INFORMATION ON SEVEN50 PLAN

from Rev. Dr. Gregory Wilson

photo credit: starwars.wikia.com 

As a citizen living in Port Saint Lucie, I am trying to understand the benefits of future planning for the local community (the Seven50 plan) and I am also trying to understand the resistance and the intensity of the resistance by the ac4pr groups. I am alarmed by several experiences that I have had. One was that I was in a meeting in Stuart where people were deliberately mislead about the Seven50 plan and becoming negatively emotionally intense about issues not related to the Seven50 Plan, but that were attributed to the Seven50 Plan. And two, that our elected officials are becoming influenced by the emotional tone of this group and not by the factual attentiveness of the Seven50 Plan to the future needs of our communities. I hope the Letter to the Editor and the Article below, which I wrote, will help bring some light to the process of intimidation in our local communities.

My Letter to the Editor :

Reading the Seven50 Plan from the website, it seemed to be a reasonable response to the inevitable future approaching the Southeast Florida region -- a mature adult response. In reading the ac4pr web page I saw a larger picture, Seven50, Common Core, Agenda 21, Smart meters, Obama care, all part of an authoritarian effort robbing us of our freedoms and rights. I needed some education and clarification.

I went to two meetings concerning the Seven50 plan -- one educational and one against but billed as educational, and afterward, I am somewhat stunned.

In his book Being a Character, psychoanalytic author and professor Christopher Bollas describes the creation of a fascist state of mind. These stages form the process of moving from a parliamentary mindset to a rigid imaginative process. There are eight stages: Distortion, Decontextualization, Denigration, Caricature, Character Assassination, Change of Name, Categorization as Aggregation, and Absence of Reference.

In the meeting against the Seven50 Plan, I saw each of these traits in action. Words such as "insidious, communists, socialist, I'm scare to death of this plan," and other inflammatory comments were common, but there were few comments on the actual presentation.

An example of De-contextualization and Categorization as Aggregation:

The meeting began with the collapsing of the Seven50 plan with the UN Agenda 21. Andres Duany's presentation was introduced as if it was the heart of the Seven50 plan, when it was only one perspective (economic), by a consultant, not even one of the planners. This misled and upset people who expected and were looking for details about the heart of the plan.

The Seven50 Plan is a sound plan and can be implemented or not, in whole or in part, by the local community. It is in our benefit to support its development.

Rev. Dr. Gregory Wilson

The article:

A Case Study: Closing minds in the local community

The Southeast Florida Seven50 Plan and The American Coalition 4 Property Rights

One way to identify fascist ideology is that it moves to destroy all opposition internally and externally. The correctness of the fascist view trumps all other thought and behavior. All doubt must be eliminated. The members of this group can have no other position and any thought that suggests something different must be shut down, both in internal dialogue and in the community. We need a systematic way to reflect upon and analyze language and belief systems, including the voices in local community meetings and in the media, in order to see where an ideology is taking hold that systematically eliminates opposing views.

This may sound extremist, but let's take a deep breath and walk through some current examples, and you decide. The campaign of the American Coalition 4 Property Rights (ac4pr.org) against the southeast Florida Seven50 plan demonstrates how this closing of minds can be brought about.

The American Coalition 4 Property Rights has created an aggregate. The elements of the aggregate are: health care (The Affordable Care Act/ Obama Care), Agenda 21, Common Core, Seven/50, and Smart meters. On their web page (ac4pr.org) they change how each component identifies itself and re-identifies the component, and then builds a case against the component based on the re-identification. The language of the re-identification language and web page lay out facilitates a process in which the belief about one component and emotional reaction to one component is transferred to each component without critical thought.

If we examine how each of these elements identifies itself, and then see how the American Coalition 4 Property Rights describes them, we can see the re-identification process:

First example:

How the Seven50 project identifies itself:

“What is Seven50?

“Seven50 (“seven counties, 50 years”) is a blueprint for growing a more prosperous, more desirable Southeast Florida during the next 50 years and beyond. The plan is being developed to help ensure a vibrant and resilient economy, and stewardship of the fragile ecosystem in what is quickly becoming one of the world’s most important mega-regions.

“Spearheaded by the South Florida and Treasure Coast Regional Planning Councils and the Southeast Florida Regional Partnership (SFRP), a unique collaboration of more than 200 public, private, and civic stakeholders, Seven50 is mapping the strategy for the best-possible quality of life for the more than six million residents of Monroe, Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, Martin, St. Lucie and Indian River counties.

