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Moon Cat wrote: Look into my eyes. It will NOT be too late by December. Trust me on that.
I'd love to. Really I would. But on the issue of Climate Change, and on the issue of Peak Oil, I think we may already have passed the point of no return.
This is why I keep saying that radical action needs to be taken right now. Yesterday might already be too late. I don't know for certain though, but every day we delay makes that more likely to be true.
When the US Dept. of Energy published the Hirsch Report (almost 4 years ago now!) it claimed that the world would experience catastrophic consequences unless a crash programme was implemented 20 years prior to the global peak in oil.
There is a lot of evidence to suggest that the peak was reached sometime in the past 24 months. But people are still enthusiastically endorsing a position of blank denial. The amount of effective action that has been taken as a response to the Hirsch Report -- 4 years after publication -- is precisely zero.
On Climate Change we're now told, assuming it's not too late already, that unless we start a massive programme of carbon cuts by 2010 then we are condemning half of whatever the world's population will be in 2050 to starvation. Perhaps earlier.
Should he become president, for example, Obama will be in power until at least the end of 2012. Everything he has said on these issues communicates to me the fact that he is not someone who will take the radical action required to deal with these issues. This isn't just abstract ideology. This is potentially the death of 3 billion human beings.
And look, I'm just using him as an illustration of this business-as-usual mentality that is threatening to fuck up the entire planet. Because it's the US elections in the news right now. It's not just him; and yes he is marginally better than the other guy. But to suggest that electing someone who will -- however good his intentions might be -- oversee the continuation of the most destructive policies in human history is anything other than a dreadful idea just mystifies me.
Maybe McCain will be even worse. Maybe he'll condemn 4 billion to starvation. But if the system offers you a choice between two suicidal options you don't ask which one is the least painful; you demand a new system.
Moon Cat wrote: And in that case why be the warrior for change and hope that you posit yourself as if, as it seems, you ultimately don't believe in it then?
I'm not a warrior for change. And I don't think I've ever implied that I am. I wish I could be, but I'm the weird bookish type with odd mannerisms and we tend to make crappy warriors. In the past I was a huge part of the problem when I was employed as a consultant by US corporations to make them more efficient. Post-nervous breakdown, I am now a writer and academic. I have a talent for being able to understand things that most people find extremely abstract or difficult. My ability to communicate this understanding is sadly somewhat lacking. And I'm not just talking about this forum; I have a long track record of failing to inspire people with my ideas.
Some would celebrate that fact as a very good thing I'm sure.
Moon Cat wrote: Dave is simply saying how the next best immediate step to make things a bit better might be taken. You are naysaying it but wanting things to be better somehow. But you are not going to be voting in November. In that case, seeing as Republicans are bad, Democrats look good but are bad, what change do you suggest like NOW?! Something that can be achievable by tomorrow morning say? Put you in charge? Actually, I think that'd be a good thing, but like... it is not going to happen right this minute is it?
I don't have the answers to those questions. The ability to see a train wreck approaching is not a guarantee of knowing how to prevent it. I only wish it was.
But the answer is most certainly not to put me in charge. On that, at least, I can agree with my critics.
Moon Cat wrote: Let's face is Jim, if we all fuck up, then you'll have been right all along. That's what I mean by comfort zone.
Don't worry, I got the point but it's not totally valid for me. There's always a satisfaction in being right about something, even if it's a terrible something. But in my case it tends to be significantly outweighed by feelings of anger, frustration and despair at my own inability to communicate it in the first place.
It's like watching Gordon Brown's speech at the Labour conference recently when he said (and I'm paraphrasing), "if anyone had said, even 5 years ago, that the price of oil would be $120 / barrel, that food and natural gas prices would be spiralling, that the international financial system would enter an historical crisis... frankly no one would have believed them."
And I found myself screaming "fuck!" at the top of my lungs (thankfully the houses round here are well sound-proofed). Because whose fault is that? The people who were saying it (and there were a fair few of us) or the people who refused to believe? And the answer is; it's both. There's little comfort to be found in the realisation that you were right but weren't active enough, or convincing enough to make others listen.
Moon Cat wrote: "Even a slight understanding of mental health issues..." More than you know. Way more than you know.
I know exactly what effect all you've said - being wrong etc has on a person. It's painful, appalling even but sometimes its what you want to hear. Sometimes it may even define you. It puts you 'out there'. And 'out there' may ultimately be more desirable than 'in here'.
Sometimes it is. But mostly it's not. Mostly it's just painful and lonely and depressing as hell. That a grim satisfaction may sometimes be found there is very much a tiny silver lining on a mountain-sized cloud.
Moon Cat wrote: I'm sorry that you don't feel comfortable in your own skin. Welcome to my world too. You are not alone Jim.
Thank you Moon Cat. And I do know that. I have a small circle of friends (amongst who, I'm proud to say, is our very own Merrick) and a lady friend who doesn't quite get me, but seems -- at least -- to feel that there's something there to get. Which is an auspicious start.
Moon Cat wrote: You are still one of the best resources of important info and passionate rhetoric I've ever come across - I bow to no one in my admiration for your depth of research into things that matter to you. But don't carry the weight of the world on your shoulders (as some bloke said).
Meh, it's not that heavy once you get used to it.
(that was a joke by the way)
Moon Cat wrote: Disagreement over an issue - i.e Obama etc - does not mean that you and the other contributers aren't fighting from the same corner.
Indeed. Which is why when I identify what I perceive to be an insurmountable difference of opinion on a particular issue, these days I tend to state my piece and refrain from further discussion. I know, for instance, that handofdave and myself almost certainly share many of the shame broad goals. Therefore I don't want to focus on those issues which will result in us banging heads. At the same time, I do feel like I have a right and, perhaps even an obligation, to express what I think.
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