do we get from here to there? If you want to know the truth about it -- I don't know! All I can do is guess and try. I can tell you what has been working in my own life and what I think I must do in the future. I retired from the rat race 19 years ago in 1969. I sold and/or gave away all my things, except for what I could carry away in a backpack. I sold all my real estate for less than $100 down payments to make them sell quick and with real easy monthly payments so the buyers couldn't afford to let the property go back to me. (However, some did give them back, but I resold them right away.) I created for myself and my ex-wife 20 year retirement fixed incomes. This has given me the free time to look at the whole picture from a very different perspective. I began then to see our slavery and what was causing it. My leisure time was the key here, I think. In order to make the small income I had created stretch enough to cover my basic needs and allow me to travel quite a bit both in this country and abroad I had to really pinch my pennies. I always looked for ways to save money. I lived in an unfinished basement for a few years in a slum area near downtown for free. Later I had to pay $50 per month to a new landlord for it. In the winter time the temperature stayed around 55o. I took my baths in one section of a concrete laundry tub. I shit on a newspaper and buried it in the back yard to fertilize the big elm trees. They prospered. I wasn't flushing it into the Mississippi River (my drinking water supply) like everyone else did. I found that the fewer "things" I owned, the fewer expenses I had to maintain and house them. I eventually discovered my own cooking to be far far cheaper than restaurants. (And much tastier and more fun.) So now I am nearly at the end of my 20 year personal pension, but then I will be eligible for my Social Security pension, which won't be much but it will help. I will need to reassess my position and decide if I'll go back into the rat race again for a while or head for the woods, a boat life or maybe walk around the world. Or perhaps a few of us will get it together enough to live somewhere and share our skills and learn cooperation and see how we like that. Thousands are already doing this in little communities. Perhaps this is how we will turn this dirty old sock inside out and build us a better world. Perhaps by turning all our excess energy into building community rather than tearing it down, we will gain more and gain it faster? We may even be able to build self sufficient communities. The Indians did it right here with very simple tools. The earth is very generous if we work with her. On April 1st I plan (Sometimes I change my plans) to give my landlord 30 days notice that I'll be moving. I plan to move out into the country where I can recycle my own waste and have less or no rent to pay. I'm tired of paying sales taxes and hidden taxes to this city for them to waste. How else can I create my better world? Maybe this is where the Revolution really is! Making oneself aware, happy and free! I know that I am not the first one to say this, but it is finally sinking into this old nut of mine. If I am too stupid to make myself happy, I may as well rejoin the slaves in the rat race. If enough of us stop giving government our thought time, anger and energy and learn to make ourselves happy, we might just create a happy world as a by-product. March 24, 1988 Ernest Mann "The only thing necessary, for the triumph of evil -- is for good people, to do nothing."--Edmund Burke 4 MISSING PIECES I got myself angry yesterday at court, waiting from 9:00 am (my appointment time) to about 1:00 pm to say, "NOT Guilty!" and get a date to come back in two months to say it again. How long would a private business last if it was always 4 hours late with its appointments and 2 months behind its schedule? (Doctors being an exception.) Somehow it doesn't seem right that I should have to hire someone (a lawyer) to protect me from these people (politicians, judges and their hired police people) that I already had hired to protect me. It just doesn't quite track. I didn't notice the anger then, only the disgust I had for government and its wasting of people's time and money. In the Government Center, I could see this waste all-round me. It reminded me of all the taxes we have to pay. It reminded me of all the relatives the politicians have had to import from all over the country and hire to fill it. It reminded me of the 23 year old expensive addition and the sturdy old civic auditorium they are tearing down in Minneapolis, to make room to build a much more expensive one. I wonder whose pockets will get well lined with this boondoggle? Whose is getting lined with the downtown waste burner boondoggle? Boondoggle is a very old word. It indicates that politicians have been boondoggling for a long long time and we have been letting them get away with it for a long long time. And we have been paying the taxes to support boondogglers for a long long time. What does this all mean? Does it mean they have kept us too busy and too angry to create a NEW GAME, where boondoggles wouldn't be profitable? Actually the benefits to the politicians from the boondoggles are only a drop in the bucket, compared to the outrageous profits that the land speculators, contractors and suppliers will reap from the taxpayers. I wonder if boondoggle can be equated with swindle? Later in the afternoon, I had a run-in with a (city paid) bus driver and there it was, all over again. The same kind of thinking and browbeating. I got kicked off the bus for not paying an extra 15 cents. My watch said it was 6:30 (the time the fair drops to 60 cents) and the driver's watch said 6:28. We hassled and he threatened to call the police, so I got off and lost the 60 cents I had put in the box. And this is supposed to be a People's owned bus company? Bah, and humbug! It's more of a boondoggle than a service to the people! (However, most of the drivers are really friendly and courteous.) Then I became aware of my anger. My poor stomach was all knotted up and not digesting the pea soup and chocolate brownie. I tried to relax it, during the walk home, but couldn't. After laying on my stomach on my bed for a half hour it settled down and was OK. The new postal increase in rates and decrease in service (how long could you stay in business if you operated like that?) infuriates me further with government inefficiency and waste. Probably all cities and county seats have boondoggles. I don't wish to pay for them. Living in a city, even renters pay for the boondoggles. If I live modestly in the country, at least I won't pay for much of them. Decent World I saw a tiny child on her tipsy toes in a cafeteria trying to see what was available and my heart went out to the dear little person. What kind of world are we leaving for her? What will she have to suffer yet? I decided to continue my crusade from my space in the woods. We have no right to work, play and otherwise escape our responsibility to leave a decent world for her to grow up in. A Missing Piece I must try to see the above actions as merely a part of the "blockade of scapegoats" that are set up by the Elite for them to hide behind, to burn up our energy, to dissipate our anger and of course, to occupy our thoughts and creativity with revenge and other diversions. This blockade of scapegoats concept, is a new incite for me. It's like finding another missing part to a jigsaw puzzle. These scapegoats conceal the truth, so that we won`t see, who or what the source of our trouble really is. If we properly identify the "prime cause," we see that the Elite who control money and thus control government and industry are NOT the source of our trouble! The problem lies in the Game we agree to play! "The take pay for your work and pay for the product," Game. This Game requires a government to protect the Winners from the Losers, i.e., to enable it to continue. In this Game we automatically become slaves. "When you take pay, you must obey!" This obedience, i.e., slavery, allows the Game to continue and causes us to do these bad things to ourselves and our Spaceship Earth. We, working people, are the ones who take the jobs as police persons and the other scapegoat jobs. These people only follow orders and get all the blame. I should feel sorry for them instead of angry. When I confront these various scapegoat barriers I keep myself too occupied, angry, sick and depressed to be able to think clearly and see that it is all just a Game and that I am one of the 5 billion losers. Confronting these scapegoat barriers, I just wear myself out and am too tired to figure out a better Game to play. This run-in with the law has been a diversion and I have allowed it to keep me in a very negative and angry space. It has kept me too occupied to be inventive and creative in trying to further the peace and happiness my vision tells me the Priceless Economic System (PES) would provide. Buckminister Fuller said we should play a game where everyone is a winner! That is the kind of game to invent or discover! That is the kind of Game I think I present in the PES Game. If you can reason your way back to the "prime cause" of war, pollution, starvation and stealing you may even come up with a better Game than the PES. But remember this, it is unlikely we will ever find the solution to any problem unless we first discover the very "basic" cause of it. Now, don't give me that often stated cliche', "People are by nature selfish and greedy." Don't buy that. Scarcity causes greed and selfishness. Who bothers to be selfish and greedy when there is abundance, e.g., who hoards sugar when there is a plentiful supply in the stores? Business As Usual How do we awaken the people who are busily engrossed in their work trying to survive and advance? They appear to be totally oblivious to the boat they are riding in and to the fact that they are drilling holes in its bottom. Every time they buy or sell something, industry produces a replacement and pollutes our environment more with each sale. They are probably unaware of any alternatives except welfare or starvation, so they continue on down their well greased slides. Yard Birds Walk or drive through a "so called" middle or upper class residential section of Minneapolis (and probably other cities as well) and see the same old game going on, same as 40 years ago. See the yard birds and house painters busily trapped in their slavery (jail?) to their house and lawn. (And mortgage, taxes, insurance, utilities and upkeep payments.) These yard birds are too busy to see that they are also drilling holes in the bottom of their boat and that they have a choice. Every time they "buy" something, industry pollutes their environment a little bit more to reproduce that item. Joggers Did you ever sit and watch joggers go by? They seem to be in such a hurry. Such a waste of so much energy. Probably a relief valve to get rid of anger and frustration. None of them look happy or like they are enjoying it. Well, whatever works! Witness Someone who had seen me "people watching," called me a Witness. As I think about it, that does describe me. I have observed many things in the 19 years of free time I have created for myself -- things I was unable to see when I was busy in the Rat Race. I have reported (I suppose I'm a Reporter, too) what I have seen (or thought I saw) in the many issues of the Little Free Press newsletter. For some readers these reports may help to confirm their own observations -- for others, these observations may present some additional avenues for consideration. What to do? How can I become more free of the need for money? a. Live without needing to pay rent by building a small inexpensive structure (from lumber I found in Minneapolis dumpsters) in a woods I own near Cushing, MN, or on a friend's land somewhere. b. Stop publishing the LFP? c. ? How can I be happier? a. Stop confronting the System's Scapegoat Brigades. They attempt to suck us into hassles (with the aid of their agent provocateurs and war scare headlines) which make us angry, fearful, defeated and depressed, i.e., subservient. You've heard of blood suckers -- these are Energy Suckers. When we fight with them, we give them energy, i.e., they hire more people and multiply their harassing and raise our taxes. This increases the emotional drain on our happiness. Energy Suckers are professionals. They have been trained for thousands of years to effectively humiliate and break people's spirits (not unlike horse trainers) and to make people angry. When I'm angry, I lose some control and I don't see, do and say what is most logical. When I allow them to get me angry, I give them some of my Power. If I can avoid confronting them, they will not need to hire more help and then they will have more free time to spend in cafes and girl watching. We will both be better off. b. Travel more and observe. c. Find myself an old lady and go sailing. d. Write. e. Remember not to ever think about hassles when I'm eating. Think only about the food! Enjoy every bite! f. ? Presidential Election I can still remember going house to house distributing literature and asking for donations for candidates. How ignorant I was. I was trying to get other people to be as foolish as I was. (Maybe I still am?) I was trying to get people to go to the polls and signify their agreements to have someone RULE them. I think I had some vague thought that laws were made to protect me and control the other people. We were and are giving these politicians carte blanche power to make laws to restrict, dominate and totally enslave us (and raise their own salaries whenever they wish). Which they did, and are still doing! If we were playing a Sane Game, we could easily produce abundance for all, as Bucky Fuller pointed out in his World Game, years ago; then we would have no need for government, laws and taxes. What a savings that would make -- over a trillion dollars a year! This savings alone would amount to about $5,000 per year for each man, woman and child in the U.S. Each one could buy a lot more food than they could possibly eat in a year and have money left over. Cottage Industry Do you remember what Cottage Industry was? It was manufacturing done at home, like a mini-factory with the worker paying all the overhead. The father forced his wife, kids (I was one of those kids on a farm. Small farms are a remnant of cottage industry.) and sometimes the grandparents to work long hours, seven days a week for just board and room. And that was about all the father got after paying his taxes or rent. The customers bought from the cottages which sold their products the cheapest. Are the big shots trying to make this happen again? Are they already farming out much of their work to small firms, i.e., the lowest bidders? Are the Day Labor (Slave Market) jobs on the same order? Big lay- offs have made people so desperate that employers can now buy part time workers for very low wages, with no benefits and no union. To be more honest, instead of saying "Where do you work?" We should say, "Who owns you?" Are individuals starting to work from home with their computers and doing work cheaper than the businesses can do it with their own help? On the surface, this looks really good to the small business person. To be able to have their own business right at home with little overhead! But look at it from the standpoint of no more benefits, like; hospital insurance, pension plan, paid vacation, unemployment checks, sick leave, a steady pay check, etc. All this; one can live with, including the longer hours, to be ones own boss. I did. What will it be like when there is an over supply of cottage workers competing for the same jobs? Will they be wise enough to hang together in Guilds and hold up their prices? Or will they be hung separately as the small farmers were and are? Will new cottagers or desperate ones cut prices to get in on a little of the business? Will we have to go through a similar cycle to what the old cottage industries went through? What was it? Will wages go down so low that big industries will hire people back again for almost nothing to do the same work? If we continue with the present world wide Pay System, we may have to go through this cycle again. Look at the remnant of small farmers -- thousands going broke every year. What would happen? If people who were financially able would take a sabbatical leave from their jobs (and those who couldn't get a sabbatical, would just quit) and focus a greater amount of their thinking, studying, observing and creating on helping to develop a peaceful and happy way for people to live together on this planet, BEFORE we destroy it and ourselves? IF we destroy our environment with pollution or war, what good would come from the additional money they would have accumulated in the Rat Race? Free Sharing Club Would anyone be interested in forming a free skills sharing club? It might be patterned somewhat after the "Free Skills Pool" of Monterey, CA. Members would list the skills they would be willing to share with anyone within our club, free of charge. And on the other hand receive other member's skills free of charge. This may be a way that we could make our lives a little better and a little less dependent on MONEY! We might just turn this dirty old sock inside-out and let our grass roots recycle the dirt as they were meant to. Wouldn't it be nice to just call someone from the club to fix your car for free (except for the parts)? Or take music lessons from a club member. Have a member come over and clean house? Get advice on your computer program? Legal advice? A tooth filled? Electric toaster fixed? A broken arm set? An ad written? A letter typed? A poster typeset? A room painted? A toilet repaired? Garden advice or help? Etc. And on the other hand wouldn't it be fun to do one of your skills for someone in the club, free of charge, once in a while to help them out and save them a little money? Also knowing in the back of your mind that this free sharing just might be the lead-in that will end the Pay & Profit System. And besides that, know that when you need something the club offers, you can get that for free too. The more we use the club and the more people and wider range of skills we bring into it -- the less need we'll have for a job, in the pay system. Anyone care to make comments and suggestions? Would this be your cup of tea? Would you like to coordinate it or one in your area? Let's kick this idea around and see if it will fly. Friendship Club? This Free Sharing Club might also be a dating club. Like everyone listed in the club directory would also list whether or not they are open to dating and if so could list what they desire in a date partner and list things about themselves and their interests. April 8, 1988 Ernest Mann POLITICS ARE CAESAR'S CIRCUS 5 TRUTH "The truth will set you free." I have looked for truth to discover what really starts wars. I think I have found it. I have looked for truth to find a better motiva tion for the production and distribution of the world's goods. I think I have found it. The Priceless Economic System seems like the simplest and most practical way for "all" the world's people to live with abundance (like millionaires, but without exploiting anyone and without wars.) To know the truth about the world's supply of resources -- that there is really an abundance (as Buckminister Fuller pointed out in his "World Game") -- is to set us free of our mind conditioning that tells us that things are scarce, therefore prices must be high. To know the truth about almost all the mass media -- that it is controlled by the Elite few -- is to set oneself free of their con tinuous mind conditioning, i.e., all the lies they have taught us to believe as truths. If we stop watching, reading and listening to it we'll have a better chance to find the truth about any matter. I have found in my 22 years in sales and 19 years as a world trav eler and people watcher, that most people are really good people who do more than their share if given half a chance. But we are lead to believe by the mass media that, (because we read almost daily of ONE murder, atrocity or wrong doing among million's of people) we should be fearful of all people and dependent on government and its police, army and courts for protection. They seldom report the millions of good deeds people are doing daily. If the truth about these proportions were publicized we would not be as distrustful and fearful of one another. We might even be able to work together and build a free society. I would not put it past the Elite to even have their henchmen fake some of the killings and atrocities that are reported in the mass me dia. To just have the "victim" drop out of sight after the staged funeral or maybe have plastic surgery or just change to a different rubber stage mask for the next staged event and a name change and/or move to a different area and be "killed" again. Perhaps there is a secret profession of "hired victims?" I am not the first one to have arrived at this conclusion. Hollywood has had much practice in faking deaths and atrocities. We even have a President and other politicians who came directly from Hollywood. Would staged assassinations and staged attempts make people afraid to be leaders, especially radical ones? If people are kept fearful of each other and dependent on the police, army and courts, are they easier to control? How ? How do we find "truth" so that we can be set free? That is one Hell-of-a question! I guess we just start questioning our beliefs, traditional ways, customs, laws, the one and only way (always be skeptical of this one, remember, "There is more than one way to skin a cat.") and question authority. Perhaps questioning to learn why, and thinking, to discover better ways, may be two of the keys in finding truth. Crocodile Dundee ll I went to see this movie. I enjoyed it. I like adventure movies with plenty of action. I always thought I overrode the killings because I was aware of Hollywood's stunts. I don't dare own a TV. I'd be watching the damn thing all the time and wouldn't accomplish anything. BUT, on the way to my van in the movie parking lot that evening, I became paranoid not only of the few people in the lot but of my work. I became scared to continue confronting the "system" with my Little Free Press newsletter. This fear for my personal safety has struck me before, when leaving movie theaters. This night just confirmed my pre vious observations of one of the purposes of violence in movies. I believe it's there to instill fear, so that the wage slaves will be afraid to rebel against authority! I'm over my fear now, but if I took a dose of TV or movies every day, I'm sure I'd soon be too scared to continue my efforts to make radical change. I wonder if other people ever feel afraid to help make radical change? I suppose if one saw real violence on the streets every day, it would be natural and healthy to be wary and fearful of people and the streets. Everything seems so powerfully real and immanent on the screen or TV that our subconscious may over-ride our knowledge of the unreality and accept the violence as reality and automatically generate fear and wariness in us. Just Think If we ever realize; a. that, we can do things better, cheaper and more efficiently than government does them, b. that, all people the world over would be happier with the Priceless Economic System than the present Profit/wage System, c. that, all people would prefer to change-over to the PES immediately, d. that, we can each help to spread these ideas out to more people, then, we may soon be ready to agree on a date to all stop accepting pay or profit for our work and begin to give all products and services away free of charge. That would end wars, polluting, starvation, stealing, a need for any government and taxes. The truth can set us free! When you take pay, you must obey! A world of volunteers could be a world of FREE BEINGS! Dropped Charges The Minneapolis government dropped their charges against me. I should have expected this, instead of fretting (off and on) about it while waiting the two months for my court trial concerning my arrest that I spoke about in the last two chapters. They reverted to their regular handling of me -- they ignored me! They act as if I'm not here at all and that I have nothing to say. They rarely give my ideas publicity, not even adverse publicity. In order to survive, the Pay/profit System must withhold publicity for the true and simple alternative to itself. It can give all other opponents plenty of press coverage because they would all continue the Pay/profit System if they won their revo lutions, i.e., super-rich people would rule only under a different name. Moved Again On May 2nd I gave up my apartment and moved back to the woods where I had no rent to pay. I figured I would build a little house from the lumber I had scavenged last year. I decided last year to experiment with starting from scratch and not live in the log cabin, but to build something myself to see how I liked that. I spent about $20 on nails and $19 on cement and $5 on sand. I figured on buying some siding boards and rolled roofing at a farm auction sale, saw mill or discount store for under $300. I figured on using saw dust from a saw mill for insulation which may be free or nearly so. I got a wood heating stove from a friend for free. I figured I can always add on to my little efficiency home if I ever get an old lady to share life. Free rent is a mighty BIG DEAL for one who lives well on very little money. I will not have a 30 year mortgage or a perpetual rent payment to enslave me to someone elses wheel. I can build what little furniture I will NEED. I do not feel a need to conform, be better than the Joneses or to show anyone how successful or important I am. I already KNOW that I am the most important person in the world -- to me. If it wasn't for me, I wouldn't be here. The same is true for everyone else, if they only dared to think it. In fact, we are each superior to most others in one way or another, even as we are inferior to most others in one way or another. So why should we waste time worrying about it. Let's get on with life and focus on using our best talents to get the most out of this present moment. Let's also take a long range view and see that we do not destroy ourselves and our environment, so that we'll have a chance to use and enjoy the future moments that are marching rapidly toward us. When I moved out of my apartment I dumped a lot of my stuff in the garbage. I had found much of it in dumpsters and bought some at very cheap rummage sales, how else could I have lived for the past 19 1/2 years on my $50,000 investment at 8% interest. I have traveled the U.S.A. and the world widely. I've had lots of fun. I have observed much. I have attempted to share in this book what I think I've seen and experienced. I'll soon be broke, but I will have had about a 20 year vacation while I'm still young enough to enjoy one. I told myself in 1969, when I was 42, that I'd be damned if I would give the best years of my life as a slave to the dollar! But back to the here and now. I did another sorting of my possessions up in the woods. I got rid of it by giving it to my neighbor. Easy come, easy go. It was good useful stuff, but I didn't really need it. It was in my way. The first three weeks out there, the weather was beautiful and warm (not hot) and I enjoyed just sitting around in the sun and using the outdoor kitchen I had made last year. I watched the birds, saw a deer, wild geese, ducks and did a little thinking, picked Morel mushrooms and wild greens. I went for walks, answered mail, visited some neighbors, went swimming, wrote in my journal, made a trip to Minneapolis to visit a granddaughter who came to town for a visit, made trips to the local towns for groceries, drank some beer, made a couple of new friends and drove around the county looking for a store front to rent. When I finally had enough of this and of just sitting around, I decided to start my building. I took an inventory of the 2 x 4's and discovered I had enough to frame-in a 12' x 12' house. So, I laid it out with string and dug a shallow ditch for a foundation. One of my friendly neighbors came over with his tractor and trailer and we hauled three loads of stones from nearby stone piles. He and his wife helped me get started laying the field stone foundation. I had never done it, but thought it would be as easy as playing with children's blocks. Well it wasn't. It was very frustrating trying to figure out which stone would be the best to lay on top of the last one. My neighbor laid the foundation for about a yard and then I took over. By the time I finally got to the end of the first 12 foot long wall, I was starting to get the hang of it a little and it wasn't quite as frustrating. The weather was starting to get real HOT and I was working up on a little hill with no shade and just couldn't get myself to do any more. I sat around in the shade for a few days and finally figured I would rather "pay rent" to enjoy a bathtub, and have electricity for a refrigerator, a fan and be able to run my computer right now, so that I could get on with publishing this book. I had planned to buy a wind or a gas powered generator to run my computer. Maybe this fall when it cools off, I'll continue the project. I should add that I was constantly picking wood ticks off my entire body and the mosquitoes were out after dark. I slept in my van and had to use a mosquito netting to be able to sleep. Everything I owned (including all the LFP newsletter files, computer, software and other office equipment and supplies) was in that van, so I didn't re ally have all that much space unless I stepped outside (where I spent most of my time). I moved back to Minneapolis and lived in my '79 Dodge van in a friend's parking lot for a few days while I looked for a store front in Minneapolis to rent and live in. I couldn't find one that they would allow me to live in. I ended up rerenting the apartment where I had spent the winter. Lucky for me it hadn't been rented. The phone company even gave me my old phone number. But gee, it feels good to be back in this apartment. I guess my five weeks in the woods were my vacation. I feel a new commitment to my work. I'm getting myself into full swing now to get this book published. Mysterious ? In the last few years I have experienced something that I cannot explain conclusively to myself. It seems that sometimes when I am trying to do something or make some changes in my life, I run into obstacles which prevent me from going any farther with the plan I'm trying. Then I must go back and try one of my other plans or think up a new one. It seems that when I finally find a plan that works, it is always (always? I think so) for my best interest. Some people may call this Fatalism. Some may call it God. Some may call it the hand of outer space beings controlling their creation. But, I prefer to think that it is merely my subconscious mind using some kind of telepathy or maybe just jumping to logical probabilities and reaching out to discover the best route for me to take. And/or it searches through my memory bank and picks up factors I am consciously unable to remember and then it communicates with other people's subconscious minds and together these higher levels of our minds formulate a plan or meeting that would be advantageous to both of us. We get a hunch to do or go to a certain place and we do it. We meet (our conscious minds thinking it merely a "chance" meeting) and things turn out much better than what we could have expected from our original plans. My explanation probably doesn't have any scientific backing and probably no great following, but it is sufficient to satisfy me at this point in time. (I wonder if negatively oriented people always manage to have bad things happen to them when they follow their hunches?) "Sale" = Happiness ? I can now see how we have been, and are being conditioned to "enjoy" BUYING. They have "Sales" which make us even happier because we subconsciously think we are "beating the game." We feel like winners! So we buy, buy, buy -- to try to get those good deals, i.e., good feelings. If we would really face the facts, we would detest and fear buying, because it uses up our money (our leisure time) so that we must work more and save less. About 90% have to work at jobs they Hate! I am learning to entertain myself and am learning to create good feelings in myself without buying much of anything. Why Continue? Some people may wonder why I persist with my efforts to promote the PES. I'll tell you. When I retired in 1969, I could have retired to some South Pacific or Caribbean island and spent the rest of my days laying on the beach, looking at nearly naked beautiful women and sipped on "Coco Locos" and drank and fucked myself to death. But I soon observed what the Game was all about. In my eyes it looked like, "Make all the Profit (or wages) you can, and to Hell with people and the environment!" I realized the environment was my "boat" and the Profit/wage Game was motivating people to sink MY boat. Well, I still have a strong survival instinct and I desire to live! So that is why I've spent most of my time and money attempting to save OUR boat. We May Be Wrong! Regardless of how much we hope, believe or assume that things will work out and that the environment will heal itself -- we may be wrong. Prestigious scientists tell us once again in the "Star Tribune" of Minneapolis on 6/24/88, that our continued polluting of the environment is causing the "greenhouse effect" and is putting us dangerously close to the end of our rope, i.e., to "the point of no return," where the earth will not be able to heal itself and sustain our species, if we wait too long to stop polluting. Politicians TALK a lot now (to get votes) about how government should help out the farmers and about passing more laws against factory pollution. They do not point out the "basic reason" of why industry and farmers pollute. No one suggests changing the cause of most of our troubles. No, it is much more profitable to continue adding to the problem. We are each responsible for this. Every time we buy something, industry (or farmers) reproduce it and do their Profit oriented pol luting. In our present system almost all production pollutes in one way or another. In our present Profit/wage motivated system -- every time a person buys something, it is like we hire someone to drill another hole in the bottom of our boat. More people had better wake up and focus more of their attention, time and energy on this problem -- or we will ALL go down with our boat! If we each buy less, it may give us some additional time to begin a Game where we can all be winners (including our environment). I hope we will think up a way to publicize, "How the Profit/Wage Game is causing the fall of the Homo sapiens.", that the business and industrial executives can relate to. We need their help desperately to expedite a better Game. We must help them understand the fact that they and their families will sink with the rest of us, if we don't change the game. Advantages of the Priceless Economic System 1. Industry will have happy healthy employees who willingly take responsibility for their work and enjoy doing it and therefore are better workers. 2. They will have no payrolls to meet. 3. Employees will have no money worries and will not feel exploited. 4. Employees will look for ways to make a better product or service because they are proud of it. 5. Employees will not sluff-off every time management's back is turned. 6. Places of employment may become communities where the workers enjoy each other and their work and may even live there or nearby. 7. We may discover cooperation to be more efficient than competition. 8. There would be no more labor or wage disputes. 9. No more government interference. 10. No more need to make a PROFIT! 11. No more need to build weapons to kill people and destroy property. 12. No more TAXES! 13. No more stockholder interference. 14. No rent or mortgage payments. 15. No more need for burdensome and wasteful advertising and sales forces. 16. Bookkeeping and accounting would be substantially reduced or eliminated. 17. Production would be geared to fill the demand, rather than to create the demand. 18. Products would be created to have long trouble free lives, instead of being designed with planned obsolescence and planned deterioration factors. 19. Producing more with less. 20. Saving our earth's resources, instead of squandering them to make some stockholders richer. 21. Reducing the amount of human labor needed for production, instead of creating "make work" jobs. 22. Employees will then have no reason to sabotage automation and robots. 23. More shifts could then be created to cut down the working hours for each individual and allow more people to get in on job satisfaction. Once we get some of the movers, shakers and doers working on this project, I'll bet they (with their expertise and use of the mass media) will change the entire world over to the Priceless Economic System in less than a year. How are we going to get the first of these big "wheelers and dealers" to break-away and give evolution a good hard kick in the right direction? I wonder if this is where we should focus our thinking and action right now? June 24, 1988 Ernest Mann VOLUNTEERS ARE FREE, SLAVES MUST OBEY WHEN YOU TAKE PAY,YOU MUST OBEY 6 MEANING OF FREEDOM Freedom starts in my mind. If I believe I can't fight city hall, I don't. If I believe the world is flat I don't venture out very far. If I believe there is a bo geyman in the basement, I am fearful of going down there. If I believe a bicycle can't fly, I don't try to make it fly. What I believe to be true (whether it is or not), more or less Rules my life. If I deny I am a slave to those who control money, I will not seek freedom from them. No one "gave" freedom to me. If they had tried I probably would have found someone else to tell me what to do. Freedom started in my own mind. When I discovered the fact that I was an individual and that I could be in control of myself if I chose to be, I found ways to reject the control that society had conditioned into me. I started making my own decisions based on what is best for the individual. I now attempt to make my own individual self happy. With a world of happy individuals, we would have a happy society. So, what is best for the individual is best for society. It is not the other way around, as I was taught. I was taught to obey the rules that somebody set up for society. And I was told I would then be happy. (Or at least, when I got to Heaven, I would have happiness.) I was taught to take care of others. Serve others. I was not to worry about myself. This was a very proper training for a servant or a serf. Society do-gooders cannot force me to conform to their concepts and expect anything but a slave. What is best for me, individually, must be considered over the "long term." It ties in with the tendency to "get even." If I take ad vantage of another person, I must expect that person or their friends to do the same or worse to me somewhere down the road. So the short term advantage is not worth the long term worry and trouble that may lie ahead. If I try to make my own life better, with a view of the long term effects, I will be doing things which will affect others in a positive way, so I will be planting seeds of happiness for my own future as well. This may help to make a happier and more peaceful world. An example of the "short term" view of individual happiness is the Profit and Pay System that is used worldwide today. I cannot make "even exchanges" in this system. I must always strive to get the "best" of each deal, i.e., I must make a Profit or I won't be able to pay my rent and stay in business (when I was in business). I didn't look down the road and see that everyone else was doing the same to me every time I bought something. The Pay System is one constant struggle to make more money than one spends. Only a very few win at this Game. I won! Not really very much in money though. But what little I did win, I used to buy 20 years of freedom for myself! When I took pay -- I had to obey! I was conditioned by TV, radio, movies, books, magazines and newspapers to desire and buy things. Pay ing for these things and taking care of them, kept me too busy to have time to think and discover my slavery or to find a way out, i.e., to find Freedom. Not only was I enslaved to the "things" I owned but to my pets and vices. I allowed them to keep me too busy to have time to wonder at: na ture, dreams, day dreaming, the thinking process and at learning how to direct it for my own personal happiness. Music They achieved effective mind conditioning with the music they sold and gave me. Music is a mood setter. I scanned my radio and seemed to hear a similarity in almost all the music and especially in the song lyrics. In the singers' voices, I think I hear a loneliness, a whining, a moaning, a sorrowing, a desperation, a sadness, a lamenting, a melan choly -- sometimes almost like they are getting ready to cry. I hear something like that in the music too. Can you hear it? If this observa tion is correct, why are they overloading the air waves and tapes with this type of mood set? Why are nearly all the songs about love? And usually a loss of love. Not happy songs. Not marching songs (yet). Not about the thou sands of good things in life that they could sing about. Is there some reason the behavioral modification people want me to focus my thoughts on love and sex? Are they trying to get me to make more babies? Use more rubbers? Are they trying to make me believe I am deprived and should focus my thoughts on finding more sex? They previously stole many hours per day of thought-time from me with this subject and the moods it induced. Why? Golden Rule [Do to others as you would have them do to you.] Taking freedom, I think, is for me to give myself the right to do, think or say anything I please. Herein lies instant learning, i.e., the Golden Rule. I soon learn what gives me good reactions from others and what gives me unpleasant reactions. In a sane society it is not difficult to predict which reactions other people and I would prefer. Presently however, we live in an insane society because we play the Money Game which makes most people losers, sick and sometimes mean. In the Priceless Economic System we will have no reason to exploit, cheat, nor steal. It will therefore be much easier to be a sane and happy individual. Speaking of us all, it would then be said we were a happy society, a happy world. Only I can decide what is best for me. If I go through life merely doing what I am told to do, I will not experience Freedom. Taking freedom, is also admitting how suggestible I am and then avoiding the media which implant the subtle suggestions which have moti vated my actions and formed my basic belief systems. Then I begin to reevaluate my beliefs and see if they hold up on their own. When I stopped accepting things "on faith alone" from my parents, teachers, preachers, government and the news media; I could use my own reasoning, experimenting and experiencing to check the validity of my old beliefs. I developed some new belief systems which give me more freedom and happiness. I do not have to let others rule me. I can find ways to avoid many rules. Rules and laws only work if people agree to obey them, as I did. Freedom and happiness can be very tricky. One can be in prison and make ones self feel free and happy. That is insane, but it helps pris oners survive their term. I told myself and others that I liked my work for 22 years. I really thought I liked it. But now as I look back on it, I can see how miserable I was much of the time. I remained in my slavery because I did not take the time to think my way out of it. It is sooooooo much easier to tune-in to a thought- leader like radio, music, TV, movies, books, magazines and the newspa pers. Or to get stoned or drunk. Or to just talk trivia with someone. I know! I've done it! I still do sometimes. Group Action Freedom is not a group action. It is not a demonstration or a march directed by someone with a bull horn telling me what to shout. This merely burned up my anger energy in a way which did little to scare the Masters. In fact they encourage it and even hire agent provo cateurs and give it media coverage. Groups do not promote Freedom for me. Their leaders usually expect conformity to their rules, i.e., slavery again. Individuals do every thing. Even in a group, it is the individuals, who do all the work. It is when I make my own decisions, that Freedom can exist. Could this happen in groups? We are all individuals. Yet, we all are almost alike, inside and out. We all have almost the same basic needs and desires. We all need food, water and shelter. We all desire love, friends and happiness. Yes, we have a few minor differences like size, color and preferences. The manipulators instigate race and religious prejudices to keep us from uniting. When we realize the fact that we will all be better off in the long run, by cooperating instead of competing, we can begin to appreci ate differences and accept each others help. Perhaps then love will flow more naturally. Down through the ages and even today the Elite use the old "Divide and Rule" concept with their relentless encouragement of competition, to keep us fighting one another instead of cooperating to get ourselves out of our bondage. We could do it easily, with both our hands tied be hind our backs, if we cooperated because there are over 98.6% of us. In 1980 98.6% of the U.S. population made an adjusted gross income of less than $50,000. 1.3% made between $50,000 and a million and only .0018% (4,112 people) made over a million dollars1. The few make the rules and we do the work and pay the bills. The world is populated by people who were once Free individuals. But the minute they submitted to, or elected a leader they became slaves. I see nothing wrong with asking advice from someone I believe knows more about a particular subject than I do. I will take that advice and use it, if it sounds good to me. And I'm willing to give advice if asked. But I do not wish to be forced to take advice, no matter how good it is. In a mob or group, leaders are able to create a "mob hysteria" in which people do insane things that they wouldn't do if they weren't in the group, e.g., lynchings, wars and religious atrocities. Freedom began in my mind. As I discovered and began replacing the negative and limiting programming in my bio-computer (mind) with positive programs which helped me discover my biocomputer's limitless potential, I began to experience my Power and the real meaning of FREE DOM. Freedom is not a battery or a brassiere. Freedom is the Natural Way of Life which our ancestors lost, long long long ago, through their ignorance about superstitions, magic, wage slavery, politicians and gov ernment. When I began to believe that I would be better off with the Price less Economic System, I began to promote that new system with all my en ergy. I may as well have the BEST that I can help to create. I have asked myself and my friends these questions: 1. Would the individual be better off if everything were free and everyone worked without pay or Profit? 2. Is it more fun to give or to sell? 3. Is it more fun to do some work for someone for free or to work for pay? 4. Would this be true for mostly everyone? 5. Then wouldn't everything be free for everyone, if everyone enjoyed giving more than selling? 6. Wouldn't everyone be happier then? August 4, 1986 One-Way Ticket We each have a one-way ticket through life. If we don't enjoy each minute of the journey, it's our own damn fault. We had better start doing what makes our heart sing, RIGHT NOW! Why not? We will never get another chance to use "this moment." We cannot own it -- but we can use it. We can use it to our detriment, we can just let it drift by or we can use it wisely. We actually have a choice at this very moment! June 24, 1988 Ernest Mann 1World Almanac, 1983. 7 BECOMING MORE FREE 1. Getting More Free Time: A. I am wasting less of my time (LIFE) with THOUGHT LEADER media. They are like spectator sports. They cause me to live life vicariously, i.e., second-hand, not real, only in fantasy. These mind conditioners are subtly designed to create not only fear and anger emotions but also create feelings of guilt and inadequacy. How many times have you heard your fellow Americans intimate that we are the "cause" of the world's problems? That our corporations are doing these bad things to the environment and to people? Did you ever stop to realize the fact that these Giant Multinational Conglomerates are "controlled" by a few International Elite people. Not Americans! But they have laid that GUILT trip on the Americans. If we carry guilt, are we easier to manipulate? These feelings stifle growth and keep one securely in ones rut. And of course the more visible purpose of the media is to create a deep hunger to acquire (BUY! BUY! BUY!) and keep up with the Joneses. "Buying" uses up my savings. I spent 22 years of my TIME (life) working as a Wage Slave. I helped perpetuate the status quo, i.e., a country of 98.6% Slaves and less than 1% Elite (49 Billionaires). I don't wish to do that any more. Almost every time I buy something, I am in fact, hiring the industrialist to hire one of us for wages, to drill another hole in the bottom of our boat, i.e., to destroy our environment a little bit more. If I continue buying products from them, I help sink the boat in which we all ride. As I stop buying their junk, I use that time and money to help build an economic system in which it won't Profit anyone to drill holes in our boat. B. I am talking less "trivia." I try to take responsibility and lead conversations into areas that are meaningful and interesting to me or I find someone else to talk with. This gives me more meaningful input and more free time; to think about what I really like to do with my life (with this moment), to experiment with different ideas and to continue to experience the ones I like best. I wish to discover what it is like to be a "Natural" human being, (instead of a "Normal" one, who conforms and obeys) to see if I like that better. I spend more of my time trying to discover what makes ME happy. 