In light of the times in which we live, I have decided to post an article here that I wrote some time ago during the Occupy movement. It is inspired, of course, by the Zeitgeist movies, which I recommend to everyone if you haven’t seen them. The work that Peter Joseph has done in the world is immeasurable and I applaud him with all sincerity. I recognize that it is incongruous to post this article and continue to manage the university within the current paradigm. It is beyond my capacity at this point to change it on my own. I do believe, however, that as each person wakes to the possibility of creating a world without money, we move toward this potential. And since we are here, now, in 2012 (whatever that ends up meaning), especially here as the holiday season approaches, it is an idea worth sharing.

The John Lennon Model: A Blueprint for a New Socio-Economic System

It is time to introduce a new socioeconomic system upon which to create a new world. More accurately, it is time to create a world WITHOUT a socioeconomic system for we, as a world community, have evolved beyond it. It is no longer needed.

It is time to end the “isms.” Capitalism, Communism, Socialism—They are all broken beyond repair. Instead we need to invent a new model, one that goes beyond contemporary concepts and embraces the truth of who we are as humans, the truth that says, “We are One.”

We are one. One world. One People. One Community.We no longer need to compete for resources. We no longer need to engage old world concepts like competition, greed, and money. It is time to let them go.

John Lennon created the template for this new world in 1971 when he penned the song, “Imagine.” The song has been touted as utopian when it was really a model of a truly workable society and all of us knew it in our hearts. We just didn’t know how to bring it about.

But the world has changed. We have finally reached a place where we are ready…ready to see and implement a new way of living. It is time and we are the ones we have been waiting for.

Imagine no possessions. Its easy if you try.
Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can 
No need for greed or hunger, A brotherhood of man 
Imagine all the people, Sharing all the world

Can you do it? Can you imagine a world without possessions? A world that moves beyond competition into a true community? A world without greed or hunger where we share the whole world?

People seem to have forgotten that the world herself provides everything that we need and always has. THERE IS ENOUGH for all of us. This is especially true if we can allow ourselves to evolve past a world of competition into a world of community and stop WASTING our resources. As long as we continue to embrace capitalism (money-ism), we will continue to compete for resources. We will continue to be “all the people wasting all the world.” And we will continue to breed a world where 1% of the people own the resources and the other 99 percent struggle.

I believe that the world has evolved beyond this. We as humans have evolved beyond this. We inherently remember that part of us that wants to share the world.

Cooperation vs. Competition

Many of us already share our resources within our own communities. These communities are called families. Whenever we sit down to the dinner table, no one asks to see your credit card to see how much of the pot roast you are allowed to have. Families continue to promote the natural display of community. Everyone shares the food on the table. Everyone shares the bathroom. And everyone shares the responsibilities of managing the household based on their skills and interests. And though no one wants to clean the toilet, it does seem that in these oh-so-precious microcosms, someone cleans the toilet. And it gets done simply because it needs to get done.

No ownership? No possessions? How could that Possibly Work?!

Well, again, families do it all the time. A house is OUR house. The kitchen table is OUR table. The refrigerator…. you name it. Inside of families, everyone just sort of owns everything. Now that doesn’t mean that people don’t have things that are special to them or that they claim to be their own. This would continue to exist even in a world without ownership. People would still have things that they LOVED and therefore they would be “theirs.” But this isn’t based on ownership in the same sense of the world (as in this is mine and you can’t have it.) It is based on love. It is based on appreciation. It is based on responsibility. And it is based on caring. It is also based on the value of that object in the creation of your life.

Ownership Vs. Stewardship

So in a world where everyone shares everything and “ownership” doesn’t exist we will need to create a new world for personal items that we care for for our own purposes. We can call that “stewardship” instead of ownership. So if you have a laptop that you use and it contains your personal items, you are the steward of that item and until or unless you choose to give it to someone else or return it for community use, that particular laptap is “yours”. You are the steward. Others respect it because they have no need or desire to take YOUR laptop for their own.

Now this is very easy to do because it is no longer a world of competition. If you want or need a laptop, go down to the Community Resource Center (formerly known as “stores’) or go on the internet and pick one out! There is enough for everyone! And because you can have all that you want and need by simply taking on the role of stewardship, you never feel a need to take home 10 laptops and you never feel a need to take from someone else! Why would you?

Breaking the Illusion

Before we can truly implement a world without money, we need to first look at the illusions that have maintained this system for so long even though it has caused tremendous hardship and pain. These illusions include the idea that we need money as a means of barter, that people only work because they are forced to, and that everyone must work or our society falls. Let’s examine each of these illusions in some detail.

