Yesterday I went to a viewing of a short documentary about the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico. The Zapatistas are a group of people indigenous to Mexico through the Mayan ancestry and whose land has been taken away by the Mexican government, leaving them poor and without a means for sustainable living. The professor who presented it said something very powerful. He said that this is our struggle too. There isn't their poverty and their poverty and their poverty, but it is a universal poverty, it is our problem. He went on to say that it isn't "doing for" others that is a means to overcome poverty - that's all well and good and can be beneficial. It's not even a "doing with" others - working together to overcome. It's a "being with." It's a deep connection and relationship with the people who are dealing with the problems and a commitment to be poor with them until their fight is won.

The idea of social activism has always made my bones tingle. I tend to give high value to macro-level policy reformation and creation. But there is need from both the top and the bottom to invoke social change. I just want to be a part of it - that's all I ask. A part of the global movement towards equality in all measures of the word.