While I’ve been away I’ve been contemplating my future in asgardia.  I still want to be involved after all and I’m passionate, clearly, about success.  My actions  back in

August would suggest otherwise but I am still committed to this community.  I am going to finish out my holiday and year and get myself reorganized and I will be back looking for the best way for me to be involved.  If I offended any of you, I apologize.  For those that were supportive, I thank you.  May we all move forward today and forever!

Todd

I’m officially done with this group I have resigned as an MP elect.  I’m tired of being shut out and ignored because I can’t afford to travel the globe.   I wish you the best but I’m out.

And think about what I’m doing.  I’ve spent a lot of time watching people online in discord and Facebook and workplace try to open dialogue, only to get opinions thrown at them that are not necessarily helpful. I’m of the mind that I want to explain my thinking and understand theirs but at times must respectfully disagree and move on.  In no case does anyone need to just be rude for no reason. If someone posts an idea and wants to create a poll and you don’t agree or want to vote in the poll, the. Just move on.  If you have to take the time to say .... I’m not voting on this because it’s ridiculous .... that is unhelpful to say the least... by all means say your peace and be heard but don’t be rude.   My point is we have a constitution and code of conduct for a reason.  If we can’t be civil to each other online then we are doomed to fail at the start.

My tip is to not respond to a post right away, out of emotion,  take a breath reread the post and THEN make your point.

I think I will continue to monitor these apps and pages but I will get active in discussion when I can see people face to face and after that I will use whatever online platform we decide upon.

For those that I will soon be representing, what is the best way you would like to be able to communicate to me as a parlimentarian?  Do you prefer, Facebook, Discord, email?  How would you like to send along your thoughts and ideas?  Respond to this post and let me know!!!

so I'm going to hang out in Discord for a while and probably won't post on here for a bit as I'm trying to nail down communications for the MP role to one or two places.  I feel a bit scattered at the moment and want to get myself on track.  I will be back and will check in with the website, I'm not abandoning you, just moving over to that AP for now to get some work done.  See you over there folks.

Hey asgardians!! I hope your days are going well.  I’ve finally printed off a bunch of our website info so that I can dig through it and make notes.   I will do as much as I can online going forward, but needed to kick myself in the pants by reading it in hand.  I’m looking for the next schedule of events and I’ve already started to get questions and feed back from other citizens.  By the way if you see a member that would like to be in the parliament but cannot afford the fee, please consider helping them Out if you can.  I will do my best as well.  Keep the questions coming I will do my best to talk to you all just know that I work full time (as do so many of you) so my communication will mainly be at night east coast time.

Good day Asgardia.  How humbled and surprised I was to learn my name is on the list of Parliamentarian members.  I can only promise you that I will do the best I can with our first move forward.  I am happy to hear any concerns you may have and am looking forward to the next official steps in this new en devour.  We are all writing our names in the history books alongside those who have explored unknown territories before us.  Some will scoff, some will laugh, some will back us wholeheartedly.  Don't let anyone be a negative force in your attempts to achieve the new.  Welcome all and lets move onward and upward.

Good day Asgardia.  How humbled and surprised I was to learn my name is on the list of Parliamentarian members.  I can only promise you that I will do the best I can with our first move forward.  I am happy to hear any concerns you may have and am looking forward to the next official steps in this new en devour.  We are all writing our names in the history books alongside those who have explored unknown territories before us.  Some will scoff, some will laugh, some will back us wholeheartedly.  Don't let anyone be a negative force in your attempts to achieve the new.  Welcome all and lets move onward and upward.

Good morning asgardia and happy Easter.  I’m excited to hear about any election updates that are out there and wanted to take a moment to say take some time for you today!   Me?  I’m baking a ham dinner and I’m thankful that I can do so.

I think I mentioned that I am the Vice President of a non- profit theater called the Springfield Community Players, in Springfield VT.  We have been around for almost 100 years, in fact, we are the longest continually running community theater (all volunteer) in the state of Vermont.

While I am looking to the future with my running for office in Asgardia, I am also working in the here and now with my theater group.  We are en devouring to get funding to upgrade out heating system and put in an air conditioning system to our theater.  We run out of a re purposed elementary school that was built back in the 1930's.  We have to shut down in November and re-open in April as our heating system uses so much oil it's too expensive and bad for the environment.  We are looking to change all that.

