There is another group “realists” who, like doomers are well informed and active, but who are trying to save what can be saved. We are trying to localize food production and inform the community about threats and coping mechanisms. We aren’t giving up.
And y'all are my peeps! I am one, too. But I honestly don't feel like there are that many of us... hence the three buckets.
Maybe I am talking to the wrong people online.
Anyway, thank you. That is an intelligent and cogent corrective. We're the ones who will have to lead the charge if there's to be a climate revolution. :-)
The system is already collapsing and the warming is irreversible and accelerating, with enough already baked into the system to ensure mass starvation before the end (or possibly the middle) of the century.
We need to adopt a palliative care mindset and practice radical prefiguration, with mutual aid built up and communities strengthened from the grassroots. Relying on top-down power to save us is a fool's errand (IMO).
I agree! I didn’t put it as eloquently as that… wish I had.
“Palliative care mindset” is brilliant. It’s just what I am thinking… but didn’t manage to write it down so well.
I am not arguing that we should relying on “top down power to save us.” I’m actually arguing that we take back the power and use it to lessen the blows to the populace. We can’t rely on the feckless fool who are in power now. I am hoping (against hope, I suppose) that some sort of people’s take over over the levers of power would allow us to spend the trillions of dollars at government’s disposal and stuff that would actually help people. Help with relocation and infrastructure hardening and whatnot. And as I type that I realize how naive I sound.
Anyway - thanks for that! Excellent comment. Much appreciated.
The realists know that the problem is a surplus of people. We've exceeded the carrying capacity of our planet. Preparation is for both self-sufficiency and defense.
The next 18 months are going to be revelatory I think. We are going to experience major reductions in food availability THIS YEAR and next will be worse. There will be a noticeable uptick in climate-fueled disasters due to El Niño effects.
Will these events collectively cause a governments everywhere to move “climate” up the priority ladder? I actually believe so, but I also think we are waaaay past too late. Still, an active plan to stop digging the hole would be a good thing to see.
I find that doomers of all colours are the only people who have a meaningful response to the sorry state of the earth. Whether that means doing nothing or trying to do something or contemplating what is to be done, doomers are based in reality.
I personally think there's nothing to be done because human awareness of reality is virtually nonexistent. The vast majority of people who recognise the harms and dangers of industrial civilisation don't have any comprehension of the reality. Hence the endless bloviating about electric buses and solar panels and other irrelevant shit.
And organising in the local community? Don't make me laugh, it's a competition over who can get the biggest car to drive their kids to school in. I know about three people who are aware of reality in any meaningful way.
Here's the problem. We know the climate is going to continue to shift upwards for a decade or so. Then we may experience an Ice Age. Sure, what Humanity remains will be forced back into tribal Hunter-Gatherers. Okay.
But, most people will die if incompetence. We, as a species have become to comfortable. And that's because of Oil.
We can't grow our own food if the soul is trash. If there's no water. People, unlike animals, will resort to cannibalism to survive. And I'm not sure how you can prep for that. Anyway, it doesn't sound like any way to live-- for me at least.
And it's that same reasoning that uncovers why the Parasite Wealthy are smearing their evil attrocities in our faces. Because within 20 years, Humanity and most other life in Earth is, quite literally, cooked.
We needed to halt the Industrial Revolution at least 70 years ago. Now it's going to be forced upon us.
Except for the ice age part, I'm not sure I can disagree with anything you said! The situation is horrifying and unforgiving, that is true. And a lot of people are addicted to comfort and have no or negligible survival skills.
The more I think about my Substack, the more I think that my focus should be trying to be useful for people during the last couple of decades we might have before civilization collapses. Folks are gonna have to figure out a way to survive in the short time, right? I mean, we aren't just all going to throw up our hands and lie down and die, are we?
I don't know. It's bad. It's confusing. But I am a relentlessly glass half full person. I know that can be silly. But it is who I am. :-)
Group 3 here, with the exception that I will not give up. I think it's probably pointless, but I will continue to try to build more "community" in my little mountain community.
Everyone with a long view of post collapse resilience will work to organize systems of climate justice and mutual care and reduce harms wherever they can. Which I suppose is another way of saying, mobilize radical prefiguration.
This does not mean we can prevent the mass suffering and death allotted to millions already at the mercy of civilizational violence. Even radical course corrections will only reduce, not erase the cruel endgame. But everyone who resists rather than acquiesces, everyone who shares skills and resources and creative determination, is lighting a path for those generations of survivors who through their unique circumstance will be making their way through to a post collapse reality, possibly even avoiding extinction.