“Let’s be clear about what Seven50 is: It’s a process for producing a new plan, currently being created, based on input from the public to help enable each of the seven counties in Southeast Florida to help guide future investment into the region.

“Seven50, which is a local initiative, made possible by a federal grant, is entirely under local control. The plan has no enforcement mechanism other than simply providing good ideas for people to consider in the future as they plan their communities. At the end of the day, each county will decide whether or not to implement those ideas.”

http://seven50.org

How the The American Coalition for Property rights defines the Seven50 plan:

“Seven 50 Regionalists in Florida are poised to enforce low income, HUD high rise stack-and-pack upward sprawl with demographic quotas built without garages located next to mass transit in "Sustainable Communities" where the government will take care of all our needs. Using combined grants from the DOT, HUD, EPA and Building One America, a massive re-distribution of wealth using a tax base-sharing scheme is about to occur. Called robbing the suburbs to pay for the cities (Stanly Kurtz' book), it is a plan so good that it takes the power of the federal government to force it upon us.”

http://ac4pr.homestead.com/#axzz2jDJBBvOy

Second example:

How Common Core defines itself:

“1) Common Core's mission Statement: “The Common Core State Standards provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn, so teachers and parents know what they need to do to help them. The standards are designed to be robust and relevant to the real world, reflecting the knowledge and skills that our young people need for success in college and careers. With American students fully prepared for the future, our communities will be best positioned to compete successfully in the global economy.

“Teachers, parents and community leaders have all weighed in to help create the Common Core State Standards. The standards clearly communicate what is expected of students at each grade level. This will allow our teachers to be better equipped to know exactly what they need to help students learn and establish individualized benchmarks for them. The Common Core State Standards focus on core conceptual understandings and procedures starting in the early grades, thus enabling teachers to take the time needed to teach core concepts and procedures well—and to give students the opportunity to master them.” www.corestandards.org

How The American Coalition 4 Property Rights defines Common Core:

“An untried and un-vetted fad is being rolled out at all grade levels, in all public schools across the nation except for Alaska, Texas, Nebraska, and Virginia. The control of mathematics and English language education has been wrested away from state and local school boards and replaced by federal control. ... Indoctrination is easier to achieve with a nationalized education. In AC for PR compiled research we expose credible links between common core and the UN agenda 21 sustainability movement which is aimed at controlling the West economically and politically as well as the unconstitutional nature of the new system.”

Major Problems with Common Core

Lack of Academic Quality/Rigor

Collection of Data and Privacy

Psychological Manipulation/Screening

Radical Curriculum

Loss of Freedom for Home and Private Schools

School to Work/Career Tracking

The Common Core Nanny State

A tangled web of conflicts of interest and influence

by private unaccountable trade groups and foundations”

http://ac4pr.homestead.com/common-core-menu.html?_=1369158838294#.UnmnJRC2aym

Third example:

How Agenda 21 defines itself:

“Agenda 21 PREAMBLE

1.1. Humanity stands at a defining moment in history. We are confronted with a perpetuation of disparities between and within nations, a worsening of poverty, hunger, ill health and illiteracy, and the continuing deterioration of the ecosystems on which we depend for our well being. However, integration of environment and development concerns and greater attention to them will lead to the fulfilment of basic needs, improved living standards for all, better protected and managed ecosystems and a safer, more prosperous future. No nation can achieve this on its own; but together we can in a global partnership for sustainable development.”

“Agenda 21 is a non-binding, voluntarily implemented action plan of the United Nations with regard to sustainable development. It is a product of the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1992. Agenda 21 reaffirms it and acknowledges that nations should develop their own policies based upon their own interests to resolve potential conflicts between environmental protection and economic development goals.”

In a brief overview Agenda 21 appears to add several elements to the globalization process that has been on going for several centuries. They are the wellbeing of the people and the planet, and how the wellbeing of the people and planet can be a consideration in the economic development of the global economic system. It is an attempt to include the local community and smaller nation states in the decision-making process.

http://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/documents/Agenda21.pdf

How The American Coalition for Property Rights defines Agenda 21

“Agenda 21/Sustainable Development seeks to abolish private property rights through the Wildlands Project and Smart Growth. The major concept of the plan is to govern and shift the three E’s - Equity, Economy and the Environment. The shift of Equity will restructure our system of justice from one that adheres to the principal of equal justice and unalienable rights to one that implements the concept of “social justice.” The Economy will be shifted from the free enterprise system that we currently have to “private-public partnerships.” It will establish a global economy where goods can “freely” cross national borders in order to redistribute the financial, natural and human resources to equalize the income distribution between nations. The shift in the Environment will give plants, animals and even inanimate objects status equal to or even greater than the rights of human rights.”

http://ac4pr.homestead.com/agenda-21-menu.html?_=1370199113422#.UnmnjhC2ayn

Summary:

Language from the primary documents:

Seven50 Plan - is a local initiative, made possible by a federal grant, is entirely under local control. The plan has no enforcement mechanism other than simply providing good ideas for people to consider in the future as they plan their communities. At the end of the day, each county will decide whether or not to implement those ideas.

