Pangea Day May 10
TimeToShine
Listening to this did give me thrill-bumps. It's powerful and profound. It breaks right through the narrow nation state mentality. Like Einstein said, our problems won't be solved at the level of consciousness at which they were created. I remember Arundhati Roy saying something about national flags being used to shrink-wrap minds in life and drape coffins in death. This, singing each other's national anthems is so simple but it is like being in someone else's skin, and it took a leap in consciousness to come up with it.
Now I will c&p excerpted Pangea Day briefing...
Dear Friends of TED...
Full details will be posted on our website next ! week.
The series of anthems sung by one country for another that I sent you earlier this week, e.g.
A viral Pangea Day film that debuted at TED this year.
....I'm convinced today's media have the power to humanize "the other". To help people make the mental switch from "them" to "us". Telling stories through film is especially powerful in this regard. At the start of a film, you see someone strange-looking. At the end you feel kinship. There's no moral effort involved here. It's just a natural mental repositioning. Call me idealistic, but I really believe that that mental shift holds the key to our shared future.
Of course, May 10th won't lead to an outbreak of world peace. But I do think it will reveal a sense of possibility: the possibility that there are incredible new ways of using technology as a force for good; that peoples' minds are not locked in a dark place forever; that our global village can start the long journey from "us/them" to "we".
As the Pangea Day website says: Films can't change the world. But the people who watch them can.
(Excerpted)
TED Curator
Access: Public
national anthem
August 2008 
Hi – thanks for posting this. I agree that sitting together and watching the movies are the most effective way for bringing folks together for this, but I'm in an all-day Buddhist teaching (which in my humble opinion is not a bad way to spend time with folks either) and want to know if you're going to put up the movies on the web (or here, at Gaia (a link perhaps?) for those of us who want to watch the films and get inspired – kind of TED-like (by the way, I'm addicted to TED). Any plans to post these gems like you do the TED talks?
ahhh! This is so wonderful … thanks so much for posting this! I am new to TED and haven't caught this. Brilliant.
Yes, me too got the “goose-bump” sensation listening to French people singing The Star Spangled Banner … So much in the way of overcoming fear and hatred in that simple act.
I want to learn their national song … and sing it loud and proud!