This article is relevant - how to support the transition with adaptive infrastructure? We need to take the power and responsibility back and restore the skills of the commons:
What a beautiful comment. 💖 Thank you. I loved this in particular - so well written.
“But everyone who resists rather than acquiesces, everyone who shares skills and resources and creative determination, is lighting a path for those generations of survivors who through their unique circumstance will be making their way through to a post collapse reality, possibly even avoiding extinction.”
Old old DOOMER here, saw the light c1967, non breeder, off grid homesteading, grew up in very remote redneck ranching family, became an Archaeogist, Historian & Interpretive Historical Artist for museums, parks visitor centers to TRY and educate the masses 😂. You are Optimistic doomer , hope to BUILD COMMUNITY 😂. C 85% of humans now live in cities/towns , no control of food production, water supply, sewage, fuels . Most humans are narrow minded tribal consumers. There can be no local community building that makes any big difference as our culture is extremely individual, selfish and dumb . The best you can do is try to get out of urban areas , store basic food, SEEDS , GUNS, water collection &filters systems and a good library of practical information. Forget forming Communities in most rural areas as the culture is very atomized , racist , religious and very RIGHTWING . I think it is a shit show that just keep’s collapsing into cascading chaos, poverty and horror . Glad I am old . Having kids for past 50 yrs is a delusion egoistic child abuse. Your cheerleading action with humans to change basic human wiring is a type of Mental masturbation to come up with Something to DO in a hopeless depressing situation our parents pooped us all into . Vote & Act to protect land , water and wild species from our sweet species, if you do anything.
Ummmmm… did you get anything *other* than what you commented out of what I just wrote? 😄
I don’t think I’m naive, BTW. I am trying to be pragmatic. People *can* act collectively on a small scale. And if folks get out of urban areas and do as you suggest, they may survive in the short term. We’re all gonna die. Their path to the grave might be less horrific if they try to take some immediate skin-saving action. No?
I belong to the third group. But it´s possible subdividing it even more. I´m among who think that our destiny is not only inavoidable but also we deserve it.
There are a lot of unused fields near me on footpaths where nothing is grazed or grown. I was curious as to how many people they might be able to support so I measured them on the map and calculated the yield for cereal grains. Based on the upper threshold of yields for wheat I came out with a figure of around 600 people for one area of fields.
Right beside these fields is an approximately equal sized area of housing. So I estimated the number of houses and residents and came out with a conservative figure of at least 700-1,000 people.
Across the wider area there are vastly more areas of houses than areas of fields such that it is evident that even if all the land were utilized it could not support anywhere near the current population.
I try to grow as much of my own food as I can and try to give the most productive plants I have to people. Most of them don't bother growing them in favor of maintaining lawns and ornamentals.
I try to grow everything using only rainwater via a watering can so I know what I would actually be able to grow absent mains water. Meanwhile my neighbors are out with a hose every day for hours dowsing their lawns and ornamental shrubs with thousands of liters.
I try to give people edible 'weeds' that grow locally and tell them what they are, how they are more nutritious than any of the salad leaves they are buying in a store and how to cook them. They continue to coat their lawns in weedkiller regardless and pull up anything which isn't grass.
I try to maintain common areas with plants that are edible and good for wildlife whilst removing anything that would overgrow them and make then impassible. Then people dump their trash there and someone else comes along and kills everything with a strimmer during a heatwave such that the soil bakes dry and everything dies.
If I unloaded even 10% of my well informed doom on these people they'd think I am insane. They care far more about buying ring doorbell cameras, filling their houses with Temu junk, using AI chatbots for every imaginable task, sticking CCTV cameras everywhere and having blinding always-on security lights.
I don't think there is any hope for them. They won't understand until it is too late. In the event of some calamity which drastically reduces the population size maybe some community could form in the wake and seek self sufficiency but currently I do not see that as possible.
I very much agree with the spirit of your piece here. I feel like we are friends already.
You seem to me to be quite naive about the actual information available regarding existential risk, and quite focused on how different groups of folks feel about something that almost no one understands.
You write as if we humans are in control, and if we all have enough information that we will act in our own self-interest and make a nice happy world to live in — because the universe is centered on such an outcome…?
I will point out that it is no accident that we are ruled by folks with the Dark Triad of personality and character traits, and that the structure of feeling for our global civilization is the Götterdammerung - to use Kim Stanley Robinson’s notion that is rooted in ancient mythology.
We love, glorify, and promote the Dark Triad in our dominant culture. We praise, elect, and invest in people who are rapacious, insanely greedy, and also compulsive lying manipulators. We also emulate these people at every turn.