1) Money is Necessary as a Means of Barter

Almost everyone believes that money is necessary— that somehow we need money to measure a person’s worth on the planet in the form of trade. Almost everyone will tell you that money evolved out of a world based on barter and trade. And almost everyone is flabbergasted when they find that this is one big lie.

Did you know that throughout history VIRTUALLY EVERY COMMUNITY WORKED TOGETHER. Barter NEVER existed WITHIN communities!!!! NEVER!!!! It was an idea that was introduced for interactions BETWEEN communities. If you had something that we as a community wanted or needed, we would barter with another community who had it. And this was only necessary because of the vast risk associated with traveling long distances to get it.

Through the use of modern day technology, these distances no longer exist. Communication can take place across the globe in real time. And we can be just about anywhere on the globe in less than one day. We are now a global community and barter is longer necessary.

2) People Only Work Because They Have To

Research indicates that this is actually not true. In fact, when people HAVE to go to work for survival purposes, they generally do a poor job. When they go to “work” because they WANT to, they produce higher quality products and feel good about the work that they have done.

I personally assert that people love to be productive. They love to participate. They love to create. They love to share. They love to help each other. And they HATE to work.

But if we find a new word for work, then we can change the entire paradigm. Perhaps we use the word “Contribute” instead. Wouldn’t people much rather “Contribute to Society” than “Work for a living”?I know I would!

In fact, as soon as you remove the broken concept of WORK from our vernacular and from our perception of an appropriate way to run a society, you’ll soon find that people are infinitely more creative, more free, and more productive in their creations than ever before.

Think of the implications of this. What if people contributed to society by doing what they most wanted to do?

Think of the contributions that could be made to society under this model! Imagine a world of equality where everyone is free to contribute in whatever way they find interesting! If people were free to explore their true talents the results could be amazing. Imagine what doctors could do if they could research cures for medicine because they felt passionate about finding a cure? And what would happen with technology if people were free to explore new options without having to bow down to those who had the resources. Imagine the art and the creativity that will be showered upon the earth!

So, you ask, what about the jobs that nobody wants to do? The “dirty” jobs like cleaning out sewers or washing the dishes?

Well, I assert that there is someone for every job. I think the natural system of things is just set up that way.

When you take money from our world, you remove competition. When you remove competition, all of a sudden every person and every job has value. In this scenario, you will find that there are many people who will be willing to take on every job that is necessary to run our society. In fact, we might find that these very jobs that we disdain in our current economic model might become jobs of high esteem in our new society. EVERYONE appreciates the guy who cleans up the messes of the world as he has very high value especially if you realize that you would have to do it if he/she didn’t.

3) Everyone Must Work or Our Society Falls

Again, if you change the word WORK to the work CONTRIBUTE then you find that this premise falls away quite quickly. I mean ask yourself, does your family dog have value? He/she doesn’t work, doesn’t bring in any kind of income, in fact he SUCKS up resources and sleeps all day long just waiting on you to show up and give him love. So DOES your dog have value?!

Well, ask anyone who loves their dog and they’ll tell you that they are of the highest value in their life. Their value is inherent.

Parents who are past their working years still have value.

Children who do not work still have value.

In fact, everyone and everything has an inherent value. When we take our world out of the world of competition and move it into the new paradigm, you will see that everyone can do whatever they want to do and we will still have all that we need to run the world!

4) Jobs are Necessary

The first thing you have to realize is that almost all jobs are unnecessary. As soon as you take money out of the system, a vast majority of the jobs simply go away. The obvious jobs are all jobs DIRECTLY related to money. This includes bankers, accountants, insurance agents, investment brokers and Wall Street types, and IRS agents and other government jobs who are responsible for collecting taxes or money from you. Then go to all advertising jobs, all marketing jobs, all sales jobs, and all jobs that support advertising, marketing, and sales. We will no longer need cashiers (and you will no longer need to wait in line to pay!) and we will no longer need real estate agents, or anyone who simply moves paper around.

When we move out of a world of competition, we no longer need so many laws because most laws are created to define who owns what and how we will punish people who try to take more than their share. Once everyone owns all of the world, the legal system becomes largely unnecessary. So there go the vast majority of lawyers, judges, legal clerks, policeman, and everyone who works at or maintains a prison. And yes, most of those who have been imprisoned (largely based on a world of inequality) will be freed to become members of society once more.

Once we are living as a global community, we will no longer compete with each other for resources. Therefore war will be obsolete. We will no longer need ANYONE or ANYTHING associated with the military industrial complex. No more soldiers. Military’s around the world will simply cease to exist.

