Food Not Bombs needs you!

About Food not bombs (taken from the foodnotbombs book written by the two founders, C.T. Butler and Keith McHenry):

The name Food Not Bombs states our most fundamental principle: society needs to promote life, not death. Our society condones, and even promotes, violence and domination. Authority and power are derived from the threat and use of violence. This affects our everyday lives through the constant threat of violent crime, domestic violence, police repression and total annihilation from (nuclear) war. Poverty is violence, and one expression of poverty is hunger. Globally, we continue to spend more time and resources developing, using, and threatening to use weapons of massive human and planetary destruction than on nurturing and celebrating life. By spending this money on bombs instead of on food for the needy, our governments perpetuate and exacerbate poverty's violence.

Food Not Bombs has chosen to take a stand against violence and hunger; we are committed to nonviolent social change by giving out free vegetarian food, thus celebrating and nurturing life. Food Not Bombs: those three words "say it all." They point unerringly to the double challenge: to feed immediately people who are without food, and to replace a system whose priorities are power and profit with one meeting the needs of all human beings.

The world produces enough food to feed everyone, if distributed equally. There is an abundance of food. In fact, in this country, every day in every city, far more edible food is discarded than is needed to feed those who do not have enough to eat. One of our goals is to raise awareness of food's abundance as well as to undermine the market of scarcity that puts profits ahead of people.

To recover this edible food and use it to feed people, three key elements must be combined. First, the food must be collected. Second, it must be prepared. Third, it must be made easily accessible to those who are hungry. The reason this is not already happening is no accident: we do not have a democratic say in how food is produced or distributed. In our society, it is acceptable to profit from others' suffering and misery. Many direct service agencies accept the role of care-giver for those most oppressed in our society without challenging the root causes of that oppression. They prefer to keep a low profile and support the status quo and will be very fearful of anyone who does challenge the system.

In addition to the collection and distribution of surplus food to help solve this problem, Food Not Bombs encourages vegetarianism. If more people were vegetarian and demanded organically grown, locally produced foods, this would encourage organic farming practices and support smaller farms. This in turn would make it easier to decentralize the means of food production and to create democratic control over the quality of food produced and stewardship of the land. More people can be fed from one acre of land on a vegetarian diet than on a meat-based one. Vegetarianism would be better for the environment, consume less resources and be healthier for us. While we encourage awareness of vegetarianism for political and economic reasons, this policy also has several more immediate benefits. The potential for problems of food spoilage are greatly reduced when dealing strictly with vegetables, and teaching people about the health benefits of a vegetarian diet actually creates a healthy, caring attitude toward ourselves, others, and the planet as a whole.

Food Not Bombs is a totally nonprofit organization and the food it distributes is always free. Its decentralized, nonhierarchical structure and direct democracy are powerful aids to survival and help prevent co-optation: we make decisions by consensus rather than by voting. In essence, ours is a qualitative rather than quantitative method of decision-making. Each person's ideas are valued and become part of the decision. Each local group is autonomous. Every individual and group chooses its own values and politics.

We do not seek permission from any government agency to engage in the work we do. Rather than trying to hide from them, we prefer to ignore them. It is unbelievable that you could be arrested for feeding people. It is Food Not Bombs' position that we have a right to give away free food anytime, anywhere, without asking for permission from the state. The revolution needs no permit.

(for more information -> http://www.foodnotbombs.net)

Today, the Food not bombs collective in Brussels needs your help! if you want to be a part of the project, please contact us at foodnotbombs@caramail.com or 0479/79.10.62

arch/ive/ief (2000 - 2005)