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Diskussionsveranstaltung

“Es gibt Alternativen. Trauen wir uns, sie zu denken.”

Österreichpremiere, Votivkino, Wien, 20.1.2011

Das Zeitgeist Movement in Österreich lud ins Votivkino zur Österreichpremiere des dritten Teils der Zeitgeist-Serie des in New York ansässigen Regisseurs Peter Joseph: “Zeitgeist – Moving Forward”.  Nach der ausverkauften Vorführung folgte eine Diskussion mit Prof. Franz Hörmann (WU Wien), Christian Felber (Gemeinwohlökonomie, Demokratische Bank), Karin Schönpflug (feministische Ökologin), Franz Nahrada (Soziologe, Vernetzer) und Nicole Lieger (Lehrbeauftragte am Juridicum Wien).  Die Moderation macht Johannes Kaup (Radio Ö1; Psychotherapeut; Sendungen z.B.: Im Zeit-Ton).

Franz Nahrada zeigt  einen wesentlichen  Selbstwiederspruch des Zeitgeist-Movement: Gerade die im Film erwähnte  ressourcenbasierten Wirtschaft wird nicht einer wissenschaftlicher Falsifikation unterworfen. Er weist darauf hin, dass eine wichtige Priorität doch in “Laboratorien für gesellschaftlichen Wandel”  liegen müsse. So sollte man dieses Modell testen, herzeigen, verbessern und korrigieren. Weiters sei die Umsetzung eines einzigen Modells für alle Bewohner der Erde für Nahrada prinzipiell nicht anstrebbar. Der Wunsch der 50er Jahre nach technologischen Wunderstädten sei überholt.

Für Nicole Lieger liegt die Lösung zu einer postitiven Entwicklung in der Vernetzung der Menschen. Denn das Verständnis der eigenen Unvollkommenheiten ist für die Ökologien eine wesentliche Grundannahme. Der Film zeige ihr zu viele fertige Lösungen, die die Menschen nicht mehr beteilige. Die Geschichte zeige ständige Veränderungen, die sie im Film als nicht gewollt ansah. Schönpflug warnt vor einer Utopie, die in den Totalitarismus münden könne.

Christian Felber war schlecht – nicht nur wegen der Überlänge des Films sondern auch wegen der fehlenden Frauen. Er wies auf die einzige Frau unter den teilnehmenden InterviewpartnerInnen hin. Der WU-Lektor und Mitbegründer von Attac Österreich sah eine  ”Wiederauferstehung des mechanistischen Denkens unter der Maske der Ideologiefreiheit”.  Ein globales Ressourcenmanagement finde er jedoch eine mögliche und positive Entwicklung. Die fehlende politische Perspektive sei ein “Bärendienst” an anderen Initiativen.

Für Karin Schönpflug war der Film das Gegenteil einer utopischen Vorstellung. Der Film sei teilweise ein Plagiat und die ursprüngliche Botschaft verzerrt. Für sie zeige der Film “technokratische Fantasien”. Die Vorstellung, zusammen eine andere Gesellschaft zu entwerfen, sei absurd und unrealisierbar.

Franz Hörmann, dessen Standard-Interview unter den drei meistgelesensten Online-Artikel 2010 war, gibt Alternativen zum derzeitigen Geld- und Wirtschaftssystem, welche Eigentum nicht mehr belohnen. Alternative Geldsystem stehen der Bevölkerung “auf Knopfdruck” zur Verfügung. Auch im Schulsystem sieht der WU-Professor dringenden Änderungsbedarf.  Er sieht  gewichtige Probleme im Zentralbanksystem und warnt vor dem Crash des Dollars in den den nächsten Monaten als realistisches Szenario. Lediglich die Absprache mit China verzögern den unausweichlichen Absturz.

Nach den Statements der DiskutantInnen hatte das Publikum die Gelegenheit, selbst Fragen an das Podium zu stellen.