If you have not looked up Like Kemp’s “Goliath’s Curse” I suggest that you do so. Climate change is not an accident or a mistake. And the late great Edward O. Wilson noted long ago that humanity is living well-into a rapid, accelerating anthropogenic extinction event, and that we are collectively shredding our habitat even at the molecular level.
Creatives like Arthur C. Clarke celebrated the end of biological evolution and the beginning of a machine evolution that a few wealthy folks thought they would control and benefit from.
If you follow the work of folks like Chris Hedges, Sarah Kendzior, Gil Duran, Emile Torres and Naomi Klein you will find that the End Times Technofascists are already well-positioned to eradicate humans who oppose the trans humanist agenda.
Human violence is currently the dominant response to our near-term extinction.
I suggest you seriously study the existential risk literature. Within the next decade or two, it is likely that much of the human population will die from war, civil war, or from war by other means — such as climate change.
Meanwhile, the body of Mother Earth will continue to destabilize and change rapidly.
We will not be harvesting crops or hunting and fishing. There will be precious few crops.
There will be little potable water.
We will be burying so many people that it will change the way we understand ourselves.
I don’t write to discourage you - quite the opposite. I work and pray for peace and for non-anthropocentric beloved community every day.
But the simple reality is that our global civilization is ecocidal, genocidal, rapacious, and violent. Those in charge are organized criminals who masquerade as legitimate businesses, governments, and civil society.
Those who demand extinction with their very lifestyles are most likely people who consider themselves to be enlightened, liberal, or progressive.
Fascism and authoritarianism always thrive on the corruption and false narrative of progress generated by those who serve regimes that are ecocidal and genocidal in reality.
The most powerful nations on earth still thrive by ongoing mass murder, theft, and slavery.
That’s what pays your bills and mine.
There is no escape from the predicament. Most of us will face unimaginable misery and then die quite soon. But once we come to terms with this, we are liberated to act with true freedom and generosity. Joy is most often found in poverty, when we discover that only love makes suffering bearable, and only kindness satisfies our hearts.
I point this out because all to often folks write about getting everyone together to support the right policies and to demand that the right technologies be employed.
The reality is that we have burned more fossil fuels in the last 30 years than in all of history before, and that in the next 30 years we will burn even more — even with so-called renewable energy being ramped up.
The reality is that farming will be much less productive ob the coming decades. We will see shortages of food.
The reality is that we will see shortages of water worldwide as well.
As we dance our prayers upon the earth, the way will open.
But the way will not be centered on you and I.
Our species is likely already functionally extinct.
Think about that for a minute.
We are mortal individuals.
Our species is also mortal.
Species die.
Maybe we need to think about how to live with this in mind?
We are living in the middle of infinite mystery.
We are so terrified of death and extinction that we have become. Monstrous, terrorist species that will do anything to give ourselves the illusions of absolute control and a kind of eternal life that we don’t even understand.
We already have the gift of eternal life and love. We are beloved and we belong forever.
We cat earn that and we can’t lose it either. This gift cannot be stolen away.
Hell Is the inability to love. (Dostoevsky)
Heaven is the ability to love.
We are here to love for a little while, and then we tip over into the infinite mystery thst we are already a part of.
Thanks for reading! There’s a lot to take on board here, much of which I agree with, and some of which doesn’t address the point I was (maybe badly?) trying to make.
Please give me a moment to recover from being called a “friend” who is unlettered, foolish, and naive - and then I’ll respond at a little more length. 😁
Thank you for your kind reply. I feel like I was quite tired when I posted my response. If you could see my face and hear my voice, I honestly feel like a combination of warm regard, grief, and frustration might have come through, and I also would have been able to see and respond to your responses to me in real time.
I’m working on my communication skills with regard to the strange, skewed perceptual and relational field that comes with social media platforms.
I attended a seminar today with Meg Wheatley, who has written about the severity of the human predicament for decades. She emphasized how important it is to develop committed relationship where we are committed to taking awkwardness and even friction as opportunities to grow deeper and to seek and hold the truth in loving relationship.
So thank you again for your kind reply.
I’m glad to have conversation in the future, but I know that this all takes time and energy for all of us.
(Today I am reminding myself to sign off and sleep when I am over-tired. I also am passionate about engaging in good faith conversations - with all of the sublime and ridiculous elements of that.)
In fairness to Group 3, it might be that some of us are more ready to commit suicide than to train up in how best to execute and/or enslave others. I do quite a lot with my local climate hub and it's nice while it lasts, but they're a nice bunch and frankly when faced with those who are absolutely ready to use torture of all forms and murder to achieve their aims, I don't think even with de-escalation training etc., will last long. At least in the US you have the benefit of //space// and so securing a little stronghold for a while might be more possible amongst co-operative eco groups. I don't think it'll be possible to the same extent here in the UK.