2. Got rid of all my debts and credit cards. 3. Getting rid of my surplus possessions. 4. Getting my rent down as low as I can. 5. Stopping my destruction of my body. 6. Teaching myself how to choose my thoughts, so that I can choose not to linger on self-destructive thoughts and am learning to focus on thinking about creating more freedom and happiness for myself. 7. Learning ways to live happily on very little money, i.e., becoming more independent. (People with lots of money don't need to do this. In the present system -- MONEY is IN- DEPENDENCE.) 8. Experimenting with food. I'm discovering which foods and how much my body prefers. It tells me when I pay attention. 9. Get rid of my vehicle as soon as it feels like a burden. 10. Won't attempt to gain Power over anyone. A slave's chain has two ends. 11. Striving to be free and happy. I share my methods of happiness with others if they are interested. 12. Overcoming the fear of being alone. I realize that loneliness is only a thought and I am gaining control of my thoughts. 13. Worrying less about what people (including mother) think about me. 14. Starting to try some new things, friends, places, skills, routes, foods, ideas, etc. 15. When I dropped out in 1969, I stopped observing all holidays, including birthdays and Xmas. I don't give cards or gifts on holidays. However if I feel moved to give a gift or send one of my own self designed cards, I will do so, but not on a government designated holiday. I think I'm almost over that too now. I get enough gift giving satisfaction from "giving" my free newsletter (my work). The holidays card and gift exchanging was a terrible waste. I received things I didn't want and couldn't get rid of without hurting someones feelings and the gifts I bought were probably just as detested. Only the stores gained from all that old nonsense. I am enjoying my complete ignorance of holidays. On those days I do just as I do on any other day, except they are a nuisance sometimes when I attempt to bank or post office. 16. Absorbing new and useful input into my biocomputer and avoiding much trivia, helps me surpass my old programing of "garbage in -- garbage out," i.e., my old way of life. Each person has the potential to become a genius in some area. But most are too busy with trivial diversions. "Plow your furrows deep, while sluggards sleep, and you shall have corn to sell and keep." Benjamin Franklin Trivial Diversions How much is too much? What portion of my conversation is trivia? How can I expect to accomplish anything but TRIVIA if I allow that to be my major focus? (However, at this point in time, I seem to need some trivia. My ability to focus on the important is still quite limited.) Democracy Is Not Freedom (Except for the Elite) I was programmed to feel reverent whenever I heard, saw or thought the word -- "Democracy." Tears would almost form in my eyes. I assumed that Democracy was a wonderful thing to have. I never looked it up in the dictionary. I never thought of it as "Government and Bureaucrats." I thought of it as an entity; being there to protect, care for me and give FREEDOM! What an ignoramus I was. I had no notion that there was any "alternative" except some worse kind of government. I took it all for granted. I assumed I (we) controlled it because I (we) voted. It was a DEMOCRACY! How naive I was. Just another one of the "suckers" Barnum said is born every minute. Webster's New World Dictionary: Democracy: Government by the people, directly or through representatives. Government: The exercise of authority over a state (people), organization, etc.; control; rule. To rule someone -- wasn't that what slave masters did? Is government just the "front men" of the slave owners? Well, I refuse to play that game anymore. I will not be owned! The "Rule of the Majority" is a farce! In practice it has always been, "The Rule of the Minority," i.e., the manipulators, i.e., the Elite. No thank you! You can have them both. I don't have a need or a desire to be ruled by either or anyone! DEMOCRACIES and other governments have kept people in Wage Slavery for the past 5,000 years or more. ALL GOVERNMENTS are basically the same -- they RULE! Rules create conformity. Rules perpetuate the status quo. Rules produce slavery. Rules stifle creativity. Rules prevent INDIVIDUAL freedom! I do not desire to have people rule me directly or through representatives. I am not a cow or a sheep. I refuse to remain domesti cated. I am fully capable of Ruling myself! I do not desire to rule anyone. I just want to be FREE! And I am getting more free because I'm not playing their games much anymore. I no longer GIVE my consent to be ruled. I don't vote for a Ruler or for Laws any more! My chosen work right now is writing and publishing. I give my work for free in my Little Free Press newsletter. My past 18 years of payless working have been far more fun and satisfying than my previous 22 years of paid working. Volunteers have more freedom than paid workers. When everyone is a volunteer -- everything will be FREE for me, and for everyone else as well! February 12, 1987 Ernest Mann Slave Attitude To protest -- is to admit subservience. A slave begs or makes weak demands to his/her Master for changes. To build and create -- is to be in charge. A Freeperson (a God) makes change. We are either Slaves or Gods. If we acknowledge someone else as God or Boss, that makes us something less. We just gave away our freedom, our Godhead. We gave away (or sold) the control of our life. We have a right to do this. We have as much right to give away our power, as a leader has to accept it. It is our choice once we become aware of it. Since I discovered myself to be a lion, I quit acting like a sheep. 8 WORLD WAR III? Will it soon seem logical to those who control the World-wide Pay System Game to cause a severe depression as they did in the 30's? Is this how the Game must go -- to terminate the continuous years of inflation since 1930? And then, must the Pay System Game have another World War to pull us out of this depression? Is this the way the Pay/Profit System Game must be played to make it work? If so, maybe we should quit playing this dumb game and start a smart game where we don't need to beat ourselves to death. How many more farms and homes will they foreclose on? How many more business people will be driven bankrupt? When will they collapse the stock market? How many more banks will they close? How many more city gang wars will they instigate? How much more violence in the streets will they stage with agent provocateurs? When will they have one of their puppets start World War III, by launching the first missile attacks on our cities? (Nuclear or blockbusters -- you get just as dead.) When? When the leaders decide we are meek, scared and broke enough! WHEN THEY ATTEMPT TO DRAFT YOU OR YOUR SWEETHEART, YOUR SON OR YOUR FRIEND FOR THEIR NEXT WAR -- WHAT WILL YOU SAY? Why? Corporations make gigantic profits when they supply governments with OIL for "defense." Can you imagine the Profits they make when they sell army bases, naval bases and missile bases for "Defense?" Think how much money they collect annually from government on just the upkeep and maintenance of these bases. Not to mention tires, typewriters, com puters, uniforms, housing, drugs and even contraceptives for Defense. Think how corporate Profits will soar, when governments are "at war" using up and destroying these products and bases! SHALL WE CONTINUE SLAVING AWAY FOR THE BIG CORPORATIONS SO THAT THEY CAN CONTINUE TO REAP PROFITS FROM DEFENSE CONTRACTS? 98.6% of the U.S. population earned less than $50,000 adjusted gross income in 1980. 1.3% earned between $50,000 and $1,000,000. .0018% (4,112 individuals) made more than a million dollars. Do you think any of the 98.6% have the time, money, expertise or the desire to start World War III? Which group does the shit work and foots the bill? Which group manages the corporations? Which group are the people in, who make the decisions to start war? Is the War-profit potential great enough to tempt the World Elite to enact another "surprise" attack, like they did on Pearl Harbor? How much easier for them now with Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles. We have always had wars and always will have wars -- UNTIL we take the Profit out of war! Time for Prevention? There is still time to prevent World War III -- right up to the last minute before the Elite decide to have the buttons pushed to launch the first 1,000 missiles on our cities and the "enemy's" cities. No matter how good we are told our missile defenses are (you know how inefficient government is) -- some missiles are bound to hit our cities. Then Americans will see and feel what WAR does to homes, friends, lovers and children. It won't be like World War II -- with Americans enjoying safe easy "Defense" jobs with lots of overtime, big wages and plenty of money to spend. Instead, it will be worse than Lon don's "Buzz Bombs," destroying a few apartment buildings and killing a few people each time one drops unexpectedly out of the sky. No! The Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles carry much more devastating war heads and better target finding technology. "WORLD WAR III, MAY NOT BE HEALTHY FOR LITTLE CHILDREN AND OTHER LIVING THINGS." Who Is Trying? Do you know of anyone who recognizes the basic cause of War and is actively trying to eliminate it? I have read or heard of no one in the regular news nor in the Underground news (except the Little Free Press newsletter) who is promoting a Profitless economic system. The Communist, Socialist, Anarchist, Capitalist, Libertarian and religious systems all use money. So, where there is money or barter, there is a way for the Elite to get their hands on the lion's share of it, and even more so, when at War. Therefore if almost "no one" is promoting the workable solution -- isn't it logical to assume that the Profiteers will prevail and start WW III, whenever they please, with no effective opposition? Just like leading their lambs to slaughter! Many good people have become alert to the fact that the "system" is doing bad things to our people, planet and other living things. They have discovered the symptoms of destruction growing in our "life-sup port" system. They have warned us that human extinction will happen soon if we don't take action to halt this destruction. This is an extremely vital work these people are doing -- shaking- up people who are "working, consuming and doing the TV Trance Dance." People need to become aware of the fact that something is wrong before they can relate to "help make change." People may need to become angry before they can leave their secure routines (ruts) and take action. Many good people are already working with Nuclear Freeze, Central American and other revolutions, Third World exploitation, world hunger, pollution, alternative energy, animal cruelty and helping people in world catastrophes. Nuclear arms and all Defense is Profitable. After a Revolution, people end up with the same or a new group or Party of profiteers exploiting them. Cash crops produce Profit and Hunger. Industrialists make more Profit by polluting than by reclaiming and recycling their wastes. Farmers make more Profit by polluting than by farming organically. Oil cartels Profit by ignoring and subduing alternative energy. Drug companies Profit from animal cruelty. When activists begin to see that the same basic motive is behind most all the world's problems, they will see their "common interest." They will see that by cooperating with the other organizations they can become more effective. Instead of burning up our energy fighting the system, we will use that same energy to cooperate and build a NEW system which will not include the "prime cause" of problems that we share in common today. That "prime cause," of course, is Profit. More Profit can be made by doing these destructive things to life than by doing otherwise. It is that simple. The problem is not political, but economic. So how do we set up an economic (production and distribution of goods) system which will operate without the Profit motive? That is also simple, after some thought. Today in every country of the world, people take "pay" (or Profit) for their work and must "pay" for products and services. Pay (or Profit) is the present world-wide motive for working. So we merely need to change the work motive. We merely need to show people that if they would work as volunteers and make their work into pleasurable experiences and use automation and robots for the dull and dangerous work, they could then distribute their products and services free of charge. Then they would have no need for money (pay). They would thus relieve themselves of the drudgery of being "forced" to work and they would rid themselves of the burdens of taxes, government, war, pollution, hunger, stealing and money worries. These rewards should be sufficient to motivate volun teers to work. There are already 84 million Volunteers in the U.S.A. Why do they work? In a priceless economy, people would choose the job they liked and receive FREE on-the-job training. They would be doing a work they liked and know that their work contribution allowed the priceless system to function. Work would then become like a hobby. People could become artists at their work. Some jobs allow one to work with very expensive equipment which one cannot afford to buy for ones home. When one doesn't "have to" do something it can be more fun to do. Most people tell me that no one would work if they didn't get paid. But how do you account for the 84 million Americans who worked as volunteers (as reported in the Christian Science Monitor of March 30, 1982)? Here is a partial list of those volunteers: Current Volunteer Strength of 20 National Agencies1 Number of Organizations Volunteers U.S. Committee for UNICEF 3,000,000 American Heart Association 2,727,000 American Cancer Society 2,300,000 United Cerebral Palsy 2,000,000 Muscular Dystrophy 1,880,000 American National Red Cross 1,357,290 National Boy Scouts of America 1,105,245 American Lung Association 1,000,000 National Assoc. Retarded Citizens 1,000,000 National Easter Seal Society 1,000,000 National Multiple Sclerosis Soc. 950,000 National Council of YMCA 757,727 Girl Scouts/U.S.A. 572,362 The Arthritis Foundation 351,000 The National Foundation 250,000 The Salvation Army 230,000 National YWCA of U.S.A. 145,000 Camp Fire Girls, Inc. 135,000 Boys' Club of America 50,000 U.S.O. 40,000 __________ Total 20,850,624 There were already nearly enough people willing to work without pay to handle the 104 million jobs that there were in the U.S.A. in 1980. Think of how many many more people will be eager to volunteer when they realize their efforts will rid the world of the: SEVEN GREATEST EVILS WAR STARVATION POLLUTION STEALING TAXATION MONEY WORRIES GOVERNMENT "Is an ounce of prevention, still worth a pound of cure?" What Can One Person Do? It has done no good in the past to ask governments to disarm. This only deals with the symptom of the disease. To cure the ill -- the CAUSE must be eliminated. I had to face the fact that PROFIT is the cause of WAR! After I realized this I was ready to help create an economic system in which there is no Profit. I help change the above "no one" is helping to "everyone" by spreading the word on what and whom CAUSES War. I try to tell people how we can set up an economic system which will be almost like Paradise for everyone, with no reason to start Wars. I try to use that Utopian System in a small way in my own life. I make my life a little richer and better today. This will make my tomor rows better, with something to look forward to. "Hope" is what it is called. Happiness and satisfaction began some years ago for me when I decided that I work on the world's most important and urgent task -- helping to free us all, of the burdens and misery of WAR! This near Utopian or Paradise system could be called the Priceless Economic System. It would create true Freedom for the Individual! "Power to the People." is meaningless. Priceless Economics returns "Power" over one's own life, to the individual. This is what FREEDOM is really all about! Individuals would then have Power over what products or services they would take and how much they would take. Products and services would then have no resale value and they could not be status symbols because they would be free for everyone. It would only be a burden to take more than one needed. There would no longer be a Profit in creating scarcities but much advantage in creating abundance. With abundance, selfishness and greed become obsolete. "In a desert, no one steals sand from their neighbor." With Priceless Economics, each individual would control the when, where, why and who they accepted products and services from or worked for. Thus, Volunteers would be treated decently or they could quit anytime and would still get everything they wanted free of charge. The more Volunteers a place of work had, the fewer hours each worker would need to contribute to produce abundance, so it would be to everyone's advantage to encourage and nurture newcomers and give them free on-the-job training. We don't need to convince the whole 4 1/2 billion world population. The little kids pretty much do what their parents do. Most of the very old are no help or hindrance. Most of them are just trying to hold it together. The silent majority mostly just conforms to what ever the media tell them is "Public Opinion," i.e., they do what they are told. So really, we have only a few "thinkers, shakers and movers" to reach with these logical advanced ideas, then the youth, aged and silent majority will jump on the band wagon so fast, it'll make your head swim. Then they will say, "I was for it all along. I just didn't think anyone else was." (Almost everyone tells me that, now!) If you can relate to these ideas, you can decide for yourself what you will do to help promote them. 10/24/85 Ernest Mann THE PAY SYSTEM The Pay System is a system in which people work for profit or pay. This makes products and services cost money. WORK: People own industry, property and natural resources if they make a profit. The rest of us work for them. We work wherever and whenever they want us. We're afraid that other workers may take our jobs. Junk production, paper shuffling and other useless jobs flourish if someone profits. Useless products and planned obsolescence create millions of jobs and require tons of natural resources and energy. Work is boring, unhealthy and unfulfilling. NEEDS: Everything that we want costs money so there is reason to steal and starve. RELATIONSHIPS: We get bad feelings from our work and bad feelings from not getting all the things we need. We're unhappy. Being dependent on someone for our needs, we often form our relationships unwisely. CONTROL: There is profit in stealing, wars and pollution; so we have a need for police, soldiers, government and taxes. Most people are unhappy with the Pay System. SWITCH-OVER: We can preserve this great world-wide Pay System and prevent any switch-over if we all continue to work for pay and be insatiable consumers. THE PRICELESS ECONOMIC SYSTEM The PES is a system in which all people work for free. This makes all products and services free. WORK: No one will care to own industry, property or natural resources when they can't make a profit from them, so we will each be our own boss. We will work wherever we choose. Other workers will welcome us and teach us because the more help they have, the fewer hours they will each need to work. We will then stop doing junk production, paper shuffling and all other useless jobs. This will free millions of workers and resources for essential production. We'll make our work enjoyable, healthful and fulfilling. NEEDS: Everything that we want will be free so there will be no need to steal or starve. RELATIONSHIPS: We will get good feelings from our work and good feelings from getting all the things we need. We'll be happier. Not being dependent on anyone for our necessities we will form our relation ships more wisely. CONTROL: There will be no profit in stealing, crookedness, wars or dishonesty so we'll have no need for government, taxes or boundar ies. All people will be happier with PES. SWITCH-OVER: As soon as everyone understands and wants the Priceless Economic System we'll all switch over together. 1American Association of Fund Raising Council, 1980; Editorial Re search Reports Dec. 12,1980. 9 UTOPIA NOW POSSIBLE A revolutionary breakthrough in employee motivation may be forthcoming which will make jobs so attractive, interesting and enjoyable that employees will work without pay. These volunteers will be attracted by good working conditions, the latest in fine tools, machines and technology, such as; robots, computers, satellite communication systems, etc. Volunteerism would eliminate the "monetary cost" of production which in turn would permit all products and ser vices to be distributed free of charge, thus allowing people to work without pay and enabling industry to provide the marvelous technologies and tools. Work would then become a privilege instead of a duty. This Priceless Economic System would cause the following departments to become unnecessary: 1. Payroll 6. Insurance 2. Sales 7. Legal & Tax 3. Advertising 8. Much Accounting 4. Credit 9. Much Administra. 5. Banking 10. Security This would make tremendous savings in resources and energy and free more than 16 million people for useful work. People leaving these unnecessary jobs could volunteer for any jobs they liked and receive free on-the-job training and begin to learn and produce immediately. Volunteers take more responsibility to do better work and create better working environments for themselves. Instead of working because one "had to" and hating it, people would work because they desired to. Then employees would take more interest and think of ways to make improvements, thereby getting satisfaction from their work in creative ways without pressure to make profits. The people who now claim they own the raw materials would then have no need for money because everything would be free for everyone. Regardless of their claimed "ownership," their employees would be distributing the raw materials free of charge as would all employees in all industry and on farms. Stockholders would have no need for money nor any reason for worries about inflation, depression or stock market ulcers. They could use their certificates for wallpaper. Because everything would be free there would be no reason to steal. 94% of the people in prison and jails1 are there for stealing. Priceless economics would end 94% of the need for: 1. 4,052 jails and prisons 2. 630,000 lawyers and judges 3. 1,267,000 guards and police 4. 412,000 prisoners Thus giving us 2,170,460 more people to help with the essential work. There would no longer be a reason to starve or revolt when everything is free. Malnutrition would become a thing of the past when land is used to feed people instead of for "cash crops," soil bank in come and speculation. Because there would no longer be a "profit" in starting wars, there wouldn't be a need for defense or military, thus releasing: 1. 223.3 billion dollars worth of resources each year. 2. 4.1 million active military personnel, direct-hire civilians and defense related workers. When the unnecessary departments are discontinued we could stop producing the supplies these departments had been consuming, i.e., this would lower the demand for: 1. office buildings 5. fixtures 2. office machines 6. electricity 3. supplies 7. factories 4. furniture 8. fuel, etc. This would save millions of human work-hours and billions of tons of raw materials. Savings in check-out clerks, cashiers and cash registers alone would be fantastic. With no monetary cost for labor, materials, rent, energy and machines, it would become feasible to reclaim and process all factory waste materials and use it to restock supplies for other production -- instead of polluting the environment. With free labor, the farmers would all be able to practice organic farming methods and produce more nutritious food and halt their pollution. There would be no inducement to rush new products into the market. They could be thoroughly tested to get all the bugs out and be sure they were safe and that their wastes could be reclaimed. With priceless economics there wouldn't be a reason for special interest groups to suppress cheaper energy sources, more efficient production and distribution methods and machines which used less or cheaper fuels. With priceless economics there wouldn't be a profit in designing planned obsolescence and planned deterioration into products. Instead products would be designed for utility, long life, efficiency, beauty, safety and be trouble-free and easy to repair with universal parts. Work would take on a new meaning. It would become an art and employees would all become artists doing creative things to make their products or services better and the process more enjoyable. People would no longer resist automation and robots because these machines would be employed to do the dangerous and boring work. This would further reduce human working hours. We may discover the fact that we have very little or no need for government, thereby saving most of the nearly trillion dollar budget and freeing 15.8 million more people for essential work. The few useful services which government now performs are: 1. postal service 5. forestry 2. fire departments 6. parks 3. sewer and water 7. and others 4. highways These departments could function more efficiently without bureaucratic and political interference and without budget limitations. People would no longer have: 1. money worries 5. taxes 2. credit problems 6. recessions 3. rent/mtg. pymts. 7. inflation 4. unemployment There would be no need for TV commercials and war fear mongering. This will reduce stress and restore hope and confidence. There would be an abundance of good food2 for everyone and much more free time to enjoy ones family and friends. Happy people get along better. People could then cooperate instead of compete and create a synergy which would yield more health, creativity, efficiency and happiness. There would no longer be a reason to create make-work projects. There is plenty of important work which needs to be done. Without the stresses of the Profit System, people could enjoy working with the neat fantastic tools, machines and computers which industry provides. Work would then become a place that people could go to enjoy themselves, to gain satisfaction in creating beautiful prod ucts or services and enjoy the camaraderie that would be shared. Work could become our most treasured recreation. We have what it takes to produce abundance: 1. resources 4. machines 2. labor 5. factories 3. skills 6. land With an abundance of top quality products which were free, there would be no reason to take too much. Too much, is a burden and free things are not status symbols. Competing companies could then cooperate to produce the best products they could mutually design -- cooperation being more efficient than competition. The "Law of Supply and Demand" would function more efficiently when we work to fill the demand, rather than attempt to create the demand. This Motivation Revolution would work best on a worldwide scale because ALL the world's people would be far better off with this new system. Underdeveloped nations could then develop as quickly as they desired, with free guidance from advanced nations if they wished it. If we are able to increase the life of durable goods (cars for example) to twice their present useful life, that alone would reduce the consumption of resources for durable goods by 50% and reduce work ing hours for their production by half. When the 38 million people now engaged in the above mentioned non- essential jobs; enter essential employment, they will greatly reduce the working hours for everyone -- or, they will greatly expand certain fields, such as; research and development, reclamation of factory waste products, cleaning up the environment, working on organic farms, the space program and/or -- they may prefer to slow down the pace of all work to have more time to enjoy the journey through life. Priceless economics would create an almost Utopian atmosphere by eliminating the seven greatest problems of the world. "Giving" produces better feelings than "selling." Getting something for "free" produces better feelings than parting with money. (Who can resist a Giver?) Being part of the work force which creates this near Utopia would be an Honor. Thus, we would pass something on to our children and grandchildren that future generations would be grateful for and remem ber us by, instead of the wars, pollution and starvation that our parents and grandparents left for us. Some say that people don't deserve Utopia, but if people create it -- they will deserve it! End Wars, Pollution and Begin Utopia First: MY job which I have chosen for right now, is to get the word out and get people talking and arguing about the Priceless Eco nomic System. Second: After everyone understands Priceless Economics they can set a date to all stop taking pay and begin giving all products and services free of charge. July 20, 1985 Ernest Mann "While we still breathe -- there is hope." Tarzan 1Statistical Abstract of the U.S., 1985; American Prisons & Jails, 1980, Vol. 3. 2There are 7.28 acres of food-growable land per person in the world. FAO Production Yearbook, 1981, Vol. 35, By Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. 3Buckminister Fuller's "World Game" findings. Other statistics from: Handbook of Labor Statistics, 1983, Dept. of Labor. 10 MAKING CHANGES We could be on the verge of a stupendous leap forward into the Space-age. One which would make the last 50 years look like a snail's pace. A break-through which would produce energy sources and their utilization to send people to other galaxies and colonize unpeopled planets. A real jump into the Science Fiction World! There are at least seven reasons why we are yet unable to make this leap: First: We don't have the money. Second: Patents and big money enable oil interests to keep certain energy sources under wraps and off the market. Patents also keep inventors from the synergy they could develop, with each other, if they shared their ideas instead of concealed them. Inventors would not need patents if everything they wanted was free. Third: People don't do their best when they are doing work they hate and know they are being exploited. Fourth: The wonderful billion dollar Bio-computer we each carries around under our hat is not being nurtured and developed to its full capacity. In fact, they are being diverted, channeled, restricted and damaged. Fifth: We are being bled-dry by the taxes, low wages, rising prices, interest and by Profiteers wasting our natural resources and our labor. Sixth: People are more creative and efficient when they are not being scared and angered, as they are now, by the endless fear and anger arousing of the mass media. Seventh: Some inventors may be wise enough not to release their inventions to the world, until its people have grown smart enough to use them sanely. They may have noticed that Competition has driven people to rape and destroy environments, kill off entire populations of natives and steal their land and resources. Any intelligent person would surmise that Competition would also drive space explorers to these same practices on other planets. These seven reasons block our progress into interstellar travel and exploration. If you examine them closely, you'll discover Profit is at the root of each one. This makes the solution simple. Produce and distribute the world's goods without making a Profit. Then we'll all profit in the long run. Buckminister Fuller, with his "World Game," years ago listed in his computer all the world's natural and recyclable resources. He pinpointed where they were and how much was available. He found that there was an abundance of resources for the entire world's population. He discovered the problem. The resources were mostly owned or controlled by the Elite few who held and manipulated them for maximum Profit, instead of for maximum benefit for people. Banana Peeling It may have been necessary for the human race to go through thousands of years of competition for the earth's resources, to solidly learn that competition is the wrong route to take, as we can almost see the brink of our self annihilation. We may discover the fact that Cooperation is much more pleasing and more efficient than Competition. Think of the resources, lives and time we will no longer waste on Wars, preparation for Wars, and the Rebuilding after each War! We are standing at the doorway of Cooperation. The door is open. All we each need to do is walk through it. There is no guard at the door to stop us, except our old idea that Competition is the best. We don't have to wait for the rest. We can each step through that doorway by our self or with a friend, today. The rest will follow when they see the fun we are having. Some people still need someone to lead the way. Some of us already have one foot through the doorway and the other on a banana peeling. We are giving some of our surplus things and labor free of charge or obligation. Fight Them? Are we being encouraged by the big corporations to fight them? Does this give them free publicity by getting their names on front pages and on TV? (Hollywood proved long ago that even bad publicity was good for profits) Does their stock go up every time their name appears in the media? Take Honeywell, for instance -- we have been fighting them for at least 15 years, attempting to stop them from producing weapons. Why? They are still producing weapons. Does it drain us of our energy and spare time so that we don't look for the primary cause of why corporations make war materials and why they pollute our environment? Have we been spinning our wheels against the symptoms of our problems and getting nowhere fast? Is it costing us time (life) and money too? If an ounce of prevention is still worth a pound of cure, let's quit wasting our time (lives) fighting the symptoms of a bad economic system and start creating a better one. There are millions of good sincere people struggling, resisting and fighting the symptoms. They are telling the Government to stop Wars. They are telling Government to stop Pollution. It does little good. We don't control Government. We have allowed it to control us. Are we being used as "dupes" by the big corporations to clean up corporate messes? After corporations have polluted land or a river or stripped a forest, or have gone broke, the government (I mean the taxpayers) often pays for the clean-up. It is a good deal like trying to keep a bathtub from overflowing by putting up side-boards and by bailing with buckets and mopping up what constantly overflows. Don't you see that the obvious solution is to get at the primary cause of the trouble and work on that, i.e., turn off the faucet? We will never be able to clean up the environment or plant trees, etc. as fast as they are destroying them. And why should we? What would happen if these millions of good sincere people withdrew their energy from struggling and fighting and led the way, by building an economic system (the production and distribution of goods) in which there would be no reason (Profit) to do these bad things to our environment and to people? What would happen? This would shut off the faucet! Then we could soon find our proper place and balance in Nature. We could build a world-wide economic system that would be for people instead of for Profit. Now, with all our new communication equipment and home computers we could change the world-wide system in one year! All the world's people are in the same bad fix and most of them are in much worse shape and would all welcome such a change. All they lack is the knowledge that such a system is available and they lack the knowledge that all other people would be as anxious to have it as they. FIRST of all, you must ask yourself, "Would I be better off -- if everything I wanted were free and I had no more money or credit worries and I could work at any kind of job I wanted and get free on-the-job training; and there would be no more reason (Profit) to start wars and destroy our environment and people?" How could anyone answer anything but, "Yes!"? Wouldn't this be true for everyone else too? I have asked thousands of people and over 99% have said "Yes!" That ought to be a strong enough majority to make it work and be easy to implement. Actu ally if the 4,112 people in the U.S.A. who made over a million dollars in 1980 really understood the Priceless Economics, they would surely want it too. They would get everything for free, just like everyone else, and besides that they would have all free labor in their factor ies. They would have people working who really enjoyed their jobs, made beautiful, efficient and long lasting products and took responsibility for doing good work. Now, workers sluff-off every chance they get, be cause they know they aren't getting a fair share of their productivity. In the chapter, "What Can Farmers Do?", the percentages I reported, are for the total number of individuals who filed tax returns. If we include the people who didn't make enough to file, we must use the total U.S. population for 1980, which was 226,504,825. This changes the statistic to: 98.6% of the U.S. population in 1980 had adjusted gross incomes of less than $50,000. This is a strong majority. As I point out in the chapter, "This Moment," we are in the middle-lower-lower-lower class (and most of us even lower) and we are the ones who are doing all the world's work. Who needs us? "They" need us and "we" need us. There is really no one to stop us from causing change. It is "our" world. But there is our own short-sightedness. Our lack of hope. Our inability to see the alternative we have. Our inability to see the value of our own individ ual contributions of ideas and energy. Our unwillingness to admit the SLAVERY we suffer. Our own ignorance in taking jobs as police persons, soldiers and judges and suppressing our own class. You never hear of any of the Elite being sent to prison for 30 years. Why? Yet they start Wars which murder thousands of people, just for Profit. We have been hoodwinked for thousands of years into joining parties, movements, lodges, clubs and radical organizations. Always we have recognized leaders and followed them. We gave them our Power and they always screwed us. If this were not so, we (98.6%) would not still be in the middle-lower-lower-lower class (or lower) and we would not now be feeling the financial screws being tightened on us. In Common The Elite have one thing in common -- they cooperate with each other and retain their power. We 98.6% have one thing in common -- we compete with each other and lose our power. Changes If we don't make changes in our lives, there is no growth -- only stagnation, monotony and a down-hill greased slide into a rest home and senility. We can each begin right now, by working alone or with friends, to implement the Priceless Economic System. We can follow our own common sense and start doing what we each think would help. We can choose to follow suggestions of others if they look logical to us, but we are not under any stress from any Party, Movement or Government Leaders to OBEY. This puts the individual in control of his/her life, i.e., in the driver's seat for a change. If we wish advice or leadership on a particular matter we will seek out a person or book we think might be helpful, and then still have the option of using it or not. This puts the individual in control of only her/himself and we don't give our power away to a leader, master or government this way. If we do -- it's Slavery! The Priceless Economic System is based on the fact that "If everyone worked for free (i.e., without pay or profit) there would be no monetary cost of production, so then all products and services could be free." Anyone can begin this system, today, at their own acceptable pace. We can begin to make available the surplus "things" we have accu mulated. We can Give them for free to people who want them or sell them at cost or lower, just so we don't make a Profit (unless we need the money badly). It is not as easy as it sounds, to Give things. First one must discover who wants them. Some people set up a Free Box in their home and give their friends first chance at their surplus. Some set up a Free Box at their Co-op. Some put up notices in stores. I saw a Free garage sale. These are the beginnings. Some hand out papers, e.g., the Little Free Press newsletter, to encourage others and explain the new economic system and what it will do for people. Some make a directory of people who are willing to share some of their spare time and Give their skills and labor for free, to people within a group of like-minded. You will no doubt think of other ways to begin this new system. This example of people Giving away their excess of things, products or services will help others to see this system would work and is working for us and others already. As people within your circle of friends understand what you are doing and set up their own Free Boxes, you start to get some Free things and services back. This gives you a little less need for money, thus enabling you to Give even more. Once set into motion, this idea should become a self perpetuating growing energy force. Anyway, what can you lose by trying it, except your burdens? Of course it is obvious that one should not Give away more than one can spare. One must first take care of Number One. Have enough. This keeps you fit and fiddle, thus enabling you to carry on this work. Actually, to have too much surplus is a burden, but to have a little surplus of some things is a must. We each find our own balance. With these experiences you discover for yourself, which you like better -- the sell way or the Give a way. When this idea becomes popular we can vote, to set a change-over date so that everyone can stop taking pay simultaneously. I really believe the Elite would like to see the PES happen. Remember, a slave-chain has two ends. One of the reasons they don't help remove it, I think, is that it is something that must originate from us (the slaves) after we have suffered enough. We must offer our labor and our ideas for free, FIRST, before we can make products free. We must put some corn into the mill, before we can expect any grits. AND we must expect to turn the crank a little too. That is the way life is, my friend. There is no "free lunch." One must "bend over" to pick up the apple. It seldom falls into ones mouth already chewed. Nor can slaves be set free. They would only seek another Master. We need to first realize we are in bondage, decide what kind of life we would like to have, then we must take our Freedom. We will take our Freedom by GIVING our labor, not selling it. WHEN YOU TAKE PAY -- YOU MUST OBEY! In the PES we will have everything we want for free, so that we won't have to take any shit at work, any more, either. If we aren't treated right, we can quit and work where we are appreciated. This kind of Movement (without leaders) cannot be broken up or stopped easily, once it gets started. Without leaders, there is no top of the pyramid to conquer, subvert, kill or buy off. People happy with their new system won't desire to change. I have been openly promoting the PES since 1972 and have never been hassled. I believe this is because everyone would really like to have everything for free and be allowed to work at a job they really enjoyed. The world's greatest undertaking= "To change the world system of living, from the competitive (dog eat dog) system to the cooperative (scratch each others back) system." The competitive system is where you try to take something away from your competitors (everyone being your competitor) and attempt to gain the most. You know how hard that is! The cooperative system is where people (everyone being a cooperator) help each other get enough from nature and no one wishes to have too much. Too much being a burden. With happy individuals we cre ate a happy society. This undertaking looks impossible. But so does a big oak tree from a tiny acorn or 60 million spermatozoon in a little dab of come. So does 75,000 seeds from one Lambs Quarter plant. People knew that the Wright brothers would never get their bicycle to fly. People could easily see that Thomas Edison would never get his glass bottle to light up like a candle. Think how difficult it must have been thousands of years ago to make wild free people into slaves -- forcing them to do things they didn't want to do. Not unlike breaking wild horses. But think how much easier it should be to encourage people to do something that they would really like to do. Of all the acorns a squirrel buries, if only two grow into trees each year -- there will soon be bucketsful more from each tree. If you and I can plant our ideas where other people will help them grow -- the idea will multiply like the acorn, even faster than the multiple progression of numbers pyramid. You can see how important your participation really is. If each squirrel didn't plant lots of acorns, we wouldn't have oak trees almost all over the world. It isn't what the group or society does -- they do nothing. It is what each individual (in or out of a group) does, that counts. If each individual does nothing -- there is no change. Some people will make changes in their own lives by simply making copies of this chapter and giving them to friends. (You hereby have my permission to do this or to reprint it in your own publication. This book is being published to end Profit!) This takes a lot of courage when doing it for the first time. Then one gains more courage and does even more remarkable things. One begins to discover what power one has and what freedom is and how to get more of it. May 23, 1985 Ernest Mann Progress Progress is a matter of trying new ideas. For example, try - - not beating your head against a brick wall, for a change. See how you like that. 11 WANTED: VOLUNTEER CREW Have you ever wanted to crew in space? You are even now a passenger on a gigantic spaceship! We are traveling at 66,636 miles per hour (18 1/2 miles each second) in our orbit around our energy source. Our sphere shaped ship is spinning at 1,037 mph at its equator. We may even be moving through space (with our little convoy of 8 planets, moons and our energy ball) at a much higher velocity. The stars seem to be traveling the same route at about the same inconceivable speed. We are moving "Hell bent on election," for: no one knows where -- no one knows why -- we can't locate the Captain -- and we've discovered malfunctions on board. A few passengers on Spaceship Earth have volunteered as crew persons. They have become aware of the fact that our life-support systems on aboard ship are being destroyed by unthinking passengers. Our life-support systems are commonly referred to as "The Environment." They are the onboard systems which produce all our food, air and water. Passengers have unthinkingly taken for granted the belief, that our systems could supply an unlimited amount, regardless of how much pollution they dump into them. We crew persons cannot tolerate having our life-support systems damaged. Not any more than a farmer would tolerate having a cow stand on his foot. First we'll inform the cow that she is on our foot. If that doesn't help we'll tell her to get off our foot. If she persists we will be forced to use stronger means. We must! Our survival is at stake! Fortunately, people can think better than cows and will not knowingly sink the ship they ride on. Some parts of our life-support systems may already be damaged beyond the "point of no return" and others are rapidly approaching that point where they will not be able to renew themselves. Several species of life are becoming extinct at an alarmingly accelerated rate. All species have a place in our life-support food-chain and the loss of even one, eventually will affect the entire balance of the chain. Therefore, we are taking appropriate actions to show passengers that they have as much need for functioning systems as we do. FIRST: We have discovered the problem. Our air, water and soil are being poisoned. SECOND: We have discovered what causes passengers to compulsively continue this destruction. A few thousand years ago a few passengers figured out a way to make people believe that they (the Elite few) "Owned" Spaceship Earth. They invented a "Game" they called "Buy and Sell" which was played with something they called "Ownership" and "Barter" (which was later streamlined into "Money.") With this Game they were able to invent "Slavery" because they could buy people to be their soldiers and po licemen, and thereby force their scheme on the remainder. The Elite eventually discovered the idea of destroying the natives' wild Free food supply and their Free places to live. They are still doing this with poison sprays, "No Trespassing" signs and other pollution. This makes people