What a superb analysis, Chris. Thank you for forwarding it.
D
David Ballard
Alexander, Ballard & Associates
Strategy and Human Change for Environmental Sustainability
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-----Original Message-----
From: Discussion list for the Crisis Forum
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Chris Keene
Sent: 04 November 2006 02:07
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [Fwd: Kingsnorth on Stern]
Know Your Place
... reaction to the Stern Report
Date:31/10/2006 Author:Paul Kingsnorth
Well, well, well. Isn't the reaction to the Stern Report interesting? I
have never seen such a flurry of activity and reportage on climate
change in all my life. Suddenly it's everywhere. Whole TV programmes and
front pages are devoted to it. Government news conferences pledge swift
action. Al Gore is revved up by Tony Blair. The dam has broken, and it's
officially official: we have a global emergency on our hands.
Why? It's the economy, stupid. Or, to put it more bluntly, it's money.
We've had dire warnings on climate change for the last fifteen years,
but those have been from silly old scientistor scaremongering greenies.
They didn't count. This one, though, is by one of the High Priests of
our contemporary global religion: economics. This one has numbers in it.
Big ones, that point right at us. If we don't do something about climate
change, it'll hit us in our wallets . Thus, action is imperative.
Should I be pleased? I suppose I am, in a way. I'm pleased that this
will finally, in the eyes of most people, spike the guns of the few
remaining deniers. I'm pleased, in particular, that Bjorn Lomborg, the
slick, oh-so-reasonable sounding Danish neoliberal who has made a career
out of arguing that doing something about climate change will cost us
too much has now had his own argument thrown back into his face by one
of the economists he so admires. I'm pleased that those of us who were
boringly banging on about this fifteen years ago were right all along.
It's always nice to be right all along.
Do I think it will change things though? In a word, no. Sorry. I know
that some of you want me to cheer up, but actually I'm not down. Really.
I'm just being clear-headed. The reaction to my last post intrigued me
on this score: so many of us seem so keen/desperate to believe that we
can muddle through, or that 'doing something' is an end in itself.
It's a curious thing. On an individual, or a community level I have met,
in my life, countless people I admire and respect, who are making a
difference, who have hearts and souls and who fill me with hope for the
future. Humans can be wonderful, but humanity, as a collective, is
usually disastrous. We don't care enough, we can't act fast enough, and
we hide our individual consciences beneath the black umbrellas of the
crowds. Put a lot of people together and they can - and will - do
terrible, terrible things that they would never dream of doing on their own.
Call me a misanthropist then, if you like, and maybe I am - but I don't
believe we will act, as a world, nearly fast enough. There are 30,000
coal-burning power station in China alone. America will face a second
revolution if its petrol prices are put up. Most of the world - the
'developing' countries, as we so patronisingly refer to them - have only
just seen, on the horizon, our material living standards within their
grasp. You think they're going to pull back now? You think solar panels
and wind turbines can power enough fridges and Ferraris to satisfy the
billions we have sold our shallow dreams to? Think again.
I'm sorry about this, I really am. I would love to give out an
optimistic, 'we can do it' type message. But I just don't think we can.
Science and psychology are against us, as are politics and economics.
And probably democracy too. The Tony Blair who gave that serious
we-must-act-now press conference yesterday is the same Tony Blair who
refuses to pull back from a massive programme of airport expansion.
Saviour of the world Al Gore takes more plane flights than most of us
put together as he exhorts us to Do Something.
His solutions include potentially planet-wrecking biofuels - anything to
Keep America Driving. Here in Britain, our very own George Monbiot is
full of typically ambitious, and typically detailed, ideas to help us
cut our emissions by 90% in the UK. But look at his list carefully. Do
you really believe any of our potential governors will do this? And this
is only the emissions for about a tenth of the world. Globally it's a
spit in the ocean.
I don't mean to be a counsel of despair. But I do think it's about time
some of us greenies woke up to the reality of what the future is likely
to actually be like - and of how distant our worldview is from most
peoples'.
Yet beneath all of this is another thought. Everyone seems so very keen
to avoid 'bringing civilisation crashing down', as George puts it. Well.
Am I the only one who has a sneaking, unspoken desire for it to do
exactly that? Am I the only one who thinks that industrial civilisation
is the problem and not the solution? Am I the only one who worries that
a combination of advanced technology, overpopulation, fearsome weapons
and human nature might actually be worth stopping in its tracks, before
it does more damage than it has already done? Am I the only one who
thinks that such an ending would actually be a new beginning - and that
stopping the machine might be, hell, a good thing rather than The End of
everything?
Well no, I'm not. And I'm not sure I necessarily want to share a space
with everyone else who thinks so (though some of them I could happily
live with). But I do know, if I'm very honest, that the prospect of this
sick, atomised, destructive, materialistic mass of potage we call
'civilisation' 'crashing down' is actually rather an appealing one. Sorry.
This blog was first posted on Paul Kingsnorth's website, click here to
go there.
Other content with same subject Blog #1 by Corridors of Power
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