In shocking news, TPP is everything bad ACTA was and more, and we can assume TAFTA will be yet worse.
Any state signing a binding international trade agreement without a vote of informed representatives and an open text is not a democracy.
I don't say that as a rhetorical position. It's not. It's a statement about the basic definition of democracy.
No member of the TPP negotiations can be considered a democratic country. They're all states captured by the interests of the wealthy.
If we continue operating on the pretense that we're dealing with democratic governments and give credence to those tools, we'll keep losing.
If we start by understanding the reality of our political situation, we might be able to actually do something.
The reality is simple: no existing state really supports freedom of expression and association. If we want those things, we must take them.
If we want an global Internet for humans, we must take it from the companies and the states and build it ourselves.
If we want the ability to make collective decisions on the future of humanity as humans and equals, we must take it and build it ourselves.
If we want to have a global cultural heritage at all, let alone one that's not comprehensively monetized and locked down, we must take it.
If we want to be able to talk to our friends, lovers, and strangers without fear, we must take that too.
No one will hand us these things. It is not in the corporate interest. The state does not find it convenient.
We can't do it alone. We need each other in this struggle. This is the infrastructure of thought; it's not a small project.
We will find some state & corporate allies in this - nothing is black and white here - but we must understand those alliances as contingent.
We are not without hope. We can rebuild it. We can have a future as humans and equals, without respect to bank accounts and passports.
But no state, no vote, no monetized product, no futures market, will ever get us there.
Americans, your cherished Constitution won't help you. It's time to stop pretending it will & join with your fellow humans everywhere else.
Europeans, you can't have rights that magically appear inside fortress Europe. These rights are for everyone or no one. Decide.
We will need every tool, every resource, & every ally that's genuinely with us in this fight, and that means the law too, when it can work.
But the law is rarely with us; it exists to support the interests of the state and the wealthy, as we've seen.
We need community, and we need infrastructure. We must make the kind of abuse that we see in TPP and by the NSA impossible.
And we must do so in full knowledge that every human matters, that everyone's suffering is equal, and that we live and die as one planet.
This fight isn't a fight about activism, although that's part of it. It's a fight about culture.
The state and the rich, to some extent, understand activism. They've spent a century learning how to fight it, and their tools are good.
Culture is much harder for them to fight, because they move within it and it's part of them.
A global culture of freedom, equality, & connectedness can sweep them off the map. Eventually, they'll go with it willingly, as part of it.
If we can't work together, join up across communities, and stop harassing or throwing allies who are with us on this under the bus, we lose.
-- Eleanor Saitta, @dymaxion
13 November 2013
Storified version
I for one support and agree with this 100%.