That’s what I’m asking for as support for this site, and for myself. For the last five days I have been researching and writing a piece for this site on how the Green Revolution was designed and deployed as a weapon of imperialism. It’s already 25 pages long, and it connects a lot of dots for an analysis that supports feminism, re-localization, and permaculture as strategic political practices.

For the past three years, I have supported myself and my family through the largesse of people in the movement against the war. I have had some writing gigs and speaking gigs. I sold books out of boxes. I had a couple of consulting jobs on the side. I’m 55, and I don’t have any advanced degrees. Aside from intellecutal sharecropping and political organizing, the only skills I possess are those from the military. As of February 2007, I will have no means of support. But I can study, think, and write to pass that study and thinking along for other people to study and think a bit further.

This site is committed to the belief that the credentialing of intellectuals within the Academy — while it does not take anything away from those with academic credentials — is an aspect of an intellectual division of labor that keeps organic intellectuals — and there are quite a few of us — out. Out of jobs, and out of public discourse. We need subscribers, quite a few, at $10 a month (or 34 cents a day) to allow us to develop this web site full time, but more importantly, to continue doing what credentialed academics do… without the institutional constraints: Study, think, and write.

We will also gladly accept larger contriubutions. (See the “subscribe” button on the right.)

I have a strong work ethic; and if necessary I’ll take whatever work I have to in February. I’m not standing here with a sign threatening to starve. I’ll work for minimum wage if that’s what it takes to pay bills.

But I’d rather spend the 8 hours a day pulling together ideas, history, and current events as analyses that support “feminism, re-localization, and permaculture as strategic political practices.” Almost everything we have on Insurgent American is open to the public. We are not managers, and we are not capitalists. We are not trying to establish a value-for-value exchange system, but one of mutual support, that bends toward the construction of communities. We have valuable things here, no doubt. But I am appealing to you for plain straightforward support, the price of half-a-cup of bad coffee each day, that might allow me to do this work, and for Brian (the technical shaker and mover here) and other contributors to make this happen.

You’d also be supporting those who can use this site, but who cannot afford to support it monetarily… because the site will develop at a rate corresponding to the time we have to invest in it. We appreciate you dropping by. Please support us; and please use this practical strategic resource.

Thanks.

Stan Goff

Posted by stan in Site