I dunno. I live in semi-rural East Hampshire and there is a lot of space here, too. Tbh there are more fallow fields than actively planted ones, and that ignore house gardens, playing fields, commons land etc. Even London is way, way, more green than most large American cities, which is obvious from the air as you come in to land at LHR.
Knowing what crops are feasible to grow in average to poor soil, without artificial fertiliser, and limited irrigation, and what that really equates to in carrying capacity all year round, and how to effectively store food for winter without refrigeration... These are the real questions that sadly I don't think anyone will be asking until too late to learn the necessary skills at scale.
The real revolution for Americans is closer than ever. It's not by accident we're in a huge pickle with our deteriorating climate. The current descent of our national social structure and climate for PAST decades still continues to ignore, but now far worse, the endless extraction and destruction of planetary resources.
But by the same token for the majority of Americans: this is the Middle and Poorer classes, make no mistake the same power brokers , billionaire and multi millionaire class has been slowly extracting money from the majority of us, refusing to provide a living wage, and raising the affordability bar making everything impossibly expensive while they literally pay 0 in taxes
To really repair our climate it is time to change the governing forces of our country and we are on the way to do that. Keep in mind we will do both even if we tackle the powers that be 1st and rid ourselves of soon to be slavery chains, we all may be under.. serious economic depravity.
So my thought: the time is ripe right NOW. We're at a critical transitional period. The majority of Americans have a laundry list of issues that have been thwarted by the power brokers and this includes climate and planetary health.
I believe the majority in this country is on the same page. It always good to hear Kira and her rant, we all need to scream for change. But the change that is most needed now is to change our governing system and the one currently in place ..A fascist regime is the worst of the worst.
So here is what we have going, the No Kings rallies, indivisible and many other social,racial, and economic, and environmental justice organizations can be leveraged actually with just the littlest nudge they will become united. Here is my suggestion:
Whats next for democracy to take hold again and clean up its mess that's been eating it away. Hope that you can help Kira
So After the regime and even before Trubumpkin and his morons slipped in as the new meat grinders, what we did is let the big money take over almost every aspect of our lives. I'd think that we'd want this to change this ASAP. So we are all thinking everything will be hunky dory after Nov elections really ?? what happens if it isn't? And Why even wait, the No Kings rallies has shown that folks are ready to fight the big money fight the billionaires., the oligarchs.
We should all remember Occupy Wall Street and what they were all about. Granted they didn't quite finish the job but they got many folks ears. Isn't it time to finish the job?
we have the Middle and poor classes, we are the clear majority . It is now the very wealthy and their small numbers.against a huge population of people that are now in a serious struggle. Her'es my suggestion, we need to act right now!
I have been saying for months we need to Occupy DC with purpose. Here goes
Enough with the No Kings one day event, It’s time to really make good trouble and Rock The Boat, People are demanding more much more. Time for one day events is over, people are ready to March and peacefully occupy the peoples Capital
Non Violent Occupation Washington, DC Rally with hundreds of thousands
To do's when there:
1. Publicly Prosecute this FFing regime on Paper every single one of those fascists. Publicly denounce them for calling democratic party communists, the left is now the new middle, we need to be in DC in their face, in the public eye for days
2. Bring in activist progressives in congress to speak, people can stay a few days and go home as others can also attend. We just need to keep a core group of 100,000 or more .
3. Begin to rebuild on paper a society and government that works from the bottom up. Stay in DC however long it takes. There is no going back to before this regime, the system needs major repairs asap. Gather and unite leaders and members from all the economic , racial, and multicultural, gay straight social justice groups.
4. Electronics and cell phones will make it possible for people across the country to take part
5. This will likely grab the DAILY news stream and will become the Blue Print for the next American Revolution. Our numbers will surge and it will be impossible for the old corporate democrats to remain in power as the corporate old guard have shown their true colors and are blocking the changes we need now
There is another group “realists” who, like doomers are well informed and active, but who are trying to save what can be saved. We are trying to localize food production and inform the community about threats and coping mechanisms. We aren’t giving up.
And y'all are my peeps! I am one, too. But I honestly don't feel like there are that many of us... hence the three buckets.
Maybe I am talking to the wrong people online.
Anyway, thank you. That is an intelligent and cogent corrective. We're the ones who will have to lead the charge if there's to be a climate revolution. :-)
Majority of doomers are also trying to do stuff. They haven't given up.
