Hey regens!
I’ve been following the convo around Regen Commons and got the itch to start pulling some of these ideas together into a rough proposal. Took a stab at mapping things out in a way that (hopefully) makes sense and reflects everything that’s been discussed so far.
Dropping the doc here for y’all to take a look. Keen to hear what you think! What feels solid? What needs work? Feel free to add comments directly to the doc or share them here.
Loving this discussion 
I see this as a well intentioned approach here. But is it attempting to protect regenerative values and the expression of these in our work as mirrors of living systems using the very mechanisms of extraction and control that regenerative systems seek to transform? Maybe there is good creative tension in all this. But I honestly think it’s a suck on energy and attention. What is being protected here? Like creating all these bureaucratic and technocratic mechanisms when the energy could be better devoting to creating healing relationships with our kin.
Know that this comes from a genuine place of care but I just think and feel this whole approach is not attuned to the regenerative spirit at the basis of our work. You cannot trademark or own being in right relationship with Earth’s systems. That relationship exists through practice, presence, and participation. I understand the fear of co-opting that is happening and will continue to happen but is this whole approach a diversion?
I agree. This isn’t meant to become a big bureaucracy or drain anyone’s energy.
If you check the proposal, you’ll see it’s designed to be as minimal as possible: the word ‘regen initiative’ stays open for anyone, and if there’s a problem, we try to address it socially first, only going the legal route if absolutely necessary.
We just don’t want what happened with ‘Sustainable’ (where it got co-opted and lost all meaning) to happen again. Greenwashing is real, and it hurts people doing the real work.