dependent on Money, to buy food and shelter, thus forcing them into the Labor Market. In the game of Buy and Sell one must make a "Profit" in order to "Win." The Industrialists make more Profit when they dump their "Wastes" into our rivers, our air and on our land, than when they recla im and recycle them. The Farmers make more Profit when they use poison sprays and artificial fertilizers than when they use safe organic farming methods. We have tried with "Laws" to make them both stop, but to little avail. They continue to destroy our life-support systems -- just to make more PROFIT! Because the Elite group (with their hired soldiers) convinced the earlier passengers that the Elite owned all the staterooms and seats on Spaceship Earth; they made the passengers work, to make Money, to buy tickets, for space on our spaceship. This Elite group did not build Spaceship Earth. They did not buy it from some aliens with a few beads and mirrors and colorful cloth. But for some strange reasons we now believe that they own it? They allow some of the passengers to Own small specks of it. Thus we think that Ownership is a good idea. But, the Elite claim ownership to the most and the best of it. Much of the spaceship, the Elite say, is Owned by groups they call "Government." But the Elite are the ones who rape that so-called Government Land of its timber and minerals. So the Elite make more Profit. But the rest of us passengers must Pay to use it. Passengers will do almost anything for Money (Profit). They desire Money so that they can Buy "Things." The Elite have convinced them that the people who have the most Things are the BEST, and that every one should s t r i v e to be the BEST. This they named "Competition." The more Things that they convince us to Buy, the more we must Work (for them) to Pay for our space on Spaceship Earth. So, there it is. This Game of "Buy & Sell" is what is CAUSING good passengers to destroy their own survival system. THIRD: Now the solution. Instead of using our time to continuously attempt to repair the damages they are causing, we are setting up a survival method that will yield no Profit to those who are now damaging our systems. We volunteer crew persons, who are now taking action to correct this problem, are going back to the principles prevalent in the prior system which worked for hundreds of thousands of years to sustain Space ship Earth. Then all people were crew persons; as are and were, all other living things on this spacecraft. All things helped to keep balance in the Nature of Spaceship Earth. They did not attempt to Control it. They allowed it to be. It worked harmoniously. They had no reason to shit in the stream that they drank from. There would have been no Profit in selling a water purification plant or selling bottled imported water, then. In that old system people "used" the space they needed on this old spacecraft. There was no reason (Profit) to attempt to keep more than one needed. There was plenty of space and there still is. My parents fed a family of four with about a half acre garden on our farm. BUT, with the present Buy & Sell Game, most people do not have access to their share (or even one half acre). Why not? We volunteer crew persons are setting the lead, blazing the trail; we are showing the passengers what they are doing to our life-support systems. We are also showing them how to live happily without doing these destructive things. We are weaning ourselves from Money and Barter. We are Giving our surplus products and services away, Free of Charge. We don't make a Profit from this work, so we have no reason to lie, cheat or do harmful things to our ship. We are working at what we enjoy doing or at what we believe urgently needs to be done, at this time. The more passengers who volunteer for crew duty, the more Free things will become available for everyone. Then the less need we will have for Money; so the more we will be able to Give. This should work very well because it is much more Fun to Give than to Sell. (Ask any sales person. You get much better feelings out of Giving something to someone than in trying to Sell something to them. Believe me! I spent 22 years trying to sell.) With this Free System, we have no reason (Profit) to pollute and destroy our life-support system. (Why drill a hole in your boat if you are aware of the fact that water will come in?) We end the monetary cost of production. Thus, everything becomes FREE again and so do we become FREE again, as we were before we sold [sic] ourselves into slavery and became domesticated. We are making immediate reductions in industrial pollution by not buying much of anything, new or used. Used is better, but it usually allows the seller to buy something new. Because we are not buying; the stores order less, so the factories produce less, thereby they pollute less. We are buying mostly Organic Farm products (when they are not overpriced) thereby reducing the demand for the polluting farmer's prod ucts. This new demand for organic products may encourage more farmers to convert to organic production. We volunteer crew persons are making CHANGES on Spaceship Earth by first making the changes in our own personal lifestyles. This is the place where we have immediate control. We don't need to ask anyone. We don't need a committee meeting. We don't need to elect a new politician. We don't need to take around a petition or ask for dona tions. We don't need to impeach anyone. We don't have to go on a long march or picket the white house or camp in front of a bank. We don't have to wait for anyone else. We don't have to buy guns and learn how to shoot. We just go and do what we think is right and best for ourself over the long haul. We practice what we preach! Actions speak louder than words. And we are having fun doing it. We are creating new lifestyles for ourselves that are easier and leave us more free time to learn more about what fun is really all about! We are making our work into a FUNGAME! Why not? It's later than you think! We had better learn to have fun today. Because tomorrow never really gets here. All we really have in life is today, actually all we have is this MOMENT! If we make the most of this moment, then we are really LIVING! We are Giving away or selling cheaply our surplus accumulations. We are discovering the fact that each Thing that we Own demands something from us. When we buy something, we usually must also buy some thing else to take care of that first thing. The more Things we own, the larger Place we need to store and Protect them. We have discovered the simple fact that Things are Burdens. They had become our Masters and we their Slaves. Taking care of and Paying for these Things was taking up most of our time (lives). They were supposed to be labor- savers but they turned out to be slave drivers. So we volunteer crew persons are unburdening ourselves and gaining more Free time -- becomi ng more FREE! And at the same time we are saving our spaceship from destruction, simply by our example. What an easy way to fly! If you wish to join the crew, begin right now. Don't send in money! Don't sign anything! Don't pledge your life away! Make your own Buck Rogers Pin. Anyone can join. Because we can't locate the Captain, you'll have to decide on your own duties, and oversee yourself. Welcome aboard, shipmate! April 24, 1985 Ernest Mann Wow! Think how just 2 copies of this idea could spread: Convince 2 people in one week = 2 to each convince 2 the 2nd week = 4 who do the same the 3rd week = 8 the 8 do it the 4th week = 16 the 16 the 5th week = 32 etc. 64 If each person who is 128 convinced; just convinces 256 two more people 512 to do the 10th week = 1,024 same -- and 2,048 if each person really got 4,096 busy and found their two 8,192 people within one week, 16,384 then in 31 weeks (less 32,768 than a year) we would 65,536 have presented this 131,072 alternative planto almost 262,144 the entire 524,288 world's 20th week = 1,048,576 population 2,097,152 4,194,304 Personally, I'm 8,388,608 trying to convince 16,777,216 more than just two 33,554,432 people, hoping this 67,108,864 will help to make up 134,217,728 for the people who 268,435,456 drop out of this 536,870,912 information 1,073,741,824 pyramid. 31st week = 2,147,483,648 ____________ Total 4,294,967,294 12 WHAT CAN FARMERS DO ABOUT FORECLOSURES? Instead of suicide, they could immediately go on welfare. Not so much for the money, but just to get even, to get back some of the tax dollars they have paid in. Then they would have a breathing space where they could get some farming done for THEMSELVES. Before, they were farming to produce something to sell. With no or little overhead they could instead, focus on providing abundance for themselves and then have much leisure time to enjoy life. They could get some sympathetic farmer to sell them about 10 acres of land for $1.00 down and low monthly payments (or barter their surplus products or labor). Then camp on the land and build a cabin from whatever materials the land contained, e.g., logs, stones, adobe, sod, rammed earth, willows and mud, caves, etc. Indians lived happily on this very land some 300 years ago, long before lumber yards or banks were here. We live here with big mortgages and trucked-in lumber and Things. We are not happy. This should tell us something? 10 acres of land will grow far more grain, vegetables, meat and fruit than one family needs. If they farmed it organically (this is how everyone farmed when I was a boy) they could even sell their surplus or use it for bartering. They would have no bank mortgage on their dwelling to worry about. Building codes, would have to be ignored. The codes were made to Profit the contractors, unions and bankers and to enslave the home builder in bondage called a mortgage. If they could get a farmer to sell them (for $1.00 down and small payments or barter) a cow, pig and some chickens, they could soon eat better than most city folks. If they stuck with simple hand-tools for their farming they would have no machinery mortgages and no machine breakdowns. The organic farmer, Nasanobu Fukuoka, in his book "One Straw Revolution" shows how he has not plowed or cultivated his soil for the past 25 years (can you possibly imagine how much work that saved) yet he gets as good or better crops and has as good or better soil than his neighbors who use big machinery and sprays. He hasn't used poison sprays or artificial fertilizer in all this time either. (Think of all the money he saved there.) He saves gigantic amounts of money and labor by his farming methods so he doesn't need to farm many acres to make a good living for his family and he has more Free time to enjoy life. I think it was the East-West or the New Age Journal which interviewed him after he made a tour of the U.S.A. He said that he couldn't find any place in the U.S.A. that couldn't use his farming methods. The East-West Journal did a review of his book in their August, 1985, magazine which included stories of two large scale U.S. farmers who are now using his methods. If people were wise they would stay away from having electricity put in and not accept a Sears Catalog. The mass media is constantly "conditioning" us to DESIRE "Things." These things cost us labor (time)(money) and they never turn out to be as valuable to happiness as the Time we LOST. It also does "Fear mongering" and forming of "Public Opinion." Who wants to be manipulated? Who wants to be their "Wage Slave?" If we need a newspaper, we can start our own. One that talks about happy events of life and how to make things even better. A paper which tells it like it really is. A paper which "reveals" all the "tricks" of the bankers and Industrialists who Profit so much by Foreclosures, Inflation, Wars and Depressions. It is not the farmers or the city workers who start wars. They wouldn't even know how. But they have to do the "shitwork" (the killing and the killed) and pay the taxes to finance it all. 96.6% of the indi vidual taxpayers in 1980 in the U.S.A. made an adjusted gross income of $50,000 or less. 3.39% made between $50,000 and a million. 4,112 individuals (.0056%) made a million dollars or more. Now you tell me! Did the 96.6% have any say-so in government or in banking? Just who then is running things? We all know! Who supplies all the labor and most of the taxes? If we are dumb enough to continue -- then we deserve what we get! The U.S. Government now has a budget of almost a trillion dollars per year to spend like a drunken sailor. Who gets most of this money? Do you? Almost all of it eventually ends up in the pockets of the multi- national conglomerate industrialists! From there the money goes into the pockets of the international bankers who own the industrialists. So because we continue to play their Money Game, who do you suppose it is that really controls the entire world? It is not "they" who are doing it to us. It is "us" doing it to us! We have not found a better Game so we continue to play their Game with their rules. "Tearing-down" (fighting the system) uses up our energy and we don't "gain" from tearing-down, even if we win. What good is a pile of rubble? We haven't really won in over 5,000 years. They had wage-slaves even in the ancient Greek times. "Building" a new system utilizes our energy in a positive way. Each stone we lay is building a better present time/space, and a solid foundation for our future. If we ever wise-up, we'll start our own Game. A game where there is no REASON to lie, cheat and steal. With: No Profit in Wars. No Profit in polluting our land, air and water. No reason to have taxes. No reason for mortgages. It really is very simple. You don't need to give anyone Power over you (like Bankers or Government). We all, already know what is right and wrong. We all practice the Golden Rule as much as we are able (us 96.6%), even in the present corrupt system. All we need to do to start the New Game, is to: Give away, free of charge, our surplus products. As more people start doing this, the things we need will start coming to us for freeeeee too. (priming the pump it's called) When everyone catches on to this real free system, then we will have ended the need for money, credit and barter. Then no one will be able to tell us to obey them or they won't pay us, and then we won't have money for a roof over our heads or food for our bellies. Then everything will be free. No longer a need to steal or starve. Then people can freely choose the kind of work they would most like to do and get free training on-the-job. Then we will produce only the very best, most beautiful and long lasting products we can. We'll all become Artists at our work. Perhaps what people need today is to see more FREE products and services on the market to give them some hope and confidence that the Priceless system would work. Then there will be no reason to elect someone to be our Slave Master. We will be our own Master. Volunteer police people may still be around if we still need them but soon we won't need them, when ev erything and everyone is free. Free to do as we like. Discover for ourselves the better response we get from people, when we do or say nice things; than from when we do or say repressive things. It does not take long or much intelligence to discover which response makes us happier. No one can get anything out of this new free game until some of the more brave, trusting, adventurous and far sighted, put something into it. Volunteers are already putting some of their labor and skills into the pump. Some free things are already coming out. The more we put in -- the more comes out. The more we practice the free game and tell everyone about it, the more they will want to be part of the action. The more people who see it happening and hear people talking and arguing about it -- the more Hope it will give them that others would participate. Think it over. Would you and your friends be able to make this Free Game work within your own circle? Sure! Then do it! Then you keep broadening the circle by letting others into it. It helps them and it helps your circle. It is important not to keep an accounting of how much each person gives and takes. That is the non-trusting money game we're playing now. We will become artists at our trade, skill or profession. We will be doing it, not for money or exchange value, but for the enjoyment and satisfaction our work gives us. We also discover it is more enjoyable to Give than to Sell. When everyone is part of the Free Game, there will be no resale value on what we "take." We have the resources, machines, skill and the labor to produce abundance, so there will be no reason to take more than we need. Too much of anything becomes a burden, instead of a Profit. There is every reason for this free game to spread quickly over all the world. All the world's working people will be far better off with the free game than they are now. For the first time in history, we have world-wide instantaneous communication systems, both audio and video. We can now help all the world's people get into the free game. We can all be neighbors and friends now -- instead of believing what the leaders say about being fearful of each other. Instead we should be fearful of our politicians! We must stop creating Politicians, by not voting. They have subtly conditioned us to believe that there would not be enough to go around, if everyone got as much as the people in the developed nations have. Buckminister Fuller proved this to be totally incorrect. He uncovered the fact that there is an abundance of resources, but they are kept scarce, to keep prices high. Working class people (over 96.6% of us) can help each other overcome our fears of each other, by giving, i.e., priming the pump. Working class people are good people! Cash and Capital produce NOTHING! It is people's labor which produces everything. We discover the ores and minerals. We mine and drill them. We haul them. We refine them. We build the machines, build ings, robots and computers. We run them. We till the soil, plant the seeds, tend the plants and harvest the crops. We distribute it all. Cash, the Commodities Stock Market and Capital are merely the distraction which makes us believe the Elite should get the lion's share of our labor. The Elite claim they own most of the best land, buildings and factories. But how can they own them -- WE built them! And the land was here before they were. They can only own them -- IF, we work for them as soldiers and force this ownership idea of theirs, on ourselves. The free game will use a different idea about land. It will be an idea of "Usership." We will take only as much land as we can "use." Anymore would be a burden. We would be giving our surplus crops or minerals away for free anyway. So who would care? There would be no profit motive for hogging too much! Leaders? We don't need "A Leader" to get this Game started. We don't need to Organize. (I'll bet you've seen that word before!) We don't need to sit through endless boring committee meetings. We just start talking it over with our friends and give them a list of our surplus (burdens) that we would be willing to give them, free of charge, with no strings attached. We can get it started right now, right in our own area, in our own lives! We will not need to wait for Jesus to bring it or anyone else for that matter. Our circle starts with a circle of one. We start remodeling our own lifestyle by making it the way we would like it to be. We add more people to our circle as they are able to relate to these new ideas. Start living the free game as best you can -- always watching for ways to improve your game. Then your life has a meaningful focal point and you become a Builder instead of a struggler or a hopeless obedient slave. The more you work at building the free game, the more ideas start coming to you, and the better you get at it. Giving builds happiness. April 4, 1985 Ernest Mann "If it's humiliating to be ruled, how much more degrading is it, o choose our Masters?" Anti-Authoritarian Anonymous 13 THIS MOMENT -- I USE IT OR LOSE IT! Life a Chess Game? I had a dream about life being a game of chess and each of us a chess piece on the chessboard of life. A game that de termines our future. I dreamt that most of us are allowing ourselves to be moved from square to square, without knowing it. Always believing we are making our own moves, and we usually are thinking through and deciding for ourselves. But, that is what is so misleading about it. We think that we are free. And we ARE free to move about anywhere within our corral. But we are kept too busy with petty problems and diversions to discover that there are several alternative moves which might serve us better (even remove the gate from our corral). Just like politics. We are given a few of "their" stooges to vote for. One is made out to look like a good guy. We vote, and no matter who wins - we lose because the majority of those who get elected ALWAYS serve the best interest of the Elite! We just gave away our Power again! How can we fall for the Election Trick year after year. Getting back to the chessboard; as we become aware of more of our vast alternatives of moves, we may find moves which will win us a game which is good for the individual, instead of continuing the thousands of years old game of "Taking pay -- and having to obey." We go with the flow, do what is expected of us, do what the boss says, etc. Sometimes we're like a flock of flighty birds. When one is spooked and flies off -- all the rest follow. At least that is what I did. I did what my parents told me, my teachers told me, etc. I did what the flock did! When I got married I did what every married man did -- had children, worked hard, made money and went to church. I never really had much time to sit down and figure out whether it was all worthwhile or not or if there might be a better way to live. I made one right move anyway; that was when I dropped out of the Rat Race when I was 42 and retired on the payments from some contract for deeds (from the sale of income property I owned) I created that would last for 20 years and then I would be broke. But I figured, if I had to, I could step back into the Rat Race then, and make some money again. I figured that "a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush." Nobody lives forever! In other words, I had seen lots of people die off even before they got their Social Security pensions or else two years after. So, I figured I deserved to take some time off while I was still young and frisky enough to enjoy it. At 62 I might be too scared to even get up out of my old rocken' chair, let alone travel across the big water in an airaplane and visit some of them there foreigners who don`t even speak American yet. I might not be able to disconnect my mind-cable from my TV either. By retiring early, I lost a maximum S.S. Pension that I was lined up for, but I will get a small one anyway. Better that, than being six feet under. How I ramble on. The luxury of 24 hours per day of free time, I guess. Just 9 days ago I moved from the city into a little (19'x19') home made log cabin in the woods 120 miles NW of Minneapolis and a quarter of a mile from my closest neighbor, with no phone, newspaper or elec tricity. It's really quiet up here. I seldom even hear birds sing. (Read, Rachael Carlson's, "Silent Spring.") Twenty years ago when I bought this land, there were thousands of birds here. Even most of the crows have died off or left. Now we find crows in Minneapolis, believe it or not, (maybe this should be called a "bad omen") trying to survive. I like it up here, anyway. I'm good company. Good neighbors to visit too. Back to the chessboard again. After I dropped out I started learning to make my own moves. I could begin to see the game from a distance. I could begin to see more of how the game is being manipulat ed and directed by the Elite (the super-rich families who know the secrets of winning in the money Game). Each space on the chess board of life can be occupied by only one person. My body weighs 150 pounds so it occupies exactly so many cubic inches of space on this planet. Let`s say I draw a small circle on the ground and step into it. No one else can stand in that space while I'm there. I occupy those cubic inches of space until I move and occupy space elsewhere. Even the King of Sweden or the President of the United States couldn't stand there when I'm occupying it. It's the same on the chessboard, only one piece on one square at a time. O.K. If I allow someone to move me around the board, "they" will determine how the game of Future will turn out. As I start thinking through more alternative moves, "I" help determine how the Future Game will be played and help win the kind of Future I desire. Because each space on earth can only be occupied by one person, being or thing -- my decision to move myself from a certain space to another space; MY movements and actions have a definite effect on the outcome of the World Future Game. No matter how small the effects may seem to me now, they may have a much bigger effect, merely because some one who had a bigger role to play in the game was unable to occupy the space I was in, or my action interfered and they had to take an alternative route or action and that changed someone else's route and action and that changed the outcome of the Game. Can't you see how important we EACH are? They have been leading us to believe that we are no more important than a drop of water in a bucketful, a grain of sand on the beach; BULL SHIT! Without that drop, you'd have no bucketful. Without those grains, you'd have no beach. Without each individual, we'd have no population. The individual is more important than the whole (population). The whole without the individual, is just a hole. "0." The individual without the whole can be a self-sufficient unit. Hermits have proved this. The more I see how the Future Game is played, (it is not really played by the rules on the box, the real rules are hidden and only known by the Elite) the more important MY chess piece, ME, becomes -- and the more I can effect changes in the Future Game. The future is not only next century, next month, next week, tomorrow, but it is also ten minutes from now! The future is also NOW! Because once I start con sciously determining my own future; by that very thought I am changing my NOW. Because NOW I am taking my future into my own hands and shaping it and molding it like a piece of clay. It takes a little courage to say, "I'd rather do it myself!" Then it takes determination to go ahead with it. I am doing things differently now -- and that is what will make my future different. If other people prefer to allow the Elite, their friends, mom or dad to mold their future for them -- I can't help them -- they will get whatever crumbs are left for the servants. One might also say that life is like going up a road. After we go up one road long enough we know what to expect up ahead. It has been a safe road so we continue going up that same road every day. We know pretty much what our future day will be like, we know what is up there ahead waiting for us. We may not like what we see farther on, but we continue traveling that same route anyway. A new route may not be safe, we think. We don't stop to realize that if we take a wrong route we can always change routes again and again until we find the very best route to our Future. If we continue to look, I think we will continue to find better routes. If everyone in the world stays on the same route they are on today -- in a very short time the scientists tell us, we will have destroyed our environment and earned starvation and begun World War lll. This is what can be seen up ahead on our present route. So as each aware individual changes her route and wakes up more individuals who do the same we become en route to a Future we Desire. What we may be doing is weaning ourselves from the need for Leadership, i.e., taking control of the movement of our own chess piece. Not relying on some great leader up there to direct our moves. We'll stop giving away our proxy (our power). We'll vote our own stock. Learn to steer our own boat. I find my own life much more fun when I'm doing the steering. Makes life really worth living. Being a slave to the dollar was really a misery. Government's Function? I grew up believing that the government's function was to protect the people from one another and from foreigners. Later I learned from Socialist books that government's function was to protect the Rich People and their property from the rest of us. But now I believe I have discovered government's most important function. Government is like a little child who is willing to give a whole handful of money for one lollipop. Only this one has a trillion dollars a year to spend like a three year old. If you were a big corporation, wouldn't you like to have such a customer. A trillion dollars is a thousand billion. A billion is a thousand million. Whe u e! They just have employees pay more taxes every year and let the three year old, spend it. What a perfect set-up. You can charge her/him dou ble or quadruples and s/he won't know and won't care, it ain't her/his money. That trillion dollar budget is about $4,424 from each man, woman and child in the U.S.A. each year. Are you getting your money's worth? Sooner or later the big corporations end up getting the whole trillion dollars, even the money paid to government employees as wages. Most employees have spent their wages, even before they get them. Problems? There is never a need to remain perplexed or indecisive. 1. Clearly state the problem. (A problem clearly stated is half solved.) 2. List all possible solutions. 3. Choose one. 4. Take action! 5. If it doesn't work, start over at number one. Shopping My what fun I had the other day, after being in the woods for twelve days, going supermarket shopping. Mostly for food. I even enjoyed putting it in my cupboard in the cabin. I had never noticed myself enjoying shopping before. Does everyone enjoy buying things? What is the meaning of this. Are we somehow programmed to ENJOY buying. We must then EARN money (work) to experience that joy again. Most people hate their work and buy things to get joy so that they can bear their work. This sounds crazy. Taking Control One of my most important goals in life is to learn to have more control over my thoughts, i.e., to be able to think on one thought line for as long as I wish, choose my own topic and "remember" to practice this skill. As I take control of my mind, I take control of my body. With my "thoughts" I control my emotions, moods and feelings. I begin to DIRECT my own show. I shape and mold my destiny -- my future -- my world. Actu ally, I'm making my NOW into whatever I desire it to be. I take full responsibility for every thought that I allow myself to dwell on. Being in charge of my thoughts -- is being in charge of my Life! Mind and Computer It is helpful for me to think of my brain as being somewhat similar to a computer so I call it a bio-computer and my mind as a bio- computer in action -- turned on! I then try to program my biocomputer a little like a computer is programmed. By using this fantasy I am able to begin to eliminate, i.e., quit using the old programs; the obeying orders, doing what is expected of me, worrying about what people think. I tell myself now that I am the most important person. I can accomplish almost anything that I really desire. And I am. I'm also learning to change my dreams to come out more satisfactory.1 I love myself and de sire to live to be 165 years and maybe even longer. My new program allows me to immediately switch programs if I catch myself putting myself down, feeling lonely, depressed, fearful, thinking I can't change the world or thinking I can't be a success at this or that. The secret of switching programs for me is being able to look once in a while at my thinking and see if it is destructive to my happiness, i.e., ask myself, "Do I wish to stay in this mood?" Just by observing the unwanted mood, i.e., becoming AWARE of being at this moment in such and such a mood; this very awareness gives me a choice; to switch programs or retain the going one. This puts me in charge of my moods or feelings (thoughts). The hard part of all this is just getting myself to remember to check out what mood I'm in and do it often. By defining emotions, feelings and moods in the following manner, I am able to take control of them. Feelings, emotions and moods (I believe) are merely thoughts. A very complex accumulation of thoughts which are tightly linked together, thoughts which are even linked to our body's operation. When a certain set of thoughts are triggered, fear and anger arise and cause adrenaline to flow and make us ready to fight or flight. We seem to bypass all the thoughts (reasons) and automatically come to the conclusion -- FEAR! (or whatever emotion) Feeling fear, for instance, while unexpectedly coming across a bear in the wilderness. Our mind doesn't have to review the fact that the bear might kill us. We automatically feel fear and run, fight or freeze. Our biocomputer made a shortcut across all the reasoning and pumped adrenaline for quick action. No doubt this "fear program" of bears, could be reprogrammed, if we studied and experienced more bears, to read something like, "Oh hello there, Mr. Bear. My, but you are a big beauty. How is hunting. Oh, you think you would like to eat me for dinner?" Then I would always carry something that I had learned would frighten bears. Maybe a flare or a small flame gun. Just something to put the bear into some other hunting space. When I knew I had this power, I think I would no longer experience the old "fear program" on bears. If so called "crazy" people learned how to operate their biocomputers, it would put Shrinks out of business. If "slaves" learned, it would put the Elite out of business. If people don't realize that they are slaves or are crazy, they have no desire to change their programs. So they remain the same. So how do we make change. Maybe we could offer them a carrot which looked better than the one they are chasing now. Maybe we should try to make them aware of their present condition so that they will seek their own change. Or maybe both. What else? You may say, "The mind can't be compared to a computer. You can't learn from one how to run the other." Well I think that we can. Take for example; if I have learned how to run a car, I can take what I learned from that and soon learn to drive a tractor. I knew how to ride a bicycle and drive a car. So it didn't take me long to drive a motorcy cle. So I learned a little bit about computers and now I AM operating my biocomputer (mind) more efficiently. Still Spraying! Are we humans dumb enough to continue playing a game which is "Hell bent on election" on destroying the participants. We do it to ourselves -- by playing this game. They continue using poisonous sprays on weeds and bugs. They are killing off the food for trillions of birds and helpful insects, etc. My neighbor here in the woods told me that the county road department sprayed the weeds along the roadway and his bees all died. Without bees, the fruit trees, berries, etc. won't get pollinated and bear fruit. He was feeling a little pissed. Some poison sprays eventually flow down to creeks, rivers, lakes and to the seas and contaminate the fish and plant life there. Does Dow Chemical Corp. care. They seem to be only interested in making as much profit as possible. What are we helpless little humans to do. Must we continue on as we are today and become wiped-out, even before our grand children grow up. Extincted! If we (I mean you, dear reader and me) don't make a supreme effort to get the SYSTEM changed we will deserve extinction. What the Hell can we do??. We help get a system started where it doesn't PROFIT anyone to do these BAD things. How do we do this??. I'll be damned if I know! I have tried everything I could think of to get people to wake up and do something effective. I keep trying to think of a new way that YOU (dear reader) can relate to, and will motivate you to get your ass into gear and help carry the load, at least one little corner. They have tried to pass laws against poisonous spraying. Can't be stopped this way. They passed laws 50 years ago against factory pollution. It didn't stop! It kept getting worse. Take a drive through Gary, Indiana, the air smells as bad as it did 50 years ago. We must find a way to change the game so that it is no longer PROFITABLE to kill us! The main reason why industry does not find ways to reclaim and recycle all waste products is because they would not make as much PROFIT! The main reason why farmers don't use organic means to control pests and weeds and to fertilize crops is because they wouldn't make as much PROFIT! PROFIT is killing our environment and then us! PROFIT is keeping us from the stars. Monopolies impede progress that could send people to other planets sooner. If inventors were working together and OIL cartels were not hiding other energy sources and patents -- think of the progress we could make. Just think how much inventive ability and how many people would like to work on the Space Project if we were allowed to. With the Priceless Economics there would be no budget limits (no money would be needed). All materials and labor would be free. It would be an exciting time. "But," you say, "man is not ready for the stars. He can't even get along with his own kind. Look at his wars and crime." The Priceless Economy will change that too. When people are creating abundance -- there is no longer a reason to be selfish, greedy and mean -- these become UNPROFITABLE! Car Radar? Since WW ll, we have had the technology, resources, skill, labor and materials to equip cars with electronics (like Radar) so that they couldn't hit another car, object or person. In 1981, in the U.S.A., there were 50,800 deaths and 1,900,000 disabling injuries from motor vehicles.2 Think of how many children, women and men and how much pain, car radar would have saved in the last 29 years! The dollar cost of injuries for 1981 alone was $40,600,000,000. And how much was the prop erty damage to cars and buildings for all these accidents? These 50.8 thousand deaths and 1.9 million disabling injuries made a lot of money for morticians, hospitals, doctors, drug companies, hospital contractors, hospital suppliers, body and fender shops, auto parts manufacturers and new car manufacturers. Do you think that any of these profiteers would push for Radar on cars??. The Profit System lacks the motivation for safety! Sick of Your Job? In 1980 sickness caused 1,878,420 deaths in the U.S.A. That is 5,146 deaths per day from sickness. How much of this sickness was caused by boredom. How much from stress from trying to cope with this INSANE Profit System. Would the chemical corporations PROFIT by starting little flue epidemics, etc. . Would they dare to do it? Suicide took 28,290 lives the same year. Homicide took 25,090 lives. With the Priceless Economic Society there will be much less rea son to take ones own life or anothers. Let's face it: PROFIT IS KILLING US! Would you believe -- Wars Are Killing Us? World War II killed 407,316 US armed service people. It wounded 607,846. How many civilians does war kill? Korean War killed 54,246 US armed service people. It wounded 103,284. Vietnam War killed 58,655 US armed service people. It wounded 155,419. These figures don't really mean much unless one of them was someone you loved. There is also the numbers on the "other side" who were killed or wounded and loved too. Who started these wars??. Did you. I didn't. My father didn't. None of my family or friends did. I don't know of any working people who had the time or know-how to start them. The working class people number just about 99% of the world population. Who does that leave? Does anyone stand to gain from a war? Certainly not the working class people. We must give our lives and son's lives to war. We must work long hours in war factories to keep wars going. Workers lose their homes and loved ones to war. What about the less than 1% of the population who seem to run things? They (the Elite) seem to own controlling interest in the major industries. When they sell to governments, do they charge more than when they sell to other corporations? Governments seem to spend money like drunken sailors. It is always easier to spend other people's money (taxpayers'). There seems to be no limit to the amounts of money corporations get for Research and Development, from the government. Can you possibly imagine the PROFITS they make when they sell governments; guided missiles, bombers, war ships, tanks, rifles, bullets and bombs and all the other supplies and parts needed to keep these machines operating and all the supplies needed to keep the humans functioning; all the way from toilet paper to food, booze, drugs, artificial limbs, etc. Just about every industrialist gets a piece of the action, so are they going to try to prevent wars? The Elite on both sides really make a bundle when they supply Governments for war. Could it just be possible that these Elite people might get their heads together and plan wars? If they don't do it, who in Hell does? We had always been led down the rosy path that said wars occurred regularly and just got started by greedy people (us). And that fighting is natural to us. But it is not us that start them, it is the Game we play. There is more PROFIT to be made in WAR than in PEACE. So the people who WIN the most in the world-wide Profit Game naturally gravitate to all the wars they can manage to start. Do they hire little spellbinders like Hitler, Mussolini and Hirohito to arouse the people? (And to be the scapegoats when it's all over?) Who were the spellbinders that were hired for WW ll, in the U.S.A.? Were they Franklin Delano Roosevelt with his "fireside talks" and Gabriel Heater and Lowell Thomas with their fear-mongering? Is their present head puppet, Regan, the current spellbinder? The name of the game is to hire the spellbinder to convince a Nation to be the aggressor. The rest is easy -- just reaction. The other nations then automatically fight back to protect themselves. Then you have WAR! Who's Kidding Who? Some people in the U.S.A., made $0.0 in the year 1980. A few individual taxpayers made over a million dollars in 1980, in the U.S.A. Let's see where we stand incomewise. Let's divide income into three classes; Upper, Middle and Lower. Divide a million dollar income into thirds. The upper third would make from $666,666 to one million dollars. The Middle Class would be making incomes from $333,333 to $666,666. Now comes the poor Lower Class. They would be making from $0 to $333,333. I'm in this class -- the Lower Class. I always thought I was in the Middle Class; I wonder how I arrived at that conclusion? Let's break down that Lower Class into thirds. $222,222 to $333,333 would be the Upper Lower Class. $111,111 to $222,222 the Mid dle Lower Class. $0 to $111,111 the Lower Lower Class. That's still no where near me. Let's divide that again. The Upper Lower Lower Class is $74,074 to $111,111. The Middle Lower Lower Class is $37,037 to $74,074. The Lower Lower Lower Class makes between $0 and $37,037. Got to divide it again. CLASS STATUS (By Income) $1,000,000 $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$ $$ $ Upper $ $ Class $ $$ $$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $666,666 ________$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$ $ $ Middle$ $ Class $ $$ $ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $$$$$$$$$ $333,333 __________________$ $$ $ $$$$$$$$$ $ Upper $$$$$$$$$$ $ L-Class$$$$$$$$$ $222,222 $$______$$$$$$$$$$ $ $ $$ $$ $ Middle$ Lower $ $ L-Class$ Class $ $111,111 _________$$______$$$ $$ $74,074 $ U LL-CL $$ $ $$$$$$$$$ $37,037 $ M LL-CL $ Lower $$$$$$$$$$ $24,690 $ L LL-CL $ L-Class$$$$$$$$$ $0 L LLL $ $ $$ $ $$$$$$$$$ ----------------------------------------------------------- The Upper Lower Lower Lower would make between $24,690 and $37,037. The Middle Lower Lower Lower Class makes between $12,345 and $24,690. That leaves the Lower Lower Lower Lower Class with $0 to $12,345. I belonged to the 4H Club when I was a kid, now I'm in the 4L Class. Actually, incomewise I'm in the 5L class. How I was ever able to stretch that 4L rating into thinking I was Middle Class is beyond me. Guess I just never really figured it out. Just accepted what others said. It made me feel as good as the next guy. Now I feel as Poor as the next guy. Just think, 96.6% of the individual taxpayers made adjusted gross incomes of $50,000 or less. That puts 96.6% of our workers in the Middle Lower Lower Class or lower. 