Boycott Whole Foods

For years I have done most of my grocery shopping at the nearest Whole Foods store. After not really giving it much thought for the last two weeks, though, it finally struck me just how depraved John Mackey is, and just how badly I want to make him sorry for being such a schmuck.

I mean seriously - the guy could have kept his trap shut. But he decided to flaunt his moronic McCarthyism as if daring people to do something about it. So, like, why don't we?

I say live by the sword, die by the sword. Let's hit Mackey where it hurts. Let's ruin his business empire, or, better yet, let's force him, through the power of the pocketbook, to apologize to all his loyal customers that he has insulted.

The guy has staked out a position well to the right of Walmart!!

So from now on I'll shop at Roots Market, My Organic Market, Trader Joe's, Giant, Safeway, etc - but until Mackey has atoned for his sins, I will never darken Whole Foods door again. Except on a picket line!

I am also joining the advocacy group Single Payer Action which has been helping to organize protests at Whole Foods stores.

".... to live freely"

Laura Dekker is my new hero. She is a 13 year old girl who wants to sail around the world, and her parents think this is a fine idea. She is a born adventurer - her mother gave birth to her on a yacht off the coast of New Zealand during a 7 year global-wide sailing expedition. But a Dutch court has intervened and taken legal custody away from her parents (although she continues to live with her father).

What Laura Dekker wishes to do is obviously dangerous. She could easily get herself killed. And of course I cannot pretend to know what is best for her. It is natural for a 13 year old to think that she can do things that she either can't do, or at least shouldn't do. I know I did!! The illusion of indestructibility and even immortality is one of the greatest gifts/curses of youth.

But to those who insist that she is not old enough to sail around the world, her reply is

"I want simply to learn about the world and to live freely."

"He is free who lives as he likes; who is not subject to compulsion, to restraint, or to violence; whose pursuits are unhindered, his desires successful, his aversions unincurred."
[Epictetus On Freedom (Discourses IV.1)]