My assertion is that a vast majority of jobs would disappear almost immediately. Once this happen, people will be free to do whatever it is that they really want to do, contributing to society from a place of joy, from a place of safety, and a place of love.

So what jobs will remain?

Let’s remove the word JOB and replace it with the word ROLE.

We will still need people to take on certain roles in our society. Primarily we will need to grow and distribute food. We will need to manage and maintain our infrastructure including technology, electricity, plumbing, roadways, and medical facilities. We will need people to take on the role of distribution and we will need to manage, maintain and grow our transportation systems. And while government as we know it will no longer exists (because we no longer need anyone to oversee our system of laws which are largely about management of money), we will still need people to oversee the management of resources. This would be our new government.

I assert that many people would happily step up to take on these roles. People want to contribute and they want to be productive. Just as people keep their lawn mowed or their house clean, they will do what needs to be done to make the world better. The payoff will be palpable making it joyous to get up and take on a role as needed. Living in a happy, healthy, safe world is motivation enough to participate in a world.

You can see examples of this in all cultures. The Native Americans, for instance, all worked together to create their communities. They gathered food together, they managed shelter together, and they managed conflict together. It is a working example of what we can create once the false monetary influences are eliminated.

5) People are Naturally, Greedy, Competitive, and Violent

I would assert that greed is an offshoot of inequality. When everyone has everything that they need, greed simply goes away. Everyone owns everything. If you want it, you can have it, but without personal ownership, no one can possibly take more than their share.

For instance, let’s say you want a yacht. Well, in this new world, we would all own all of the yachts and we would all take care of all of the yachts. So if you want a yacht, simply go to any dock where the yachts are stored, and take one. If you want it for an afternoon jaunt with some friends, take it for an afternoon. If you want to take it on a 3-month cruise through the Caribbean, do it. There are enough yachts for everyone to do whatever they want. This is easy to imagine. Go to any yacht club on any given day and you’ll see that the vast majority of yachts are just sitting there unused.

So if you can have access to anything you want at any time (based on the appropriate management of available resources) then why would you be greedy? What could possibly stimulate a need for more if all of your needs are satisfied?

Perhaps people are competitive but if you remove the competition for resources this competition moves more into the natural competition between people for the love and attention of other people. This is a healthy competition. And perhaps this would change as well. You have to ask, if couples didn’t need to marry and stay together for financial reasons, would they? And is there even a reason for the family unit in its current incarnation if people were all part of one big family?

As far as violence goes, I would think that most violence is an offshoot of the frustration of inequality. While I can’t assert that ALL violence would be eliminated, it is reasonable to assert that general violence like street gangs, etc, would dissipate or disappear as equality was reestablished.

What Would Our New World Look Like?

Oh man, THIS is the fun part! There are so MANY different ways that the new world can evolve that it is mind-blowing! And as soon as you realize that it is a world of cooperation, not a world of competition, everything becomes possible again! YOU NEVER HAVE TO ASK WHERE THE MONEY IS COMING FROM BECAUSE MONEY NO LONGER EXISTS! Instead you think in terms of possibilities and you think in terms of resources.

Resource Management

A critical aspect of this is learning how to appropriately manage our resources. Now this seems like a big deal because we still believe in lack, but once you realize that if we take care of our resources instead of destroy them we are hugely abundant! And when 1% of the population hoards the vast majority of the resources, we have enough for EVERYONE to have all that they want! This includes people in places where poverty has been the norm. When we work together we have more than enough for everyone!

So we need to start with the simple concept of resource management with starts with something as simple as DON’T WASTE! The way we live now, in terms of waste, is just ridiculous. How often have you bought something at the store that you bought BECAUSE it was cheap, you kept it for a few weeks or months or even years before it broke down. And of course, it is more expensive to get it fixed than to throw it out and get a new one. And thus, your purchase and the resources it contains go into a waste dump forever more. What a huge waste! This waste is built into our current socioeconomic system that virtually requires companies to make the cheapest products possible with attrition built in so that the product MUST be replaced in as short of a time as possible, making it necessary for you to buy another one and subsequently employ people to mine the resources and subsequently put them together and sell them to you.

So when we remove capitalism from the equation, we can go back to making quality products! I mean think about it, if you were going to build a table for your family, would you build it from the cheapest materials possible so that it would need to be thrown away in a year or two? NO! Of course not, you would build it from the highest quality materials you could find and you would build it to last for a hundred years!

Well, if all of our manufacturing with built with this in mind, we would have a whole new world of resource management! We would stop building crap and build quality once more.