3.39% of the taxpayers made between $50,000 and a million dollars. These I suppose are mostly the Elite's managers. On the other hand, she had warts. No, no, no. On the other hand, .0056% of the taxpayers made incomes of over a million dollars. That, by the same standards would put them in the Upper Upper Upper Upper Class. Make 'em feel good. They have a 4U rating. They are glad to do your thinking 4U. I suppose by telling us that we are Middle Class, there doesn't seem to be as much gap between them and us. But, by God, there is one Hell of a gap between even a $50,000 and a $1,000,000 income. That would be 5/100 or you could say one would have fives in her/his wallet and the other would have as many hundred dollar bills to spend. Or if you take the persons making $10,000 per year (take home pay); that person has $10 bills in his/her wallet and the millionaire has $1,000 bills to spend, save, invest or waste. Some gap, eh? Do you still think of yourself as upper middle class? You can look at this from another angle. People can only eat so much, rich or poor, but we spend a much higher percentage of our income on food than the rich. Same with housing, medical and clothes. THEY have all this EXTRA money to spend on their leisure time, on invest ments (to get richer) and just to spend foolishly. We have little or nothing left for investments. There is a real difference in what we can do with our time. We use up most of our time (life) just trying to keep even with the game. And most people can't even keep even, nowadays. The Elite can spend their time just about any way they desire. They hire us to do all their work for them. How many people can you afford to hire to do your work for you and to even make money for you? What I'm trying to say is that they are playing the PROFIT Game with loaded dice. The Elite got their big grub stake from their great great grandpa who was probably a banker, munitions maker or huge landlord back in the old country. They are Billionaires! The Du Pontes are an example. They brought their money with them from France. But, you say, you know of someone who made a million dollars who started from $0. Sure there are a few. The Elite need to allow a few to make it. It entices the rest to bust their balls striving for the golden ring. For some strange reason, very few ever get their hands on the billion dollar ring. With a few hundred thousand dollars a year jobs, they can hire people to take care of their holdings, business and industries. These highly paid managers can be told to foreclose mort gages on delinquent farmers, business people and home owners. They will lay off workers, lower wages, raise prices, hire scabs and strike breakers, etc. They pay big money for these "bastard" jobs. Leaders I no longer have a need for a LEADER! I now prefer to figure things out for myself. I have discovered my own ability to do this. I do it far better than the Leaders. They always had something to gain (Profit) from the lies they told me. I don't trust leaders even as much as used car salesmen. As long as people make money from leadership, leaders will take advantage of followers. I am not now, nor ever have been or aspire to be, a leader. I aspire to improve my self-leadership ability. As more people see the ad vantages of self leadership and discover their own capabilities in this area, there will be fewer followers, less work for leaders and fewer slaves. I gladly share with others what I'm learning about self leadership. I also learn from others, about self-leadership. Ideas go out and they come back. Being Free I have been a FREE Being (more or less) for almost 16 years! I have had 24 hours of free time each day. I do what I please. I love it. Why don't all people set themselves free? (They don't know how -- or why. I didn't either until I was 42 years old.) I still work, but not for pay. This puts me in CONTROL of my time (life). (When you take pay -- you must obey!) My Free Time has allowed me to gain new incites into the RAT RACE. I have published my findings in the Little Free Press newsletter for free. Anyone can become free -- if they wish to -- and are willing to take charge of their thinker (mind/bio-computer). If they DÿAÿRÿE to become FREE, they will. There was really no one to stop me from becoming FREE -- only my "beliefs" in my need to conform and OBEY! I was my own prison guard. I am now my own liberator, leader and guru. Giving My Free World started in 1969, when I stopped taking pay for my work and started giving, free of charge, my time for what I believed in. Giving is more fun than selling and it gives me control of the who, where, if, when, why, how and what I give. Who can resist a giver? It might even become contagious if others enjoy giving as much as I do. Of course, if everyone does, then everything that I want will become free too. "What goes around comes around." Freedom starts with me. I take my own freedom by giving. I can't take Freedom by selling myself -- that does not track. Representatives As I stop trusting and relying on "representatives" to make my decisions for me and to make laws for me and start taking the responsibility for my own happiness -- then I must look at my decisions over the long-term view. Will this proposed action be best for me over the long haul? Will it hurt others so that they will desire to hurt me back? Will it injure my environment? Is it the safest way? Does it use up the least and produce the most and the best and the most beautiful? These are questions I try to ask myself when I work for free. A volunteer has POWER and CONTROL over her/his time (life). Keep in Time We are all rowing on this gigantic slave galley space ship called Earth, around the sun, once each year. The drummer is in the stern, setting the pace for our rowing. He broadcasts the beat on the radio, TV, records and tapes. The rowers move to the dictate of this drum. Listen! Listen! Listen! Move to his beat! Conform! Keep in step! OR get whipped with the dollar bill. Is our boat leaking? Whenever one buys a new product, is one in fact hiring the producer to hire a worker to drill another hole in the bottom of our boat, i.e., by the pollution s/he creates? So who is the "cause" of our sinking ship? So how do we stop the hole drilling? Disguise the Poor? Some years ago I read some author who believed that the reason why cheap, colorful clothing is so abundantly available is so that poor people will disguise themselves. Then it's not so obvious, how poor we really are, compared to the Elite. If we see each other dressed in ragged, patched, wrinkled drab mismatched clothing every day and see only a few who wear $1,000 suits and dresses, our differences would be more obvious so we might feel more resentful and even inclined to revolt. I think that he is right. Don't Believe Me! You must NOT believe what I write. I could be wrong! I was wrong once before, back in 1944, (when I enlisted in the Navy) and maybe a few thousand times since then. Figure things out for yourself. Don't just take my word for anything. I may be overlooking some basic factors that could throw off all my reasoning. Test out, try out and think out these ideas before you reject them. They may be valid. I could be right too. So at least think about them a little before rejecting them. These ideas are a bit radical compared to the normal public beliefs. We have been programmed with standard stereotypes designed to keep us in bondage, for example: "I can't fight city hall. I am in significant. Other people are bad and greedy. They won't help. They won't do their part. WE NEED GOVERNMENT! Foreigners are bad. Asians are Gooks. Irish live in shanties. All Jews are rich. Swedes are stubborn. Things could be worse. Cover your ass. Don't rock the boat." Try to bypass these programs. Think about specific people. Think of each of your friends. Would they work as volunteers if they had everything they wanted? Would your friends do their share? Especially if they could choose any job they wanted, one that they could enjoy doing? We have been conditioned to believe that the "masses" are a stupid no-good lazy lot. But they are your friends, my friends and our friend's friends. The masses are people like us. As much as it hurts to admit it, I am part of the stupid masses. "But," you say, "look at those people living off welfare and the rich people living off the workers. They wouldn't work as volunteers." You may be right. Or you may be surprised. When people are given a decent chance to work at something they like to do and if they don't feel exploited (as all workers are today) they may choose a job and have a share in the fun and may find pride in carrying their own weight. There are more than 84 million people working right now as volunteers. These people already have the basic essentials for life and a little free time. Many are giving their time after a hard days work in the salt mine. Some volunteers today are even doing jobs that they don't particularly enjoy. Take some of the nurse's aid work. There are volun teers in Scouts, AA, charity, hospitals, in schools, churches, ecology, politics, anti-war, feminism, ageism, racism, PTA, etc. Some of these people are doing jobs they don't like but they think need to be done. But they are not getting paid, they are Volunteers. Money is NOT the only thing that gets people to work. And even the rich people have special skills (or they wouldn't still be rich) which may be useful in the PES. In case I am wrong and there are some diehards who won't work; the Priceless Economic System will still be better because it will not cost anything to administer Welfare aid. They will get everything for free just like the rest of us. I'll bet that in our present Pay System, it cost us at least three times as much for administration expense as it does for the actual Welfare aid we give out. I don't think that coercion or ostracism (negativism) will be necessary to get people to work. It's the old monkey-see, monkey-do trick that works so well on us right now. Just let people see us having fun becoming artists at our work, turning out products or services that we are proud of. Everyone will want a piece of that action. Cabin in the Woods I moved myself, lock, stock and baggage, to a little log cabin in the woods. I have been here since September first, 1984, It is a wonderful quiet experience in survival. Cutting my own wood. Kerosene lamps. Repairing the cabin, the privy and taking saunas and riding to town with a neighbor, has kept me busy. Writing a little -- this chapter. After about 10 years without a car to worry about and spend money on, I bought a '66 VW camper bus. Worked on that for two weeks to get it running and enjoyable. Now I'm having as much fun as a kid with his first bicycle, going to the different surrounding towns and buying "things" for the car, e.g., tools, oil, gas, battery, hose connections, bolts, nuts, screws, WD40, car parts, insurance, license and title transfer. The car cost me $200 and I think I have spent almost that much more on it already. Why do I seem to enjoy BUYING these things? Secret Getting back to THE WORK; how do we get people to participate in their own release from slavery? I think I have the most important SECRET in the world! What should I do with it? Who should I tell it to? I'm running out of names. Do people really desire to have their environment destroyed? Do people really wish to have people starving to death? Do they really wish to have people steal from them? Do they really like to take all that shit from their boss? I have tried to give this Secret to the poor people, to the working people and I have even tried to give it to the rich people. NO ONE SEEMS INTERESTED! Should I just bury the Secret and help people drill holes in the bottom of the boat we are all riding in? If you won't help (dear reader) who will? ? ? ? ? ? This reminds me of the story of the shipwrecked people trying to survive in the large wooden lifeboat. Their food had all given out and one passenger discovered some grubs in the wooden hull and he proceeded to dig them out with his knife and eat them. Often his blade would go all the way through the boat and cause a small leak. Then the rest had to bail out the boat a little more often. Soon others had seen this guy eating grubs and got hungry enough to do likewise. Pretty soon the boat was leaking profusely. Some people started plugging up the holes with bits of their clothing. They eventually were naked but continued creating more holes looking for more grubs. Eventually the boat sank to the bottom of the sea with all its occupants. To this day, the story goes, they sit down there arguing about whom drilled the smallest holes. There were two or three who claimed they were innocent because they didn't drill any holes at all but only watched, saying they never thought the boat would actually sink. One said she was waiting for the Captain to come. Mass Media Who controls the mass media, the rich guys or the poor guys? Does this mean that they can print or broadcast events and ideas which will be to "their" advantage? Is this the reason why the Priceless Economic theory seldom gets any positive coverage? Does the mass media ignore ideas which could be a real threat to its system? Then does it follow that it gives coverage to anything which will act as a diversion from its true opponent? If this is true, then ev erything we see and hear in the mass media is NOT a threat to the present world-wide Pay System. This would include Nuclear Freeze activities, political campaigns, Central American revolutions and Middle East wars. They all get plenty of coverage so they must be safe grits for the mill. November 1, 1984 Ernest Mann The Priceless Economy (a song) I'm make'n changes in my life, get'n rid of stress & strife. I'm spend'n a lot less money, and have'n time for my honey. I'm learn'n to laugh and dance, have'n a lot more chance. The media no longer interest me, I'm make'n my own history. 'Cause everything will be free, in the Priceless Economy. When we stop take'n pay, we'll no longer have to obey. We'll all work as volunteers, and live like millionaires. With no monetary cost of things, we'll all be rich as Kings. We'll produce abundance for all, the skinny, fat, short and tall. 'Cause everything will be free, in the Priceless Economy. We'll all take a job we like, every Suzie, Sally & Mike. We'll produce only the best, which will pass every test. Oh, we'll build things to last, that'll go plenty fast. We'll make 'em easy to repair, even in your old red underware. 'Cause everything will be free, in the Priceless Economy. We'll have no shortage of power, with windmills on every tower. We'll harness the ocean waves, and eliminate all the slaves. We'll harness the lovely sunbeams, for power beyond your dreams. We'll fly to the nearest stars, much farther than Pluto and Mars. 'Cause everything will be free, in the Priceless Economy. We'll reclaim factory waste, and soon our rivers we can taste. Starvation will be a thing of the past, as it was never meant to last. There will be no reason to steal, not even a new automobile. There'll be no Profit in War, so we won't do that any more. 'Cause everything will be free, in the Priceless Economy. Farmers will all turn organic, and have time to be romantic. We'll be artists at our trade, oh, we'll really have it made. We'll all do our own thinkin' and all of our own drinkin'. We might smoke a little pot, but not really a lot. 'Cause everything will be free, in the Priceless Economy. We'll be proud of what we do, and happy to give it to you. It's better to be a snob, than just part of the mob. Tell all the world's people, from high on every steeple. It's you and I who must tell, the Profiteers to go to Hell. 'Cause everything will be free, in the Priceless Economy. EITHER WE START THE FREE GAME, OR IT DOESN'T GET STARTED! 1"Creative Dreaming" by Patricia Garfield 2World Almanac, 1983. 14 HOW TO BECOME A MILLIONAIRE (And End Wars in One Year) Here is a simple formula that anyone can follow to become a millionaire, IF they are willing to give up all their spare time, for one year. You can continue doing your present job or business, being a student, collecting welfare, living off the street or whatever method of survival you have. You are a survivor or you wouldn't be breathing at this moment. You wish for something better or you wouldn't be reading this. As far as I can determine, this method of "becoming rich" has never been published before. You are one of the lucky ones to have come across it! You don't need any money to get started. You don't need to join a party or buy a set of samples. You will need to find two persons who would like to become millionaires too -- any two people you choose. They don't have to know each other or even ever meet. The secret of success of this scheme is that all three of you must become millionaires or else none of you will. So you must help each other. The stakes are high. The reward is great. A million dollars is not to be sneezed at. You can have and do a lot of things if you are a mil lionaire. Would you be willing to give up, all your spare time for a year, to get rich? Would you be willing to stop watching TV, reading the paper, listening to the radio, music, reading books and magazines and going to movies? Are you willing to stop doing drugs, smoking and drinking? It takes a clear mind and body to accomplish this in one year. Would you be willing to stop making small talk? Could you give up sports? Could you stop talking about and being active in politics and religion? Could you discontinue your thought time spent on sex fantasies? Would you be willing to reduce the amount of time spent on having sex and in looking for it? Would you spend less time playing with and fixing your car and other machines and tools? Would you be willing to deprive yourself of these activities just to become rich? Would you be willing to spend less of your time shopping and buying things? Would you be willing to spend less time fixing and car ing for all the things you have accumulated? Are you willing to spend less time and money on entertainment? Are you willing to focus your thoughts in this one area and let "becoming a millionaire" be your only entertainment? If you have answered, "Yes!" to these questions, you are well on your way to success. Let's say that you spend 8 hours per day making a living. That leaves 16 hours per day to become a millionaire. Of course, you must spend some time sleeping and eating. But the amount that you use for getting rich is entirely up to you -- Number One. Yes, you are Number One! If you don't take care of Number One, no one will. "They" have brainflushed us to take care of "them." It may sound selfish, to look out for yourself, but you will soon see that "everyone" will benefit from this scheme. First, you must decide with whom you would like to get rich. Perhaps two of your best friends? They need not live in the same city or area, as you can work this scheme even through the mail, however it's easier if you live in the same area. This scheme is completely legal. In case you don't have any friends who would like to become millionaires, there are other motivations you can use to get coopera tion. This scheme will: 1. Eliminate Wars. 2. End the destruction of our Environment. 3. Solve the starvation problem of our world. 4. Halt the reason to steal. These big hookers will grab most people who can't be persuaded to become rich. It will have far reaching effects (I hope you don't mind). You will become rich and have all the things you've always wanted in spite of these far reaching side effects. You can work with your two friends together or separately. You have heard the expression. "Priming the pump." For those who don't know about the old cistern pump; its leather gaskets got dry when it was not in use and wouldn't hold a vacuum. In order to make it pump water one had to pour water into the pump before it would work. In order to get the wealth pump to start, one must pour some wealth into it. One way to prime this wealth pump (which won't cost you any money) is to put a box inside, beside your front door and put some of your surplus things into it. This is called a Free Box. Encourage your friends to take what they want, and to start their own Free Box at home. When you get this Free Box idea established among several of your friends and acquaintances (this is NOT the essence of the scheme) you will begin to get some of your needs filled from their Free Boxes and therefore SAVE money to invest in your scheme. The more time and money you invest, the sooner you will succeed. Never GIVE money away, not even to me. You must carefully invest it in ways (explained later) which will assure your becoming rich beyond your wildest dreams within one year. Your first job in this scheme is to persuade 2 people to become rich (or to help stop war, pollution, starvation and stealing) with you. That doesn't sound too hard does it? Well it IS hard. You must keep after them to see that they do their part. You must persuade them to give up their diversions too, so that you will ALL have more time to pursue your goal. It is not easy to become wealthy or to save the world from pollution, starvation and crime; if it were, everyone would be wealthy and the world would be saved. Another thing that you must do is to persuade your 2 proteges to EACH find 2 friends to teach the secrets of wealth and they must work with their friends, i.e., they must EACH pass on The Scheme to 2 more people. The Secrets of Wealth have been carefully hidden. They have been shared with only a select few of the rich people's friends. THIS new scheme will share the Secrets of Wealth with everyone on this planet; and your first job will be to share them with only 2 people and to convince them EACH to do the same. If you do your job of getting 2 people to help and keep after them until they EACH get their 2 people to help, then we will succeed. You will have done your job. That isn't asking too much is it -- to become a millionaire? Now, here is the essence of "The Scheme." To be a millionaire means simply that one can have anything that a million dollars can buy. The million dollar check is not what we really want. It is what it will buy that we desire. This scheme will get us the things that a million dollars will buy without all the hassles that go along with actually having a million dollars. How could we start a game where everyone is a winner; where everyone can have everything s/he wants, free of charge; where everyone has a job they enjoy, i.e., to have the prerogatives of millionaires? The answer is so simple that it has been overlooked and suppressed for thousands of years. We are kept too busy with all the diversions and toys to notice it. Our present complicated Profit Game is based on Competition and forced labor. People are forced to, "Work or starve!" Working because one "has to" is never as much fun as working because one "wants to." The simple Free Game is based on Cooperation. Cooperation is possible when we are not trying to make a Profit. Coercion then becomes unnecessary. If you could have everything you wanted, free of charge; with no credit card, money, check book, barter, work credits or obligations; if you could work at any kind of work you wished, get free on-the-job training; would you work as a "volunteer" to make this Free System pos sible? Would your friends? Would everyone in the world be better off with a free system like this? With a system like this there would no longer be a Profit made from starting a war, no Profit to be made raping and destroying our environment. No reason to steal when everything is free. No reason to starve. No reason for unemployment. No reason to hate our work when we can freely choose work that we enjoy. No more money or credit worries. When everyone works without pay, there will be no monetary cost of production, so all products and services can be free of charge. Wouldn't 99% of the world's people be better off with this free System? If your answer is, "Yes!" then our job is to help inform everyone of this opportunity. There are a little over 4 1/2 billion people on this planet. How could we reach all of them? Sound impossible? Too big a job? You and I don't need to inform them all. All I need to do is to inform and convince just 2 people so thoroughly that they EACH inform 2 more people to do the same. That is simple enough isn't it? The People's Grapevine, i.e., the geometric progression of numbers then takes over (see diagram in "Changes" chapter). Would you believe that 31 doubling would reach the whole world population? Try it! It's like a chain- letter, only with no money to send, just one hell of a lot of work to convince 2 people so well that they carry on and do the same. Actually it is not as simple as it sounds. It means CONVINCING them that this scheme will work, and keeping after them until they each convince their 2 people. Believe me, it requires all the ingenuity one can muster because almost everyone has her/his own "Plan" to get rich or to save the world. Some are waiting for their big break in capitalism, communism, socialism, anarchism, democracy, Christ, God, a revolution, a great holocaust or a lottery ticket to give them money, power, Paradise or to save the world. It is like they have blinders or filters on their minds that shut out all solutions but their own. How do we convince just 2 people? How do we get this idea past their blinders and filters? I honestly don't know. But I keep trying. Maybe we'll find a way or find someone who will. Maybe this book will speed it? I don't plan to quit until we find a way. Our very survival is at stake! They are drilling holes in the bottom of our boat faster than we can plug them! It took Thomas Edison 999 tries before he finally found a material that would work for a filament for his light bulb. It took years and a lot of ridicule before the Wright Brothers got their bicycle to fly. Good things don't always come easy. Perhaps that makes them more of a challenge, something worth puzzling on. So you see that if I could find my two people (are you one?) in one week and convince them each to do the same the next week, we will have reached the whole world's population in just 31 weeks. That is less than one year and you would be as rich as a millionaire. You could have anything you wanted free of charge (and so could the rest of us). Time is of the essence, as the lawyers would say; meaning that we had better get this show on the road before the present World Economic System (The Profit-Pay System Game) totally destroys our Environment or starts World War III, or gets us into a REAL Depression or all the above. Could you give up all your diversions in order to focus all your spare time and thoughts on this Scheme? Would it be worthwhile if we succeed? Would this scheme be more fun than your present diversions? List your present diversions. What kind of Future will you buy for yourself, if you continue to investment your Time in them? This scheme is based on the individual doing what is best for the individual; what is best over the long haul. The short term profits that people in our present Pay System strive for do not take into account the fact that they are sawing off the limb that EVERYONE is standing on, e.g., they are destroying our environment, eradicating entire species of living things important in our food chain, and killing people. PROFIT is the prime motivator in the world today! What will make the most Profit? Profit disregards the long term effects of its actions on the Environment and on People. This is today's World Game: Make a Profit (and Damn the People)! The free system game (Priceless Economic System) is based on the Cooperation of Life for happiness and survival! If we ALL start doing what is best for the individual (ourself), we will have happy indi viduals and thus have created a happy society. Only the individual knows what is best for her/himself. Society does not know. The Church does not know. The Government doesn't know. They all try to make us conform to the ways which Profit the leaders the most. The leaders don't give a shit about us. They send us off to wars, force us into unsafe mines, polluted cities, filthy unsafe factories, unsafe vehicles and a whole lot worse things, just to make BIG Profits for themselves. But this is our own damn fault. We allow it. We stand still and let them milk us. We obey them. We're like domesticated farm animals. Mostly because we don't know of a better way to exist. A better way is herein being brought to light. If you can see its merit you can help yourself out of the mess you have allowed yourself to stay in. Critical Mass Effect Actually it may not take many people to form the "critical mass effect" which will sway the rest. The rest may jump on the bandwagon when they see a few people whose judgment they respect promoting this idea. It may simply be a lack of hope which is inhibiting people from participating in this promotion. How can we invest our surplus money in ways that will help to bring about this Free System sooner? I think the first step in this scheme is to INFORM all the people of this alternative. Then it would seem very logical that everyone would wish to change-over right away. But as we all know, "There is many a slip, betwext the cup and the lip." These chain-letter pyramid clubs always break down and we can't expect a perfect chain reaction even when we are giving away a million dollars or ending Wars or saving our Environment. We can add a little extra insurance that will increase our chances of success. That would be to inform MORE than just 2 people. Following are some suggestions on additional ways to get the word around: 1. One could make copies of this chapter or others and distribute them. 2. One could write her/his own paper or book and invest money in distributing it. 3. One could think up other ways to disperse this idea and invest in them. We are investing our money and time in a better future and a better NOW too, as we will be working on a meaningful challenging pro ject. A future in which we won't need money. This will truly be letting the money work for us. We may as well use it. Money is hard to part with after working hard and long to get it, but Life is in the here and now! If we can enjoy using it for something that we think will bring an almost, Utopia or Paradise to Earth for ourselves and our children and grandchildren to enjoy -- let's do it! We have lived in Hell (slavery) tooooooo long! We don't need to fight City Hall. The humans who work there will be better off with the free system too, so they won't stop us. Even the rich people will be better off because they will get everything for free without having to hassle with investments and money any more. Work What would work be like in a truly Free System? First of all we would find a job that we could enjoy. The other workers would obviously be there because they enjoyed it, thus being a happy lot to work with. A real team of friends working together to put out the best, most beautiful and durable product that the researchers, inventors, designers and production workers could envision. Doing this in a beautiful environment that was also envisioned by these same people with the aid of architects and builders. These people might like their work so much that they would wish to live nearby in thoughtfully designed and lovingly constructed homes or apartments, with their fellow workers. They may have their own community where everyone knows everyone and shares the same dreams. A community takes many different levels of intelligence to function. People would find a Place, a level that they enjoyed and felt at home. Working because we wanted to, in stead of because we had to. We could feel proud of our products or services. We wouldn't feel exploited because we would all be Artists at a work of our own choosing and all have equal access to all goods and services. We could eliminate many jobs. We would no longer invent "make- work" projects just to have jobs for people. Instead we would focus on ways to eliminate work and divide the remaining work into shorter shifts so that more people could share the fun of production, and all work only a few hours. We, as artists, would make work into our hobby or turn it over to the robots, so that only the enjoyable creative jobs would be left for humans. Then everyone would have more free time to enjoy themselves and each other in our carefully preserved environment with all the wonderful inventions that we chose to produce. Because everything would be free we would all have equal access to them. Planet Earth has the resources, the labor, the machines and people with skills to produce abundance for everyone. When there is great abundance there is no reason to hoard. When things are free, there is no resale value, so there is no Profit in tak ing more than one needs. Too much, then becomes a burden instead of a status symbol. Who would add bricks to his/her own back pack? The Time Is Ripe! We are living in a New Era. This is the first time in history that the world has had instantaneous world-wide communication systems, both audio and video. Now we are at a point in time where we can communicate with all the world's people at once. So, once we get this free system idea "caught on" in this country we'll get into the mass media and then cover the entire world with this idea. Then there will be no reason for one country to try to gobble up another one. There will be no Profit in wars. No reason to have border guards. No reason to restrict travel. Good reason to create an easy to learn international language that everyone could use when traveling. And every reason to help another country develop IF it wishes help. Under Your Hat Have you ever deliberately watched the infinite number of thoughts which pass through your mind? Sometimes these thoughts seem to be started by the things I look at, hear, smell, taste or touch. Sometimes I take them from my memory bank and build fantasies with them. Thoughts seem to occupy the conscious section of our marvelous biocomputers (minds). A whole lot of thoughts flash across my biocomputer display, sometimes around 60 per minute. Time yourself. Have you ever considered how much of this expensive biocomputer time we waste? We can't build a computer so small, which will do as much, even for a billion dollars. Think of how much work the automatic (subconscious) section of our biocomputer is constantly doing. It keeps all our organs and systems functioning and is constantly directing their rebuilding. Keeping in contact with trillions of cells and giving directions to muscles to operate in certain ways to enable us to walk or move our hands, etc. By watching what I'm thinking -- I become POWERFUL; I can then choose the topics I'll occupy my billion dollar biocomputer with, i.e., I take CONTROL of my Now and my Future. 1. I can choose to set my biocomputer on drift and allow the objects that I see and hear occupy my biocomputer time. 2. I can choose to set it to follow someone elses thinking; by reading, watching movies & TV, listening to radio, music or people talking trivia. 3. I can choose to allow it to obey an employer who will program it for 8 hours a day (or more). 4. I can choose to program it to be selective. Then I can choose topics for it to work (think) on which will help me achieve that which I desire from life. Here I need to list on a sheet of paper, what I want to get out of life, what I want to do, what makes me happy, etc. We are each equipped with a magnificent biocomputer. The "catch 22" is that they never taught us how to use it for our own good. They have kept us as dumb and domesticated followers (workers). To escape domestication and become Natural Free Beings again; we have only to learn to use the "selectivity" knob on our own biocomputer. Then we begin to figure things out for ourselves. Freedom lies not with leaders -- only servitude. FREEDOM begins by taking CONTROL of Headquarters. HQ is located under our hat. We waste expensive biocomputer time on our many diversions. What do we profit from them? We are just wasting away -- dying instead of growing. They say that every day we lose a few memories. If we are not replacing our lost learning with new input, what becomes of our brilliance? As we start focusing our biocomputer time on becoming mil lionaires or on saving our world we will be amazed at how much more we will accomplish. We will discover more of its capabilities. It is lifting ourselves up by our own boot-straps because the more we watch our biocomputer (our thinking), the more we learn how to use it; we get better at watching it, and our progress accelerates. I'm just beginning to learn to operate my biocomputer. I'm 57 years old. I hope you get an earlier start. I really can't imagine how smart I'd be today if schools and my parents had taught me how to THINK instead of mostly just how to OBEY and memorize things I wasn't interested in. Thomas Edison was really lucky when his teachers thought that he was too dumb to learn and expelled him. His wise mother allowed him to learn whatever interested him. Today people say that he was a genius. Perhaps that is what we become when we focus most of our biocomputer time on that which is really interesting and important to us. I'm doing what is terribly important to me. I'm focusing my creative energies on "bringing to light" an economic system in which; me and my children and grand children (and you and yours), will have a chance to work "with" people and Nature instead of destroy them, as the Profit System motivates us to do. (Have you noticed how TV has pro grammed children to smash toys whenever they can? Why?) I give my newsletter away, free of charge. This is surely a lot more fun than the 20 years I spent trying to sell my time. Why does it feel so good to give? It costs me a considerable amount of my time, and some money besides, to write, publish and distribute the Little Free Press newsletter. I can do this "full-time" because I dropped out of the Rat Race in 1969, and since then haven't worked for pay. I'm using up the money from the investments I made before that. My fixed income dollars are shrinking. I can buy less than 1/4 as much with each dollar today, as I could in 1969. But I can still buy everything I need. By 1989, I'll be broke; then I'll have to go back into the rat race and make some more money, start receiving my minimal Social Security pension and have learned to live on a lot less, have changed the world to the Free System or some option I haven't thought of yet. I am not worried. "Necessity is the mother of invention." I'll think of something. Once in a while I get something for free, which is a thrill. Often I find things in dumpsters that I can use or fix and use. Salvaging something is a thrill for me, as is getting a bargain at a rummage sale. As more people discover the good feelings of giving their work away for free, we will get more things for free. When everyone decides to do this -- we will get everything for free, then we will all be into the Priceless Society of the New Era. Soooooo! Do you still wish to become a millionaire or save our world? If you think that it would be worth all your spare time, then let's get started: 1. Start a Free Box. Encourage your friends to start them. 2. Begin dropping your diversions and using that time for this work. 3. Make at least two copies of this chapter. 4. Find your two people and give them each a copy. 5. Start helping them understand what this is all about. 6. Encourage them to each find their two people. 7. Make sure that they instruct their two people to do the same. 8. Invest some money in printing and postage and distribute this chapter or a paper or book that you write, to people you think might understand. 9. Use your best talents to disperse this idea in your own way and invest time, thought and money into that. 10. Cut way back on your expenses. Then you'll have more time and money to invest in your better future. August 15, 1984 Ernest Mann COMMON SENSE The Elite have one thing in common --they work together and retain their POWER! We 98.6% have one thing in common --we compete with each other and lose our POWER! 15 PROBLEM & SOLUTION The environment and people are being destroyed! More creative, inventive, reasoning people are needed to set aside their current work for a while and focus their creativity, energy and thoughts on this problem until it is solved. We may become happier if we find the solution than if we continue to bury ourselves under MORE STUFF! The destroyers make huge PROFITS! How could we produce and distribute the world's goods without Profit? This book attempts an answer. A Letter All people who pay taxes are to be praised for their endless generosity. For you are supporting the poor innocent industrialists who sell war materials to governments (at slightly exaggerated prices). All taxes earmarked for Defense eventually end up in their pockets. You can be proud of your role because industrialists couldn't continue without your taxes and your labor. In the meantime, "someone" mysteriously gets little wars going. "They" increase the recession (deprivation) in a country. "They" cause more unrest and create agitators for a revolution (revolutionaries always fail to foresee the fact that they will end up with the same exploiters, but a new set of faces in their government [front men or women]). For some strange reason, the U.S.A. gets involved. Of course the U.S. Government loans them money, which is seldom paid back. No! You may as well say, that YOU taxpayers GIVE money to these countries so that they can buy these "special materials" from our poor innocent industrialists. Even though you may have to "skimp and do without" a little, you should not begrudge this little dab of profit to the military industrialists. Don't falter, lag or grumble because you will soon get your reward -- they will invite you or your sons, to release your hostilities, by wearing a beautiful uniform, listen to grand marching music, be offered the opportunity to see the world, have a girl (or boy) in every port, even be promised free schooling (if you survive), i.e., do a wee bit of the fighting -- patriotic duty. Oh, such Glory! To be allowed to fight and die for the Industrialists. Such an Honor! And a free burial thrown in to boot. What a deal! Aren't they wonderful thoughtful people? You don't get to meet their kind very often. You don't need to even think about it. They LIKE to do your thinking for you. No problem! Just watch TV, read the papers, listen to their music and hear your radio. It costs them a little money to lead your thoughts but it's OK because they'll just add it to the cost of what you buy. They will take care of you and tell you what to do. Just follow their fine laws and work, pay and obey. Life is so simple this way. Of course they have a "God given natural right" to do this. It says right in the Bible, "Give unto Caesar . . ." (You don't suppose Caesar had a hand in writing the Good Book do you? I wonder if land lords, tax collectors and other bill collectors still use that one?) If people are willing to obey -- they are willing to pay (a little anyway). The Profit Game can get to be a bit of a bore after a while. It isn't all that much fun, once you learn how to win at it. It is really decent of you to supply the taxes and the wo/men. Life would be terrible dull for the Elite without their Wars. Com manding the Generals and Admirals is really quite fun you know, "The Sport of Kings." Loretta Nose, Ex-secretary "Big Daddy" Warbucks' office Productivity Sharing? Read what Fortune and Forbes Magazines, (April 29, 1985) had to say about some of the largest U.S. corporations. They list the in dustrialists by rank. Mesa Petroleum Corp. ranks 1st for exploiting workers. They made a net profit in 1984, after all expenses and wages, of $397,400 from each of their 700 employees. Tucson Electric Power made $125,800 from each of their 1,000 employees, while Exxon (the first in rank in sales) made only a measly $36,900 net profit from each of their 150,000 employees. I ask you, what incentive is there for an honest worker when they receive so little of their productivity? Recessions Recessions don't start by accident. Someone turns them on and someone turns them off. (Why do you think they do this to us?) "Someone" gave the Federal Reserve Bank directions to raise the Discount Rate. Then bankers raised their Prime Interest Rate and tightened up on mortgage money. This closed down the home builders. They laid off most of their carpenters, plumbers, roofers, block and brick layers, cement finish ers, carpet and tile layers, painters and paperhangers, sheet rockers, plasterers, electricians, laborers, landscapers, architects, lawyers, realtors, etc. This made a slow-down in all the industries which produced and dis tributed the materials for home building, e.g., lumber, nails, hard ware, plumbing, windows, cabinets, roofing, electrical, block, brick, carpet, tile, cement, appliances, paint, etc. The layoffs extended to the miners and others who produced the raw materials. The transportation and trucking industry and then the oil and coal industries slowed down and laid off people. These laid off people couldn't afford to buy new cars, so the auto industry laid off workers. Laid off people couldn't afford to buy appliances, clothes, furniture, etc. This caused more lay off. Laid off people don't pay income taxes so this made shortages in the government treasury. Then government spending and funding was cut back. And more people were laid off. This shortage of jobs and welfare money caused more crime. Some people chose to steal rather than starve. CAN YOU SEE HOW EASY IT IS FOR THEM TO PUT US INTO A RECESSION? They just tighten up on money. The "clue" is when the Federal Reserve Bankers raise their Discount Rate a substantial amount. When "they" decide to LOWER the Discount Rate, and for some mysterious reason, mortgage money loosens up, people can get "easy" mortgage money again and contractors hire back their tradesmen and soon prosperity returns. SEE HOW EASY IT IS FOR THEM TO END RECESSIONS? At some point, industrialists raise prices on basic materials, like oil, copper and steel. Then all product prices must go up. THIS IS THE CAUSE OF INFLATION! Inflation is simply the result of "their" deci sion to raise prices on basic materials. Then the unions MUST ask for a raise. And then, the unions (the workers) are blamed for inflation. WHAT BULL SHIT! The people on fixed incomes, blame the workers, instead of the real culprits, for the inflation which has shriveled their buying ability (that's not all it shriveled). At this point the workers get the old "squeeze" put on them. If they do not get the same percentage of raise in wages as the inflation got, they loose, because their wages won't buy as much as before. Take for instance -- now. Now, we are squeezed almost to half our size. Now we have to give "them" 80 hours of work per week in order to buy the same things for our family as our fathers did with 40 hours of work. (Author's note, 1988: Could one of the reasons why we are in a bind in the U.S.A., be that our country has been sold-out to big money people in Asia, North Africa, Canada and others? In the Star Tribune of Minneapolis on 10/18/87 their article, "Wealthy foreigners increasingly see U.S., as good investment." gives some substantiation to what some of us thought we were seeing -- that we were acquiring different Masters. The article states that 13.5% of the major cities' (of the U.S.) commercial real estate with a value over $20 billion is already foreign- owned. And that 46% of all commercial real estate in Los Angeles is foreign owned. In New York City, $7.65 billion is foreign-owned or 28%. And in the little city of Minneapolis they already have 32% of it. What percent of a big corporation or city do you need to own to control it? You don't need that much! My guess is that they have a good grip already on the U.S. economy and are tightening the screws on us. Will they eventually expect us to subsist on a handful of rice and a couple of fish heads, like some of their slaves back home? They already have a growing number in this country conditioned to eating rice. Is it cheaper for them to raise than potatoes or is storage easier? So far they have only gained 3% ownership in Seattle, 11% in Portland, OR, 17% in San Francisco, 19% in Denver, 39% in Houston, 18% in Atlanta, 12% in Washington, DC, 11% in Philadelphia and 10% in Boston. My thoughts a few years ago were on these lines -- "We are being sold-out to the rich Asians and N. Africans who get more work out of their slaves." They are already getting twice as much work out of us as our former Masters did. If these conclusions are correct, then we will not be able to tighten our belts enough this year. We'll be doing it year after year. Why are they buying our country? FOR PÿRÿOÿFÿIÿTÿ ! FOR PROFIT ! FOR PROFIT ! FOR PROFIT ! So, let's get rid of Profit and get our country back! Wouldn't that be a cute little trick to play on 'em? End of note.) Around and Around Then they raise the Federal Reserve Bank discount rate again and the whole recession/inflation cycle goes around again. Shall we let this System go on forever? Let's start a new system -- the Priceless Economic System. This new system would invalidate the "cause" of war and the "means" for making recessions, yet provide the method for the production and distribution of the world's goods. Work would become an art and privilege because of the limitless freedom that this new system would allow each individual. It would become as enjoyable as a hobby. There is such a diversity of aptitudes and attitudes that there would be a potential artist for each job. People would have the freedom to creatively find pleasurable ways to transform their jobs into art. To produce the most with the least, yet turn out durable, efficient and beautiful products of which they would be proud. Because products would last longer they wouldn't need to be repro duced so often, giving our new artists the leisure to think, cooperate and produce the highest quality. No more, "Hurry! Hurry! And cut corners." Aptitude testing and on-the-job training from experts would make it easier to find the right job -- and allow the very young and the very old to help if they wished. Today, we don't always find the "experts" teaching in the schools. Planned obsolescence would be replaced with "allowances in new designs to accept predicted improvements." Work which no one cared to do would be relegated to automation and robots. Everything would be free. Profit, money, barter, credit and taxes would be obsolete. Without PROFIT the following would become extinct: 1. Politicians 5. Acid rain 2. Bureaucrats 6. Scarcity 3. War mongers 7. Taxation 4. Robbers 8. Unemployment As soon as everyone understands and wants this new system, all workers can set a date and stop taking pay on that day and give their products away, free of charge, from then on. The basis of this new system is that everyone would have equal access to employment and to all products because: WHEN ALL PEOPLE AGREE TO WORK FOR FREE (AS VOLUNTEERS), THERE WILL BE NO MONETARY COST OF PRODUCTION. THEREAFTER, ALL PRODUCTS AND SER VICES CAN BE GIVEN AWAY FREE OF CHARGE. THEN PEOPLE WILL HAVE NO NEED FOR MONEY, SO THEY CAN ALL WORK AS VOLUNTEERS -- AS ARTISTS. The people who now think that they "own" the Earth's natural resources and land would have no further use for money because ev erything would be free for everyone, so they would no longer have to protect property and worry about profit and loss. With Priceless Economics we'll replace the "right of ownership" with the "right of usership." There will be no point in trying to control (own) thousands of acres of land and minerals if one's employees are giving the products or minerals away free of charge. This new system can't happen until people become AWARE of it! Let's use our energy in a positive way to build something we want, instead of dissipating it through defensive actions, i.e., by reacting to the current news (straw men, fear, anger, hate and war mongering). The news which the Elite allow in the mass media is designed to not only make us fearful and angry but to keep us BUSY! BUSY! BUSY! Busy buying. Busy working. Busy trying to keep the bills paid. Busy thinking and talking about, looking for or having sex (I resent having Madison Avenue motivate me, even in something I like doing). Busy absorbing. Busy arguing. Busy griping. Busy demonstrating. Too busy to have time to discover the real cause of our problems. Too busy to work on building a new and better system. Too busy to figure out and create our own happiness. You don't gain ground by DEFENSIVE actions such as resisting and demonstrating. Look where it has gotten us. We're loosing ground. They have put us into another recession. Thousands of farms and homes have been foreclosed by their banks. Many small business people have gone bankrupt. Many are out of work, using up their meager savings. Many have had to go on welfare. They continue to increase "defense" spending. They continuously provoke Russia. Unions are being broken. The Elite have raised prices faster than wages. Now a young family must give the Elite 80 hours a week, to support a family as well as their fathers did with 40 hours. WOULD YOU CALL THIS PROGRESS? For whom? We need to ACT instead of react, i.e., take the offensive by starting to build a system in which exploitation is impossible. Politics can't do this for us. A government by its very nature is designed to keep the Elite in power (in the background). A government restrains people from USING the Earth's best land and natural resources which the Elite and Government claim they OWN. Politics doesn't bring freedom. It brings servitude. Our consent to be governed is displayed every time we vote. By vot ing, we give implied permission to other human beings to pass laws and enforce them against us, whether we agree with the laws or not. Is this FREEDOM for the INDIVIDUAL? A group, an organization or a party requires conformity to its rules. A member who doesn't conform is punished, expelled or purged. Can there be Freedom for the individual within a party? At our work we must obey the boss (or a client) for at least 8 hours each day. Is that where Freedom must start? "An economic system which enables each individual to get everything s/he wants, free of charge, and to get a job which allows each person the time to become an artist at whatever production one chooses -- produces Individual Freedom." Since we seem unable to convince the Elite to help, we'll have to proceed on our own. We number over 99% of the world's 4 1/2 billion population. We certainly have the people-power. Surely our first job is to publicize this new idea. To let people know that there is an alter native system available. To give them hope and relieve them of the frus tration of not being able to stop the present system. To give them EACH something they can do right now, without having to join a Party or pay dues. People who take pay or profit for their work (in all countries), will be better off with Priceless Economics. It will be more efficient and more enjoyable. We will be able to eliminate many expensive large burdensome departments from business and industry. This will free millions of workers to help with the necessary jobs, creating more shifts, thus reducing the working hours for everyone. Produce More The Priceless Economic System will employ only volunteers. Volunteers produce more because we; 1. work because we want to 2. choose work we desire 3. actually have fun 4. have free on-the-job training 5. have no money worries 6. are treated better 7. have control over our space and being 8. can quit and still survive 9. don't feel exploited 10. are more creative 11. are happier -- thus healthier 12. choose our own hours 13. improve our working conditions 14. take responsibility 15. cooperate instead of compete 16. don't play company politics 17. aren't under stress 18. don`t have to kiss ass But would anyone work if they didn't have to? There are over 84 million people doing so now. You may be one. I am one. I have asked hundreds of people in the last several years if they would work for free, if everything were free, and 99% have said that they would, but they didn't think that anyone else would, so they concluded the cause was hopeless and dismissed the idea. They didn't realize that 99% of the people I talked to would, that I would and you would and that most of their friends would. Clearly a lack of communi cation. Actually, we have been misled to believe that people are mostly bad, and out to get us. In our present Profit motivated system, it is partly true. We must steal as much as we can from each sale we make. It's called Profit. We can't survive in the Pay System by making even exchanges. Why would anyone volunteer? Volunteers are motivated by things greater than money, i.e., a desire to help create something better, pride in their work, satis faction in doing a good job, knowledge of doing one's share, seeing a need and wishing to fill it, desire to give, the craving to be trusted, honor of helping, feeling the integrity of doing what one thinks is right, feelings of accomplishment, praise, to avoid boredom, the fun of using or learning a new skill, of using tools and computers and the joys of camaraderie. Volunteers are the artists of skills, the true professionals. The EXAMPLE of people actually enjoying work may also be alluring. There would then be no opposition to automation and robotry for the monotonous and dangerous jobs and of course for the so-called shit jobs. Wouldn't people take too much if everything were free? 1. Sometimes we must get a belly ache before we know how much is enough. By proper orientation beforehand we might realize the fact that the less we take, the less we'll need to produce, thus the more free time we'll have to enjoy what we have and each other. 