If you would just take a moment to look at my gofundme link and feel free to donate or share the link, I would appreciate it so much.

https://www.gofundme.com/central-heat-and-ac-campaign

I don't believe that I am breaking any rules by posting this here as I could not find anything forbidding it.  But if you know of it, please copy me on the rule and I will take this down.

In the meantime, thanks for any help you can provide, monetarily or just sharing.

Todd Hutchinson

Vice President

Springfield Community Players.

http://www.springfieldcommunityplayers.org/

I think I mentioned that I am the Vice President of a non- profit theater called the Springfield Community Players, in Springfield VT.  We have been around for almost 100 years, in fact, we are the longest continually running community theater (all volunteer) in the state of Vermont.

While I am looking to the future with my running for office in Asgardia, I am also working in the here and now with my theater group.  We are en devouring to get funding to upgrade out heating system and put in an air conditioning system to our theater.  We run out of a re purposed elementary school that was built back in the 1930's.  We have to shut down in November and re-open in April as our heating system uses so much oil it's too expensive and bad for the environment.  We are looking to change all that.

If you would just take a moment to look at my gofundme link and feel free to donate or share the link, I would appreciate it so much.

https://www.gofundme.com/central-heat-and-ac-campaign

I don't believe that I am breaking any rules by posting this here as I could not find anything forbidding it.  But if you know of it, please copy me on the rule and I will take this down.

In the meantime, thanks for any help you can provide, monetarily or just sharing.

Todd Hutchinson

Vice President

Springfield Community Players.

http://www.springfieldcommunityplayers.org/

So we thought I had the flu, but after a week and the medications have not worked, I went back to the doctor and the took and X-ray and found I have a mild case of pneumonia..... If THIS is mild?, then I’d have to have the full blown version... this makes me think.... how do we handle illness in a closed space environment?   Hmmmmmmmm....

hmmmmm interesting.....

Water: Economic Commodity or Human Right? -- Christiana Z. Peppard

Author
Christiana Z. Peppard

April 2, 2015

Water is essential to biotic existence, and it is not a value-free substance, even as the availability of fresh, clean water is often taken for granted in the United States. In other parts of the world, billions of people lack potable water; their lives are constrained by its absence.

Fresh water is also a necessary resource for generating economic wealth and political power; corporations and governments contend over water in many regions of the world.

Who owns water, allocates it, manages it, receives it—in what ways and for what reasons? These are political, economic, and ethical questions.

Structurally entrenched patterns of privilege and injustice—such as access to fresh water—require action on many levels of scale and with the input of variegated forms of situated, moral creativity. In the twenty-first century, such issues of political ecology should interface productively with religious ethics.

Consider water: Should it be understood primarily as an economic commodity or as a fundamental human right? Fresh water is not like most other environmental goods or services. It is sine qua non (fundamental to ecosystemic and human existence) and sui generis (there is no substitute).

These features are universal but are not uniform. Yet for a range of reasons it took the United Nations General Assembly until 2010 to affirm a fundamental human right to water.

Given the U.N.’s rather recent endorsement, it surprises many observers that the Catholic Church has taken a moral position on this issue since at least 2003—insisting, in no uncertain terms, that fresh water is a unique and essential substance for human life; that it is a gift from God; and that therefore access to fresh water should be considered a fundamental human right.

In fact, the hierarchical magisterium has even referred to fresh water as a “right to life” issue, which is no small claim in the pelvically-focused United States. How might this insight resonate with environmental justice movements in the twenty-first century, in and beyond the pews?

Like many U.S. municipalities, the city of Detroit has significant segregation between relatively affluent (often white) middle-class suburban families and downtown residents with compressed earnings—many of whom are African-American, some of whom are unemployed.

During the summer of 2014, attempting to limit economic losses as part of the city’s bankruptcy management, Detroit Water and Sewerage District (DWSD) began shutting off water supply to accountholders in arrears, ranging from corporate clients to individual homeowners.

