I'll start by explaining the name: CounterHeg. CounterHeg is hipster lingo for Counter Hegemony, which is precisely the nature of the news I compile. It is not the whole picture, it does not claim to be an objective picture, but it is a challenging picture. This is not The Truth, but it is not The Lie either. It embraces its subjectivity, its constraints, and uses every tool available to tell a different story.

Utah Phillips has said, "We all assign blame in our own best interest. So one of the most important functions in society is who controls the blame patterns. Why is that so many workers in my country assign blame downwards towards a few welfare chisellers who want to get a little something for nothin', instead of upwards towards a whole bunch of big-time chisellers who steal a whole lot of something for doing nothing at all?" He goes on to criticize the school system, the profit driven media system, and other institutions for arranging our priorities against the majority's interests. Why isn't free universal health care at the top of our agenda? Why are we more concerned about the costs of social welfare than corporate welfare? Why were we more concerned with Clinton's cigar than with his foreign policy?

Within the next few months, it would be cool to develop this site into something much bigger, complete with discussion forums, tip-sheets for the "everyday struggle" (eco-living, recipricol relationships, informing without arrogance, things like that), original artwork, essays, regional events, car/food/language learning cooperative databases, etc. If you are interested in contributing to this project let me know and perhaps we can organize this. e-mail dlesh@hotmail.com if you're interested.

Thanks,
Dan Lesh
www.counterheg.org