2. We might learn the advantages of "sharing" the use of certain things, e.g., lawn mowers, vacuum cleaners, typewriters, vehicles, pleasure craft, etc. then we wouldn't have to pro- duce so many, nor keep so many in repair. 3. There is no reason to hoard when things have no resale value. 4. There is no reason to hoard when there is abundance. 5. Possessions would no longer be programmed as status symbols. 6. Why own it, if you can borrow it from the local storage center? Could we produce abundance? We have the technology, machines, labor, resources and the land to produce abundance. But we lack the incentive. Planned scarcity produces higher profits in our present Profit motivated system. With the PES there would be reason to produce abundance. Abundance abolishes greed and selfishness. Production will become like sex. The process will become as enjoyable as the product. The process becomes an art done by artists, i.e., people who enjoy their work and have the time and freedom to be creative and are not dependent on the sale of their products for their survival. Will management still be needed? Management has the ability to see the overall process, coordinate and maintain harmony. Leadership is an essential part of production. When management operates as a volunteer, it must be treated with re spect (as must all volunteers) otherwise it can cease giving direction and still get everything for free. If the present management refuse to help, new ones will soon evolve from within each industry. Would any leader care to manage huge industries if they didn't receive gigantic salaries? If they were interested in "pure" production, they could then have fun in management. One would no longer be constipated by labor disputes, hampered by lack of credit or the need to make a profit. In addition, one would have interested responsible helpful crews to work with. One could work with the challenge of "producing the most and best with the least." Will we have to sacrifice our luxuries? Everyone would keep what they have. Everyone would also have free access to all new products and services. Would we still use money? We would have no use for money, credit, barter or work credits. Ev eryone would be relieved of the agonies of mismanaging money and credit. No more check-out lines. No more need for locks. Money would no longer be a criterion for choosing a vocation. We could then choose a job that we were suited for, could enjoy and excel at. Children Without money hassles family life could be much happier. Millions of little children would have the chance to grow up without being brow- beaten by parents who were harassed by job and money stresses. Can you imagine what beautiful beings these kids would grow into? What would you and I be like today if we could have grown up in a joyful environ ment with parents who had no money worries? People would then be more capable of becoming great artists in their chosen fields, i.e., better workers. It would then be reasonable to encourage everyone to become more educated in whatever interested them (for free, of course). We might become valuable thinking individuals instead of non-thinking Nobodys trying to look and act like Hollywood or a favorite rock star. Each person has a billion dollar biocomputer balanced upon his/her neck that is exploited and used mostly for self-sustaining and simple monkey-see, monkey-do processes. Very little of this biocomputer time is spent creatively. Is the nurturing of these expensive biocomputers being overlooked or even repressed? Are most people used instead to do jobs which robots could do more efficiently? It was assumed that "muscle" was what people had to sell, but it was with our biocomputers that we invented and de veloped machines, computers, robots -- and what next? Can you possibly imagine the fantastic progress we could achieve if all these walking biocomputers were encouraged to think creatively instead of being channeled into being spectators? Do industrialists allow their million dollar electronic computers to sit around idly or watching TV? Do they keep them in polluted areas? Do they feed them polluted energy? Do they occupy their time with irrelevant diversions? Do they program them with lies, deception and fear? Do they program them with slow self-destruct (cigarette ads) and to even destroy each other with wheels and guns? Do we invite industry to do these bad things to our bio-computers when we take pay? "When we take pay, we must obey." Volunteers can say, "Horse manure on you!", and quit. Will volunteerism require more workers? Think of the millions of people now employed in all the jobs that we won't need; like sales and advertising (cutting down trees and paper making, just for advertising) and the over 14 million people in government and the military -- when they start doing something useful and we use more robots and automation, we can have more shifts, with shorter working hours for everyone. (Except the Robots. Oh, the poor things!) It would then be more logical to produce peace and plenty. With free access to the world's goods and information -- people will become happier, healthier and more knowledgeable. Inventive progress would accelerate and the space program could be escalated. Are we wasting our time (lives) trying to win at Monopoly -- when we could be having more fun playing Give away? Would there be a place for individuals or groups who wanted more privacy or just wanted to be independent? Of course. The world is a big place. There are 7.28 acres of food growable land for each of the 4 1/2 billion persons on this planet; however, because of our acceptance of government and laws of ownership, the Elite and the governments own most of the best land. Seven acres is far more land than we need to produce abundance for each person. Plus we have the mountains, deserts, rivers, lakes and oceans which produce food and are lived on. After we stop producing for profit there will be no reason for the Elite to hoard (own) land if they are not actually using it. There is plenty of land for us all. Will we have to move back to the land? No. Only those who wish to. When the cities and factories are no longer operated for profit they can be remodeled to become beautiful and healthful places to live and work. But the machines are destroying us! When production is motivated by need instead of profit, we will discover whether or not we can use technology to make itself safe and beneficial. What about sex crimes -- will the Priceless Society eliminate them? Maybe. At least it should lessen them. Having no money worries and having happier, more satisfying work with people we like, we may get along better. We may be able to create a therapeutic method to cure these peo ple. We may teach them how to get all the love and sex they want. We might even give them an overdose of love and sex. Wear them out. Then they may prefer a natural amount. Or we may be able to match them up with their agreeable counterpart. Will we still need hospitals? The more we reduce the "stress" in people's lives with our new happy society -- the less need we will have for doctors, nurses, medicine and hospitals. Will there be a reason to continue to destroy the whales and seals? We may be wise enough to allow buffalo, deer, whales, seals, fish, rabbits, birds, etc., to multiply until they roam in huge numbers again. We may learn to just take what we need instead of wasting them just for profit, sport or genocide. They feed, water and care for themselves. This would save farmers a lot of work and provide fun occupations for people who liked fishing and hunting. Some people don't like to cook. Could they eat in free restaurants all the time in this Priceless Society? Sure. Then the people who really like the culinary arts could enjoy their work more by having really appreciative customers. When cooks are not trying to make a profit they can produce more delicious and nutritious meals. Will we stop having home kitchens? Many people may wish to continue to do their own cooking. Individuals will each decide for themselves. With free access to mater ials and labor we should be able to design and build some very beauti ful, peaceful and efficient restaurants. How pleasant it will be to share delicious food and drinks and interesting conversation with friends and travelers in such surroundings. Volunteers may find it fun and challenging to develop the best ways to operate their restaurant. Customers will become their friends with much jovial interchange. With short shifts the workers won't need to be "worn ragged," as they are today. It may be very satisfying to provide meals that people rave about in a beautiful peaceful setting. Will people have free access to one-of-a-kind objects, like paintings and sculptures? This could be a problem. However, we may not want the responsibility of guarding such objects. We may find it simpler to keep them on display in free art galleries. Because we'll all be artists and have a lot more free time, there will be an abundance of really fine free art. You say we won't need government once we all become volunteers, but who will tell the farmers and industry how much to produce? The "true" Law of Supply and Demand would then take over. The farmers and industrial workers would supply enough to fill the demand. When we stop using Sales and Advertising and many other useless de partments, what will become of our vacated skyscraper office buildings? With no rent from them, there would be no point in retaining ownership and the burdens of management and maintenance unless one enjoyed it. They would probably become something like condominiums with the occupants just "using" their space and managing it themselves. Or perhaps people won't wish to stay in the crowded cities, then these buildings may become stockpiles of materials from which disassembly crews would recycle materials. Without huge incomes, wouldn't people lose their status and prestige? These attributes are not CAUSED by money. They represent the ability to amass money. People with ability will be able to demonstrate it in the Priceless Economy by how well they do their chosen work, how they relate to others, and probably several other ways, thus they will gain prestige, love and admiration, without hurting anyone. Will the Priceless Society eliminate Classes? People may prefer to associate with people who have similar inter ests. Won't the Elite lose their POWER when we stop using money? Priceless Economics will declaw and detooth the bulldog named "Power." The Elite will no longer be afraid of other people with bulldogs (when they are toothless). I think they don't want to have anyone telling them what to do. I believe that is why they needed a bulldog, to protect themselves from each other, certainly not from us. We are just a bunch of sheep. We were taught very young in life to do as we are told! I don't think that they would want a "Dictatorship of the Workers" telling them what to do either. I certainly do not want a dictatorship of the workers telling me what to do! If the sheep had all that Power, they would just let some black sheep or goat con them into his/her way of doing things. There was good reason for the statement, "Power corrupts!" Money and Ownership were the teeth and claws in that old bulldog. A toothless bulldog will not be able to give us the ultimatum, "Work for us, or Starve!" The 1% will no longer be able to hire us to carry guns for them as henchmen, policemen or soldiers. We won't need the pay and why should we continue to suppress ourselves? The Elite only have Power if we give it to them. When we establish the Priceless Economics we will all have all that we need, then we can politely tell the Elite to, "Shape up, or ship out!" It will be to everyone's advantage to expose all POWER seekers and their little tricks to get followers. In order to preserve this near Paradise, this harmonious relationship with nature that we will create, we will teach our children to be their own leaders instead of teaching them to OBEY, conform and vote for a leader. We will teach them how to THINK instead of accept and memorize what someone else has written. I think that we all have it within us to become our own leader. What is best for the INDIVIDUAL is inevitably best for Society. Happy individuals make a happy society. We will give our beautiful little children a wondrous joyful place to grow up. We will give ourselves the chance to be creative and the time to produce marvelous, wondrous things for the good of us all and in harmony with our generous planet. There really is no way the few Elite families, who now run the world, can stop the 4,500,000,000 of us once we start working for OUR OWN GOOD. If you and I play a small part in helping other people see the advantages in working together for equal access to our production instead of giving the Elite, the cream of the crop and then having to fight each other over the skim milk -- then we'll achieve the Priceless Economy sooner. I can think of no better investment for my money and my time, than in spending it on promoting the Priceless Economic System. If we can achieve this system we will end wars, pollution, crime, starvation, money and the need for government. There will then be no reason to have money so I may as well spend all my money now, to promote this better system. When I run out of money I may have to get back into the Rat Race and make some more to continue this promotion. My money will be of no value if the War mongers win and end life on this Earth as we know it, with a nuclear war. Nor will my money be of any value if the industrialists destroy our life-support system with their pollution. We will suffer and die prematurely in either case. I have been spending (investing) my money and most of my time since 1969 in this better future. In a better "now" too actually, be cause I have taken the FREEDOM and the time to enjoy my work (my life) more as I go along. I feel I'm engaged in the world's most important and most urgent work. If we don't get this new system under way soon we will be past the "point of no return" in the destruction of our envi ronment -- or, we could be thrown into nuclear war any time the Elite decide to tell the leaders to "Push the buttons!" You know damn well there will soon be another World War. Both sides have plenty of missiles ready to fire. We have had wars because people have been complacent. (Are most people still that way?) We al lowed leaders to make all the decisions. When the time is ripe the Elite will start WW III! Don't sit back on your dead asses (like most of our fathers and mothers and grandparents did). This time start making decisions of your own. Start DOING THINGS NOW! Do things to help motivate others to help. Get over your FEARS of the law, of being laughed at, of being thought dumb, of making mistakes -- start helping to create a new economic system in which there is no reason for WAR! Start it in your own life first. Make a few mistakes now, learn from them, grow and proceed. Your biggest mistake is to do nothing. If the war does get started you will look back (if you survive) and blame yourself for not having helped more. Your kids will blame you, if they survive. "An ounce of prevention, is worth a pound of cure." You have a chance to help with the prevention, here and now. You will find several suggestions of what YOU can do to help here and now - - in these pages. YOU can figure out some things to do yourself, if you try. Get rid of your Idiot Box and come on out and play. If you happen to be one of those who survive the first blasts of the nuclear war and you see all the injured, the pain, death and destruction around you, you will HATE yourself for not having done MORE, to have had more GUTS when there was yet time. "Oh, that you had stated your opinion more often and had promoted a better way more diligently!" After the first missile lands on one of our big cities, killing millions of children, mates, grandparents, parents, sisters, brothers, cousins and friends -- then, it will be too late to help with the prevention. Then people who survive will be so full of fear and hate that they will ACCEPT war and they won't be cured 'til they get their bellies full of killing or full of lead. If you watch TV, movies, read the papers and listen to the radio, you are probably scared shitless -- paralyzed -- unable to help with the change. STOP taking in their FEAR MONGERING and lies -- start thinking things out for yourself. Even if you only start doing little things at first (like sharing this book with a friend), it's a step at a time. Each step gives us more courage. Before long you won't be afraid anymore. It is that simple. It was that way for me. Once I was a very straight business man who bought new suits and new cars and conformed in every way. I am quite different now! Idle Rich War for the idle rich may be an interesting spectator sport and a way to keep us workers occupied so that we won't think of seeking our INDIVIDUAL freedom or realize we're not getting a fair share of our productivity. (That doesn't make them BAD people, if we had been brought up like they were, we might be doing the same thing. It's just that we are ignorant of a better GAME to play. If WE didn't play their game with them, there wouldn't be wars and all the other bad stuff! So really, it's our own damn fault!) For us, War is Hell! What is war like for the little children who still live, who can't find their mommy and daddy? For mothers and fathers who can't find their kids? War is not just marching, drinking, travel and free schooling -- WAR IS KILLING, WAR IS PREMATURE DEATH, WAR IS PROFIT, PROFIT, PROFIT and more PROFIT! Pioneers The growing number of people who refuse to conform to style changes, to cut their hair or shave, who refuse to adopt current public opinion; they are the pioneers of the better future -- people who are starting to trust their own reasoning POWER. We are starting to believe in ourselves, to know that WE are the real POWER. WE produce all the world's goods. WE support and fight the wars and kill each other. WE buy the "things" that the factories make which cause the factories to pollute. WE run the machines in these factories which pollute. WE give away our POWER when we vote, WE then allow some one to govern us. WE allow Slave Masters (the Elite) when WE accept pay. You've no doubt heard of Wage Slaves? (Do you suppose that term got started just by accident?) It is WE who will have to change! If you give your POWER away to a politician, it leaves you helpless and frustrated. You try to get the politician out of office af ter s/he passed some bad laws and raised his/her salary, but you didn't seem to realize that when you put another one in office you give away your POWER again. The new politician doesn't erase the bad laws of the prior politician, but instead makes a few bad laws of his/her own. There is no way to win when you play with their rules. It is a frustrating futile game of Round Robin -- them robin' us. Get this straight, "When you give away your POWER -- you lose it!" Keep your POWER -- don't vote! The whole political scene is just a big circus, a staged play, a diversion to keep you watching and too busy to figure things out for yourself. Long ago, Caesar said, "Give them bread and circus and they won't rebel." Our real power is achieved when we have the independence (freedom) to choose who we will GIVE our Labor and our Ideas. This is really all that the Elite want from us -- our labor and our ideas. They want our kids, too, to continue their labor supply. Oh yes, they want us to con sume. But that is only to make us NEED money so that we MUST work for them. Some of us now, who have saved up a little money or who have excep tional skills, have the Freedom of choice of whom we will give or sell our skills. We who are aware of the tremendous benefits to humankind (to all life) of the Priceless Economics are the Pioneers who are at tempting to learn and teach this new freedom. We have nothing more to gain than you will. We are pioneering a system where it won't pay to be crooked or destructive. With the Priceless Economic System, the INDIVIDUAL will have the ultimate POWER. We can refuse to give our energy to produce any product that we think is not good. We have another POWER now, but we can seldom exercise it of our own free clear will. That power is our CHOICE of what we buy. Our choices are usually biased by all kinds of advertising, by status sym bols, by conforming to what the others are buying and by what we can afford. So we usually don't have real freedom to use our power of selection. In the Priceless Society, our selection of a product will be our vote for it. In this way we will exercise conscious direct control of the "Law of Supply and Demand" which will regulate what and how much will be produced. Red Meat Eater I didn't eat meat for a little while because I felt sorry for the animals I ate. (Tell an anteater to feel sorry for the ants and see how long they survive and how many ants you soon have. Nature keeps her own balance. Is it wise to mess with her act?) But now I feel sorrier for the humans that are being killed and injured by wars, pollution, crime and starvation. If we don't save our environment and our own species there won't be any animals left either. Everything -- in it's own good time. Now I'm trying to become a centenarian. First I will help save human life (my life). When I'm eating red meat I feel energetic and healthy. I am ag gressive, fearless and I "go for" what I want. I take my rightful place in the food chain. I avoid my predators, e.g., lions, tigers, grizzly bears, loan sharks, barracudas, piranhas, crocodiles and kissing fish, and I eat my prey. It is up to my prey to watch out for themselves. I am a human, attempting to find his natural position in nature's food chain, not an altruist. Some people have grown fearful of meat because some claim that meat is full of drugs, herbicides, pesticides, etc. (Could this be some of the Pay System's propaganda, attempting to channel us into vegetarianism?) But if this is true, then the rest of the food is also contaminated. If it is true that herbivores must eat about 20 times more than carnivores to get one pound of protein, then this must mean that humans who eat meat, only need to work their digestive systems 1/20 as much as a non meat eater. We are not equipped with four stomachs like a cow, nor do we chew our cud like a sheep. For the argument that "meat raising" uses up too much land -- remember vegetarians require a lot more land to grow their additional pounds of food to get their pound of protein. Why not let the animals do this gathering for us and then eat them? We are part of this food chain. In 1980 there was 7.28 acres of food growable land per each person on this planet. Far more than we need. However much of this land is in "soil bank" where some people are reaping millions of dollars from the government for not producing. If they want more land for food production why not also stop the "cash crops" of tobacco, sugar beets, sugar cane, soy beans used for paint and plastics, etc.? If everyone in North America and Europe stopped eating meat, the people in the poor countries still couldn't afford to buy it. There is no scarcity of food or meat in the poor countries, the poor people just don't have the money to buy it! I have been abroad. I have seen this. Go over there and take a look for yourself! After we change-over to the Priceless Economic System and stop killing people and polluting, then, I may wish to "mellow out" and eat less meat and more vegies. As it is, I eat meat (about a third of a pound) once a day for my big meal at noon. I eat nothing with it. I just enjoy it for its own flavor. I have read that when our stomach receives food, it injects certain digestive juices, acid or base, and certain enzymes. If we put food into the stomach which requires acid and food which requires a base, then the acid and the base neutralize each other and loose their ability to digest food and the enzymes may also do this. Therefore the book said that only part of the food is digested and the rest passes on out of the system. So they recommended not eating unlike foods at the same meal. I usually cook freshly ground (in my Corona hand mill) grains or eggs and freshly hand ground coffee for breakfast. At supper time I usually have vegetables or fruit. But I am not strict with myself, I vary sometimes on whim or convenience. Sometimes I eat the old mixed up way. I have some pastry, ice cream, milk, cheese, candy, etc., sometimes too. I still like my coffee and have a social drink on oc casion. I like Ben Franklin's ideas on "Moderation." Why not be good to myself, I may only live once. I also take about a half hour nap after my noon meal. Since I started eating meat by itself at my big meal (author's note: I'm still doing this in 1988) a year or so ago, I eat about the same amount of meat as I did previously but because I don't eat the ve gies, bread, fruit, salad, desert and milk, (which I used to eat with it) I am eating much less food. I don't feel hungry. I'm not loosing weight either. I'm feeling fine, have more energy than even younger people and less waste passes out of me. It is an interesting experiment and experience that seems to work well with my body and mind. An interesting by-product of my diet is that because I buy mostly all fresh (not fresh-frozen either) foods, they cost me a lot less. I buy some dried foods, like; peanuts, bread, grains, popcorn, raisins, etc. The more they process food -- the more chemicals and spices they add and the more nutrition they destroy and the more they charge for it. I eat very little in restaurants now because they don't have much that I like and their prices are too high. I like my own cooking. I do everything up just the way I like it and that turns out to be the simplest way. I use only salt and pepper for spices. This not only saves time and money but I get to enjoy the natural flavor of each particular food. Oh yes, you'd be surprised at how much time I save with this kind of eating. I save time in planning, in shopping, in cooking, and in washing dishes. I eat good (steaks too, the cheaper cuts) and my gro cery bill is very small. I sometimes wonder if the System didn't get people started in this vegetarian kick just to mellow them out, keep them too lethargic and frightened to stick up for their rights (feed a dog raw red meat and it is much more aggressive than one fed vegies). To keep us docile -- that is one of the Elite's tricks. They have really cheap labor in Asia where they feed people mainly rice. Have you noticed that labor is getting cheaper here in the Good Old U.S. of A? They now get 80 hours per week out of most families for the same buying power they gave their parents for 40 hours work a generation ago. At present we feel powerless. They raise prices faster than they raise wages. We are being put in a squeeze. We are helpless in the Profit System unless we are wealthy. The Elite have it good even in De pressions and War. But we can start a new game -- the Priceless Economics where each individual will have equal POWER to give his/her work where they choose and equal POWER to take what they choose. Is this POWER worth working for? Would it be better than the Ultimate Destruction the Profit System is guiding us toward? The Profit System offers us inevitable choices -- death by WW III, death by the destruction of our environment and/or death by starvation. What To Do? Some people are already beginning to turn the Pay System inside- out. 1. Some people have a "Free Box." 2. Some have started "Free Skills Pools." 3. Some are giving all their products away, free of charge. 4. Some have dropped-out. Some have stopped taking pay for their work and are living off their accumulated resources (knowing they can always earn more money again when and if they need it). This gives them more TIME to figure things out and do something constructive towards change. 5. Some are unburdening themselves. Many have sold and/or given away most of their THINGS. They have fewer worries, less to take care of, fewer expenses and more free time. Some have shed down to one back pack full and are traveling with no back-home rent to pay. 6. Some are buying less. Industry then produces less, thus polluting our environment less. 7. Some are reducing their expenses. As people discover Voluntary Simplicity they gain more free time to discover themselves and gain more inner peace. 8. Some are distracted less by the mass media and other trivia, so that they can focus more thought-time on creating an alternative and learning how to play and entertain them- selves. 9. Some have rejected their maximum pension potential. Many will receive only a small pension because they chose the free time, here and now, instead of working for pay until they are 62 (should they happen to live that long). With the Price less Economics we won't need pensions anyway. 10. Some are teaching Priceless Economics by being an EXAMPLE of a person who is enjoying life. A happy satisfied person who feels good about her/himself -- knowing they are doing creative things to stimulate change. 11. Some are traveling extensively and getting new incites into themselves, others and the world situation. 12. Some share this book with their friends. 13. Some are writing their own papers and are otherwise using their best talents to disperse this idea. 14. Some are getting less dependent on the present Pay System and are gaining more Freedom. 15. Some are working for 2 or 3 months for pay and taking off the rest of the year. 16. Some are ENJOYING LIFE. If we are not -- we are sure as Hell doing something wrong! We had better start doing what makes our heart sing! We may as well have fun because chances are pretty damn good, that we won't get out of this old world alive anyway. These sixteen examples are of people who are taking CONTROL of how and who they will COOPERATE with. December 1, 1983 Ernest Mann Ten Years Ten years from now, do I want to be doing what I'm doing right now? If I continue doing what I'm doing now, won't I be doing this ten years from now? What do I want to be doing ten years from now? What do I want to be doing one year from now? What do I want to be doing next week? What will I have to start doing, right now to make this happen? July 4, 1979 16 TALKING TO MYSELF I must learn to be aware of how I'm feeling at this moment. I must aim to be happy and contented at this moment. Am I doing or thinking what pleases me? If I'm happy with this moment -- I need go no further in this study. If however I'm feeling undecided, depressed or if I have nothing to do -- then I should read on. I seem to be the happiest when I'm busy doing or thinking about something that I planned myself. This puts me in control of my life and my destiny, because everything I do today will have a very direct influ ence on my tomorrows. By acknowledging this fact and taking responsibility for my today, yes, and for "this" moment, leaves me with no one to "blame" for my present predicament, space or attitude -- but myself. I am whatever I have made myself! Do I like the product? If not, it's back to the old drawing board, and then try to describe the me I desire to be. Most of my life I have unknowingly allowed other people to influence, direct or lead my thoughts. I gave away my "Power." My Power to; 1. do as I wished 2. think as I wished 3. learn what I wished 4. be me 5. be a natural human 6. reason things out for myself 7. be contented 8. love 9. not be afraid 10. not be in want 11. control my destiny 12. control my "now" 13. be happy 14. judge for myself 15. know what is right for me Gave Away My Power I have discovered myself to be a highly "suggestible" creature, not so highly evolved above my cousins, the monkeys. I find the "monkey- see, monkey-do" principle working often on me. I thought that I knew it all. I learned to play the game of work, consume and pay -- work, consume, pay and be entertained. I thought that was all there was to life. Ideas and suggestions come at one so fast on TV, radio and in movies that a person doesn't always have time to evaluate, before others are bombarded at one. Consequently one tends to unconsciously accept some of them as truths, if they are repeated often enough. Music falls into this class too, but it is so subtle or hypnotic that people are seldom aware that it can put us into moods or create desires that we may not want. Plus the use of subliminals; on TV, movies, radio and in magazines, for mind conditioning by the people who have control of the mass media. They have created a "worker-consumer" mentality. Music deserves special mention because it is so widely used (and always has been) as a mood modifier and thought manipulator. Have you noticed that nearly everywhere you go there is background music? (Read again, Orwell's "1984") A background music company in Minneapolis has disclosed publicly that it uses subliminals in the "canned" music it sells to stores. Some people have known for centuries how to "set our moods" with music. You know how certain music makes you want to march, dance, feel sad, sentimental or angry. That's mood setting. A Sign of Subservience Have you noticed that much of the singing is like whining? And many of the singers are not really singing but are yelling? (People pay for this?) Does the whining set our "national mood" as whiners, beg ging the government or "whoever" to stop polluting or whatever and to give us a few crumbs. This protesting may keep us too busy to think of learning how to fill our own needs, or how to design our own economic system. Is the yelling in today's singing a behavioral modification method similar to raising ones voice louder and louder attempting to win an argument when logic is failing? Do dictators use this method? Did Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini? Do some preachers? How about some spouses and parents? Does the yelling drive their points home into our belief systems? I've discovered myself raising my own voice attempting to win arguments. It seems that I may have a weak argument if I must resort to this tactic. They have used our suggestibility and our gullibility to manipulate our minds with the thoughts they create with their words in songs. I still catch myself humming and repeating the words of songs I heard years ago. They undoubtedly affected my beliefs. Of course the newspapers, magazines, books and movies have their own special ways in which they affect our thinking. For example by reading fiction, one experiences life vicariously, thereby wasting the time that one could have used to live life. Because I don`t watch, listen to or read much of the mass media, I have much more time to observe, listen, discuss, reason and draw my own conclusions. This feels far more rewarding and may lead me closer to "TRUTH." The big joke is on us. We pay them for their records and tapes, for radios, tv's and movies, i.e., we pay to be mind conditioned! Ha, ha, he, he. I'll bet they laugh about this. We thereby never get time to reprogram our own bio-computer. Many of the places that I go have background music that I dislike. I hope to find a way to encourage these places to turn off their music while I'm there. I may try boycotting them or simply find places with more understanding and considerate owners. Conform! Cut your hair! Wear the current Paris, hippie, Disco, or punk styles! I grew up believing that I must conform. That it was important to have the approval of my peers, parents, neighbors and relatives (and it probably was, if I wanted to get a good job). I was supposed to be and do what they expected. When I got a job, I found out where the ultimate power existed. Conform or be fired! Conform, instead of; observe, think, reason and form ones own judgments; instead of learning to live my own life in nature; build my shelter, make my own clothes and grow or gather my own food and make myself happy. I was taught to work for others (altruism?) and make them happy. Long ago they called this, I think, "Slavery." Now we call it by its euphemism, "employment." When you take pay, you must obey! Who Is Most Important? I'm learning to do for "me" now. Make myself happy. I'm trying to get over worrying about what people think about me. I try to do as I please. I do not try to harm others because I do not crave the conse quences. I know that I'm a "good" person, so I have no need for other people's approval. I'm not perfect. I still make mistakes and I suffer from them but I also learn. (Sure, there are plenty of ways I must still conform, in order to get my needs met. When in Rome one may have to do some of the things the Romans do.) I am the most important person on this planet -- to me. No one or no thing is more important than I am -- to me. Without me, I wouldn't be here. I refuse to reduce myself by thinking of myself as "one among many." No! This is the way to condition the slave mentality, create a Guru and follower relationship or become an inconsequential part of the whole. I am the Whole! There is a lot of that "part of the whole" philosophy going around lately, almost as bad as the flu. Everyone Makes Ripples! There are no two blades of grass exactly alike. We are all extremely important! Everything that we do and say (and neglect to do and say) has some influence on the present and the future. For instance, some of the inspiring or degrading things you say today to a friend or stranger, will affect his/her mood to some extent. And this will affect how they will act and what they will say to others. It may affect their creativity and inventiveness or that of someone they contact. The feelings of happiness, encouragement and hope or the feelings of fear, anger and depression that you pass on to even one person, keeps getting passed on, down the line of people, like the ripples of a pebble thrown into a pond. The ripples that you start by each contact you make may finally touch someone on down the line who will then be inspired to do something really outstanding for humanity and life, some thing that even you may benefit from. In other words if I do a little good or bad to another person and that person passes it down the line, each person may be nourished a little bit by what I started, for their good or their detriment. And on down the line somewhere it may grow to be a gigantic good or bad which may come back and affect me. I'm trying to say that we are extremely important and we had better be careful of what we send out on the pond of life, i.e., send out only what you would like to get back. Fantasy Adventure A few years ago I became aware of a different aspect of my day- dreaming. I was playing a fantasy adventure in my mind as I was walking. The story was getting rather scary and I became aware of my heart pounding and of the tenseness and anxiety I was feeling. I tried to stop the story, but couldn't. I had to bring it to a safe conclu sion. They say that you can't stop thinking about elephants by repeating to yourself, "I won't think about elephants. I won't think about elephants. I won't think about elephants, etc." By experimenting, I discovered I could stop thinking a story without finishing it. My method is simply like changing channels on a TV set. I think to myself, "I don't want to continue with this line of thought. What shall I think about instead?" I decide on another topic and think on that. Consequently the old thought line disappears. There doesn't seem to be room for the old thought line when I really concen trate on my new topic. This thought control helps me get more positive usage from my bio-computer. April 11, 1983 Ernest Mann Ignorance "Ignorance is of a peculiar nature; once dispelled, it is impossible to reestablish it. It is not originally a thing in itself, but is only the absence of knowledge; and though man may be kept ignorant, he cannot be made ignorant." Thomas Paine (1791) 17 LIKE BEING SQUEEZED? Why would a person drop-out of the rat race just after he learned how to win? I can answer this question, for myself. Anger! The cumu lative effect from watching government. I was 20 years a real estate salesman and broker and at the same time a landlord and caretaker of my properties. I am not ashamed of having been a landlord, I even told myself I enjoyed real estate. I pro vided good clean housing for low income families. In Minnesota (burr, it's cold here) housing is as necessary as food. I grew up on a farm and I worked as hard providing housing as I did raising food. Some people frown on anyone who is, was or even thinks of becoming a landlord. If these naive people would try living in state owned housing in this country or in Russia, they might learn first-hand about government inefficiency, wasting of materials, time and human labor -- especially in slowness of getting anything done. I started getting angry with government about 30 years ago when I used to see the city's street crews "at work?" There would be six men resting and one man shoveling. Reminded me of the depression times and the W.P.A. I once asked a WPA worker why it took nine men to mow a lawn. He pointed to an out-house up on the hill and then to a lawn mower and said, "There are two men coming and two men going and two men sitting and two men mowing, and I'm the boss." I saw monumental government inefficiency in the court house where I paid real estate taxes, had papers recorded, etc. The wasting of my tax dollars made me angry. I had to work hard and long hours for that money. Once they sent two men to inspect some electrical wiring. One man or a boy could have done it. But what really took the cake was when, a month later, they sent out two more full grown men to do it again, even though the first two had approved it. They said they were "redevelopment inspectors." I was in such a rage I almost hit them with the hammer I was carrying. I was an enlistee in WW ll, but I protested the Korean War and when the Vietnam War came along and threatened to take my two sons, that made me blow my cork. I quit the real estate business. I sold my 13 rental properties to my tenants for, from a dollar, to a hundred dollars down and payments less than their rent. I even sold the duplex we lived in. My wife and I took off in an old used pick-up truck with a camper. Our youngest kid was 16. We told her she could come with us, stay with a relative and finish school or go on her own. She has been on her own for 10 years now. She learned more about living than her friends did who finished school. My wife and I traveled the U.S.A. for a year just getting unwound. I read every book I could find on utopias, who rules America, health food books, alternative lifestyles, etc. I started protesting the Vietnam War (1969). I decided I didn't want to be married any longer and after a good 25 year marriage to a very fine woman, I per suaded her to agree to a divorce. We had about a hundred thousand dollars worth of equities in contract for deeds. We divided them equally. Now after ten years I have an income from my remaining con tracts of about $500 per month, which will last approximately another ten years. Then I will be broke. I'll be 62 then and will be eligible for a small Social Security pension, even though I paid in the maximum SS tax for about 20 years. I am learning how to live on a lot less money per month and am lik ing it better. I know how to make money so I can always jump into the rat race for a time and make some more. But at present it seems that the more things that I get rid of and the fewer things that I buy -- the more free time I have. I like the free time better than the things. I'm starting to learn what life is all about. I'm much more satisfied with my present growth and lifestyle than with what I had back in the unceasing "buymore" rat race. I grew up on a farm in southern Michigan, enlisted in the Navy in 1944 (dumb farm boy, me). After the war I worked for about two years in factories. Took my free schooling in business college and then practiced selling, business and property ownership for about 22 years. I learned about Economics from experience -- not just from reading about it. I was successful. I learned to play the game. But it only took me about two years after dropping out to realize that it was an anti-people game. It is for profit, not for people. People all over the earth are exploited for Profit. For the profit of the few. When we work for someone we must obey orders or we get fired. Even a business person must please his/her clients, unless s/he has a monopoly. This is slavery with the dollar used as a whip. But it is "voluntary" slavery. We agree to this slavery contract because we are unaware of any alternative. We think that this is the way it always was and therefore, always will be. After I dropped out I watched and thought a lot about government. I was able to see that we voters did not control government. I saw big money always getting its own way. And I saw it get bigger and richer. I soon deduced and read that a handful of super-rich families controlled the corporations which in turn controlled government. After traveling around the world a bit, this appeared to be true all over, even in the communist and socialist countries a handful of people control the gov ernment and the wealth. Then I asked myself "How do these families get their power?" I was able to see that they "owned" or controlled most of the best land, natural resources, industries and the biggest apartment and office buildings. The few can "own" the most, only because the many, agree to the concept of "ownership." They tempt us into agreement by allowing us to own a few small pieces of property. We were born on this planet just like they were. We have as much right to have a place to sleep here as they do. We have as much right to eat the food that grows here as they do. They have no prior right to "charge" us for these natural rights, unless we're dumb enough to pay for them. They have conned us into believing they have this right. They forced our ancestors to agree to some "God given right of Kings." It has evolved to where we are today. We take jobs as politicians, lawyers, judges, policemen, jailers, and soldiers and we force the ownership laws upon ourselves. How come we're so stupid? The ownership concept forces us to get a job to pay for the things which nature would provide just for the picking if we would allow her. People were as free as birds to live on this planet until the time of the "GREAT CON JOB." I deduced that "money" and "ownership" went hand in hand, in holding us in slavery. I could see how the rich people set wages. They set the prices on products on which they have trust agreements, monopolies or