Common Core - Teachers, parents and community leaders have all weighed in to help create the Common Core State Standards

Agenda 21 - is a non-binding, voluntarily implemented action plan of the United Nations with regard to sustainable development, Agenda 21 reaffirms it and acknowledges that nations should develop their own policies.

Language from the AC4PR:

The Seven50 Plan - it is a plan so good that it takes the power of the federal government to force it upon us.

Common Core - common core and the UN agenda 21 sustainability movement which is aimed at controlling the West economically and politically as well as the unconstitutional nature of the new system.

Agenda 21 - The major concept of the plan is to govern and shift the three E’s - Equity, Economy and the Environment, seeks to abolish private property rights,

In each of the ac4pr language presentations, something is being taken away and something is coming in to control and dominate life from a top down power.

Comments and questions:

Clearly the meaning of the language and the intent of the mission of the groups have been distorted by the language of ac4pr. Whereas the intent of the projects of The Seven50 Plan, Common Core, and Agenda 21 is to empower local communities and involve local communities in the development of the programs dealing with the problems local communities face and will face in the future, the origin and intent of the projects has been re-framed to lead us to believe each project is a form of oppression from an authoritarian power.

Two questions come to mind: what are they trying to accomplish and how are they going about it?

The first is beyond the scope of this paper; however the method of moving communities to adopt the viewpoint of the American Coalition 4 Property Rights will be the focus of this paper.

We have already identified the beginning of the method, the pattern of redefining what something is and then building an aggressive response to your own redefinition as part of a systematic process of capturing the community's mind.

A fascist method of transformation:

Fascism

“Traditionally, Fascism has been viewed as a nationalist ideology. For instance, Richard Falk, Professor Emeritus of International Law and Practice at Princeton University, defines historical fascism as “the convergence of military and economic power of an ultranationalist ideology that views its enemies—internally and externally—as evil and subject to extermination or extreme punishment” (as cited in MacKinnon, 2003)

“Falk articulates what I have long felt about an emerging American national style and language of totalitarianism: one must examine both the cultural act and the cultural disguise. In many ways, the language is very careful. It is important to acknowledge that if this fascist threat exists, it exists in a distinctive form both in the United States and in the world, and that it is conditioned by the American political culture—which is resistant to the language of fascism. Proponents think they’re doing something else; it will all be done in the name of democratization. It’s a very deceptive and confusing style of political domination, because it pretends to be the opposite of what it is.” http://jop.missouri.edu/OrganizationalTotalitarianism.pdf

So an old adage must come into play: Trust the behavior, not the words.

If the American political culture is resistant to Fascist Language and vulnerable to fascist characteristics how shall we determine when fascist ideology is in operation?

We know that fascist ideology moves to destroy all opposition internally and externally. The correctness of the fascist view trumps all other thought and behavior. All doubt must be eliminated. The members of this group can have no other position and any thought that suggests something different must be shut down in inner dialogue and in the community. We need a systematic way to reflect upon and analyze language and belief systems, including the voices in local community meetings as well as media. I have found that the work of Christopher Bollas does provide a direction and a model to use for this task.

Christopher Bollas

I have been working with Christopher Bollas's framework for over a decade and for the most part used historical references and the collapsing of historical references to understand this process, particularly decontextualization. In his book Being a Character, Christopher Bollas describes the creation of a fascist state of mind, which is the necessary precondition for the creation of a fascist political state. These stages are the process of moving from a parliamentary mind set (in which several viewpoints can be considered) to a rigid imaginative process that no longer has an inner decision making capacity and can only see one view.

Bollas says that there are eight stages of moving from a free state to a fascist state. The eight stages are Distortion, Decontextualization, Denigration, Caricature, Character Assassination, Change of Name, Categorization as Aggregation, and Absence of Reference. These stages move through a process of distorting the opponent’s view, taking the views out of context, belittling the views, belittling the individual, discrediting the opponent’s personal character, eliminating his or her proper name and identity, and finally simply not referring to the opponent or his or her views at all. The opponent has become “a disposable non-entity.”

