 
ReSent-Message-ID: <4fs0gc200awFMPVGIQ@andrew.cmu.edu>
ReSent-Date: Thu, 29 Apr 1993 13:06:48 -0400 (EDT)
ReSent-From: "Jon C. Slenk" 
ReSent-To: +dist+/afs/andrew/usr/js9b/Public/camc.dl@andrew.cmu.edu
To: angst+@CMU.EDU
Subject: Keristan Future Fantasy
From: wce@hogbbs.scol.pa.us (Bill Eichman)
Comments: Validated
Message-Id: <3ZBN3B2w166w@hogbbs.scol.pa.us>
Date: 	Mon, 26 Apr 1993 23:39:13 -0400
Organization: The Heart of Gold BBS, Lemont PA

Here's some more stuff from that Kerista magazine/book, probably the
last that I'm going to type in.. maybe I'll do more if I ever get the
scanner and ocr program I've been promising myself. This is from
page 37 & 38, and appears to be an informal introduction to their long
term plans.


==================
UTOPIAN PSYCHOLOGY
==================

Future Fantasy
--------------

From Utopia 2, Blueprint for Heaven on Earth, 1988, Kerista Commune, 547
Frederick St, SF, Ca, 94117.
==================================================================

The vision that motivates us has been carefully sculpted and lovingly
crafted over the course of more than 30 years of dedicated team effort.
To understand the vision, start by thinking ahead to the year 2050. the
world population has reached 14 billion. Inside of that 14 billion, a
small percentage are part of a neotribal, transnational kibbutz
movement... 3.6%, which comes to 504 million people. The kibbutz people
live a fantastic lifestyle. Their housing is a vast network of
"ecohomestations", rural, urban, and suburban. The ecohomestations
include "ecovillas", which are designed for group living, with 36 people
as the basic module. They are built to afford maximum comfort at minimum
economic and ecological cost, making use of solar cells and other
renewable energy sources. Many of the rural ecohomestations have large
gardens, orchards, and fish ponds and some operate actrual farms, while
others include small factories. The grounds outside of farming and
production areas are landscaped at the Golden Gate Park level of beauty.

Inside the ecovillas themselves, besides the ordinary things you'd
expect to find in a normal house (good beds, a fully equipped modern
kitchen, etc.) there are a number of unique features. The main one of
these is that each ecovilla is an "intelligent house". This means that
computers and artificial intelligence are completely integrated into the
structure. So, things, like temperature, humidity, and lighting are
automatically regulated; you can "talk to the walls" and get an
immediate response. Each house has a telecommunications center, a
computerized linkup to the entire transnational kibbutz network and to
the "World Brain" a comprehensive multimedia encyclopedia of knowledge
on every conceivable subject. You can plunk yourself down in a
comfortable armchair in one of the ecovilla's little audio/visual
learning rooms, tell the walls what subject you want to study that
afternoon, review the list of options offered on the subject, make your
selection, and settle down for a relaxed session, viewing your program
on a top quality large screen video withy stereophonic sound.

The possibilities are almost endless. A large portion of the work people
today have to do in offices they travel to from their homes is done
right _in_ the home. A whole rich world of computer art and music is
readily accessible to anyone who wants to delve into it, and many do. A
large part of consumer life-- shopping-- is to be done from the home,
reviewing products under consideration for purchase right in that same
comfortable armchair in the learning room. Sophisticated communications
systems keep people all over the world in close contact with each other.
Issues and policies of importance to the entire network, or any portion
of it, are debated and analysed by members in every corner of the globe,
and resolved via electronic democracy... right in the home.

The work life of these lucky folks is also like a good dream; a seven
hour work day, a four day work week, a 1092 hour work year, & a 13 week
annual vacation. The factories and businesses operated by the network
have all the amenities: good sound systems, swimming pools and/or hot
tubs on the premises, no dress code, no angry bosses. Every member has a
"Smart Card" which is like a credit card that gives them access to all
the restaurants, shops, theaters, and so forth within the complex.
Family groups plan their time in two and three year increments, with
itineraries that have them spending three months in a Jamaican
resort-type ecohomestation, six months in Northern California, two
months in an old Scottish castle recently bought by the network and
converted into a research and development ecohomestation... all
co-ordinated so that the spaces within the network are getting maximum
use at all times and affording the residents maximum variety.

No one individual or even set of individuals owns this great
international estate; smaller units of people within the larger
organization are trustees of land trusts, and other corporate or
nonprofit entities are the legal owners of the assets. Every member
lives at the same standard of living as every other, regardless of
her/his personal earning power. Lifetime access to the estate and all
it's benefits is the ultimate social security system, and individuals
do not accumulate private wealth beyond a small workout fund. All their
needs, including health care, education, childcare, and the needs of old
age are taken care of. The "social security" is further enhanced by a
social/psychological/philosophical system in which the concept of
friendship is taken out to its furthest possible limits. Negative,
divisive trappings of old fashioned relationships like jealousy,
possessiveness, or rivalry have been phased out, and a fantastic gestalt
growth and communications process phased in, allowing individuals to
develop their full potentials and to live in polyfidelitous families of
best friends. It goes beyond the type of social system that exists today
in the Israeli Kibbutz movement; it is what Fritz Perls, a pioneer of
gestalt therapy, called the "Gestalt Kibbutz".

If you think this sounds too good to be true, you're probably being
shortsighted and a tad narrowminded. But what about the rest of the
world-- the 13.5 billion other people on a crowded, dirty planet? Ah,
here is where idealism and hedonism meet and fall in love. The reason
that the half billion people in the kibbutz network do not accumulate
private personal wealth beyond a limited amount is so that their
earnings, above and beyond what is required to cover their cost of
living, can go into special funds to be used for research and
development and philanthropy. Even in such a splendid lifestyle, the
economic savings of closeknit cooperation keep the per capita cost of
living very low. This means that an average person in this lifestyle,
working for an average sort of income, will be able to both live
extremely well and have a significant amount of surplus left over for
philanthropy.

(two paragraphs on philanthropy left out)

When you put all of this together, you get a very futuristic, enlighted,
and bourgeois notion of existence, and I say this sincerely, without the
slightest degree of negative connotation or sarcasm. The much maligned
bourgeoisie, or midle class, actually sets the standard for, and is the
engine that will take us to, Heaven on Earth. The average middle class
standard of living, which includes cars, nice homes, washing machines,
etc. is at least materially higher than the standard of living of most
royalty throughout the ages. It is through the surplus, the "shuck" of
middle class living, that a philanthropic force can be mounted to solve
the problems which currently plague the planet. When you add to the
level of middle class comfort the rock'n roll spirit of excitement and
vitality, life becomes transformed.




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