Implementation was uneven. Stories trickled out of people—some elderly, some homebound, many living below the poverty line—whose water had been cut off without an apparent appeals process.

National outcry by local water justice advocates attracted international attention, leading to a public condemnation by the U.N. special rapporteur on water and sanitation. Discrimination charges were filed by legal aid organizations on the grounds that the shutoffs disproportionately and unfairly affect African-American residents.

Detroit's arrangements of political economy, urban infrastructure governance, and structural racism converged to privilege certain human bodies over others and reveal that problems of environmental (in)justice exist right in the backyard of middle America.

These contests over water resonate globally with patterns of privilege and disenfranchisement in global political economy, even while specific cases vary. Ethical reasoning and prudent, justice-oriented norms for action in this planetary context can benefit from the engagement of religious communities and moral traditions.

The Catholic Church’s global, public endorsement of the right to water is but one example. There are many others.

In Detroit, where questions of water and justice remain visible and vexed, support for disenfranchised people can—and should—take practical, embodied forms.

One compelling and recent example comes from Islamic Relief U.S.A., which along with the Michigan Muslim Community Council donated $100,000 to defray water bill payments for impoverished Detroit residents. “It is important to us in our faith to help our neighbors,” said the CEO of Islamic Relief USA in January 2015.

To be sure, religious cosmologies or moral principles will not save the planet on their own. But they are crucial, often vibrant repositories of values and practices that might just help to make the world a more just, sustainable place—one municipality or human right at a time.

Resources :

Peppard, Christiana Z. Just Water: Theology, Ethics, and the Global Water Crisis. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2014.

To learn more about the stance of the Roman Catholic Church on the issue of water, see, for example, the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church (2004) , chapter 10.

United Nations Human Rights, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. “Detroit’s water shutoffs target the poor, vulnerable and African-Americans.” October 20, 2014. http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=15190&LangID=E .

Couch, Robbie. “Muslim groups give $100,000 to help Detroiters Without Water, Say ‘It’s Part of Our Faith to Help’.” Huffington Post , January 8, 2015, Impact: What's Working. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/08/muslim-group-detroit-water_n_6437506.html

The authoritative, catalyzing text on U.S. environmental racism is Robert D. Bullard, Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class, and Environmental Quality, third edition (Boulder: Westview Press, 2000).

For a recent analysis by a religious ethicist, see Willis Jenkins, The Future of Ethics: Sustainability, Social Justice, and Religious Creativity (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2013), chapter 5.

Image: Industrial sites (Zug Island and US Steel) on Detroit River, 2014; Credit: Corey Seeman / flickr creative commons. To comment, email Managing Editor, Myriam Renaud, at DivSightings@gmail.com .

To subscribe to Sightings and receive it by email every Monday and Thursday, please click here .
Author, Christiana Z. Peppard , (Ph.D. Yale University) is Assistant Professor of Theology, Science, and Ethics at Fordham University. Her research focuses on ethical analysis of modes of valuing fresh water in an era of economic globalization and climate change, and on the construction and deployment of the concepts of nature and of human nature. She is the author of Just Water: Theology, Ethics, and the Global Water Crisis (Orbis Books, 2014). Peppard is also a Fordham University Public Voices Fellow and her work has appeared in TED-Ed, CNN.com , Microsoft's Global Innovators in Education blog, the History Channel, and the Washington Post. @profpeppard

See all articles by Christiana Z. Peppard

Topic Tags: Christiana Peppard Catholic Church Detroit U.N. structural racism environmental justice water rights Islamic Relief USA

.... even the sun is a limited resource.... we need to determine how to recycle as much as we possibly can ... in ways that no one has ever thought of before... what can we do to ensure we are leaving no footprint in space outside of what is necessary?   There’s so much garbage in orbit already... we need to help clean it up.... for our own safety.. the safety of our satellites And the future of any long term established colony’s should we go that route.... thoughts?

As much as I get the flu shot every year, wash my hands and do everything I can to NOT get sick.... this year the flu has nailed me.   While it’s not the worst case in the world it just proves I can’t always avoid it.   So I’m feeling Blah but still excited to see how our elections went, when they are finalized.  Be safe and healthymout their folks!