cartels. They control the unions too, now. They are in the process of putting the squeeze on people. They are raising prices faster and more than they are raising wages. This leaves us with less money after we've paid for our food and shelter. Many people have already had to tighten their belts or else get a second job. Many have lost their homes and farms. Most of the young wives have to get jobs now. Do you realize this has been going on for some time? Can you remember when your father or grandfather made enough money so that mother or grandmother could stay home with the kids? You may say that this is really for the good, because women shouldn't have to stay in the home all the time. They should be able to become professionals too. Well, I agree to this. Wives should have this choice. But then instead of a day care center for the kids, I think the parents should then rotate. One should stay home every other day and go to the job, every other day. Sell the boss 40 hours not 80. Things are a'changing. They're putting the screws to us. It may be a good thing. It helped make me angry enough to drop out. Now that I've had some free time to observe and think, I can see through their big game. I also think I can see a solution; an alternative to our slavery, i.e., the exploitation of our lives. Because we agree to use "money," they print as much as they want for themselves (How do we know that they don't do this? As a group they control government and the mass media, why not the government printing press and the Tmen, Gmen, FBI and CIA?) and they give us some of it, if we work for them. Then they regulate prices on products and wages. They then use their free money to buy our land from us (or tax us to death) and rent it back to us. Then they raise the rent again and again, so that we must work more hours for them. It's a neat little trick -- for them. They control us through money and ownership. We do not change this fact by changing political parties (sic). They have the same control in communist and socialist countries because people there, take pay and must pay for their products, the same as we do. It surely is obvious and logical that we must stop using their basic means of control -- money! But how? If we were to spread the word around that we would all stop taking "pay" on a certain day and on that same day we would begin to give all the products away "for free." We would make instant changes in power. Everything would then be free. Their money could no longer buy henchmen or lieutenants to use force on us. There would no longer be a reason for ownership or money, if there were no profit. We would eliminate two bad birds with one little change. We could then continue to produce all the good things that we still wanted. We could then quit producing the things that are de stroying our life-support system. If each individual worker couldn't see a good reason to have a product they wouldn't give their labor to it. There wouldn't be a reason to hide facts then. It would then be equally important for everyone to expose any production which was drilling a hole in the bottom of our lifeboat. They pollute now because it is more "profitable" for the owners than to recycle their wastes. When everything that we want is free, they will not be able to blackmail us by saying that if we don't let them pollute they will take their factory (our job) some place else. There will no longer be a reason to own industry if there is no profit in it. We will produce what we want, things that are well made -- made to last a long time. And no one will own the factories and minerals any more. We will just use them. There won't be a reason to use advertising and sales people to try to force people to come and take things when they are free. If people want something they will come and get it, if not we will stop producing it. Our present system is based on "the faster things wear out -- the more profit there is in it." Most of the bad things in our system to day are done mainly for profit, e.g., pollution, wars, exploitation, raping of the earth, robberies and starvation. If we decide to quit taking pay and give the products away for free we will have no more reason to do these bad things to people and to our planet (our darling old Spaceship Earth). Science and technology will then be able to advance in a new direction -- for people, instead of for profit! There will no longer be a reason to suppress inventions and discoveries which may infringe on the oil industry, etc. Patents will be unnecessary. Inventors will proceed much faster when they share ideas instead of withhold them. Synergy will speed up progress; a progress for life, happiness and long term survival, instead of for profit. I've heard all kinds of arguments why people think we couldn't have this free system. To date, I haven't heard a reason that seemed valid. One reason presented is that the rich people would stop us from working for free and giving the products away for free. With proper ground work, I think, we could avoid this. First, remember that it's us "pay takers" who are doing the suppressive jobs against ourselves, that is, such jobs as policemen, guards, soldiers and henchmen. These guards (they are good people just like you and me who have rent or mortgage payments to make, food to buy and all the same expenses as we do. They have kids to rear, mates to keep happy and perhaps even lawns to mow. They are just trying to get by and they took this guard job because it may have been the best they could get at the time) must be informed of how they will be better off with the free system than they are with the present pay system. Then they will not stop us from giving our products away for free. The super rich families comprise far less than 1% of the world's population, so they couldn't stop us. The super-rich are people too. They will have more to gain by allowing the free system to be born. They will have everything they need for free but they will no longer have all the hassles of holding their property, i.e., Power. They can still exercise their leadership if they please. But it will have to be by friendly persuasion instead of by coercion. They may have some good ideas too. When everyone has everything they need, they may no longer have reason to do harmful acts to their own species or to other life forms. I always get better feelings from doing something nice for people than when I have said or done something that people didn't like. I prefer the good feelings. I don't think I'm any different than other people. The next objection I hear is "No one would work if everything was free." In the preparation for the change-over people would need to understand that we couldn't have the benefits of the free system unless everyone carried a little bit of the load. So, one reason for working would be the good feeling one gets from doing one's share. Another reason would be that we could have fun at work. When we give our time for free we are in control of what is made and how it is made, otherwise we are free to quit and take our energy to a place which pleases us. Thenceforth jobs will get done or products made only if we want them. Under these terms we'll have power to make any job into a pleasant one or we won't do it. When we stop all the junk production and other useless jobs we'll have three or four times more help in the essential work. We'll be able to cut individual working hours way down, if people so choose. I think that we will work because of the good feelings we will get from making beautiful long lasting and smooth oper ating products. Everyone would feel more equal. But still everyone would be different. Different aptitudes, attitudes and abilities, but probably all would get the same good feelings by working just a little to create their share. Everyone would have equal access to on-the-job training and jobs. Another objection people offer is, "Some people would take more than they needed." Here again it would be necessary for a clear understanding of the free system before we changed over. We would need to realize that the less we use, the less we will need to produce -- therefore the less anyone would need to work. People might need to be reminded that, having too much stuff around just gets in ones way. Too much food on hand -- grows stale and rots. Eating too much, makes one sick, i.e., too much can be a burden and the right amount -- a pleasure. If you would like to have everything for free, and be able to work at a job of your own choosing, do the following: 1. Begin today by telling your best friend about the Priceless Economic System (PES). 2. Begin to discuss this free system with everyone you talk with. 3. Write letters to the editors of your newspaper and your favorite magazines about how the free system would eliminate our current problems. 4. Start writing your thoughts in a journal. You will come up with good ideas of your own on what to do. 5. Figure out a way to use your best talents as a means of communicating the idea of PES. 6. Write personal letters to all the influential people who you admire and tell them about PES. 7. Set aside a certain time each day and think only about the idea of this free system. You will think of new ways to promote it. 8. Write down the ideas you get and follow them. 9. Write notes and send pamphlets to politicians. 10. Organize a group of friends into a synergy unit and share ideas and support. 11. Let's do it! The sooner we start, the sooner we'll have a better system. June 25, 1979 7 MAJOR PROBLEMS 1. Wars & Revolutions 2. Starvation 3. Destruction of our life-support system 4. Crime 5. Governments 6. Debts & taxes 7. Fear mongering media Prime Cause Some people make huge PROFITS from each of the above problems. Solution If everyone works as a volunteer, there will not be a monetary cost of goods, so all goods and services can be free of charge. When everything is free there will no longer be a profit in the seven major problems. How to Implement I honestly don't know. But, perhaps we can each start living FREE as much as we can in our own lives. I give my newsletter away for free. Volunteers have much more freedom to say and write what they please. I'm lowering my expenses. I'm getting rid of my "things." I usually give my surplus things away for free. I'm trying to learn to enjoy life in the "here and now." "It's later than you think!" I inform as many people as I can about the Problems and the Solution. What else can we do? There must be a faster more sure way to slide us all into this ancient free system. 11-18-88 Time to Play I have got to find some way to remind myself to have a little more fun in life. I don't have to work all the time. There are some little things I like to do. I'm going to let that little boy inside of me, go out and play more often. 1-27-89 Ernest Mann (The following Warbucks Office Memo was brought to the author by a courier who must remain anonymous.) 18 SLAVE MANAGEMENT Slaves need to have electricity so that they can stay up later and get up earlier to work and study to be able to earn more money so that they can pay their electric bills and pay for all their fine labor saving machines which enable them to finish their work in time to get some recreation which will help them feel more like going back to their jobs to earn money to live their wonderful merry-go-round lives as wage slaves. They are lucky to be allowed to buy all the wonderful things which make work and play so much easier. If they didn't buy these fine things they would have no reason to work for money. People who take their food from the land and sleep wherever they can, deprive themselves of the need to work for money. This further deprives them of the need to buy, maintain and store fine labor saving devices. They don't seem to realize the fact that they are holding back progress. If they could be forced to consume more, and work, we could increase our gross national production which is useful to keep this excellent system going for us. Consumption can be increased by making welfare and government grant money more available. This we can charge to the workers who pay taxes. It may become necessary to provide better working conditions to stop slaves from dropping out. As more drop out and provide for their own needs and direct their own lives it leaves fewer people to control them. It is necessary to keep them dependent on jobs or government money to maintain our control. We must find ways to keep them from dropping out of our schools too. Here we mainly teach them to obey orders, respect our laws, memorize and absorb our mind conditioning and love their country. Of course the school and college systems are one of our biggest money makers. For example; the land, school and college buildings, furniture, fixtures, constant maintenance supplies and all the books we sell to the students. Buses and fuel for busing students are also big profit makers. We are increasing our profits in our school scam industry by encouraging more adults to return to school for more education or "culture." Coincidentally, we teach them a trade or profession with which they will minister to our needs and whims or to the needs of our servants or to the needs of the servants who serve our servants, etc. We could have them taught on-the-job much faster and better but it takes more time to complete their domestication and obedience training. And besides that, the longer we keep them in school the more money we milk from them. Ha, ha. Those who take care of their own needs are difficult to catch and milk. We must encourage people to become dependent in every area that it is possibly to do so. Alexander Warbucks September 6, 1978 Ernest Mann LAWS, RULES AND REGULATIONS ARE THE FOUNDATION OF SLAVERY. FREEDOM NEEDS ONLY ONE LAW -- THE GOLDEN RULE, AND THAT IS A LAW OF NATURE . (The following Warbucks Office Memo was brought to the author by a courier who must also remain anonymous.) 19 WARBUCKS FAMILY MEMO: (Family Distribution Only!) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . SUBJECT: Alexander's memo, "Slave Management" PROBLEM: Alexander's carelessness allowed this memo to leak out and be published. DISPOSITION: Alexander will be restricted from all South Pacific islands for a period of six month for this indiscretion. SUMMATION: We must hold tighter security on family memos. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . SUBJECT: Dropouts. PROBLEM: As more of our subjects quit working for pay and start providing for their own needs, we lose part of our control. This is occurring not only in blue collar but in business, professional and man agerial classes as well. If we are to continue running the world we'll have to find more ways to keep the classes dependent on each other, on jobs and on government. As you all know it has been rather nice to have the whole world's population ministering to our needs and desires (our personal slaves and the slaves who minister to them all the way to the bottom of our pyramid). We are starting to lose our grip with our money counting attraction. The idea has always been to "keep them busy -- counting, earning, saving, stealing, spending and worrying about money." This has kept them busy for thousands of years, but lately they are spending less, so they need to work less; this has given some of them some free time to do a little thinking. We will blow it all, if we allow them time to figure it. As it is, most of them, haven't the foggiest notion that they are slaves. If they take "thinking time" and figure out who really runs things, they may rebel and find ways to become independent of our games. DISPOSITION: 1. In all our thought leader media, especially music, we must intensify our subliminal motivationals. 2. We will keep them occupied by stirring up trouble between them by reactivating the Nazi Party and the Ku Klux Klan. 3. In our various religious programs we must put more impetus into encouraging them to have larger families (we never have too many servants, it seems). We must encourage mates to look for sex outside of their marriage. Make them think they deserve a mistress or a boy friend. With our media we can make them think that this is going on all over and that it is wonderful! This will help to break up more marriages. We will imply that their orgasm will be exotically preferable with someone else. It will create more single parent families. This will make, not only unhappy children, but also unhappy discontented frustrated parents. These people look for happiness by over-consuming. Divorce doubles the number of apartments we can rent and all the extra appliances and furniture that we can sell. We will create more lonely people who will spend more money looking for happiness. They become compulsive consumers and workaholics. Wonderful quality in slaves! 4. We must reaffirm the work ethic -- that "constant work" is essential and desirable. This will keep them too busy to think. 5. Because more food can be grown per acre with trees, we must encourage the planting of shade trees instead of fruit and nut trees. Should they ever produce enough free food to survive on, they might all quit paying us rent and mortgage payments. That would end our control. 6. We must keep them so occupied that they have no time to discover all the free food that is available in nature. Keep them too fearful to find all the free places that there are to sleep on this planet. Make them feel too inadequate and shameful to provide themselves with body coverings from nature. Motivate them to use vehicles and oil instead of their legs. 7. Keep their desire levels far above their actual need levels for food, shelter, clothing and "things." This will keep them tame and domesticated, as they obediently continue to work for us to pay for their (Warbucks programmed) desire fulfillments. SUMMATION: If more drop out it will leave us with fewer servants to guard our vast holdings. This would make it easier for them to "squat" on our land and even subvert our guards. So you can well un derstand the importance of this memo. If we are to survive this recent trend we may have to, "Give them a few feet, before they take a mile." Marie Warbucks September 21, 1978 Our Time is Limited If our economic system is destroying our life-support system and people, should we use our time to repair the damages or should we use our time to change the system? November 7, 1979 Ernest Mann (This is a copy of a letter that was "liberated" from a New York City office.) 20 WARBUCKS INTRA-FAMILY COMMUNIQUE I know that you don't like to think this, but we are much like humans. We are subject to the human frailties. We forget. We get slip shod. We fall short of our disciplines. You have selected me to be the family coordinator and I agreed to be, at least until someone better comes along. So, that is why I'm now reminding you of some of our basic principles for handling slaves. Our slaves can get bored easily. If bored, they get restless. Then they might start thinking and questioning orders. Therefore it is necessary for us to direct their thinking into areas which keep them dependent on our leadership. We must make them feel dependent on society for all their needs. Make them feel important by telling them that they are part of the great "whole" and that their work is necessary to the Great Whole to which they belong. Keep them too deep in debt (in the hole) to have any spare time to experiment with the principles of self-sufficiency or even just getting out of the hole. A few of the slaves who refuse to conform are squatting in various places and planting their apple seeds, plum pits, grape seeds, avocado pits, orange seeds, nuts of all kinds and vegetables. (They are not using our hybrid seeds. They found organic natural seeds more productive.) They are creating Garden of Edens, with free food, no rent and an "acceptance of the Golden Rule" instead of Government. So far, only a few of the smarter non-conformists are doing this. It is working out OK for us too, because it gets them off our case. However, we must not give them any publicity, as it might encourage more of our workers to "not conform." The family came up with a great innovation when they first decided to "allow" the peons to "own" land. Ownership gives them roots, ties them down and makes it easier to find them. It also gives us a clas sification of slaves known as landlords. They serve us by forcing people to pay them rent in order to have a space to sleep on this planet. Thus they ALL work for us for the rest of their lives. We must always make them think that this is normal and that everyone has always had to pay rent and that they always will. If the slaves deviate from their present thought patterns, they might think it strange that they "agree" to work for us for 30 years to buy a place to sleep. They might wonder why some "primitive people" are able to build their homes from the materials at hand in a couple of weeks and have NO mortgage to pay on. They might even find it simpler, more enjoyable and even more adventuresome to walk to where they wish to go, instead of working for us to earn money to make perpetual car payments to us, so that they can get to a job to make the money to make their car payments. To say nothing of the car maintenance costs and depreciation. We must constantly entice them to buy, buy, buy. They make much better workers if they are always in the hole. Automobile If we allow them space to think, they may question the vehicle with which they are killing themselves, at the rate of 50,800 persons and disabling another 1,900,000 per year (1981) in the U.S.A. alone. They may see how machines and their present manufacturing processes are destroying their life-support system. They may see that all the pro cessed "junk food" we're selling them is making them sick and costing them more; see that their boring unsatisfying jobs are driving many of them, bananas. They might even discover the simple unprocessed foods which are very cheap and healthful. As it is recorded in our family archives, one of our forefathers, Galus Julius Caesar, actually once said, "Give them bread and circuses, to keep them from rebelling." It is a simple matter to give them food, but it takes a little more imagination to give them circuses. I guess this is the creative part of being slave masters -- to create diversions to keep their gullible little minds busy, busy, busy. Our Watergate Scandal was a fine circus. It kept them thinking and talking along safe lines for years. We are still getting some mileage out of the Kennedy assassination and they still aren't sure whether we shot the real Kennedy, his double or a dummy. We have a fine show going in Israel and Arabia. Some still lingering in Africa. Another one in Vietnam, Cambodia and China. We may use the China invasion to start another world war. It will be a challenge to attempt to involve our sheep in another big war, so soon, after our U.S.A./Vietnam War. However, we may have to pull off another Pearl Harbor, to get them angry enough to fight. Maybe we should have China drop a missile on Los Angeles. This would certainly get a big one started. We wouldn't need to use the older nuclear bombs, as they could be dangerous to OUR families' health. We haven't used poison gas or bacteria because they, too, could get out of control. We might use a few of our cleaner H-bombs. It will be a real creative fun time for us. Wars are truly the sport of Kings. They are more fun to stage and run than chess games or the hum drum activities of production or politics. Creating straw-men for slaves to knock down is one of our best numbers. For example, nuclear power is an elaborate straw-man, and now we're letting them tear it down. It started out as a fun experiment. It diverted much of their creative energy. It didn't work out, but we have created another excellent diversion by resisting their efforts to tear it down. We gave them the threat of a domed stadium in one of their downtown areas. We can't lose. If they stop the stadium construction it will occupy their thoughts, anger and energy for some time. If they don't stop the stadium, it will occupy their thoughts, anger and energy anyway. We learned long ago that people can think on only one thought line at a time. We feed them thoughts and they either fight them or go along with them. Music has always been an effective tool for setting their moods, their pace and leading their thoughts. While dancing they learn to step (or jump) to the beat of our drummer and keep the pace WE set. This teaches them to obey orders. The drum has always been useful for this. We let them touch each other during the dance. They seem to enjoy touch ing and they feel successful when they keep in step, so this training process becomes self-perpetuating. It also serves as an excellent distraction. They must occupy their minds with keeping in step to the beat and with how they are going to entice their partners into bed. If they are constantly bombarded with distractions they will have no time to do any real thinking. They will only be aware of that which we make them aware. Our closest guarded secret is the fact that SLAVERY still exists in every country on this planet. Laborers, farmers, tradesmen, professionals, managers, directors and presidents -- all take pay, so they must obey our orders. They are not aware of their bondage. Some are vaguely aware of the idea that "big money" runs everything. But they are unable to relate to the idea that THEY are part of that "everything." They think that they are free people, making all their own decisions. We allow them to make the unimportant ones. The important ones we cover in their laws, and in their customs, religious, confor mity and moral codes. We have even trained them to punish "their own kind," when they do not conform. We have been masters for a long, long time. We teach our kids how to be masters. The slaves teach their kids how to work, to be submissive and to obey orders. These kids grow up to be good slaves, like their parents. Most of the parents even go so far as to break their own kids' spirits. So by the time they are of work age, most of them are docile, gullible and easy to manipulate. Through all our media, including books, we give them a substitute for living. For example, we encourage them to live vicariously through the exciting adventures of fiction. This puts their fantasy life through an exciting energy drain which seems to satisfy some of their emotional hunger. This substitute fills one of those spaces in time which they might have used to go out and experience life firsthand. Distractions keep them from discovering the bondage they are in. We must continue to titillate them to want to watch TV and movies, to read newspapers, magazines and books and to listen to radio and music. We use the mass media not only for a distraction, but also to help create their basic beliefs and expectations. Of course, the schools and churches serve this purpose too, as do popular songs and music. Our "well known" use of the media is to create the desire to buy, buy, buy. In this way we motivate them to work for us. They continue to administer to our needs as they did to Caesar's and as they did for the priests' in the time of the great pyramids. Those ancestors of ours really knew how to handle people. Although, as slaves get more education it takes a little more finesse to keep on top of them. However, it's basically the same even today. Keep them fearful; fearful of death, fearful of pain and fearful of each other. Always encourage competition. It's like fighting. It separates people and keeps them fearful of losing. We must not give the slaves enough "free time" to discover that death is a natural termination of all life. That no one dies until they want to die. That old age brings with it, eventually, a desire to die. That people allow themselves to get sick or to have an accident, just because they no longer desire to live. People program themselves subcon sciously to live as short a time as they wish (we consciously program ourselves to live as long as we wish). In fact, we help them in this area considerably. They were living way past their usefulness to us a few generations ago. Some were living as long as 95 years. We were able to reduce the longevity of the next generation by nearly 20 years, and now many are dying in their 50's. We have subtly created the belief that they won't live very long and that they should spend their money NOW and not save it. This is making more efficient use of our slaves; to program them to die shortly after their prime working years. We don't need to give them any pensions this way either. We use both subtle and subliminal suggestions in the media to achieve this. We have made them afraid of death by telling them that they have spirits which live on after their death. If they obey our rules, which we tell them were inspired by a God, their spirits will be assured en trance into a Heaven, or reincarnated into a better existence, depending on which of our religions they have chosen. This makes them afraid to die, because they know they haven't obeyed all the rules (which we deliberately made too difficult to always be obeyed). If they can be kept "afraid" they are easier to manage. Then they look to us for guidance and protection. Promoting fear of pain is another distraction we have always used. We must not give them time to discover the fact that "pain" is their body's method of alerting them to the fact that they are doing something wrong to it. So before they can check out the reason for the pain, channel them to a doctor who will attempt to numb the pain. He will take up their time and money in doing so. It creates a great diver sion. Some people talk about their pains constantly. The patient's pain will usually return (sometimes to a different part of their body), after their "cure." Doctors usually don't remove the "cause" of pains. This would put them out of business. We hire some of the slaves to act as police persons and soldiers so that we can threaten to inflict pain and imprisonment on the others. They literally enforce their own slavery when they take jobs as law and army people. We keep them too busy and too broke to realize this. We have been very successful in keeping our slaves busy. Sports and gambling have always been good mind occupiers. Of course, money is our most reliable mind occupier. Sex may rate second place. Booze and drugs, third. We have achieved a sort of mass hypnosis by using movies, TV, radio and music with which we have been able to implant suggestions and beliefs without their being aware of it. We may need to give our Space Program front page coverage again soon. It can take up the slack to hold their attention in case it is untimely to start a hot war now. Remember, the Warbucks family has ruled on this planet for over six thousand years, so it is our right and destiny to continue doing so. Keep up the good work and if you have any problems, contact Alexander or Marie, as I'm taking a little vacation on our secret moon base. Cleopatra Warbucks This letter was "liberated" by Quick-finger Pete, Peoples' Snoop1, and delivered to the Little Free Press, where it was reprinted. Quick-finger entered the Warbucks' New York City office disguised as a potential "hit man" considering a possible contract. He spied this letter in the hopper of the paper shredder. By dropping his pants and screaming, (author's note: I wish I could have seen this) he was able to divert the secretary's attention while he flipped his hat over the hopper and thereby liberated the Warbucks letter as he retrieved his hat. Needless to say, his crazy display lost him his chance to negotiate any further on the contract. Editor's Note: Except for a few major alterations performed on Quick-finger's story (to protect his cover), this story is accurate. February 18, 1979 Ernest Mann TOTAL LICENSE (except to do physical harm) Issued to: ___________________________________ 1. To do whatever you wish. 2. To discover and be the real you. 3. To find and do your own thing. 4. To smile at and speak to any member of any sex, age, race or creed. 5. To be hereby relieved of all obligations and duties that you no longer agree to. 6. To go nude wherever you won't get caught. 7. To shape and mold your own destiny. 8. To break any promises or contracts that you no longer agree with. 9. To accept or reject any programming for your conscious and subconscious bio-computer. 10. To reject all guilt for not pleasing others. 11. To cancel anyone`s right to control you. 12. To have an unlimited number of close friends. 13. To be exempt from all customs, traditions, expectations and morals that you do not agree with. 14. To disobey orders if you disagree with them. WARNING! Be prepared for the consequences of your thoughts, words and actions. License fee: Free This license has been issued at the proper time and place on this planet. Valid on planet Earth only. by________________________________ (Fredrick the Fourth) 1An alias used to throw off detection. 21 WARBUCKS LEAVING EARTH! A Telepathic Message from the Warbucks Family (It is around midnight, I think. I have just awaken from a vision which told me to wake up and start writing. I can hear the music of the spheres clearly in my head at this moment. I'm being told a story and I'll write it here as fast and as accurately as I can.) I'm being told that the Warbucks' family is sending this message to the people of the world. They are tired and bored with making all our major decisions for us. They are in the process of withdrawing their leadership from our planet. They have now finished development of spacecraft with which to return to their home planet. They are taking all their family with them. They thank us for all our labor which they used to develop the necessary technology. They say they are withdrawing their key management personnel slowly so that we will have time to assume management of our planet by ourselves. The Warbucks wish us luck. They warn us not to continue with the money and ownership system they established, because after they leave there will be no reason for Power to remain centralized and thereby controlled by just a few people. They're saying that if we stop taking pay for our work and start giving the products away for free, we will then get leaders from among our own kind who will lead us in unselfish pathways. This free system will encourage leaders who have the vision to see how beautiful this planet will be when it is not being raped for profit. These leaders will have nothing to gain but the chance to exercise their abilities as visionaries and seers into the future. They will know that if they can steer you into a wonderful "Garden of Eden" relationship with your planet, that they too will have a more wonderful life and so will their children and grandchildren. Listen to the visionaries who have nothing more to gain from their ideas than you do. Beware of those who speak of some great power which will save you. We, the Warbucks family, were that Savior. We invented that fable, and then wrote all the "Holy Books" to substantiate it. Because you be lieved what we told you, you were much easier to manage and control. We were stranded here on Earth thousands of years ago when our spaceship ran out of fuel. (Don't you feel sorry for us?) We promptly began the management of your planet and proceeded to upgrade your species and teach you how to obey orders. In this area we have been extremely successful. We tried to keep you always too busy to learn to do your own thinking. As I said before, we are giving your planet back to you. However, it will not be necessary for you to start thinking for yourselves if you do not wish to. Some of your brothers and sisters (our lieutenants) who have been and still are controlling your media will continue to tell you how and what to think. They will wish to continue with the Pay System because this will give them the Power that we have. We took this power from you and we are giving you back this closely-guarded secret so that you can regain your freedom -- your Garden of Eden way of abun dance and plenty if you wish it. Never vote away your power by allowing anyone to represent you. Share this planet. There is plenty of room for all of you. Use it to live, not for profit. Harmonize with nature. Never kill unless in self-defense or for food. Never even cut a blade of grass unless you are going to eat it. Do not interfere with nature's natural cycle of life. If you wish to continue to destroy your bodies and minds as we taught you, with drugs, alcohol, nicotine, caffeine, sugar, white flour and auto and factory exhaust, go ahead and do it. You have that right. We don't need you any more! You have a choice, however. You can learn to treat your body better and be healthier and happier or continue down your well-greased slide into misery and an early death. We have allowed the first three Warbucks Letters to "leak out" and be published by Ernest Mann of the Little Free Press, who we are dictating this message to, telepathically. We speeded up the evolution of man, on your planet Earth, by millions of years by breeding with your lower ancestors when we first arrived and now you all have the good fortune to look just like us. You are made in our image; you are Gods along with us. You can follow us into outer space in a few years if you accomplish your freedom. If you choose to continue in your slavery, we will see to it that you do not gain "outer" space travel. We give you your freedom. But you will now have to take it from our lieutenants, the Rockefeller, Rothchild, etc., families. They can retain our power only if you continue to acknowledge a right of ownership and if you continue to take pay. They may try to retain you in the Pay System of slavery. Some of them, I'm sorry to say, are very shortsighted. They are not the visionaries who can see how everyone would be so much better off in a priceless system. In this system, everyone will have everything to gain by just "carrying a little bit of the load." Even the greedy money power hungry lieutenants may eventually see how power is a burden -- not a thing to be sought after. Freedom and happiness bring health and abundance. Friendships and true love can flourish when you discontinue competition and begin independence and cooperation. When you discontinue ownership as we taught you and begin to practice your ancient system of "usership," you will have many of your people leave the ratbox cities and start communities out in the fresh- air country. Those who remain may dismantle most of the buildings and allow trees and plants to grow where the cement was. When the cement companies, chiropractors, doctors, and shoemakers stop taking pay or profit, they will not want cement sidewalks either. You will discover dirt paths to be much healthier and natural to walk upon. It will put your bodies in direct contact with the higher vibrations of health, peace, and pleasure. Please remember we are giving you a choice. You can continue to follow orders or you can "take the time" to think for yourselves. If you elect the former -- keep your eyes and ears glued to the mass media, it tells you what to think and how to feel. In this way you live your lives vicariously -- it's much easier. If you prefer the latter -- then wean yourself from all the mass media. Cut drastically back on your buying. This will give you lots of slack time because you won't have to work so much. Take this spare time and observe what's going on. Dream about how you think things should be. Be careful with this spare time -- there is a trap-door called "diversions." If you fall in, you will be too busy to find your freedom. You don't find freedom with booze, sex or drugs -- you find addiction, enslavement and diversion. You have a limited amount of time left to live. Decide what you want from life. Then go for it! Nature, if encouraged with the right seeds in the right places at the right time, will provide all the food you want. People for thou sands of years have been able to build shelters from the materials at hand that nature provides. 35-year mortgages of indentured slavery for a shelter were one of our clever inventions. Here again you can choose -- either continue with this enslavement or create your own inde pendence. We cannot emphasize strongly enough that if your leader, teacher, preacher, guru or guide is taking any kind of pay from you, you have reason to be skeptical of him/her. (We should know!) They may be using you as a means to their own ends. There are many leaders (people with vision) rising up today among you. You may be one yourself. You can at least be your own leader. You can immediately start making your own decisions. You can decide to continue all the bad habits we taught you, to harm your body and mind, or you can decide to discontinue them, one at a time. Making changes in your life will give you a grand new feeling of power over your own destiny. You will soon learn that you can gain full control of your life once you vow not to let the media continue to condition and program your mind-computer. When you get your head above water, you may even wish to help a brother or sister along the way to get their heads above water too. When you see that you don't need or really want all those "things" that the media conditioned you to want, then you will begin to have some breathing space -- some time to think about what it is that really makes you happy. We're telling you these things so you can take over now that we are leaving. We couldn't tell you our secrets before, but there is no point in holding them from you any longer. May we meet in outer space someday, as equals and friends! (This message was written down as it came into my head at midnight.) May 31, 1979 Ernest Mann CHANGES ? If we don't make changes in our lives, there is no growth -- only stagnation, monotony and a down- hill greased slide . . . into a rest home. 22 OUT OF THE RUT The original objective of the Little Free Press newsletter was to help free the world of War, but it has turned out to be a means for me to clarify my thoughts and provide a focal point for my life. I am gaining my own freedom by discovering my enslavements. I still believe the Priceless Economic System to be the system that our common sense will steer us toward if we stop, look and listen. I hope that some of the things I've learned will be useful to others. When I retired 9 years ago, I told myself I wasn't going to use my "thinking time" inventing machines, building shelters or innovating ways to make money. Instead, I decided to try to use that creative energy to discover or develop a better social order. I figured that our social science needed my creativity more than our mechanical science did. Reason told me that I could be most effective if I concentrated most of my efforts into one area. I tried to choose the most crucial area. I think that our mechanical, chemical and electronic sciences should call a moratorium on further developments and help us learn to use that which we already have without destroying life and our life sup port system. In other words, we should learn how to live in peace, happiness and harmony with people and other living things before we build more machines. One At a Time I seem to be able to think on only one thought line at a time. However, while trying to concentrate on one idea, I often get side tracked into another line of thought; but I don't seem to think on both thoughts at once. For instance, I may be trying to write about the priceless system and a bird lands on my window sill. My thoughts seem to switch to the bird until I decide to bring them back to the work at hand, or I pick up on a conversation in a restaurant and I follow that until I catch myself and bring my thoughts back. I can do two or more things at once but I don't think I can actually think on two or more thought lines at once. Maybe you can. I have been aware of this process for some time, but I'm just beginning to relate it to the "freedom of thought" that I imagined I had for the past 51 years. I now understand how my thoughts were not only diverted, but actually led most of that time. They were led and confined into certain approved areas. The slots that I thought in were: money, love, marriage, creating and rearing new workers, accepting the powers that be, sports, war and peace, war and almost peace, don't rock the boat and government knows best. I'm beginning to relate my freedom of thought to that space that I have remaining between now and the day that I terminate. My "now" is really the only valuable possession that I have, and yet, I waste 95% of my "nows" ("this very moments") on trivia! My past is dead and cannot be changed. My future is not here yet, so I cannot live that. All I can really do, is to do the best that I can with my present (my now). I still make a few plans for tomorrow, but I change them if I feel like it. I'm learning a little bit about living spontaneously. My main purpose in life for many years has been to make the highest and best use of my time (my now) that I am able to think of. (I don't believe in a reward after I die, so I try to make my Paradise right here and now. If there turns out to be one, that will just be an unexpected bonus for having done my best.) When I have been aware of this goal (which wasn't too often) I tried to make the best choices of which I was aware. I have only recently become aware of the fact that for the past 51 years most of my thinking has been led for me. I can see that I have been reacting instead of acting most of these years. I have moved through life like a trolley car, taking orders from my pole connected to the overhead wire and following the tracks below me. My first thought-leaders were my parents, relatives and friends. Then came the teachers, preachers and government. Books, comics, movies, radio, TV, newspapers, magazines, billboards, sports and music led my thoughts. Almost all the media, almost all the time, attempts to create a desire to buy, buy, buy. This is true not only in its advertisements, but in its pictures and stories about people who have fine things. Much of the media also seems to make me afraid of other people and afraid of some great catastrophes that might happen. I used to read, listen to and watch much of the media. They were leading my thinking along lines that were beneficial to them (big business). I was reacting, instead of acting on my own initiative. I had a wife and three kids. We had seven rooms, an attic, a basement and a double garage full of "things" to prove that we were good, normal reactors to their suggestions. I am just beginning to become aware of how suggestible I am and was. Now that I'm getting aware, I have a choice. Well, as you may guess, I had to work, work, work to pay, not only for all those things, but also for the housing to keep them. Since I have stopped watching, reading or listening to most of the media, I seldom have a desire to buy anything except food, clothing enough to keep warm and a place to sleep. I also became aware of the burden that my acquisitions were causing me. I sold or gave away just about all of them. Now I have just enough "things" to fill my backpack. I even sold my car about four years ago when I became aware of how much of my time (life) it was demanding, besides all the money it drained from me. For example, one day I was almost blown away when I suddenly realized how much of my day (week) I was spending thinking about the troubles of my car, how and when I would fix it. Where and when I would get the parts. If I would fix it or who I would find to fix it. I spent more time thinking about the car before I got it fixed than I did when I was actually fixing it. Then it hit me like a cyclone -- I was allowing that "bucket of bolts" to rob me of many hours of my life. I have since found many cheaper ways to get from here to there. I no longer need it for a status symbol. I said to myself, "I am an intelligent, good person. I don't give a damn what people think! I'm go ing to try to do what's best for me." The Time Slots I'm trying to look at time in this way: let's say that each life has a bagful of "time-slots" to do with as one wishes. Say that it's a large bag, but it is dark inside and one can't tell how many time-slots one has. Except one knows that one has 24 time-slots to use each day and that these each contain 60 sub-slots. So, we each have 1,440 sub- slots to use each day until our bag is empty. I can either take these slots out of my bag and use them knowingly, or I can allow others to pilfer from my bag or I can just al low them to float out by themselves. Anyway, my bag is always 24 slots lighter at the end of each day. Getting back to thought-leading. The time-slots that I give to reading, watching or listening to the mass media are part of my remaining life that I'm allowing someone to lead my thoughts. In fact, they are doing my thinking for me in that space. I'm allowing them to grab a handful of time slots from my bag (there are still times that I allow this to happen, but it is becoming less frequent). This thinking that I have allowed them to do for me, may influence my beliefs and my actions, now, and in the future. It may cause me to react instead of act of my own volition. The time that I gave to them is time that I have wasted, because I could have been using this time in thinking and in learning how to think, my own thoughts. As I learn to do my own thinking, I'm also learning to act. Retired at Age 42 Learning to think is getting to be an exciting part of my life. I feel like I'm just beginning to become aware of some of the elementary processes of thinking. I'm starting to break through into the other 90% of my brain that has been idle for 51 years. Wow! I always thought that I was a good thinker. I was successful enough in business to retire when I was 42 years of age. But I did not know how to think. I wasn't really aware of the thinking process. I only reacted. I reacted to their Game. I was not aware that my thinking was being tampered with. I thought that I was making all my own decisions. Look at it this way -- when I used to watch sports or read a novel, I was not living my own life, I was living vicariously. I was not thinking for myself. I was reacting to the game. Thinking about someone elses game. I was postponing my own living. I was killing time. (I mentioned to my neighbor that I was reading science fiction to kill some time. His little girl asked me why I wanted to "kill" time. That got me to thinkin'.) I was pouring my time-slots down the drain. It was easy. I just got into a rut and went around and around like a phonograph needle in a record. I'm out of that rut now. I'm standing on the ridges and hopping from one ridge to another. Ya, sometimes I fall back into the rut and take a few more turns around. Actually the needle moves very little. It's the scenery that continually changes. We have a few ups-and-downs and in-and-outs but mostly straight-lives just react to those and that which is around them. There is very little growth or change when one is plugged-in to the present main-stream. Like learning to think has been damn hard work for me sometimes. Sometimes I couldn't make any progress and I just plugged into a thought-leader for a while, like a movie, or read science fiction to kill some time. I'm doing the best that I can and it ain't always easy, Baby! But the rewards are so wonderful that I can't stop now. I'm getting good feelings of freedom and self determination. I'm now able to see how I have created the present ME and am now creating what I will be like in the future by simply making my present moment the best that I can. I can see that I am making choices all the time, either positive or negative choices which create for me either a positive or negative life. I am not able to blame anyone else for my "bad breaks," nor for my "good breaks." I brought them both on by myself. It sure feels good to know that I can steer my own ship if I choose to. As I become aware of people (even my best friends) manipulat ing my life, I'm beginning to tell them, "Hey! It feels like you're trying to tell me how to run my life. I'd rather do it myself." Most of the time I just think it and try to change the subject. I may get enough courage to tell them (in a nice way) that if I want their advice, I'll ask for it. Focusing I think that I began thinking for myself when I occasionally would write some of my thoughts down in a notebook. This way I was able to carry the thoughts out much farther without having my thoughts distracted into another channel. So, by writing my thoughts, I was able to learn to focus my attention and, thereby, get more of my thoughts to gether and then sometimes arrive at a conclusion. I started writing the Little Free Press newsletter about nine years ago. Then I got more practice in focusing my thinking on one subject. Oh, I suppose I used to "think." I had to know how to focus my thoughts on my work and whatever I was doing. I guess it was just that my thinking was more "reactive" thinking in the lines of thought that I was channeled into. Like when the bills came at the end of the month. I would react by trying to work a little harder to make more money to try to get ahead of them. I would react to a "Sale" on men's suits or to a news article that said the price of gas would go up this week-end. By getting myself out of that channel and into some self-directed thinking I have been rewarded. My greatest reward is that it is teaching me how to think for myself. It has taught me the value of fo cusing my energy on that which "I" think is most important. It is teaching me how to take care of my own body (life). It is giving me many good feelings of satisfaction. Even if the Priceless Economic System is never adopted, I feel that my time has been well spent. Subconscious Telepathy? I'm experimenting with what I call telepathy on the subconscious level. With my conscious mind, I think -- no -- I tell my subconscious mind to send out thought waves to other minds who are tuned to my frequency. I tell my subconscious that I need something, and I tell it what I need. Then I forget about it. The next step is to tune in my receiving set. My subconscious seems to communicate to my conscious mind through what we call "hunches." So, I try to become aware of hunches to do or to say a certain thing or to go to a certain place. Usually, when I follow a hunch, I am very pleasantly rewarded by finding what I have ordered. Sometimes by following a hunch, I find something that I needed but was not aware of having ordered. These are positive examples of getting what I order. A negative example is the person who always thinks the worst things are going to happen to him/her. Perhaps they are giving their subconscious mind an order to communicate with people who are tuned to the same negative wave length who will help their beliefs about themselves come true. It seems to work out this way. Birds of a feather, flock together. My Freedom Now! Now that I have gotten rid of most of my "things" and am living very cheaply, I can stay retired for a much longer time. Eventually I may have to make some more money and when and if that time comes, I'll find a way to do it. If I didn't have some money saved up and if I were now working for pay, I think I would try to persuade my employer to cut my hours down or to be a sort of "fill-in" person. Or I would look for a job where they would let me work the hours of my choice. Or I would start some sort of business where I could choose my own hours. Or I would work as many hours as I could for a few months and then quit for a few months. I would get some free time, one way or another. I now have 24 hours per day of freedom to learn to think, to learn whatever I wish, to observe how things really are and to speculate on how good they could be. I have freedom to travel. I not only enjoy traveling, but learn much from it. I have plenty of time to discuss ideas about life. I find this very rewarding. I have gained a lot of freedom because I have stopped absorbing the mass media, therefore, I have stopped desiring "things" and this has broken my slave chain. February 22, 1978 Ernest Mann THINGS IS THIS "THING" THAT I WANT; WORTH THE HOURS OF MY LIFE, THAT I'LL HAVE TO WORK, TO PAY FOR IT ? 