The first stage is Distortion, distorting the truth about the view of your opponent. We see this in the pattern of redefining what The Seven50 Plan is and then building an aggressive response to that redefinition as part of a systematic process of capturing the community's mind.


The second stage is Decontextualization -- distorting the contextual understanding. For example, Andres Duany was at one time identified as “The Architect of Seven50” in the ac4pr website. I went to a meeting where a video was shown of Andres Duany presenting the Seven50 plan to a group of local planners. His presentation was billed as the heart of the Seven50 plan. The meeting began with the collapsing of the Seven50 plan with the UN agenda 21, defining social equity and sustainable development and then labeling that as a negative direction. Even after Duany clearly said he was going to speak in the abstract and not give details, presented a picture of global economics and how Southeast Florida fits into that model, many of the attendees were angry because he did not give details. This was the convener's design. To present a consultant's perspective, (and he is only one of 16 consultants) on one of the 10 issues of the Seven50 plan as the heart of the plan will of course mislead and upset people who are looking for details about the heart of the plan. It was a beautiful and artful decontextualization move by The American Coalition for Property rights.

The third stage is Denigration, belittling the person’s views, a process that reduces conversation by replacing reason (the ideation of the disagreement) with emotion (affect).

“Tyranny in Florida: Seven 50 Exposed” is the name of one of the segments on the ac4pr web page.

It is language used to stir emotions.

From here we move easily to the fourth stage, Caricature, where you belittle the person.

The fifth stage is Character Assassination–discrediting the personal character of our opponent.

This quote is from the ac4pr web page, “Andre' Duany is demanding the power to usurp our free speech and our representative government with a tyrannical form of government in Florida that will dictate every aspect of our future lives. He intends to establish a fascist form of government in our state to bypass our individual voices. Duany clearly states he wants to eliminate public meetings to start Seven 50 in Florida, then the United States and then the United Nations. Join us now to help us protect our individual liberties before it is too late.” This is simply not true.

The sixth stage is Change of Name. Changing the name is the first rule of conflict. Objectifying the enemy, objectifying the other person means that I am no longer yelling at another person. I am yelling at the objectified name. In the case of Seven50, "communist", "socialist," freedom taker, it seems any name that has historical negitive emotional intensity is in the grab bag.

The seventh stage is Categorization as Aggregation–in which the opponent’s identity is lost as you lump him in with others, “ health care ( The Affordable Care Act/ Obama Care) , Agenda 21, Common Core, Seven/50, and Smart meters.” 



And finally the eighth stage, the Absence of Reference, at which point you simply don’t include a group of people or particular thought in the conversation.



The information below is from the ac4pr website. I think it is action designed to move Seven50 into Absence of Reference stage, eliminating the Seven50 plan from discussion before it is even fully formulation:

"Tuesday November 5, 2013 – 6:00 PM  SLC Board of Commissioners meeting.    Please come and show your support for the fight to Stop Seven50.

Thursday November 7, 2013 – 6:00 PM  Seven50 staff to present final Seven50 Plan to St Lucie Board of Commissioners at special meeting, open to the public.  AC4PR will make a rebuttal presentation at that meeting.  If you can only attend 1 Board meeting, THIS IS THE ONE TO ATTEND.

Sometime before February 15, 2014, consortium partners who wish to withdraw must officially notify the Southeast Florida Regional Partnership of their decision to withdraw.

Saturday February 15, 2014 – HUD funding for the grant ends. At this point the Seven50 Plan will likely be adopted by the Southeast Florida Regional Partnership.

It’s unclear, but documents on the Seven50 website suggest that Consortium partners that have not formally withdrawn may now be considered to have adopted the Seven50 Plan and have some level of obligation to IMPLEMENT the Seven50 Plan."

These stages effectively eliminate dissenting voices within us, and within the fascist state. Learning to recognize when this method is being used can help keep us free, both internally and externally.

In Conclusion:

Using this model that was developed to identify the process that is transformative of national and relational dynamics to close the imaginative process down and inculcate a mindset that is narrowly focused with absolute assuredness founded on an intense, fearful, and angry foundation raises many questions. I hope that by using the case study methodology, highlighting the relationship between The Seven50 Plan and The American Coalition 4 Property Rights, some light was brought to the community dynamic of creating a Fascist State of Mind. To oppress an idea and plan developed by the local community and the joining of other local communities to deal with impending problems, facing the future without responding to the problems themselves ought to raise attention by itself. However to identify a move to oppress local citizens with rhetoric that has little connection to the local community and can be connected to a national movement ought to raise alarms.