Written
in the 1970s. Updated Oct. 2014.
The
purpose of the festival is to show the urgent need to shape alternatives now. Ways
must be found because of the violent, acquisitive, alienated, industrial
society which now poses a threat to survival. People have for centuries
searched for equality and the right to and ability to
determine their own development.
Individuals must accept responsibility for themselves. Personal happiness and
equality, as much as a good society depend on self-realisation.
The most
vital factor is the sense of true identity. This is lost because our
identities are created by others – not by ourselves. The all-powerful externally
created hegemony in this assumed-to-be free society, and its eternalised
personal alienation, must be understood if self-realisation is to be achieved.
The
starting point must be ‘will to be that self which one truly is’.
There must
be equality and effective individual participation in government and in every other
group activity if self-realisation is to be achieved.
ConFest
will be concerned with the search for the true nature of man and woman.
For many
centuries, belief that man is inherently bad has exercised tremendous
influence. Because of this belief, individual needs are suppressed and the
result is that personal helplessness, lack of independence, and the desire
to be led are created.
From infancy on, people are re-trained to be self-denying, falsely modest, self-effacing, and mechanically obedient. They are taught to suppress or hide their natural feelings or energy.
Social
ideology is governed by contradictory altruism, by guilt, and the
inability to experience work and action as a pleasure. This results in tendencies
towards violence. But is not the basic natural needs of people that have a
destructive and hedonistic outcome – it is the result of the repression of
basic natural need that is violent and destructive.
The internal
social crisis of today that result from these contradictions means that we must
shape the alternatives now. There is not just one alternative. The new society
will be made up of the choices of multitudes of people – individuals and groups
– who are determined to find a way out. No one can be excluded.
Sincerely Jim
Cairns