23 A LETTER FROM MOTHER Dear Son, (me, a 51 year old grandpa) I received the newspaper clipping1. I didn't show it to anyone. You sure live in a mess and look a mess too. I don't see why you live like that. You are not in a war prison. My sister's son died in a war prison in Japan. He couldn't have leave and go home. You are making your friends and relatives feel bad. You are making them sick. I was thinking of that Saturday and Sunday night. I got so sick I didn't think I would be here today. I was not able to walk to the phone to call your sister 'till later this morning. I tried to get to the bath room which is next to my room. I could hardly get there. I never felt so sick in my life. I thought I would faint before I got there. From 4:00 AM til morning I was very sick. I never was that sick before. Dad and I should have blistered your bottom when we first saw you looking like that. It would have shocked you back to real life again. Our dentist doesn't live like you, does he? My brother's three boys don't live like you and your cousin doesn't either. If you don't feel well, go to a doctor. I had two very smart children and I thought they would always be like that. My three little children (neighbors) came over for cookies today. They always behave so nice. I told them to bring the clothes that needed mending and we could all mend. Why don't all the old folks help the young children and teenagers too? I would love to see you be your old sweet self again. That would be heaven on earth! Love, Mother (78 years old) (Note - 1989, she is 88 years old now and still nags at me in the same way.) DEAR MOM, I haven't written to you for three months. I made myself angry with you because of your last letter which I'm enclosing a Xerox copy. Now, I ask you, if you were living the kind of life that you thought was the very best for you, wouldn't you get angry with your mother if she would reprimand you, as you did me? My friends tell me that I should try to understand you. I'm trying. Another friend says that as long as I seek your approval I will never find happiness and freedom. I think they are both right. I've been sending you my papers for nine years now. My friends tell me that my papers are not too bad, but you never comment on them. I interpret this as disapproval. Well, I continue to grow and write in spite of this. You may find it hard to believe, but, I occasionally get a letter from a reader with favorable comments. I'll try to see the picture from your side. I have hopes for my children and grandson too. But here I have learned from you, that I don't like to have you tell me how to live, so I now try not to give them advice unless they ask me. I have seen you and dad live together for 49 years in suffering and fighting with each other. I have learned from that. I got a divorce when I became dissatisfied with my 25 years of marriage. I left a mighty fine lady, much to your disapproval (I certainly don't recommend divorce unless people can't get along or their arrangement can't be worked out to both partner's satisfaction). I try to realize the strict religious training you and dad received. I remember how concerned you were about receiving your relatives' and neighbors' approval. I suppose these were impossible obstacles to overcome because of your beliefs. I guess I understand that, even as I continue stubbornly to reach for the freedom that I believe in. I'm remembering now that when I was in high school I really wanted to be a dentist, then a chemist and then an inventor, but somehow I got sidetracked into going to business college and then to work for your brother in real estate. At the time I thought it was my own idea, but I'm not so sure now. I suppose you thought it best to steer me into what looked like a good opportunity to you. It's too late now to "cry over spilt milk" but I can see now how you have been doing that more or less all my 51 years. I have felt your disapproval since I first "dropped-out" nine years ago, but I have gone ahead and tried to figure out and live my own desires since then. I think that I have finally weaned myself from my need for your approval. I believe you are a loving mother and a really good person. I believe you have exercised this "guidance" because you loved me. This was the best way you knew of to show your love and motherhood. It has served the "world good" because it has taught me not to attempt to "direct" my kids' lives any more. My three kids are between the ages of 25 and 29 as you may remember. If I can successfully "get off their backs" I believe they each have enough natural intelligence to discern their own needs and desires and to find and live their own happiness. If they pass this liberty on to their kids, this may help in a small way -- the geometrical progression of a segment of freedom. This is what I'm trying to learn now, after about 51 years of conformity -- to find and live my own happiness. So my kids have a 22 to 26 year head start on me. Actually they have more of a start than that because they "took" most of their freedom from me and their mother when they were much younger. I remember the day my oldest, who was about seventeen then, took his major breakthrough towards freedom. He had grown taller than me and had taken wrestling in high school. That day he pinned me down on the floor when I had attempted to spank him for not obeying my "orders." Dad had trained me to obey by beating me. I used the same technique on my kids. I truly regret this now but I did not know of a better method of being a good parent at the time -- just as dad didn't. I forgive him now. I think my kids have forgiven me as we now have good relation ships. My problem was, I guess, that I didn't grow taller than dad. By allowing my kids to do their own things I have gained a lot of free thinking and doing time. I try not to waste my time worrying about whether they are doing things "right" or not. I try to tell myself that they may need to learn the hard way, as I often did. I now use this time to work out and do my own life. This is not nearly so frustrating because I have more control over "my" life and am learning how to make changes that are pleasing to me. Mother, now that I have gotten all this off my chest, I feel a lot better towards you. I love you and keenly desire you to have the best life that you can make for yourself. Love, Ernest July 11, 1978 Ernest Mann Time To Live Ads cry, buy! buy! buy! I did, more! more! more! I paid, work! work! work! Where's my time to find my thing? To do my thing? Is there more than buy, work & pay? Some day I'm gon'na die, so now's my time to live. You take the things. I'll take the time. 1Minneapolis Tribune, Larry Batson Column, 4/4/78 24 MORE ELECTRICITY? When I was eleven years old my folks bought an 80 acre farm in lower Michigan. There was no electricity in the area so we used kerosene lamps for light. It was a mellow peaceful life we had. Dad bought three or four cows, two horses, two pigs and a couple dozen chickens. About half the land was woods and pasture. We farmed less than 40 acres to raise food for the animals. We used about a half acre to grow food for ourselves. The garden was my job. Something to do while I was resting. Ha, ha. My folks, my sister and I picked wild blackberries in the woods every summer and mother canned them. Boy! Did they ever taste good come winter. After about a year the other farmers and dad got together and got REA to put electricity into the area. Each farmer had to pay some money to install the power lines. We all thought that this was real progress. Now we could have electricity! Now we could buy all those fine electric labor-saver ap pliances and tools we had seen in the Sears & Roebucks (I wonder if they are any relation to the Warbucks?) catalog. Mind you, we were happy before we got electricity. We had time to visit with the neighbors and go to town once a week, see a movie and buy a malted milk. We could even see the stars in the sky before we got our fine electric yard light. After dad bought mom an electric stove and refrigerator, had the house, barn and chicken coop wired he had spent all his money. Now there were a whole lot more fine labor-saving appliances that we still wanted, but we needed more income. I don't recall how dad did it, but he bought some more cows and more chickens because this was where we got our money -- from selling milk and eggs. Because of the additional animals we had to raise more hay, corn, oats, soybeans and needed more pasture land. Somehow dad managed to buy the adjacent unoccupied 80 acre farm. Now our two horses were not enough to work all this land so he bought two old tractors which were always needing repair (and gas). Thus we were able to increase our milk and egg income and buy more electric and gasoline powered labor-saver machinery and appliances and pay the increasing electric and gasoline bills. With the electric lights we were able to work until late at night and get up before dawn to start working again to make enough money to make all our payments. This was certainly glorious progress. We could now buy rugs for our house so that we could use our new electric labor-saver vacuum cleaner. Mom got an electric egg beater too. We had to work longer hours and work harder but it all seemed worthwhile then, because we had what everybody else had -- Electricity! Boy, were we lucky! October 12, 1977 Ernest Mann TWO PEOPLE "If two people were ever to truly work together, there would come about so much order on this planet that the rest of humankind would flee into the universe, in search of the comfort of chaos and confusion." Hemeralopia Strabismus (Copenhagen) 25 LIFE CAN BE BEAUTIFUL My Day This morning I felt like I had the day in my bag with my hand held tight around the opening. Like I could do exactly as I wanted to. I still feel that way. To hell, no to retirement, with all bosses. I've found ways to get along without them. To pasture with the teachers, they have yet to learn what to teach. To vacation with all the leaders. Let leaders rise up who take no pay or profit from their leadership, then I might at least listen to them. Free Time I can fill my spare (free) time by allowing others to entertain me, e.g., reading what others have written, booze and drugs are enter tainers, all the media, sports, a job (the boss directs the entertainment), listening to people talk about their day, the weather or gossip, etc. In other words, I can keep busy (distracted) just to fill the space or I can fill that space with that which makes me happy. Activities related to survival, of course, are natural and must be done. At one time in our evolution we may have spent most of our time in pursuit of survival. There may have been a time when there was plenty of food and fewer people so that survival was easy and required little time. I wonder what people did with their spare time then. I would guess they practiced making babies -- no, no, no -- I would guess they may have observed what was around them and perhaps wondered, speculated and experimented. They may have invented reason and superstition then. What will I do with my free time now? With the knowledge that I have, I survive with very few hours of work and use very little money because I stopped buying the junk and stopped trying to keep up with the Joneses. Maybe humans have always been able to survive with very little work, except when there was a drought or a flood. Chunk of Life When I was in the rat race, was I filling my spare time with that which I chose or was I allowing myself to be hypnotized by the sugges tions of the media and my culture? Was I then following those suggestions, but thinking that they were my own ideas, and doing things which ultimately made someone else a little richer? Yes, I was. This made me a little poorer so that I had to work more and this also made someone else a little richer and left me with much less free time. When I work for someone else I give them a little chunk of my life (almost one third of it) to do with as they please. These chunks of my time are part of that space between my birth and my death. I do not have an unlimited supply of time. That time I waste fulfilling others expectations of me or in following the boss's orders or the media's hidden suggestions, is time lost from my life, never to be returned. Act or React? At times I "react" to situations or people and do and say things that I would not do or say if I would have deliberated. So as I become aware of my urge to react I learn to "act" deliberately. I gain more control over my life (my time) and consequently more freedom. All this speculation leaves me with the feeling that lots of spare time is natural for people. How will I fill this space? What criteria will I use to decide? What makes me happy? I have made a list. I like it. I wonder what it will do for me? What Makes Me Happy? I feel a pleasure in crawling into my bedding at night. I look for dawn two or three times before I feel the joy that it is there, then I take pleasure in a few more dreams and then get up. I'm beginning to find pleasure in eating. I'm finding much pleasure in the additional freedom I get from living alone, however I would prefer to live with a mate but haven't found one that will put up with me. Sex I lived with a wife for about 23 years and a lady friend off and on for about 5 years after that and I thought that it was the only happy way to live. But now I can do exactly as I wish. I don't have to wait for anyone nor put up with things I don't like. Now that I have stopped absorbing the sex programming from all the media I rarely feel horny, so I don't need to have a sex partner on hand always. Ever since I got married back in '47, I thought that sex was the most fun thing to do in the whole world. For the last couple of years sex has not occupied such an important place in my life. It may be because I'm 50 years old now, or it may be because I don't read, watch or listen to hardly any of the media any more; or perhaps it may be for some other reason? I seldom listen to music any more, it seems to be heavily loaded with sexual suggestions (and a whole lot more besides). If I'm going to have sex, I don't want a commercial outside stimulus determining when and how often I should have it. I think I would like to find out what my body's natural lusts are and fulfill them if I can. I catch myself humming old tunes from the 40's and discover how, even then, songs were loaded with sex suggestions. So now when I hum or sing, I sometimes make up my own words and tunes. If there is going to be programming done to my subconscious, I`m going to put the suggestions in there that I want. Journal It's really nice to sit here in the sun and put these thoughts down on paper. By putting them down on paper I'm able to focus on one chain of thought longer and sometimes even arrive at a solution. When I'm trying to do the same thing in my head (without the paper) I often get diverted to some other line of thought. I think I've learned more by writing to myself than I have from reading anyone else. We may be a lot smarter than we have been led to believe. Programming I think that everyone has a choice in the matter of programming, once we become aware of it. We can choose to be programmed by others or we can discontinue absorbing it and begin to program ourselves. But then comes the big question, "What do I really want?" I tried for a couple of years to make a list of what I wanted and I couldn't get anywhere. Now I've restated the question to, "What makes me happy?" This one I can handle. I've been able to make a list and have expressed some of it here. I think I shall always be adding to that list. At the moment I can't conceive of how I could ever be bored or lonely again if I can just remember to consult this list when I feel it coming on. Hypnotism? When I belonged to the Insane Society (the rat race), I wonder if the reason why I was unable to turn off my TV (before I gave it away) was because programs and commercials may have some elements of hypnotism in them. I wonder if music on tapes and records have subliminal suggestions which encouraged me in my old consumer habits. Sometimes I tune in with my conscious mind to the lyrics in music and hear statements and suggestions that I totally disagree with. Phrases and key words are repeated and repeated and repeated and drummed into the mind, not unlike repetitive advertising. (Reread Huxley's "Brave New World") I think most people who share their music with me, as background music, are doing it because they think I like it. But, background music is an infringement on my rights to peace and quiet and good conversation. If they refuse to turn it off, I may be able to find alternative places to get what I want. I think I shall tell the person in charge that their music annoys me and if they persist with it I shall take myself and my money elsewhere. It's Later Than You Think I used to see and hear about people who worked hard and long hours so that they could retire when they got to be 65 and then finally have fun. Many of them died before that, and some died a couple of years later. Some felt too old and worn out by then to dare to have fun. "Fun? What's that? Something for kids, ain't it?" they said. Lately I have been noticing many people much younger, who have gone bananas because they couldn't endure the rat race any longer. When I was 42 years old I decided to drop out while I still had all my marbles and enough energy to use them. I'm sure glad I did. I'm 50 now and am really learning how to enjoy life. I realize now that I could have dropped out much sooner if I had only been aware of the consumer programming and how to avoid it. If I had know what I'm just beginning to learn -- how to entertain myself and how to be happy with myself, I could have dropped out much earlier. I'm finding much more satisfying ways to take up my time now which are free or nearly so. Shelter I'm beginning to learn ways to live without having to pay much rent. Some ways are illegal, like living in some ones unfinished base ment. I did that for a few years for $50. per mo. But I do not consider them a crime because I don't think there can be a crime if there is no victim. One might be able to live in a vacant house or apartment in exchange for a sort of night watchman service until it is rented or sold. I have just bought a tent and plan to travel extensively, I think I can find free and very cheap places to camp. I think some parks and backpacking trails are free. Personal Possessions I have gotten rid of most of my personal possessions now except those that I can carry on my back. I carry my home (tent), my bed (sleeping bag and pad), a warm jacket, a rain poncho, a change of clothes, a couple of books, some traveler's checks, my passport and bank book. Total weight about 20 pounds. In my head and hands I carry some skills. In my heart I carry a desire to use these to support myself. I get mighty good feelings from knowing that I pay my own way on this planet. Work The reason I used to have to work so much was simply because I spent so much money. Now I spend little and so my meager savings lasts longer. Bankrupt Government? There was a time when I thought that those who took government money to live on were helping to overburden the system and would help to destroy it. But that strategy is not working because they just print more money and raise taxes, etc. This strategy may have the adverse effect of making the money recipient more subservient, dependent on gov ernment and deprive them of the good feelings of independence. They may then not wish to bite the hand that feeds them, so they may be afraid to help with change. Electricity I have very little need for electricity since I started to simplify my life. I use candles and go to bed early. I have no desire or need to own any electrical appliances now. Lonely Many people have asked me, "What do you do with 24 hours of spare time each day?" My first year after drop-out, my wife and I spent traveling in an old pick-up camper. This kept us busy. The Little Free Press newsletter was born then too. The next 7 years the paper was a major focus for my thoughts and time. Of course there was time between issues when nothing was happening and this time I filled with traveling, building rafts, hunting in rubbish boxes, rummage sales, people watching and many of my old time-fillers like; movies, TV, the other media, novels, women, a little drinking, smoking a little pot, eating in different restaurants and the regular necessities. My last few weeks have been changing. It has been almost 4 months since my last paper and I have become more aware of my 24 hours free time. Since I read about the subliminals the media are using, I have stopped taking in most of the programming by not watching, reading or listening to the media and very little music. This has left me with lots more free time on my hands. I'm now becoming aware of the fact that I used to fill my spare time by reacting to my loneliness or my boredom by doing the things that were constantly suggested by the media, etc. Now that I'm not taking in their suggestions, I'm making some big changes and finding things that "I" like to do. Many of these things are free. I like to sit in the sun and people-watch, to close my eyes and day dream, to go for a long walk, to walk the RR tracks, to fly a kite, to carry my bundles on my ahead, to look into rubbish boxes, to go to rummage sales, to pet dogs, to watch the trees blossom, to feed squirrels, to sit in my room in the dark and think and day dream and to watch the pictures that pass through my mind when I have my eyes closed, it's like rummaging through my memory bank. Outer Space Messages? I've discovered a sound in my ears or in my head some place. Some call it a ringing in the ears. Some call it the music of the spheres. It sounds like thousands of electrical circuits flowing at the same time. Maybe the brain makes some sound. Maybe it's thousands of other people's brains sending out video or audio messages. If that is so, wouldn't it be neat if I could tune-in my brain's receiving set to just one sender at a time and either see or hear what they are communicating. Maybe it's some beings from outer space sending messages. Will I be able to decipher them? Tune in next week. Ha ha. Many people can hear these ear sounds. Just put your hands over your ears so that you don't hear the outside noises, and listen intently inside your ears. You may have to do this a few times before you can identify the ringing sound. After that you can tune in to it without holding your hands over your ears. Well, "So what?" people may ask. Yes, "So what?" But on the other hand we may find some uses for this sound. I'll be darned if I know what it is but I've found a use for it. When I want to really relax so that I can see the movies on my eye lids or when I want to fall asleep, I just listen intently to my ear sound for a few minutes. It works for me. Alternative System? The "free time" that I have created for myself has given me time to observe how things are and time to speculate on how things could be. Having a lot of free time and using it consciously in ways that make me happy, are obviously more enjoyable for me than my old life style was (22 years in the rat race). Dropping-out has made me happier, and made it even plainer to me how bad it really is for those who are still in the race. All this has encouraged me to try to share these ideas with anyone who is tired of the rat race. I have talked with hundreds of people about the Priceless Economic System and about 99% have agreed that it would be a better system than the present world-wide "Pay System," but they say that they just don't see how it could ever happen. Well, it partly happens to each person when they drop-out. They immediately become much more "free." I'm thinking that as more people drop out and start really enjoying their more free life, they (we) will act as examples. People come up to me and ask me, "How and why?" and I tell them what I can. I get a little impatient with the slowness of this "example" method and publish my ideas in my newsletter and now in this book. There are and will be drop-outs with different talents than I have who are and will appear on the scene to demonstrate this free system in different ways than I do. Dropping out may be a first step towards freedom for everyone. It looks like an individual thing, one step at a time, not a mass movement -- but a revolution within each one, revolting from being enslaved to the rat race. Part of my own personal revolution was when I said to society, "You can't make me cut my hair, shave my face or wear your clothing styles!" It felt good to say it then and it feels natural to live it now. What If? Well someone is going to say, "If you all drop out, who is going to produce the goods?" If we continue using the present "Pay System," us drop-outs will have to work just enough to grow or pay for what we each consider essential for us. The rest of the people who still wish to buy the "junk" will continue to work at the jobs which produce the junk. There will still be a balance, because as long as there is a demand for the junk there will be jobs for those who need the money to buy the junk. They won't have to produce nearly so much junk, so then they will not pollute our planet as much nor will they use up nearly as many of our resources. The junk producers and consumers may even learn by watching us, even as I learned by watching some of the young people having fun. Conditioning If everyone is finally able to become aware of the mind conditioning that is going on and how it is being done and by whom, then there may be some hope for freedom for everyone on this planet. Then people may be able to understand "power" and how to set up a soci ety where power is no advantage but is a burden. Then they may understand the Priceless Economic System; which is based on working for free, giving the products and services away for free and with no need for money or ownership. April 19, 1977 Ernest Mann WE HAVE ALWAYS HAD WARS AND ALWAYS WILL HAVE WARS -- UNTIL WE TAKE THE PROFIT OUT OF WAR! 26 WHAT IS HAPPINESS? Is happiness a way we feel? Are feelings a result of a thinking process? Who is in control of my thoughts? Are my thoughts led by an author when I'm reading? By a speaker when I'm listening? By an actor when I'm watching? By events? By objects? By music? By sports? By the news media? By my work? Otherwise, do I allow my thoughts to wander most of the time? Am I the happiest when I'm thinking about things or ideas which please me? If I wish to be happier, should I focus my thoughts more often in this area? What is loneliness? Is it a mood I put myself into when I have been thinking that I need "someone" and don't have her or him? If I continue in this line of thinking will it get worse? If I begin thinking about something which makes me happy, what happens to my feelings? Isn't it the same with boredom and depression? Aren't they only a thinking process, subject to change like all the other feelings? Do others make me angry or do I make myself angry by how I interpret what others say or do? Do I loose control when I make myself angry? Would I be happier and feel more in control of my life if I tried to understand why the other person acted as they did? Should I let them know how I perceive them and tell them that if they continue, I will do such and such or have nothing more to do with them? This would give them a free choice then, to relate in a pleasing way, or not at all to me. I have learned to direct my thinking into any area of thought that I please; it's like switching TV channels, I just tune into a whole different set of thoughts, I am becoming the Master of my own Destiny. Whenever I catch myself thinking along a line that I know will get me depressed, I immediately start thinking about something else to think about. Or I analyze my problem and start thinking constructively to find the best solution and then take some action. Even wrong action is OK, because it leads to learning and to the correct action. We have been conditioned to believe that we need "someone." WHATEVER WE FIRMLY "BELIEVE" -- IS TRUE FOR US, and we live our lives according to these beliefs, whether they are actually true or not. Therefore, we can firmly believe that we don't need someone and then that will be true for us. "Man is an Island." Hermits (both women and men) are living prof of this. Then our searching for fulfillment and happiness through someone else, can cease, because we can also believe that we are "enough" -- that we are each a complete and self-sufficient unit. We can then be happy with our self. We can then enjoy others for the moments that we share together, but know that we don't "need" them. We are not dependent on them, thus we give them no power over us. If we learn to love ourselves much, even joyously -- then perhaps we will not hold jealousy any more. Perhaps "possessive love" is not a happy love and it may be the only kind of love a person can feel if they do not love themselves enough. I'm not really sure about this. Present Thought Topic We are all living our lives as best we can, learning and growing as fast as we're able. The more we become aware of our thinking process, the more we can take control over our lives -- the happier we'll become. First, the best we can do is to start watching what we are thinking about. Second, is to evaluate and ask, "Is this what I re ally want to be thinking about?" Third, if we decide that it isn't, we must then decide what we would like to be spending our time (our life) thinking about at this moment. Fourth, we can now settle down to some good thinking on a topic that we have consciously chosen by ourselves. At this point we start becoming the Master of our Destiny, perhaps even on the road to genius. CHECK LIST 1. Is there any reason to live, if life is not enjoyable? 2. Am I enjoying what I'm doing right now? 3. I want to enjoy what I'm doing! 4. If I can't enjoy what I'm doing, I shall stop doing it! 5. I shall find something to do that I enjoy. My time on Earth is limited, so I refuse to waste it doing that which makes me miserable. 6. I am totally responsible for the way that I choose to use every minute of my 24 hours each day. 7. I am the loser when I waste any of my time (my life) doing miserable things. 8. I shall try to check often during the day to see if I'm doing that which pleases me. March 8, 1981 Ernest Mann 27 SIMPLIFY? Ecologists tell us that if pollution is not stopped soon we will eventually be without drinkable water and breathable air. I have just discovered the idea that I personally have more power and control over this situation than just picking up my beer cans and candy wrappers. This power is a by-product of my realization that all the "things" that I was buying were a huge burden to me. They were taking up almost all my time (my life) just taking care of them and paying for them. The paying meant using up my savings so then I would have to go back to work sooner. The volume of my things was impressed upon my mind and body every time I moved. Like; box after box, trailer load after trailer load of things. Up and down stairs, in and out with arm loads of boxes. Wow! It finally got through to me after about 25 years of married life, moving about every five years, that I would be better off without those "things." I am now looking at things in a different light. Now I think, "Is this thing really worth the hours of my life that it will cost to pay for it and take care of it? Would I feel more free without it? Would I rather have a lot of free time on my hands to do with as I please or would I rather use that time as a slave to this thing?" I now look at most things as just burdens and anchors. I now live close to the area where I "do my thing" so I sold my car three years ago. I realized that I was spending many of my hours thinking about and working on my car. They say that many people spend three month of their wages, each year, just to own their car. Well, that means that people who don't have a car could take a three month's vacation each year. Ah, ha! Now I walk, bus or fly. I like walking best, not just because of the exercise, but because I feel more free to stop anywhere and chat with people. Whenever I find someone who is willing to spend a little time discussing ideas that interest me, like alternatives to our Pay System or how to get the most out of life, etc., I really get extra pleasure from my walk. I even enjoy smiling and saying "Hello." to absolute strangers. This is mostly an upper because most people seem very pleased that someone acknowledged their presence on this planet. Their pleasure gives me definite good feelings so I have increased my good feelings in the past few years. Of course it's impractical to do this where there is too much traffic. Some people don't answer or smile and after I understood why, it didn't slow me. I have had people smile and say "Hi." to me sometimes when I've been down and I know how good it made me feel. You know, life is really fun. Getting back to stopping pollution and waste: Can you see that as I quit buying the junk products, the adult toys, the unneeded things, they do not manufacture as many. I have a direct hand in how much my planet is raped. As I stop consuming, they proportionately stop producing and polluting. As other people see that I and others like me are happier without all the burdensome junk, the age old principle goes into effect, monkey-see, monkey-do. Everyone wants to be happier. "Things" bring a very short-term happiness. As a diversion I often stop and check out rubbish boxes. I have lots of fun finding neat useful things. In printers' and insurance companies' boxes I often find paper and envelopes that I can use. I now get all my clothes from rummage sales and rubbish boxes. I get good feelings from salvaging something that would have been destroyed and from saving my money. Sometimes I find things that I don't need and have fun giving them to people who want them. Last Sunday I found a butter nut and a delicious plum tree right here in Minneapolis. I got nuts and pits from them and gave them to a friend who will plant them. I'm not afraid of people any longer since I stopped watching TV and reading all the alarmist fear inducing newspapers. I have since walked a good many miles alone on streets in many parts of this country and abroad. The place that I live is in a close-in slum district. I believe that all people are basically good if given half the chance. I have come to the conclusion that there is nothing that I really have to do except suck in and blow out, take in a little food, water and excrete. Yes, I need a little shelter in extreme weather and I like to talk with people once in a while. I need free quiet time to think. It takes very little money to take care of my real needs. The more I practice this philosophy the less I need. I got rid of almost all my things. I won't get much Social Security pension because I dropped out when I was 42, seven years ago. I figure if I ever need more money I can find a way to earn it. The less I need the longer I can remain dropped out. Some people tell me that they wouldn't know what to do with so much spare time. Well, I have enjoyed seven full years of spare time. I always find things to do. I could have gone back into the rat race anytime, but I like this better. Of course, I haven't got it all figured out yet. I still have times when I get lonely. But because "necessity is the mother of invention" it seems like I always figure out something that pleases me. I am learning to just "swing" with the low periods of my cycle knowing from experience that I will come out of it. When I remember this I usually come out of the "low" much faster. I quit fighting it and maybe go to a movie or some other diversion. (Author's note, 1987: I couldn't get myself to get back to work on this book for the last day or two. I started to feel a little sorry for myself and then I could see I was starting to get depressed. I tried a couple of my old standby tricks to come out of it. I walked over for a crescent and coffee and people watching for a spell. Bought a newspaper took it home and skimmed it. It didn't seem to help this time. I called a friend. She happened to be depressed too. I didn't talk long with her! A couple of hours later another friend called. I told him of my blues. I told him it was probably just a low in my cycle I'm going through. He seemed to agree with me, BUT, he questioned me about what was making me depressed. I came up with 3 or 4 things and unloaded some frustration about them. Then we argued almost heatedly about politics and ended our conversation on happier thoughts. This morning I arose refreshed at 2:00 AM and went happily and enthusiastically back to work on this book. I don't think there is such a thing as natural mood cycles, anymore. I think that circumstances create them. Like when I was working in the Rat Race, there were periods when I would get into a low mood every month just as sure as a woman does. I would get depressed right after the 10th of each month, right after I attempted to pay my bills. During the three recessions that I somehow managed to struggle through during my 22 years in the Rat Race, I had plenty of tough going trying to support my family and set aside a little real estate investment program for an early retirement for my wife and myself. I don't know if my friend's questioning and exploring or my unloading of my frustrations or if our heated discussion of politics (or all three) brought me out of the depression I was working myself into. The natural mood cycle theory doesn't seem logical any more, because I hadn't been feeling the blues for months. I'll have to remem ber this little episode for the next time I get moody [as I surely will, eventually]. I now think circumstances and how I react to them, are the culprits. END OF NOTE.) In cutting back on my consumption to stretch my income I keep experimenting. I went for five months without electricity in my apartment last year and am now doing it again. I enjoy candle light and often read by it. I get along without the refrigerator easily because I eat mostly in restaurants. I enjoy the absence of all electrical appliances, especially the TV, radio and stereo. I don't get off on propaganda any more. I have a few pieces of discarded furniture. I now prefer to sleep on the wood floor with a doubled over blanket as a mattress. My life style may sound very primitive but I'm learning that the more I simplify my life -- the happier I am becoming. (Author's note, 1987: I now cook, have an electric toaster, refrigerator, popcorn popper, mattress, van, a clean cozy $235 furnished apartment, a computer and am accumulating used things again. I find I have different needs at different times. END OF NOTE.) I'm cutting back on my spending so that I won't have to go back to work so soon. Purely a selfish reason. I'm not doing it to save the environment. That just happens to be a by-product. I do quite a bit of traveling and I could afford to live it up a lot more but I prefer to stretch out my free time as far as I can. I may be able to stretch it until we all switch over to the Priceless Economic System. Actually, I work for free now. I don't make any profit or even wages from my newsletter. Look at what people have to pay to get Ralph Nader's newsletter and as far as I was able to see, he does not get at the prime cause of the problems. Some people get paid for doing the same kind of work that I do, e.g., writing, editing, lay out, delivery to the printer, pick up and distribution. In fact it costs me about $200 every time I put out a newsletter issue. So you can understand why I only publish when I think that I have something to say. I do it for a selfish reason, not to save the world. I really have a lot of fun writing and learning how to publish these ideas. There is a lot of satisfaction in thinking that I am making the highest and best use of my time (life) that I am able to at this point in time. It gives me a focal point for my creative energy. (Once in a while a friendly old woman comes along and gives me a couple of focal points too.) And beyond all this, if my efforts are successful, I will reap another benefit -- that will be to live in a Priceless Economic System where we all cooperate instead of compete for our needs. I'm already learning to practice cooperation. I allow any one to reprint and distribute my newsletter for free. I do not copyright it. I get many good feelings from this free system. It's more fun to give it than to sell it. I should know, I sold my time for 22 years. Giving is more fun! I have discovered myself being motivated often by the monkey-see, monkey-do principle, e.g., when I'm drinking coffee or beer with someone and they have a sip, I seem to automatically take a sip too. I have experimented with this and have found that I can instigate the sipping too. I have also noted that it takes quite a bit of concentration not to follow suite in the sipping. Advertising and movies use this monkey principle. There is nearly always smoking and drinking in all the movies. Well, the smoking doesn't get to me, perhaps because I have not really been hooked on it. But, the drinking almost always does. I nearly always think to myself, "I ought to get me a bottle or stop in for a drink." I seldom get the drink but they got to me anyway. Monkey-see, monkey-do. Perhaps it's part of our heritage. This same principle is now at work helping us change the system. Many of our kids are accumulating less, and liking it more. I've watched them. I've tried it. I like it. I like it. If others are able to relate to this simplification idea they will soon gain more free time too. With this free time will come more opportunity to explore cooperation. Cooperation may be a very close step to the Priceless Economic System. This free time that I now have, has given me time to see that our political-economic system is all fucked up. It has given me the time to see a common sense solution. This realization about "things being a burden" may be one of the first steps in converting to a really free system together. I think that we may do it in steps. We may; 1. become aware that our present world-wide Pay System is doing bad things to people and to our environment. 2. desire a better system. 3. realize we each have the right to a place to live on this planet and the right to eat the food that grows here. 4. reason that we don't have to allow anyone the right to control the land and the food. 5. discover that we are able to communicate well enough with one another and reason out the idea that we will each be better off if we cooperate instead of compete. 