The system is already collapsing and the warming is irreversible and accelerating, with enough already baked into the system to ensure mass starvation before the end (or possibly the middle) of the century.
We need to adopt a palliative care mindset and practice radical prefiguration, with mutual aid built up and communities strengthened from the grassroots. Relying on top-down power to save us is a fool's errand (IMO).
People always pull together in a crisis.
I agree! I didn’t put it as eloquently as that… wish I had.
“Palliative care mindset” is brilliant. It’s just what I am thinking… but didn’t manage to write it down so well.
I am not arguing that we should relying on “top down power to save us.” I’m actually arguing that we take back the power and use it to lessen the blows to the populace. We can’t rely on the feckless fool who are in power now. I am hoping (against hope, I suppose) that some sort of people’s take over over the levers of power would allow us to spend the trillions of dollars at government’s disposal and stuff that would actually help people. Help with relocation and infrastructure hardening and whatnot. And as I type that I realize how naive I sound.
Anyway - thanks for that! Excellent comment. Much appreciated.
The realists know that the problem is a surplus of people. We've exceeded the carrying capacity of our planet. Preparation is for both self-sufficiency and defense.
Good point: “Reaching out to both groups to form a coalition of action is the only course of action that will get us anywhere.”
And yes, a very heavy lift. I was in the Citizens Climate Lobby for a long time. Ugh.
While 'lifting everyone up' is very nice, it isn't practical.
Time to triage and 'help those who help others'.
And yet, ask if anyone is doing solar cooking on sunny days? Any interest on that tiny skill set is my litmus test these days.
The next 18 months are going to be revelatory I think. We are going to experience major reductions in food availability THIS YEAR and next will be worse. There will be a noticeable uptick in climate-fueled disasters due to El Niño effects.
Will these events collectively cause a governments everywhere to move “climate” up the priority ladder? I actually believe so, but I also think we are waaaay past too late. Still, an active plan to stop digging the hole would be a good thing to see.
I'm a doomer through and through.
I find that doomers of all colours are the only people who have a meaningful response to the sorry state of the earth. Whether that means doing nothing or trying to do something or contemplating what is to be done, doomers are based in reality.
I personally think there's nothing to be done because human awareness of reality is virtually nonexistent. The vast majority of people who recognise the harms and dangers of industrial civilisation don't have any comprehension of the reality. Hence the endless bloviating about electric buses and solar panels and other irrelevant shit.
And organising in the local community? Don't make me laugh, it's a competition over who can get the biggest car to drive their kids to school in. I know about three people who are aware of reality in any meaningful way.
Here's the problem. We know the climate is going to continue to shift upwards for a decade or so. Then we may experience an Ice Age. Sure, what Humanity remains will be forced back into tribal Hunter-Gatherers. Okay.
But, most people will die if incompetence. We, as a species have become to comfortable. And that's because of Oil.
We can't grow our own food if the soul is trash. If there's no water. People, unlike animals, will resort to cannibalism to survive. And I'm not sure how you can prep for that. Anyway, it doesn't sound like any way to live-- for me at least.
And it's that same reasoning that uncovers why the Parasite Wealthy are smearing their evil attrocities in our faces. Because within 20 years, Humanity and most other life in Earth is, quite literally, cooked.
We needed to halt the Industrial Revolution at least 70 years ago. Now it's going to be forced upon us.
Hi Kaitlyn!
Except for the ice age part, I'm not sure I can disagree with anything you said! The situation is horrifying and unforgiving, that is true. And a lot of people are addicted to comfort and have no or negligible survival skills.
The more I think about my Substack, the more I think that my focus should be trying to be useful for people during the last couple of decades we might have before civilization collapses. Folks are gonna have to figure out a way to survive in the short time, right? I mean, we aren't just all going to throw up our hands and lie down and die, are we?
I don't know. It's bad. It's confusing. But I am a relentlessly glass half full person. I know that can be silly. But it is who I am. :-)
Thanks for your great comment!
Group 3 here, with the exception that I will not give up. I think it's probably pointless, but I will continue to try to build more "community" in my little mountain community.
I am right there with you. Group 3, not gonna give up either. 😁
Everyone with a long view of post collapse resilience will work to organize systems of climate justice and mutual care and reduce harms wherever they can. Which I suppose is another way of saying, mobilize radical prefiguration.
This does not mean we can prevent the mass suffering and death allotted to millions already at the mercy of civilizational violence. Even radical course corrections will only reduce, not erase the cruel endgame. But everyone who resists rather than acquiesces, everyone who shares skills and resources and creative determination, is lighting a path for those generations of survivors who through their unique circumstance will be making their way through to a post collapse reality, possibly even avoiding extinction.
