ENGAGE US #10: The Time is Ripe
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Millions of people have organized courageously against corporate assaults - of the legal and culturally-accepted kind and of the illegal and culturally-rejected variety. This is as it should be, as Eugene Debs has noted: "If it were not for resistance to degrading conditions, the tendency of our whole civilization would be downward; after a while we would reach the point where there would be no resistance, and slavery would come."

Thousands of activists groups are flourishing. People from all walks of life have taught themselves to demystify complex issues and their special languages: chemistry, biology, physics, nuclear energy and weaponry, genetic engineering, global finance and trade, civil rights and human rights law, regulatory and administrative law.

After two centuries of struggle, the formerly dissed and disenfranchised have gained the legal status of persons. In recent years, many have invested time and energy exploring identity politics. This means that even as "corporate persons" cast grotesque shadows across a disfigured cultural landscape, there is finally a multitude of human persons who can envision ripening into a self-governing people.