Weblinks:

• Youtube: Zeitgeist – Moving Forward
• Zeitgeist-Movement Österreich
• Zeitgeist Movie Website – Frei zugängliche Videostreams der Filme Zeitgeist & Zeitgeist Addendum
• Who is Peter Joseph? – Interview mit dem Regisseur der Zeitgeist Filme auf YouTube
• Monetative.de – Initiative
• Steuerboykott



All the members of Sierra Leone’s Refugee All Stars lived in or near Sierra Leone’s capital city before fleeing Freetown during the country’s decade-long civil war.

They had lost everything else, including contact with family, friends, and the musical life they had known

Throughout most of the 1990s, Freetown remained relatively sheltered from the rebel war that had turned much of the West African nation into a bloody battlefield. Near the turn of the 21st century, however, rebels attacked the city and forced a panicked mass exodus to neighboring countries. Among the thousands who fled were Mr. Reuben Koroma and his wife Grace. Reuben and Grace had fared among the best, having fled Freetown in the midst of a rebel attack. In the camps, the couple had one another, but had lost everything else, including contact with family, friends, and the musical life they had known.

In camps like Kalia, discovering someone alive feels like a miracle

Walking through the squalid and dangerous Kalia Camp in Guinea, Reuben found Francis “Franco” John Langba, a musical brother from the pre-war music scene in Freetown. Franco had been separated from his wife and kids and had still not been able to learn anything of their fate. In camps like Kalia, discovering someone alive feels like a miracle. But the three took the miracle a step further by making music for their fellow refugees. Soon, the camp was caught in the middle of the region’s fractious politics, and the defenseless refugees were relocated to Sembakounya Refugee Camp in the remote countryside away from the volatile borders. It was there that Reuben, Grace, and Franco met their future band mates;

The newly dubbed Refugee All Stars acquired beat-up instruments and a rusted-out sound system and began to play for their fellow refugees

Arahim “Jah Voice”, so called for his perfect high pitch, who was forced to watch rebels kill his father before they cut off his arm at the shoulder and left him for dead. Mohammed Bangura had similarly been forced to watch the murder of his parents, wife, and infant child before having his hand severed. Alhadji Jeffrey Kamara, called “Black Nature”, is the youngest of the group. Orphaned by the war and tortured by police in Guinea where he had fled, Black Nature is considered an “adopted son” by the others. With the help of a Canadian NGO (CECI) the newly dubbed Refugee All Stars acquired beat-up instruments and a rusted-out sound system and began to play for their fellow refugees, bringing sorely needed hope and relief to a traumatized populace.

At Sembakounya Camp, American documentary filmmakers Banker White and Zach Niles along with Canadian singer-songwriter Chris Velan encountered Sierra Leone’s Refugee All Stars. The first-time filmmakers, both living in San Francisco, had previously had substantial experience in Africa, and were in Guinea looking for stories that would balance the Western media’s focus on the region’s violence with a sense of African society’s beauty and resilience. When they were introduced to the All Stars, Niles and White knew they had found their story. They ended up following the band for three years as they moved from camp to camp and eventually returned home to face their war-torn country and reunite with family, friends and former band-mates, many of whom they believed may not have survived the violence.

The All Stars express their fierce loyalty to each other and to their people, and indeed to refugees of all the world’s terrible conflicts

It was during this trip that the current line-up of the band was cemented and their lifelong dream of recording in a studio was realized. It is in such grace notes and in the warmth, humor, and searing candor with which the band members bear their personal and collective wounds as well as in the music they make, that the All Stars express their fierce loyalty to each other and to their people, and indeed to refugees of all the world’s terrible conflicts. They must face the present with courage and the future with hope in order to save their lives. Thus the band’s return to a barely reconstructed Island Studios in Freetown, while the devastation and a shaky peace treaty signed in 2002 keep many refugees away, comes as a powerful message of renewal.

(www.refugeeallstars.org)

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