This article is relevant - how to support the transition with adaptive infrastructure? We need to take the power and responsibility back and restore the skills of the commons:
https://radfembiophilia.substack.com/p/the-invisible-systems-holding-industrial
What a beautiful comment. 💖 Thank you. I loved this in particular - so well written.
“But everyone who resists rather than acquiesces, everyone who shares skills and resources and creative determination, is lighting a path for those generations of survivors who through their unique circumstance will be making their way through to a post collapse reality, possibly even avoiding extinction.”
Old old DOOMER here, saw the light c1967, non breeder, off grid homesteading, grew up in very remote redneck ranching family, became an Archaeogist, Historian & Interpretive Historical Artist for museums, parks visitor centers to TRY and educate the masses 😂. You are Optimistic doomer , hope to BUILD COMMUNITY 😂. C 85% of humans now live in cities/towns , no control of food production, water supply, sewage, fuels . Most humans are narrow minded tribal consumers. There can be no local community building that makes any big difference as our culture is extremely individual, selfish and dumb . The best you can do is try to get out of urban areas , store basic food, SEEDS , GUNS, water collection &filters systems and a good library of practical information. Forget forming Communities in most rural areas as the culture is very atomized , racist , religious and very RIGHTWING . I think it is a shit show that just keep’s collapsing into cascading chaos, poverty and horror . Glad I am old . Having kids for past 50 yrs is a delusion egoistic child abuse. Your cheerleading action with humans to change basic human wiring is a type of Mental masturbation to come up with Something to DO in a hopeless depressing situation our parents pooped us all into . Vote & Act to protect land , water and wild species from our sweet species, if you do anything.
Ummmmm… did you get anything *other* than what you commented out of what I just wrote? 😄
I don’t think I’m naive, BTW. I am trying to be pragmatic. People *can* act collectively on a small scale. And if folks get out of urban areas and do as you suggest, they may survive in the short term. We’re all gonna die. Their path to the grave might be less horrific if they try to take some immediate skin-saving action. No?
Nice call to action, but it's empty! What do you want the politicians to do?
There's plenty I would want them to do, but you have to name the things.
Most if not all effective actions would be unpopular. How do you sell unpopular policies to the folks in government?
This article was a cliff hanger, not a bridge.
I belong to the third group. But it´s possible subdividing it even more. I´m among who think that our destiny is not only inavoidable but also we deserve it.
There are a lot of unused fields near me on footpaths where nothing is grazed or grown. I was curious as to how many people they might be able to support so I measured them on the map and calculated the yield for cereal grains. Based on the upper threshold of yields for wheat I came out with a figure of around 600 people for one area of fields.
Right beside these fields is an approximately equal sized area of housing. So I estimated the number of houses and residents and came out with a conservative figure of at least 700-1,000 people.
Across the wider area there are vastly more areas of houses than areas of fields such that it is evident that even if all the land were utilized it could not support anywhere near the current population.
I try to grow as much of my own food as I can and try to give the most productive plants I have to people. Most of them don't bother growing them in favor of maintaining lawns and ornamentals.
I try to grow everything using only rainwater via a watering can so I know what I would actually be able to grow absent mains water. Meanwhile my neighbors are out with a hose every day for hours dowsing their lawns and ornamental shrubs with thousands of liters.
I try to give people edible 'weeds' that grow locally and tell them what they are, how they are more nutritious than any of the salad leaves they are buying in a store and how to cook them. They continue to coat their lawns in weedkiller regardless and pull up anything which isn't grass.
I try to maintain common areas with plants that are edible and good for wildlife whilst removing anything that would overgrow them and make then impassible. Then people dump their trash there and someone else comes along and kills everything with a strimmer during a heatwave such that the soil bakes dry and everything dies.
If I unloaded even 10% of my well informed doom on these people they'd think I am insane. They care far more about buying ring doorbell cameras, filling their houses with Temu junk, using AI chatbots for every imaginable task, sticking CCTV cameras everywhere and having blinding always-on security lights.
I don't think there is any hope for them. They won't understand until it is too late. In the event of some calamity which drastically reduces the population size maybe some community could form in the wake and seek self sufficiency but currently I do not see that as possible.
I very much agree with the spirit of your piece here. I feel like we are friends already.
You seem to me to be quite naive about the actual information available regarding existential risk, and quite focused on how different groups of folks feel about something that almost no one understands.
You write as if we humans are in control, and if we all have enough information that we will act in our own self-interest and make a nice happy world to live in — because the universe is centered on such an outcome…?
