Welcome to "the Auto-Free Timesí
nineteenth issue." We now call this magazine Culture Change to
try to improve our focus.
Please let us know what you think.
As this issue shows, we still hope to bring about a
global halt to new road construction, and we still promote car-free
living. But there was always a lot more to Auto-Free Times, and we
now get down to those issues by going deeper and broader.
You can send us your articles, drawings, cartoons and
photographs beyond transportation, land use and energy.
The Auto-Free Times started off as the Paving
Moratorium Update in 1990. It shed the latter name and tabloid format
in the mid 1990s. But, despite the compliments we always got for uniquely
addressing critical issues ignored by the mainstream environmental
movement, we sort of reached a point of spinning our tires and not getting
much traction. Itís okay to be ahead of the times, but when a change can
help, one should go for it.
This time Iím hopeful of greater success in
publishing for a good cause. All good causes, in a way, are covered by the
concept of culture change. Iím happy about my work again, and my
colleagues are on board more than ever.
Reactions are typified by the excellent contributions
of exclusive articles whose subjects go beyond even the wide range covered
in the Auto-Free Times of yore.
Considering the heightened threat of violence as the
U.S. responds uncreatively to the attacks on the World Trade Center and
the Pentagon, it is important to address societyís violence. Culture
Change does this unflinchingly. The dominant order likes to use
violence (despite its claims), against people and nature, so we here are
part of the worldwide movement creating peace on all levels.
Culture Change is for anyone wanting to see more
family cohesion and solidarity, more community to fall back on when
getting carjacked, or anyone reducing overconsumption. You donít have to
be car-free or fight highway constructionóbut youíll see the need if
you donít already!
Wouldnít it be great if we could just transform
overnight into a bike-riding, train-transported, walking, sailing,
paddling, horseback-riding society? But if you insist on working for
someone else, donít worry, you can still get to work: if commuting is
your thing. Let it happenófor as long as energy supplies permit! Thereís
the rub. Thereís the global warming. The war on mother Earth. Such
violence needs to be curbed if we wish to cure terrorism, so we canít
ignore what motor vehicles do to our lives. General Motors et al is
not just above the law, it may be the law. Then what? We
"Reclaim the Streets," although protesting nonviolently can get
you labeled "terrorist" today more easily, by those who already
wanted more control over all citizens.
This magazine may help us all get to nonviolenceónot
passivityósoon; later is too late.
I have contributed more than my normal share of
articles this issue. Please send material for us to publish (without my
byline - ha ha), and join us in hoping to be able to pay contributors some
day.
If you want Culture Change to continue in its
mission to help change or replace modern destructive culture, then please
let us know in any and all ways.
Join in a beautiful cause and hope-filled endeavor. Our
readers have almost all agreed in the concept of freedom from "asphault"
and other forms of petroleum dependency. Letís see how much better we
can together further the global movement for a sustainable, just world.
