• Restart America

    Posted on July 30th, 2008 by and currently 7 commenting.

    I’m curious what would happen if we the people voluntarily unplugged America for a day. Of course essential services like hospitals, security and such would continue, but what if we at home and in business joined together for one day to turn it all off? (Except for the refrigerator) No TV or lights. No cars or trucks, trains or planes. No air conditioning. No hot shower. No lawn mowing or leaf blowing. No cooking or computing. No texting or twittering. No blinking signs or squawking speakers. What if we just all took a day to just be alive and talk to each other face to face? Read a good book. Take a long walk or dance in the streets. Play a board game or charades. What if, for just 24 hours, we burned only human energy while the other energies we consume, that are consuming us, took a break? What do you think would happen? What would we save? What would we lose? What would it prove? What might we see that we never see? What might we hear that we never hear? What would learn from each other? What on earth would the world have to say? What in the world would the earth want to say? In joining together to turn it all off just imagine the power we would feel.

  • http://www.chaosscenario.com Cam Beck

    No AC in Texas? That’s just crazy-talk.

    Seriously, I can’t imagine how they could have done it before. Must have been a lot of heat-related injuries.

  • Whit

    Do you think people would know what to do? I’m in DC and it seems most people in a major city (not in the South) do whatever possible not to make eye-contact, not to acknowledge each others existence.

    Maybe a day of “an America unplugged” would show people the value that we could all bring to each other.

    Great use of the blog to start the conversation. “America unplugged” will obviously never happen but if people talk about it and what it might do, could you get the effect even if the cause doesn’t actually happen?

  • http://www.blog.webbedmarketing.com Rebecca

    Might be tough in the cities but I would love to see people willing to try this. Being unplugged make me feel more powerful because I am less reliant!

  • http://www.thebrandbuilder.wordpress.com olivier blanchard

    You want to do this in the United Sates?

    Non-US citizens would set up a table outside, invite their neighbors, open up a few good bottles of wine, and have a grand old time.

    In sharp contrast, I’d say that many of my neighbors would just hide indoors, and complain about the heat and the liberal tree-huggers who forced them to live without electricity for 24 hours. :D

    Man, I miss simple outdoor summer dinners. Big tables, friends and family, loads of FRESH food prepared in the kitchen for the occasion, not a plastic cup or paper plate in sight, hours of stories and laughter trailing well into the late hours… Good stuff.

    Yeah, we’re definitely missing out on real human interactions by being so plugged-in all the time.

    What I think would happen? People would finally take the time to watch the sun set. Hanging out outside late into the evening with family and friends, they would rediscover night skies and constellations. Neighborhood kids would play outside together. We would get to know our neighbors a whole lot better. The old photo albums would shed their layers of dust. People would write letters on paper. With their hands. Recipes would be shared. Stories of where these recipes came from would be shared. War stories would be told again, only better than the last time.

    Sales of gasoline would be exactly zero in the united states for one whole day, and we would all end the evening by saying something like “we should do this more often.”

    Some people would go into seizures from not having access to the internet, the Fox box, or their favorite place to shop.

    I dig it.

    Start a movement, Greg. Pick a day (like Earth Day) and start something. ;)

  • Jenny

    hmm…this sounds like what we did last week when our power went out for 7 hours. read books by candlelight. it was rather nice actually. however, it’s bizarre to see your whole street completely pitch black.

  • http://www.dennymarketing.com Stephen Denny

    Imagine a day without electricity… touchless payment systems… painless dentistry… antibiotics… oh, hang on, I completely lost the spirit of the thing.

    Frankly, this sounds like how much of the world operates on a daily basis already, and not always with purely utopian results. Curious to think how people who live this way, every day, would love to have air conditioning, pay per view, and all the conveniences of *our* home, even for a day?

    However, returning to the ‘happier place’ from whence this post probably originated, I’m all for turning off the television and the Blackberry for a while. Is that enough for now?

  • Morena

    It’s funny that I come across this because I am always saying to my daughter that I would love to geo back and see what life was like when you’re not so dependent on electricty to “survive”. It seems that life would have been less complicated…more work but less complicated. Also less stressful. You wouldn’t spend most of your life working to pay for electricty, etc. to keep things going that keep you from having a strong family bond. Maybe people would be more appreciative of what they have instead of trying to have everything that doesn’t matter anyway. I think it would be cool…an adjustment but cool.