Technology as Solution

When we finally remove fear and lack from the equation, it is possible to put our true technological prowess to work. Instead of protecting jobs, we will use technology to automate as many jobs as possible, allowing people maximum freedom to create and live. Since the implementation of Capitalism, technology has been squelched in the name of profit. For instance, as early as 1901 Nicola Tesla began creating something called the Wardenclyffe Tower. This tower was designed to provide free energy for the entire planet. The tower was shut down, however, by George Westinghouse when he asked Tesla, “Where do we plug in the meters?” Once it was clear that the energy would be free, the project was shut down. In a world where money is no longer the authority, these technological advancements will become possible again.

Manufacturing, The Light Bulb

Did you know that it is possible to make a light bulb that lasts for more than 100 years! In fact, a light bulb that was built in 1901 is still going strong after 110 years! Think about that! From the very beginning, we have known how to make a light bulb that would last for 100 years! But because our our socioeconomic system, we choose to make light bulbs that will last 100 hours! In fact, you can look at the box and it will TELL you how long they have manufactured the light bulb to last! When you think about the implications of this, it is mind blowing. How many millions and millions and millions of light bulbs have been manufactured unnecessarily that will never decay and fill landfills all over our globe? And how many thousands of people have spent their lives making these inferior products? And if we applied today’s knowledge to light bulbs, could we create a light bulb that NEVER went bad? Now that is an exciting idea!

If we simply adopt the Lennon Socioeconomic Model of All the People Sharing All the World, we can go back to manufacturing products with quality!

Automotive Industry

Think about the implications of this on the automotive industry? What if we started building quality cars to last? We know that car manufacturers build cars to break down. Under the current socioeconomic model, they have no other choice! If they don’t sell more cars, they are out of work! Well, we know that it is possible to create a car that will go for 300,000 miles because Toyota did it with the Camry. What if we manufactured cars that could last for a million miles? And what if we could manufacture cars that run on water instead of oil? We also know that this has already been done because Stan Myers figured out how to do it in Grove City, Ohio more than a decade ago! Think about the implications of this? How much of your life is spent working to pay for a car? And to pay for the gas that goes into a car? Remove that from the equation! Can you feel the relief in your life and in the life of everyone you know? The thing about this is that it is sooooooo very possible! And it is possible right now!

Medicine

For many people the big question mark is what about medicine? Won’t we still need doctors and nurses and the big huge pharmaceutical machine? Well, this is yet to be seen. Much research indicates that stress is the primary cause of illness and aging. If you take survival stress out of the system, it is easy to see how many people will simply lead healthier, happier lives. The need for medicine will diminish. Add to that the need for medical companies to keep us sick to maintain this machine and one has to wonder how many pills and surgeries are performed merely for the profit. Add to that the suppressed cures like the Rife Machine which was known to cure cancer as early as the 1940′s and you can imagine a total and realistic transformation of the medical system that can serve all people without requiring people to work 80 hours a week to maintain the system. This doesn’t even include the tremendous power of alternative/energy healthcare solutions that have been suppressed for decades and which offer natural and healthy alternatives to the medical model.

So How Can This Happen?

It is is really, really easy. We simply collapse the current system. And this is really, really easy. We simply collapse the banks and we refuse to let the government dictate a new “solution” in the form of a one-world currency or a one-world government. Many know that this plan is already in place by the 1%. It is designed to enslave all of us forever and it will work if we don’t wake up to the fact that we don’t need them, they need us. Their system of competition and greed requires our cooperation. When we remove it from the equation they are rendered powerless. This is the goal.

We are already in the process of collapsing the system. Or more accurately, the system itself is so broken that it is breaking of its own accord. People have simply stopped paying their credit cards and their mortgages. The more of us who stop playing their game, the weaker they become. If we simply all took all of our “money” (resources) out of the system it would collapse over night. The game ends when we stop playing.

I personally believe that it is as easy as collapsing one major bank. Bank of America seems the obvious target as they are the largest US bank and they are already in trouble for their less-than-integrous business practices. So if we, the 99, simply decided to charge up our Bank of America credit cards and then simply stop paying them back. Easy. And if you have a Bank of America mortgage either stop paying until the system collapses or move your mortgage somewhere else. Simply take them out of the equation. If enough of us did it, they would collapse and take the whole system with them.

So take yourself out of the system. Stop participating. That is all that’s required.

NOTE: This article is originally published at this website:
http://intermetu.com/2012/11/the-john-lennon-model-a-blueprint-for-a-new-socio-economic-system