I will point out that it is no accident that we are ruled by folks with the Dark Triad of personality and character traits, and that the structure of feeling for our global civilization is the Götterdammerung - to use Kim Stanley Robinson’s notion that is rooted in ancient mythology.
We love, glorify, and promote the Dark Triad in our dominant culture. We praise, elect, and invest in people who are rapacious, insanely greedy, and also compulsive lying manipulators. We also emulate these people at every turn.
If you have not looked up Like Kemp’s “Goliath’s Curse” I suggest that you do so. Climate change is not an accident or a mistake. And the late great Edward O. Wilson noted long ago that humanity is living well-into a rapid, accelerating anthropogenic extinction event, and that we are collectively shredding our habitat even at the molecular level.
Creatives like Arthur C. Clarke celebrated the end of biological evolution and the beginning of a machine evolution that a few wealthy folks thought they would control and benefit from.
If you follow the work of folks like Chris Hedges, Sarah Kendzior, Gil Duran, Emile Torres and Naomi Klein you will find that the End Times Technofascists are already well-positioned to eradicate humans who oppose the trans humanist agenda.
Human violence is currently the dominant response to our near-term extinction.
I suggest you seriously study the existential risk literature. Within the next decade or two, it is likely that much of the human population will die from war, civil war, or from war by other means — such as climate change.
Meanwhile, the body of Mother Earth will continue to destabilize and change rapidly.
We will not be harvesting crops or hunting and fishing. There will be precious few crops.
There will be little potable water.
We will be burying so many people that it will change the way we understand ourselves.
I don’t write to discourage you - quite the opposite. I work and pray for peace and for non-anthropocentric beloved community every day.
But the simple reality is that our global civilization is ecocidal, genocidal, rapacious, and violent. Those in charge are organized criminals who masquerade as legitimate businesses, governments, and civil society.
Those who demand extinction with their very lifestyles are most likely people who consider themselves to be enlightened, liberal, or progressive.
Fascism and authoritarianism always thrive on the corruption and false narrative of progress generated by those who serve regimes that are ecocidal and genocidal in reality.
The most powerful nations on earth still thrive by ongoing mass murder, theft, and slavery.
That’s what pays your bills and mine.
There is no escape from the predicament. Most of us will face unimaginable misery and then die quite soon. But once we come to terms with this, we are liberated to act with true freedom and generosity. Joy is most often found in poverty, when we discover that only love makes suffering bearable, and only kindness satisfies our hearts.
I point this out because all to often folks write about getting everyone together to support the right policies and to demand that the right technologies be employed.
The reality is that we have burned more fossil fuels in the last 30 years than in all of history before, and that in the next 30 years we will burn even more — even with so-called renewable energy being ramped up.
The reality is that farming will be much less productive ob the coming decades. We will see shortages of food.
The reality is that we will see shortages of water worldwide as well.
As we dance our prayers upon the earth, the way will open.
But the way will not be centered on you and I.
Our species is likely already functionally extinct.
Think about that for a minute.
We are mortal individuals.
Our species is also mortal.
Species die.
Maybe we need to think about how to live with this in mind?
We are living in the middle of infinite mystery.
We are so terrified of death and extinction that we have become. Monstrous, terrorist species that will do anything to give ourselves the illusions of absolute control and a kind of eternal life that we don’t even understand.
We already have the gift of eternal life and love. We are beloved and we belong forever.
We cat earn that and we can’t lose it either. This gift cannot be stolen away.
Hell Is the inability to love. (Dostoevsky)
Heaven is the ability to love.
We are here to love for a little while, and then we tip over into the infinite mystery thst we are already a part of.
That takes the pressure off.
Love.
Nurture.
Heal.
All flourishing is mutual.
Let go of ultimate outcomes.
Only love.
Thanks for reading! There’s a lot to take on board here, much of which I agree with, and some of which doesn’t address the point I was (maybe badly?) trying to make.
Please give me a moment to recover from being called a “friend” who is unlettered, foolish, and naive - and then I’ll respond at a little more length. 😁
Thank you for your kind reply. I feel like I was quite tired when I posted my response. If you could see my face and hear my voice, I honestly feel like a combination of warm regard, grief, and frustration might have come through, and I also would have been able to see and respond to your responses to me in real time.
I’m working on my communication skills with regard to the strange, skewed perceptual and relational field that comes with social media platforms.
I attended a seminar today with Meg Wheatley, who has written about the severity of the human predicament for decades. She emphasized how important it is to develop committed relationship where we are committed to taking awkwardness and even friction as opportunities to grow deeper and to seek and hold the truth in loving relationship.
So thank you again for your kind reply.
