I recently was speed walking around the city skimming plaques on houses, sidewalks and statues, astounded by the depth of documented mainly political history on every corner. I also couldn’t get over how people (presumably politicians or the politically motivated ) wore suits in a city of such heat and humidity, but that is another conversation. As a visitor from the small mountain town where I live, being in DC felt like the epicenter of politics, the White House, the pentagon, THIS was where the things happened. What the things are exactly, I couldn’t tell you, there was just a conscious sense of separation between where I live, the decisions I make and this burgeoning metropolis where people aim to set the policy and laws that impact the world.
Tag: united states
How can we rebuild trust and create change within our lives?
It can be difficult to imagine how to begin to create a better world when we don’t trust one another and when we don’t trust our government to do what is best for us. It can be difficult to mobilize and find strength in our community when we don’t trust our neighbors and when we don’t trust ourselves to be able to make the changes necessary to bring integrity and accountability back into our democratic process.
There’s a great deal of jadedness and apathy stemming from this simple, yet difficult, problem: a lack of trust.
What can I do to strengthen democracy?
Democracy is a system of self-governance in which citizens elect representatives to pursue their interest, and a system whose functionality relies upon the concepts of truth, justice, the rule of law, and an educated populace. In the United States we rely on representative democracy as our system of government. We rely on this system to provide for […]
Why is media literacy important?
As a country, we are yet again faced with a moment to reflect upon; a moment that some view as a triumph of our justice system and others as a failure. Regardless of which perspective you believe to be true, in a moment such as this we all must take pause to understand how mainstream media coverage and social media messaging has impacted our understanding of recent events.
Education, Democracy, and the Media in the United States.
The neglect of the relationship between education and democracy is in my view our greatest contemporary failure, and it has led us precisely and inevitably to this moment of profound civic crisis.