Ital is vital

Retail therapy they call it - the instant and fleeting rush that comes from buying and consuming. It is all more fuel for the consumerist fetish that sees the buying and selling of unnecessary products as good for the economy.

Despite his statements about 'neither left not right' which is not how I would phrase it Nandor is real example of what I want to do as a Green politician, what is rational and beautiful from Rastafarianism shines from him.

He wrote a nice piece on political economy for my book Babylon and Beyond. Read it here online.

To all those politicians more concerned with gravy trains than accessible public transport, Nandor can give you another way.

Nandor flags up from a Rasta perspective a lot of the anti-capitalist deep green politics that the rest of us get from Marx, Buddhism or even the Koran.

Read and see what you think.

Ital is Vital
Natural living is a must. The foundation of Rastafari livity is to seek a life that is natural and earth-loving.

Rastafari philosophy overstands that the most beautiful thing a person can be is one's true natural self. It is also the most powerful thing. That is why naturality is such an affront to Babylon - it is a direct challenge to the power of the empire.

Just within Aotearoa, hundreds of millions of dollars are spent teaching us that we are inadequate. We must be made dissatisfied with our lives, so we can be manipulated and sold - sold as wage slaves in order to be sold the crap we don't need to make ourselves feel better about ourselves.

Retail therapy they call it - the instant and fleeting rush that comes from buying and consuming. It is all more fuel for the consumerist fetish that sees the buying and selling of unnecessary products as good for the economy.

We must be ashamed of our humanness. Shave your face, your legs, your armpits, your bikini line, splash scented alcohol all over yourself, clog your sweat glands with anti-perspirant, dye the grey out of your hair, condition the kinks out, perm kinks in, bleach your black skin, fake tan your white skin, anything to make you look, smell and feel less like your natural self and less like a human being.

Rasta rejects all that. A dreadlock Rasta has thrown away the brush, thrown away the shampoo bottle. I&I wash our hair with water and herbs and allow our hair to be what it wants to be. If it dreads, it dreads. If it does not, it does not. It is the direct opposite of Babylon's obsession with fashion, including the fashion that cons young people into paying hundreds of dollars to a hair dresser to fake dreadlock one's hair.

Dreadlocks are DREAD-locks because they strike dread into the hearts of downpressors. They confront the artificial person with their own fakery and assert naturality. Fake dreads on the other hand warm the downpressors heart, because they mean Babylon has found a way to commercialise even that.

The interesting thing is that when chemicals, combs and razors are kept from one's hair, when the knots become nats become dreads, then an amazing thing happens. Those snaking locks become roots, or antennae, into reality. As writer Alice Walker wrote in her book "Living by the word", growing dreadlocks lifted the lid off her skull and allowed her to see a new kind of reality.

So dread is ital. The Rasta lives an ital life also through the food that I&I eat. The highest heights (ites) of the italist is strict vegan - no animal product at all. I as a Rasta have not reached that level yet, although I am strictly vegetarian. Some Rasta eat fish, and even those few who eat meat would try to avoid pork and shellfish.

It is not just about meat. Unprocessed foods are best, no refined sugars and flours, no salt. Ital is wholesome, natural and living food.

Babylon loves processed and artificial food. It keeps better on the shelf, so is good for capitalism. Food can be grown, processed, synthesised and preserved, transported, stocked and stored from one side of the globe to the other. Never mind that it is shit, for the body and for the land.

Better to grow ones own food as much as possible, or get it from a local grower. Better to use whole grains or freshly ground. Better to eat food that is freshly harvested and that still retains the vitality of its life force.

Babylon fears the natural because the natural world is uncontrollable. Every attempt to assert mans domination on the natural world ultimately ends in chaos. Today's illusion of human control is maintained by a massive entropy of ancient energy stores in the form of fossil fuels. It will not last.

The need of the empire to control and dominate has created a weird mythology. The story of "Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde", the writings of Freud or the book "Lord of the Flies" demonstrate the false assumptions underlying Babylon's fear of the natural human being.

The fear is that civilisation is a thin veneer holding us in check. Take away that control, they say, and we become wild ravening beasts, murderous and rapine. In reality it is "civilised" humanity that has defined the depths of human depravity - the Catholic inquisition, the Nazi death camps, the torture houses around the world supported by the US empire and that maintain capitalist control.

Such depravity can only come from a people alienated from themselves. The natural human being is whole, one, content in themselves and with no need to exert power over another.

That's why ital is vital.