6. then soon get to the step where we decide to work for free and give the products and services away for free and maybe we won't. If we should follow some of the above steps I think we may enjoy life more. Please don't feel that I'm putting you down if you are not doing what I'm doing, because I realize that I may have been where you are or I may yet be doing what you're doing. I believe that each of us is doing the very best that we are able to do at this moment. You are growing and looking for better ways or you wouldn't be reading this book. We each grow as fast as we can. It ain't easy, baby! I can see that change is already taking place. The Watergate scandal opened up Pandora's Box and it's all coming out. People have lost faith in government. That was one of the primary steps. People are starting to work together cooperatively in little grocery stores, bakeries, and many other means of production. Many are already working for free or just for subsistence wages. There are good signs all- round. Take a look. August 26, 1976 WHAT WILL HAPPEN? When everybody stops taking pay for their work, and starts giving their products and services away, free of charge? WOULD YOU? If you could have an economic system where there was no reason to have wars, no reason for industry to pollute our environment, no reason to steal, no reason to starve, no taxes, no money worries and everything you wanted was FREE; would you be willing to work without pay, to make such a system possible? Would your friends? Would everyone? August 4, 1986 Ernest Mann 28 PURPOSE An amazing thing happened to me. I think it started when I decided to help stop the war. I concentrated my energy in this area. I began to find people, books and underground papers with new informa tion. I began to discover for myself the things that were happening. There was a period of gathering information, thinking and arriving at conclusions. The observing continues of course and so does the learning. The Little Free Press newsletter began as a means of sharing these observations and ideas. My purpose was to help stop the Vietnam war. Now my purpose has evolved to "help develop a better system of living together on our spaceship that we call Earth." This "purpose" has given me much happiness. It has helped me focus my thinking and activity in one area. This concentration of my energy has made my efforts much more effective. The process of becoming aware of what's really going on and seeing the very obvious solution is a very satisfying and exciting experience for me. I believe that my purpose is a worthy one. I can find no higher calling at this point in time. My purpose is a selfish one. I'd really like to live in a system where everyone has enough of everything, where people are happy doing creative work that they like and where individual freedom is respected. I think that it will be much more fun to live. Cooperating has a tendency to bring people closer together and make it easier to be friendly. So why wouldn't I work my tail off to help bring this about? Whenever I see children who remind me of my own kids when they were young, I feel a strong flow of love and sadness. Especially if the child looks sad or mistreated. This scene always stimulates me to greater effort towards bringing about individual freedom, especially for children. It is amazing that a "purpose in life" can give one so much energy, health and pleasure. I'm amazed when I think of my own personal growth and good health that has also happened as a by-product of my purpose. I'm Greedy Some people tell me that we can't have the Priceless Economic System because most people are greedy. Well, I'm as greedy as they come, I want the best I can get for myself. If this is true for other people too, then they are going to want the PES as much as I do. All that remains to be done then is to show them how they will be better off in a priceless economy and how it can be achieved, then there will be no stopping them until they have it. Greed will be working for humankind instead of against us. Some people ask me, "Why don't you stop using money as long as you're telling us to stop?" I guess I don't make myself clear enough. I have attempted to say that we should set a date and all stop using money on the same day. It would be nearly impossible to stop using money until everyone stops at the same time. I have discovered that by not owning many "things" or using much money I have become more free. The more possessions I had, the more burdened I felt. I didn't "give up" my possessions to help the poor countries. I "got rid" of my burdens because I'm selfish and want more freedom for myself. The less stuff I have, the less I need. I don't suppose it's possible for anyone to understand this until they have tried it. As I discover the fact that I need less, I buy less. My savings will last longer and I can keep my freedom longer and continue doing my thing. Another interesting by-product has come from my efforts to find out how the world is run, who runs it, how they do it and to look for an alternative. While pursuing these efforts I ran smack-dab into myself. I started to learn about me, about how I'm relating to others, about my needs, about fear, life and death and about love. They say you can't find happiness by pursuing it. Maybe this is true in finding out about ourselves too. Perhaps it is a by-product of being involved in following a purpose we have set up for ourselves. I'm not sure, but that seems to be the case for me anyway. I can't write about how oth ers are feeling, thinking or believing, so if I'm to write, I guess it will sometimes be about myself. If it bores you, you will quit reading it, but as long as I enjoy writing, I will continue. Thinking When I'm thinking about: Crooked government, pollution by industry, sexism, racism, drinking, smoking, taxes, murders, robberies, auto accidents, sports, repairing my machine, movies, TV, prisons, laws, news, traveling, sailing, building a better house, getting a second job, my job, space travel, UFO's, high prices, a new energy source, shortage of jobs, revolution, going to jail, salt on the street, rusty cars, escaping, sex, holidays, sickness, fears, love, clothes, appearances, what the neighbors think, God, good, evil, bureaucrats, socialists, communists, capitalists, democracy, money, property, security, etc., - - - then I can't be thinking about, discovering or sharing a way we could live together in peace and happiness on this planet. Which thinking and action would be the most beneficial for us over the long haul? Just think how fast change will come when we each focus our thinking and energy on that which is most beneficial to us. January 20, 1975 Ernest Mann NOTHING IS ACHIEVED BY GROUPS! EVERYTHING IS DONE BY INDIVIDUALS! 29 GOOD LIFE -- C. O. D. Protests Seems like our protest demonstrations have served at least two good purposes. They drew us into the action and they showed us that we do not control government. When we protest to our Masters we are playing their game and asking for better conditions. If we controlled government we would tell them. To quiet us they give us a few minor changes. We get off their backs and they remain in power. We stop playing their games (with their rules) when we seek an alternative system and begin to implement it. It is the same as when our car begins to malfunction. We don't destroy it and then go looking for a new car. No, we use it until we find a better one. The money game is a complex and unnatural system of "them with the most, telling us with less, what to do." Seems simple enough: 1. Figure out who rules. 2. What kind of system do they use? 3. Figure out an alternative system where no one can get control. 4. And change-over! This is what I have attempted to do at the Little Free Press. This is what this book is about. I believe I have found a simple and natural free system. Seems like an obvious solution once you get into examining all possible alternatives. As far as I can see this solution has as yet been unnamed, so I just call it the "Priceless Economic System. Chaos? People have said to me, "The idea of having everything free for everyone and working for free and controlling our own jobs sounds great by wouldn't there be chaos if we made this change-over all at once?" Let's attempt to think through this problem and see what we come up with. Let's say that we all start talking to each other openly about Priceless Economics. Seems like this is our first task -- to get people discussing these ideas. We discuss back and forth how we are going to do things after the Change Over Date (C.O.D.). We may decide to keep our same jobs for a while to make sure that the flow of necessities continues to the stores. As we get the feel of freedom; of getting everything for free, of working for free and being our own boss. This doesn't mean that we won't take advice if we think it's good. We'll have the right to choose. We'll start evaluating our jobs. I suppose lots of people already know that their jobs are totally useless and they will just quit on C.O.D. and get into a work they like. We will discuss our "after" C.O.D. life and work so much and so thoroughly that we will have a hard time waiting for that date. But getting back to the here and now, 1974, I don't see how we can set a date until just loads of people start talking about these Priceless Economic ideas. I guess we will all know when we are ready to set the C.O.D. I'm ready now! Are you? Let's try to visualize how we would do our present job without a boss, how we would feel if everything we wanted was free, how we would feel without money or wage worries. How would we get along if we didn't need to use words like mine and yours so much? If we shared the use of more things it sure would eliminate a lot of production wouldn't it? Everyone will need to understand how they will be better off in the Priceless Economic System before they will want to change. That's all we have to do -- just show people that. No need to force anyone. No battle. No fighting. No struggle. No blood shed. Just good old American "jawing." All companies are operated by people like you and I. The little companies are even managed by an owner who isn't super-rich, who has the same problems (and more) as you and I. In the big corporations all the work is done by people like us. We all have about the same basic needs. We're all in the same family -- "the family of humans." We are producing all the peoples' needs right now. We have the know how. We're doing it. The super-rich are nowhere to be seen. They produce nothing. How could they stop us from doing things the way we see best and from taking control of our own jobs? Well, you might say they will have their foremen stop us. No. Foremen are us. Then they'll have their superintendent or corporation president kick us all out -- they could call the guards. But the guards are us. Then the sheriff and police? No, they are us too. Then how about the army? No, they are us too. So you see there is no one to stop us. Nobody except our own selves. We will not allow the change over to happen until -- we can clearly understand how the new system will work and how -- we will be better off. After C.O.D., if you decide that your job isn't producing anything that you consider necessary for survival or happiness, you will probably quit and start working where you choose. However, if you think your work is producing something valuable to our society you will start thinking and talking with your fellow workers about how you can make your product or service better, how you can make your work easier and more pleasurable, how you can make your environment at work more beautiful and healthful, how you can eliminate waste, pollution, needless work, conflict, etc. You will probably help to develop on-the-job methods to train new people who come to work with you. Your place of work might turn into a sort of family of very close friends working and maybe even living together. Seems like that would be fun. (I'm a 47 year old grandfather, but I still like to have fun. I think we are never too old to enjoy life.) I can see how we will wel come grandpas and grandmas and even children to work if they wish to help. Let's take an example. Say, C.O.D. has arrived and you are a worker making cans for beer and pop. Well, let's say, you have decided by now that you think it is a big waste to have disposable containers, so you quit your job and perhaps get into making reusable containers that people can wash out and take in for refilling. Even though most people decided for themselves that disposable cans were a waste of our planet's natural resources and labor, let's suppose that a few people still wanted to use them. If most of the workers had quit, then the only way they could have cans would be to work at producing them. Perhaps then they would be able to understand the waste better when they provided the labor. We are slowly evolving into many different kinds of living arrangements. After C.O.D., I suspect this evolution will be accelerated. With everything being free it will be much easier to experiment with change. November 25, 1974 Ernest Mann ALL WORK AND NO PLAY, MAKE ME A VERY DULL BOY. An Hour A Day Long long long ago, people1 worked about an hour per day to survive. They used their wits and muscles. They were healthy, happy and friendly. Today, people still work their hour, but must do an additional 7 hours per day to pay for their wonderful labor-saving devices. They are unhealthy, unhappy and unfriendly. ? 1Tasaday Cave People, National Geographic Magazine, August, 1972. 30 MEMOIRS OF A DROP-OUT My ex-wife and I were happily married for 23 years. But it seemed to me that the last few years we were growing in different directions and at different rates of growth. We had the option of compromising and giving up part of our directions and speed of growth to fit the other's needs. This seemed to me to be a restricting thing to do. I wanted to grow to be me, not partly be somebody else. So we lived separately for a couple of years and then finally had the courage to divorce. We are still good friends and both can grow as we please. This was a very difficult thing for us to do. And as I look back on it, I can see that I played several games to accomplish this freedom. I had seen many couples my parents age who stuck it out for almost 50 years together, who spent much of their time fighting. This fighting in my opinion made them physically sick much of the time. This didn't seem like a wise thing to do, to me. I suppose it influenc ed me in my decision to live my own life. My hope was that I would find a person or people whose interests were more similar to mine and that we might be able to spend some time together before our interests grew apart. Because I don't, at this point, quite see how two people could possibly grow at the same pace indefinitely. But the time we do spend together can be beautiful anyway. (Author's note, 1988, 15 years later: Did you ever read such bull shit? Boy! How I conned myself back in '73. As I look back on that period of my life, I can remember why I really wanted a divorce. I wanted to go out and make love to all those other pretty women out there! I couldn't cop to that then so I gave myself that cock and bull story to make the divorce look good. I think I was affected by the mass media which was always telling about all the "affairs" people were supposed to be having and wife-swapping. My, but that sounded exciting. I wanted some of that action and I went for it. I never found much and none was as good as I had had it in our marriage. My current belief is that you need to know someone really well before sex gets especially good. This may be just another belief that I will outgrow or it may be a Truth. WARNING: Let this be a warning to you, don't accept what I write as truth, it's only what I believe to be true, at this point in time. I make plenty of mistakes. END OF NOTE.) Most of our parents grew up programmed with the beliefs, hopes and desires of their parents who were programmed by theirs. The present young people are lucky because many of them (in America) have a lot of leisure time before they start working. With this time, many of them have looked at my generation and my parent's generation and have asked themselves, do they want to live that kind of life. My generation and past ones didn't have the time to do this because we had to go to work and start supporting a family right away. We didn't have time to think, to evaluate, to decide for ourselves. We did what was expected of us. We worried about what the neighbors and relatives thought. But some of our kids, those beautiful people, are trying to break out of our old deep deep ruts and are looking for better ways to live. They don't have to look far to figure out better more logical ways to live. Now we can learn from some of them. At least learn to think for ourselves instead of accepting all the old ways. Just because they have been having wars since "who knows when" doesn't mean that they are a good or a necessity. Watergate Revelation Now that we can see the government crookedness being proved in the Watergate court case we are reinforced. We thought this was happening all the time but we weren't quite sure. Now we may ask ourselves the next question -- "Who needs it? What good do governments do for people anyway, that we couldn't do better and cheaper for ourselves?" When I was 19, I decided to get a job where I could make the most money the quickest way possible, and then retire at a younger than usual age so that I could try to do some good in the world. So I decided to be a real estate salesman. I went to business college and then to work as a realty salesman. Later I invested in real estate and had my own realty business. I married at 20 and we had three kids. In the regular rut I was too busy to see or think about anything except the game I was in called "Have a lot of sex and pay your bills." Around the age of 40, my bills started to get caught up. It occurred to me that I could retire even before I had made a million or before I reached 65. I wouldn't be able to buy a new car every 3 years or have champagne every day but I could eat good and travel for a long time on what equity I already had in property. So I sold it all, even our home and bought an old pick-up truck with a camper. We traveled around the U.S.A. for a year, put on 20,000 miles and that's when I realized many things. I began to be free. And I wanted more of it. There's an old saying, "The more keys you have, the more worries you have." That was true for me. I had had two cigar boxes full of keys in the trunk of my car. I then began to get rid of my personal possessions. Here I unburdened myself even more. I didn't have to take care of all those things any more or worry about someone stealing them, etc. I don't really want to own anything anymore. But I do like to use some things once in a while. So now I rent them or buy them second hand and then sell or give them away when I'm through with them. Wow! What a relief. I can now carry all my possessions in a small bag on my back. Sometimes I think of all the hassle that I went through to get to where I'm at today. I look at the young people who are at that same place already. Man, are they lucky! They took a 20 year short cut. I hate to think of all the drudgery, worry, stress and shit I took to get all those things and all the work it took to get rid of them! I actually need very little money to live. I can now see that I could have started way back there to really live my own life instead of going through that 22 year work-money-possessions hassle. I have very little need of money so I may be able to remain "retired" on my merger investments until my Social Security pension starts. I have time to think about anything and everything. I have time to reason. To figure out how good things could really be on this planet for all people if we just used our heads more and spent less time in bed. As long as we just work hard, buy a lot of stuff and let the other guy do the thinking -- they're going to keep us in our ruts. The truth of it all is there for everyone to see when they take the time to look. It is and has been a lot of fun; learning about myself, about others and finding cheaper ways to live. I guess my definition of the word "necessary" has been continually changing. The process of trying to do things on my own has strengthened me greatly. Given me the courage to try even more scary things. Things that a couple of years ago were just day dreams or "I don't dares." Now they are just stepping stone. Sometimes they are growing pains and sometimes growing joys and sometimes they just seem natural. I have been writing my thoughts in the Little Free Press newsletter now for about 4 years and I guess I can now condense what I've been saying into one paragraph. And that is: "We could have a really beautiful world for people and other living things if we would quit using money, barter and property owner ship. If we would work at our jobs for free and therefore make all the products and services free for everyone, we would control our own jobs and keep people informed of all the ways that anyone could make slaves out of us. Governments would then be unnecessary. Wars and pollution would stop when there was no profit motive. And probably even sickness would almost disappear when people were happy (I'll bet that on the day we change over to the PES, at least 50% of the patients in hospitals will get up, dress and leave). Working together would also be more fun than competing." The Priceless Economic System seemed so clear to me and seemed so simple that I thought sure people would pick it up and start some sort of "crash program" to teach these ideas to everyone (including the policemen and soldiers) so that when everyone could see that this would make for a happier world they would all just change-over together, with out a revolution. It seemed to me that if we really worked hard on it we could do it within a year. I don't know what you can do to help. I'm doing all that I can do at this moment. December 11, 1973 Ernest Mann "The only thing that is constant in the world --is change." Albert Hubbard 31 GOOD HEALTH IS EASY Mind Programming Since I dropped-out of the rat race four years ago I have had more time to observe, think and experiment. I have discovered some interesting and even exciting things about myself and the world around me. The invention of the computer has made it easier for me to understand the workings of my mind. I can now see somewhat of a paral lel between my body and an automatic machine controlled by a computer. A machine that can be run on automatic or on manual. I can now see how "The System" had conditioned me to respond to their stimuli automatically. Mind Library I understand that sounds, sights, feelings and thoughts are recorded and stored in our immense capacity mind -- like filing things away in a huge multi-storied library or the programming of a computer. Our computer-quick subconscious mind is able to sort through this library anytime and all the time. Our conscious mind seems to have a very limited access to this library. Both positive and negative thoughts are stored in this library. If we accumulate mostly negative, then we will be negative people most of the time. What I mean by positive is, "for the good life that I want for myself" and by negative, is "against the good life for myself." You wouldn't believe how much baloney I have fed into my mind library that is really against "the good life for me" or negative. I have just started to see this and I am now learning how to stop feeding this negativity into my mind. I have discovered the fact that my mind can only think one thought line at a time. So when I discover a negative thought coming in I say to myself "That's negative, I don't want that! What is positive about this that I do want?" Then I try to think about the positive and try to get something good "for life" from the thought or experience. A computer is neither positive nor negative until it is programmed. I believe the same is true about us, when we are born. But from birth on we are programmed constantly with both + and -. Now that I have caught-on to this phenomenon I am trying to reject the negative and admit only the positive. This doesn't mean that I refuse to see the bad things that are going down. No. I'll see that, too. But I dwell on positive ideas that may help to solve the negative problem. I try to see how things could be in a positive sense, and try to figure out how to get there. Negative programming examples: I'm no good. I can't do anything right. What will people think? I'm all thumbs. I'm a born loser. You give me a headache. I'm going to make a mistake. I need you. I can't live without you. He is my hero, I want to be like him. Everyone is watching me. The FBI are out to get us. Got to buy guns for the Revolu tion. My phone is taped. My mail is censored. Positive programming examples: I'm a beautiful person. I'm learning. I'm getting better. I'm just right for me at this present moment. I accept myself for what I am now. I'm changing as everything is changing. I'm changing for the better because that's what I want for myself. I'm exploring new ways and new ideas. I'm learning. I accept ideas and things that work best for me. I'm glad I'm me and I'm evolving to be me, not to be like someone else. If I`m being spied upon, I hope the spies are capable of seeing where their long term best interests lie. Our commercialized competitive environment is constantly bombarding us with fears. These I'm becoming more aware of. I'm more choosy about how I allow this programming to enter my subconscious. I try to see it for what it is, mostly propaganda to sell something; prod ucts, politics or some slave-master relationship. Tension I'm not quite sure yet but I think that these negative thoughts give tension in different parts of our body. Try making your arm real tense, like you're showing off your muscle. Hold it tense for a little while and see how weak it gets even way up to your shoulder, neck and your head. Do you see how this tension may slow down the blood supply and the nerve energy flow to your arm and even to your hand and fingers? I believe that in this weakened condition it will start to deteriorate and even come down with some disease or ailment. But did you notice, when you let go of the ten sion, the tingling of the blood flowing back into your arm to feed those starving cells? I think that our body is programmed by millions of years of evolution to heal itself, if we just allow it. That is, when I discover an area of my body to be tense, I just relax it. Then the blood flows back and the healing begins. Relax Sometimes I discover a tension, after it has been there long enough to cause a pain. In this light, pain is a good thing because it alerts me to the fact that I am tense some place and am shutting off my blood supply to the painful area. My next step is to tense up real hard the muscles in that area of pain and then let them go -- relax. I repeat this extra tension and relaxing routine a few times to get the feel of the area being relaxed. I try to figure out what's going on in my thinking that is making me so tense. I think it's usually some problem that I must solve that was causing the tension. When I face the problem and do something, one way or the other about it, then the tension can go away. Or perhaps it is a negative thought I'm holding (I'm experimenting in this area yet). I notice sometimes I get tense in my facial muscles when I'm a little up-tight talking with someone. If this continues very long, before I notice it, I get a tooth ache or an ear ache in this area. Well, this pain is my signal. I realize what's wrong and I immediately relax these facial muscles and the ache goes away. Sometimes soon, and sometimes it takes several hours to heal, depending on how long I have kept it tense. I have a good deal to learn yet about the thoughts that cause the tension. But I thoroughly believe that almost all illness is caused by tenseness that we are holding somewhere. And that once we learn to relax that tenseness, our body will heal itself. I also believe that any hate, anger or revenge that we hold in our minds will cause tensions some place and make us sick and perhaps even cause cancer. Somehow we must turn these negative thoughts into positive ones if we are to get well. (Some call this "forgiving.") (Author's insert, 12/22/87: Sweet Revenge? Anger, hatred, fear and revenge are things I have experienced. On some unconscious level, I felt fear of government when I used to watch the old box. I had seen the spy stories and with all their surveillance gadgets and weapons, and how they always caught their wo/man. Perhaps that was part of the reason I was scarred at first to say anything against government for the very bad things they were doing. That fear eventually turned into anger and then into hate. I made attempts to get my revenge on government by not obeying some of its laws and not earning enough to pay it taxes. As I learned who controlled government, my anger, hatred and revenge turned to the Elite. I tried not to spend much money in their corporations or sell them any of my labor. Eventually my thinking evolved to where I'm at now. Now I believe that it is the Game that we are all playing that makes good people do bad things as they attempt to win at this game. I now don't think that governments are bad, I just think that they will be entirety unnecessary and illogical when we play a Game where everyone can be a winner. I no longer think that the Elite are bad. They are just better at playing the Profit Game than the rest of us and that if we were as good at it as they are, we would probably be sitting at the head table with them right now. When my belief systems were focused on revenge, I spent most of my spare thinking time in this negative area attempting to tear down these institutions. This left little or no thinking time to be dreaming about how good things could be for us all if we had a sensible Game going. It left little time to be dreaming up a better Game. Revenge is a very sickening game. It sickens both parties. One party thinks of ways to "get even" and takes action. Then the other party must find a way to punish (get even) with the other, etc. It's the same as the old "family feuds," e.g., the Hatfields and the McCoys which lasted for generations. It has undoubtedly led many people to cancer, insanity and even murder. Some churches recommend "forgiving" these people who have wronged us. And this works. It is not logical but it works! It is like letting go of a tremendous burden. Like taking off a 70 pound back pack. Such a relief to no longer be driven to get revenge. A more logical way to dump this revenge burden is to become aware of "why" a person, government or corporation is doing these bad things. Did they act originally in a moment of extreme agitation or even hysterical anger or fear -- to do the thing that got the whole revenge trip started? Did I do or say some things that triggered some sore spots in them that fired the event into a blaze? Do others loose their cool and go momentarily hysterical sometimes -- just like we do? Once one understands the "real" reasons behind those actions, one no longer has a need to hate the person or persons responsible. To put ones self in their place and ask if we might have done the same, had we been in their shoes -- helps one understand. Then one can focus ones en ergy on creating a Game where these bad things are not Profitable. Both of these methods have worked for me to shed huge burdens. After that, I had the free thinking time to do positive thinking and then I designed the Priceless Economic System idea. Since then I have attempted to use my time in a positive way to share these ideas. Unburdening myself of fear, anger, hate and a need for revenge has freed my biocomputer of most of its garbage. Now I have space in it to work on things which are making my life much happier and more satis fying. I seem to only think on one thought line at a time, so now I'm trying to use my "thought time" for positive thoughts which build a better tomorrow and a better NOW for me. I find these positive thoughts make my body and mind feel much happier and healthier than when I dwelled on the old garbage. End of insert.) TASTE YOUR FOOD AND ENJOY IT! After it's swallowed, it's too late. Counter-act Negativity In order to counter-act all the negativity that our mind has been programmed with I think that we merely have to handle the negative thoughts as they surface to our conscious level. Then to reprogram our mind with a positive thought about the same idea. It seems like there are at least two levels to our mind, the conscious one, that we are aware of and can control and the subcon scious one, that seems kind of hazy, one that we are not quite aware of. Most of our body functions are run by the automatic or subconscious mind level. Most of our actions seem to be governed by the programming that we absorbed in the past. If we want to change our future actions it seems likely we'll have to change some of our programming. Hunches I'm beginning to believe that what we call a hunch is really our subconscious mind communicating with our conscious mind. Perhaps our subconscious mind is so computer-quick it is able to sort over our vast mental library of information and present the best solution available to our problems. It may present this solution in the form of a hunch. We don't consciously know why we should do a certain thing or go a certain route, but it just feels right and it proves rewarding. I'm trying to flow more now. To be more flexible. I'm starting to get hunches now. I usually follow them and it turns out good. I used to have long range plans that wouldn't allow one to follow a hunch. I can see now that it was very limiting. Hunches usually seem very illogical but I guess that is because we don't see or remember all the facts that are present. Telepathy They say our minds are more complex than a computer, radio or TV. Then perhaps it's possible that we may be able to send mental radio messages or mental TV images to other people who are tuned in to our channel. Perhaps we can even sort through someone else's mental library for ideas if that other person is open to it. I'm not certain yet but I've had some experiences with hunches that seem to point to this. Like a friend subconsciously gets my message that I need something. So he doesn't know why but he breaks his pattern and stays home one Saturday. That is the day I call him for a favor. He's usually at the lake but he didn't go this time. This looks to me, like, if two people are open telepathically to one another, they may sometimes communicate subconsciously. Maybe someday we will learn how to do it on a conscious level. Wow! No more phone bills! Fantasies I have just recently made the fascinating discovery that a lot of my time is (or was) taken up by reliving certain past or possible future events. I would get into these fantasies so deep that I would discover myself all tensed up. Now when I find myself in one of these fantasies I examine it and see if this is a productive place to focus my attention, if not, I begin thinking about something else. Thinking Seems like thinking is done with words. Like talking to oneself. I must experiment more in this area. What do you know about thinking? I sure have a lot to learn yet. But, Baby! It's fun learn'n. Destiny I am the one who controls my present and future, because I'm beginning to control the programming of my mind. My mind is me. It is the thinking or conscious part of me. My life is not in the hands of some outside or higher power or destiny. Everything that I think and do is creating my present and future for me! I am the one who ultimately has "set up" (either consciously or subconsciously) all the good and all the bad, that I have experienced in life! I am taking complete control of my life because I choose to do so. I choose to be me, not a rubber stamp copy of someone else or their expectations of me. You can have a Master if you wish one but I choose to be my own Master. October 29, 1973 Ernest Mann MY MIND IS MY MOST IMPORTANT POSSESSION! 32 CHANGING GAMES Of course the Priceless Economic System is the best Game yet presented, but how do we implement it? By Example! Those of us who believe in it are doing it! Here is how: Individually a. We avoid intake of the mass media because we know it is designed to preserve the present Profit-Wage System. It is like taking off our mind conditioner helmet or slave collar. By avoiding it we not only miss the subtle mind conditioning to be fearful and to desire more things but we also escape the even more imperceptible persuasion to "conform." This saves us much money and time and leaves us with clearer, more creative and courageous minds. b. This "time" that we save is our Life. We learn not to "kill" this extra time, but to figure out ways to use it to make our lives happier and more worth living. c. We try to stay away from entertainment that we must pay for and learn new ways to entertain ourselves. d. We get rid of our surplus "things" (by selling or giving) and discover they were burdens. Some of us are then able to live in a smaller space, thus reducing not only our rent or mortgage payments but also our housekeeping and upkeep. We gain more free time too, not having all that stuff to take care of and worry about. e. We get rid of all our debts in one way or another. For some debts, we work and pay them up. Some of us ignore debts that we now feel are exploiting, like some bills from big corporations, government, colleges, hospitals, i.e., anyone who charged ridiculous amounts for their time that they sold us. Once we realize how we "got-took" by these Robber Barons (who have their monopolies and price-fixing agreements) we don't feel guilty about not paying them. Beating these robbers may not be possible if you keep a job they can garnish or assets they can find. f. We cut way back on our expenses, thus stretching out our money for a longer period of Freedom or reduce the amount of time we need to work for money each year. Again gaining more free time. g. We who were "workaholics," find plenty to do in helping to promote this priceless new system and building our own log cabin or other survival system of one sort or another and learning how to play. We are not needed in straight production as it really only takes about 10% of the popula- tion today to produce all the "necessities." h. We reevaluate our old belief systems and discover which were designed for controlling us and causing us to conform to some set of rules which allowed a few (or one) to control everyone. The people at the top of these hierarchy pyramids are usually very wealthy. This can be seen in the buildings they build, the cars they drive, the property they own and the prices they charge. They enjoy the Power too, so you can see why they encourage us to believe in and follow certain belief systems. Rules set down by others take away our individual freedom to discover for our self what is best for us (this may be true for children as well). As we ignore the established rules (laws, customs, morals & traditions) we eventually discover the only Rule we need and that is called the Golden Rule. It was used long before religion was invented, it is just common sense. We get along much better by using it, than not. All the rest of the rules are redundant, except for those who wish to Rule. Individual freedom is something we each just TAKE. There is no one to really stop us. Just our fears: "What will people think? Can I really make it? What will mother say? I'll loose all my seniority. I'll be punished! I'll get reincarnated as a worm. The Devil will get me. I'll starve. I'll be lonely. I can't get along without this job. I'll not find another as good." FEAR guards the door of our prison (our slavery). As we face our fears they vanish and we are FREE to progress. We take our freedom one step at a time. We like to be able to see that there will be a safe place to put our foot before we take each new step. It takes lots of free time to do all the thinking and research that is needed to gain each step toward ones INDIVIDUAL FREEDOM. Should our lives be devoted to merely keeping our bodies and minds fit to go to the salt mine each day and give our 8 hours? Has the life of the slave really changed? The Master still gets our labor and now s/he "sells" us the diversions to fill our minds, when we are not at work in his/her salt mine, e.g., ball games and movies to watch and shiny toys to play with. As individuals take their freedom, others learn from their example and the process accelerates by geometric progression. Eventually we may have a Free World of Free Individuals -- if we persist. As we take the steps to Individual Freedom, those who follow us gain confidence faster because of our example and consequently learn shortcuts and the route gets shorter and easier. Just think of some of those who went the route ahead of us. Some had it much harder than we do. Some of us may be almost there! With Friends We can cooperate as much as possible without using money, credit, barter or accountability and we'll each be better off and more independent of the money and Profit-Wage System, for example: a. We can make known our skills that we are willing to give, at our convenience, to others within our circle of friends. b. We can make available, with a free box or garage space, our surplus "things" or products we are willing to give to anyone in our circle. c. We can make available a list of tools, appliances, machines, etc. that we are willing to loan to people in our circle. Some of us who have saved up a little money are giving our products free of charge to anyone who wants them right now. We have discovered much more freedom and joy in our free production because now we are in control of the how, if, when, where, why, what and who of our work. When we sold our work we had to please the boss or our customers. Now we please ourselves. If there is no demand, we can continue to produce anyway. We may just be a little ahead of our time. Regardless, we are in control of our production and can continue on, or we can make changes, as we see fit. For some of us, our "product," is our promotion of the Priceless Economic System, i.e., food for thought. We believe that the sooner more people learn about the PES and start arguing about it, the sooner they will want to implement it world-wide. Even though not many are living the simplistic lives that some of us have chosen; after everyone understands PES, we can take a vote and all switch-over on the same day on a world-wide scale. There is little doubt that everyone would be happy to work without pay if they could have everything they wanted free of charge and only need to work about 1/3, or less, of the hours that they do today to create abundance. Especially when they could get free on-the-job training at a work they would like to do. Especially; when they realized that there would be no more wars, pollution, starvation, stealing, taxes and no more money worries. The switch-over would not be complicated. We merely agree to stop taking pay on a certain day and then begin giving all products and services free of charge. We would keep our present jobs, so that the flow of useful goods and services would continue as usual, except for people who could see that their jobs really were not necessary. Obsolete Jobs For example: Most government employees and all politicians, check- out clerks and sales persons, advertising people, bank and insurance employees, credit departments and bill collectors, armed forces personnel, 94% of the prisoners (they are in for stealing) 94% of jail and prison personnel, security guards, most of the lawyers and judges, most of the bookkeepers, accountants and secretaries, 94% of the police persons and all meter maids, workers in defense factories and other "junk" production. These 38 million (or more) people could then get free training in work they would like, that they could see was useful. They might be able to use their same skills or have fun learning a new skill right on- the-job. With this huge influx of new help, more shifts would be created, thus cutting down the working hours for everyone. The engineers and designers from previously competing companies could then get together and design a superior product which would last 10 times longer and be more trouble free, easy to repair and maintain, more economical to operate, more beautiful, more useful, easier to run and be without their present built-in obsolescence and deterioration factors. Once the market is saturated with these new long-lasting products, output would be reduced to almost nil. Only a small plant would then be needed for each industry to keep up with the demand. The excess plant could then be dismantled and recycled and the surplus crew could get retraining in some other production or service. Then working hours would be reduced again by these additional workers. Because no one will fight against having complete automation and robots for the boring, dangerous and just plain shit jobs, this will further reduce our human work load. You can see how this will eventually lead to very few hours of work per week for everyone, and we may just each work for one month and vacation for eleven or whatever it works out to be. We will all have more time for free travel, free learning, time for crafts, art, etc., and time to enjoy each other. More people may choose to help out in space travel and satellite colony research. There will no doubt be unlimited volunteers in this work. With no budget worries the Space Program should super-accelerate. There will be exciting times ahead! Inventors will no longer have to hide their ideas, but will be able to work together. This gained synergy will prod progress even more. There will no longer be a reason for the Oil Industry to hide patents on cheaper and simpler energy sources. This alone should ex plode progress into many new directions. Besides all that, think how nice it will be, without commercials on TV and no advertisements in the paper and magazines and not have to pay for cable or satellite TV, and have some creative happy and enjoyable programs for a change. And have all video tapes free along with free beer, etc. Besides not having to balance your checkbook or pay taxes any more. And BEST of all -- NO MORE MONEY WORRIES or arguments about money! Remember too, as volunteers we will be treated really well at work, because we can quit at any time and still get everything free of charge. It will be to the other workers advantage to keep us happy, because the more people they have the fewer hours they need to work to keep ahead of the demand. You may wonder why I have spent the last 18 years of my life and most of my money developing and promoting PES. It's because I'd like very much to live in a world like that. And, I'd like to leave that Free World as an inheritance for my kids and grand kids -- wouldn't you? I can see it happening too, maybe even within a year, if all the good people start helping who are now burning up their extra time and energy fighting each of the tentacles of the blunderpus named "Profitwagegame." Its tentacles reach out in every direction to cause us trouble. One arm stretches out and stirs up wars, another one dumps pollution all over our planet and then there's the tentacle which steals food from millions of people. Profitwagegame even reaches out and prods people to steal. It has a tentacle in industry which causes unemployment, inflation and depressions. It has several tentacles attached to its puppet called government. When our good freedom fighters and all the other protesters finally realize that when they attack and cut off part of one of the blunderpus's tentacles, it grows back almost as soon as they get home and grows a few more besides. It feeds on their energy. The more they fight it, the more people it hires to protect itself. Just look what it is costing us just to feed its puppet "government" each year! And look how fast it is growing! A blunderpus is the easiest critter in the world to kill. We just stop feeding it. It loves attention. Ignore it and it will soon die for lack of energy. It is such a waste to fight it and feed it so much of our energy. Energy that we could be using to build a new society. One -- for peo ple, instead of for Profitwagegame. There is no enemy -- only ignorance -- of a better Game to play. We either get this show on the road or the old blunderpus will soon drop a lu lu of a depression into our laps and then a few years later WW lll to get us out of it. Lets create us a Game that we can all win at, before it is too late. July 27, 1987 SEVEN WONDERS OF THE WORLD 1. People don't own things -- things own people. 2. A few billionaires control all governments. 3. Five billion wage slaves permit this. 4. Scarcity is created for PROFIT. 5. Environment is destroyed for PROFIT. 6. Wars and revolutions are started for PROFIT. 7. There would be no PROFIT in destruction, if people worked without pay and gave products free of charge. ------------------------------------------------------------ Ernest Mann Little Free Press 1011 6th Avenue NE apt 21 Little Falls, MN 56345 USA (612-623-1965) ----------------------------------------------------------- FREE I GOT, by Ernest Mann. ISBN 0-9620301-1-2. It covers all the Little Free Presses since I WAS ROBOT was published up until the termination issue #90. This book is also available on computer disks from Little Free Press. ----------------------------------------------------------- WHY MAKE COPIES OF THIS BOOK? 1. To give more people a chance to see what is really going on. 2. To give people some HOPE that we can EACH do something to help create a more Utopian Life for ourselves, here and now. 3. To show people they don't have to change all the rest of humanity. 4. To demonstrate our good-will by giving this book (on disks, by modem or hard copy) to at least two more people. (See the pyramid of numbers idea on the last page of chapter 11.) 5. To put this book on a computer bulletin board. 6. To awaken that wild-free-being within yourself and begin finding and using more ways to set yourself FREEEE and share these ideas with others. END