RSFIC is a private operating foundation building long-term, systemic resilience in Iowa City. We say "rizz-fick!"
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Thanks to Kady, Sara, Lilli, Sydney, and Terresa for helping us greet people, water trees, and make our gathering space accessible to other groups this week! Next volunteer orientation is April 8th. |
Our culture tells us the myth,
“if it’s legal to sell, it must be safe.”
By default, we assume things for sale are fine to buy. For example, you can go to a restaurant in any part of the country and feel pretty confident eating the food, even if you never met a single person who works there. Surely there’s a health inspector in this town, right?
This story streamlines a lot of different parts of our society and ultimately enables us to get a lot of stuff done that might be impossible otherwise. We fortify it with spin-off stories like “surely they have a permit,” “their license is clearly posted on the wall,” and “look, it clearly says the employees must wash their hands.” In return, we get the power to trade goods and services with billions of strangers, without needing to invest time in relationships or precautions.
What if we told the story from a different angle:
“this is for sale, so someone is trying to get my money?”
This story defaults to suspicion of things for sale. The spinoffs from a myth like that might be “they might be hiding downsides or side-effects,” “this might have been produced immorally,” or “local shops are less likely to be stealing from you.”
If our culture was aligned to the second set of myths, we might lose the power to do global commerce. We might not be able to confidently eat in strange towns. If we felt that tech companies would intentionally harm our mental health, we might not buy their phones or apps, which might mean losing the power to text from a concert, take photos from a mountain, or stay connected with friends across distances. If, in general, we believed companies were actively trying to trick us, we might not be able to do any of the stuff we can pay for today.
So, we’d lose a lot. Would we gain anything under the second mythology?
If we’d puzzled over what big ag companies were hiding in their prices and sweet foods, would we still have clean water?
If we’d been suspicious of how tech companies would manipulate us with social media, could we have avoided our loneliness epidemic?
If we’d wondered how the meat for sale at the grocery store could possibly be cheaper than the meat from our local farmers, or why so many companies want to sell us soda and alcohol, would we be physically healthier and literally stronger?
A few weeks ago, we packed FilmScene with folks who wanted to spend time celebrating stories of community. We heard the story of neighbors in the Miller Orchard area who planned an Easter egg hunt, folks who gather at the Green House to have important conversations in the context of death’s universal inevitability, and the story of the Northside Kitty Walk, a simple joy for the cat lovers in the area.
When we deliberately share stories together like “making events for kids is valuable” or “meeting our neighbors is safe and joyous” or “talking about hard things can heal us,” we are taking control of the stories that guide our collective behavior as a society.
For this event, we partnered up with the public library to bring more free collaboration to the table, and some of our excellent librarians brought a whole table of books and archival news articles that reminded us that these alternative stories have been around for a long time. Check out the books they recommended in the postscript! Did you know you could put holds on books at the library for free, and they’ll bring them to the front for you to pick up!?
The next Stories of Community celebration is May 30th. This week, there are a ton of free things you can do to shape your own internal mythology. Here are just a few!
There are many more things to do around town that prioritize art, music, community, strength, safety, education, and more. Let’s keep sharing stories about these things!
Our current culture tells the story that stuff for sale must be safe to buy. We also tell it from the other direction. “There’s no such thing as a free lunch,” which makes us suspicious of things with low price tags. Take this example I learned from Curt, our mentor at the EDC: If I’m selling a luxury car for $100k, wow, it must be really dang nice, right? But if I was trying to give you the same car for $5,000, wouldn’t your first thought be, “what’s wrong with it?” or maybe "what's the catch?"
For me that example helped me see the systemic forces pushing us to spend more money. Even in a fictional example I noticed myself trusting the higher price tag automatically. Can you imagine how selfish actors could abuse my reaction? I think it makes it a little clearer why we might have an affordability crisis on our hands right now.
What if giving up the power to easily buy stuff from other people granted us the power to trust each other when money is not involved?
The stories of community event was free, and we celebrated stories of other free events. Most of the events we link you to are free as well. This is part of RSFIC’s strategic value, Consume Less, because consuming less gives us more power and more control and more flexibility when conditions change. Plus it’s cheaper, lol. The next time you see something inexpensive, just take a moment to wonder what narratives are at play in your heart as you react to it.
Could you practice trying to override our cultural defaults and start to think, “wow, this event is free, maybe the organizers are in it for community rather than to take my money?”
Peace,
Riley
PS: Here are the books our public librarians recommended to go along with the narratives on the screen. You can put any of them on hold for free from icpl.org , or of course just stop in and ask for help!
Community and Community Building
Cats
Kids - Cats
Death
Kids - Death
Easter - Kids
RSFIC is a private operating foundation building long-term, systemic resilience in Iowa City. We say "rizz-fick!"
Did someone forward you this email? If you like, you can subscribe for yourself here!
