The marrow from my speech at FutureEverything 2012 - a big thank you to Jodi Rose for making this beautiful PreziTation for me to use as a frame for the keynote.
Democracy:Upgrade on Prezi
Democracy: upgrade = (re)Public –
(r)evolution - (h)activist - H(e)art-h
What is democracy?
Who is the system to serve?
What is a parliamentary representative?
What is a parliamentary representative?
Who does he pledge alliance to?
Who writes our laws?
What are the cornerstones of Democracy?
What is the purpose of a constitution?
I want you to think about these
questions and find out what their content means to you.
I am an activist in parliament. The
longer I serve, the more I think about the meaning of the questions I
have just posed. The more I understand how the system works, the more
obvious it is to me that there is a serious system error. The system
is like the hard drive on computers you would have to defrag in order
for them to work, the bigger the files the less efficient the
computer would work. The problem with our systems is that they are
too big, too alienated from the people they
are supposed to serve. It is too difficult for the public to be able
to influence and have impact on the (re) in the rePublic. Sometimes
when the computer is too fragmented the best solution is to zero it
in order for it to work, sometimes a complete system upgrade is the
only way out. We have reached the point in our democracies that we
need to zero the system and install a new system. We need to move
away from the big complex to the small fast system, where each and
every person has to understand that we are the stuff that makes the
system. We are the system. We are the government. We are society. We
are the power. We are the law. It is not beyond us, unreachable nor
undesirable to be it, the system is a reflection of who we are.
In order to empower people to act on
this awareness and to start to apply changes through our only means:
through action, we need to have direct democracy with the liquid
add-on. We need to craft our constitution
for and by the people. (Constitution is the agreement of a nation on
what sort of society they choose to be). Law is currently crafted by
and for the 1% - we need to simplify our laws and make sure we agree
on the spirit of the law, rather then adding on their complexity with
endless patchwork.
The cornerstones of society are freedom
of information, expression and speech. The Internet is the last free
world, that has enabled us to connect, share, be informed, act and
resample our creativity. The internet is now under serious attack, as
the corporations and governments are trying to place their reins of
power on it, in order to industrialize it
and to have absolute control over how we connect, share, be informed,
act and resample our creativity.
I am a hacker in parliament, I went
into the system in order to understand how it works and my conclusion
is clear: Install new system with a new form of democracy of the
future, where we move away from democratic dictatorship with many
representative heads to a direct
responsibility of direct liquid democracy. Are you ready to be the
co-creator of your society? Do you understand the importance of your
participation? We are running out of planet, so for the future of
everything it is time to wake up and start co-creating.