I’m glad to have conversation in the future, but I know that this all takes time and energy for all of us.
(Today I am reminding myself to sign off and sleep when I am over-tired. I also am passionate about engaging in good faith conversations - with all of the sublime and ridiculous elements of that.)
In fairness to Group 3, it might be that some of us are more ready to commit suicide than to train up in how best to execute and/or enslave others. I do quite a lot with my local climate hub and it's nice while it lasts, but they're a nice bunch and frankly when faced with those who are absolutely ready to use torture of all forms and murder to achieve their aims, I don't think even with de-escalation training etc., will last long. At least in the US you have the benefit of //space// and so securing a little stronghold for a while might be more possible amongst co-operative eco groups. I don't think it'll be possible to the same extent here in the UK.
I dunno. I live in semi-rural East Hampshire and there is a lot of space here, too. Tbh there are more fallow fields than actively planted ones, and that ignore house gardens, playing fields, commons land etc. Even London is way, way, more green than most large American cities, which is obvious from the air as you come in to land at LHR.
Knowing what crops are feasible to grow in average to poor soil, without artificial fertiliser, and limited irrigation, and what that really equates to in carrying capacity all year round, and how to effectively store food for winter without refrigeration... These are the real questions that sadly I don't think anyone will be asking until too late to learn the necessary skills at scale.
The real revolution for Americans is closer than ever. It's not by accident we're in a huge pickle with our deteriorating climate. The current descent of our national social structure and climate for PAST decades still continues to ignore, but now far worse, the endless extraction and destruction of planetary resources.
But by the same token for the majority of Americans: this is the Middle and Poorer classes, make no mistake the same power brokers , billionaire and multi millionaire class has been slowly extracting money from the majority of us, refusing to provide a living wage, and raising the affordability bar making everything impossibly expensive while they literally pay 0 in taxes
To really repair our climate it is time to change the governing forces of our country and we are on the way to do that. Keep in mind we will do both even if we tackle the powers that be 1st and rid ourselves of soon to be slavery chains, we all may be under.. serious economic depravity.
So my thought: the time is ripe right NOW. We're at a critical transitional period. The majority of Americans have a laundry list of issues that have been thwarted by the power brokers and this includes climate and planetary health.
I believe the majority in this country is on the same page. It always good to hear Kira and her rant, we all need to scream for change. But the change that is most needed now is to change our governing system and the one currently in place ..A fascist regime is the worst of the worst.
So here is what we have going, the No Kings rallies, indivisible and many other social,racial, and economic, and environmental justice organizations can be leveraged actually with just the littlest nudge they will become united. Here is my suggestion:
Whats next for democracy to take hold again and clean up its mess that's been eating it away. Hope that you can help Kira
So After the regime and even before Trubumpkin and his morons slipped in as the new meat grinders, what we did is let the big money take over almost every aspect of our lives. I'd think that we'd want this to change this ASAP. So we are all thinking everything will be hunky dory after Nov elections really ?? what happens if it isn't? And Why even wait, the No Kings rallies has shown that folks are ready to fight the big money fight the billionaires., the oligarchs.
We should all remember Occupy Wall Street and what they were all about. Granted they didn't quite finish the job but they got many folks ears. Isn't it time to finish the job?
we have the Middle and poor classes, we are the clear majority . It is now the very wealthy and their small numbers.against a huge population of people that are now in a serious struggle. Her'es my suggestion, we need to act right now!
I have been saying for months we need to Occupy DC with purpose. Here goes
Enough with the No Kings one day event, It’s time to really make good trouble and Rock The Boat, People are demanding more much more. Time for one day events is over, people are ready to March and peacefully occupy the peoples Capital
Non Violent Occupation Washington, DC Rally with hundreds of thousands
To do's when there:
1. Publicly Prosecute this FFing regime on Paper every single one of those fascists. Publicly denounce them for calling democratic party communists, the left is now the new middle, we need to be in DC in their face, in the public eye for days
2. Bring in activist progressives in congress to speak, people can stay a few days and go home as others can also attend. We just need to keep a core group of 100,000 or more .
3. Begin to rebuild on paper a society and government that works from the bottom up. Stay in DC however long it takes. There is no going back to before this regime, the system needs major repairs asap. Gather and unite leaders and members from all the economic , racial, and multicultural, gay straight social justice groups.
4. Electronics and cell phones will make it possible for people across the country to take part
5. This will likely grab the DAILY news stream and will become the Blue Print for the next American Revolution. Our numbers will surge and it will be impossible for the old corporate democrats to remain in power as the corporate old guard have shown their true colors and are blocking the changes we need now