in response to an article on Grist (click to read article)

on the subject of sustainability, and the need for our global societies values to be altered to not only allow for but encourage sustainability: for sustainable practices to be 'built in' to our every behavior. it seems to me that it's best to simply reverse the system that has allowed our values to become so skewed in the first place. it was capitalist ideals, greed, that drove the wedge between man and the earth, and it will be philanthropical ideals that will bring man back into natures fold.

cooperate, not for profit--as a corporation does--but to promote sustainability and equality in every aspect of life. build non-profit cooperative schools, car manufacturers, insurance providers, hospitals, automotive service centers, recycling plants, solar power plants, fisheries, farms, building developers, music labels, film producers and distributors, employment agencies, et cetera.

any necessary business can succeed at providing better products, at a lower overall cost, while also providing higher quality employment to more people, as a non-profit cooperative than as a greedy for-profit corporation. the only question is whether to build them as member operated or employee operated organizations; and that will most often differ in accordance to the customer/members contact with the org. a farm is best run by those who participate in it's functions personally, while a grocery needs the input from it's members to determine what products it should buy, and from where.

also, like the for-profit business model today which uses the International Monetary Fund to promote the use of it's model globally, a Non-Profit or Cooperative Monetary Fund can be created with the pool of excess funds from the overall cooperative and non-profit community, which can then be used to fund the global development of yet more cooperatives: buying and converting for-profits when there isn't room in a current marketplace for what could be a very beneficial cooperative.

this, by the way, was how communism was supposed to work. only with communism a government was used as a middle man; with the job of acquiring property, businesses, and banks, and then redistributing ownership over these things to the people... however the greed and selfishness of those in government lead them to hold onto that which they acquired in order to promote and maintain their positions of wealth and power. the model i've described does not allow for such foolishness to occur; so long as all cooperatives are limited in size, and allowed to function as an individual entities; while still maintaining the support of the larger community.

billboards? manipulative or deceptive advertisements or commercials? copyrights? most business law? most gov regulation and oversight? unemployment? high crime rates? excessive drug use? excessive sales of antidepressants? high suicide rates? terrorism? these things have no place in a sustainable society.