the dilemma

Last week, we (my husband and I) ran into a couple of friends/acquaintances/colleagues we hadn't seen in a while; and in the course of the usual "so, what have you been up to lately" talk, they told us all about their recent travels to Asia and Europe… And I found myself confronting my usual dilemma in these situations: do I bite my tongue, nod and listen politely (thus implying that I think flying around the world is not incredibly destructive), or do I let myself blurt out something like "do you know how much a flight to Europe actually costs in terms of atmospheric carbon?"

After all, one reason I wrote that long letter (and then started this blog) in the first place was to explain to my friends why I can't share their joy in flying off to distant lands, but tend to sit in uncomfortable silence when talk turns to foreign travel… And another (probably the main) reason was that I do feel the political situation is hopeless, and the only way to turn this thing around is to change people's behavior, persuade others to live as low-carbon as possible, one friend at a time if need be…

But when it comes right down to it, it's very hard to go beyond that uncomfortable silence stage and actually evangelize for a livable planet — not without alienating all of my friends and colleagues, which is not a good way to change anyone's behavior in any case. So when I wrote my letter, I carefully worded it to avoid insulting and driving away those that I sent it to, hoping against hope that it might give someone enough food for thought to begin to change some habits...

I desperately wish for a sane world, a world where travel mavens like Rick Steves (not to mention feedlot operators) were looked on as the social parasites they are, and where hopping on a plane for vacation and all forms of conspicuous consumption were as socially unacceptable as smoking in a roomful of children… But we need a huge shift in perceptions to get there, and in the meantime I guess I'm not a very good evangelist. I wish I knew how to do this better…

another example of the sickness of our society...

This may not be immediately obvious as global warming-related quote, but... In an article after Hugo Chavez' passing, entitled "Little Reaction In Oil Market To Chavez Death," an AP reporter wrote:

"Chavez invested Venezuela's oil wealth into social programs including state-run food markets, cash benefits for poor families, free health clinics and education programs. But those gains were meager compared with the spectacular construction projects that oil riches spurred in glittering Middle Eastern cities, including the world's tallest building in Dubai and plans for branches of the Louvre and Guggenheim museums in Abu Dhabi."

Of course, one can argue how huge a problem it is that Venezuela gets the majority of its wealth from oil in the first place... but when I heard this quote it jumped right out at me as another measure of the sickness of our society — that the Chavez government could be criticized, not for pulling all that oil out of the ground, but for not using the proceeds to build glittering construction projects and tall buildings! This one shocked even me — as Lily Tomlin said, no matter how cynical I get, I just can't keep up...

worthwhile conversation...

... I just recently read an conversation between Leanne Simpson, a Canadian First Nations author, poet, and Idle No More activist, and Naomi Klein. Very well worth reading... I especially appreciated the concept of (and coining of the term) "extractivism" — so descriptive of our (western, capitalist) culture. The complete interview is available at Yes! magazine — in the meantime, a few vital passages:

(Leanne) "We’re running out of time. We’re losing the opportunity to turn this thing around. We don’t have time for this massive slow transformation into something that’s sustainable and alternative. I do feel like I’m getting pushed up against the wall... I think that the impetus to act and to change and to transform, for me, exists whether or not this is the end of the world. If a river is threatened, it’s the end of the world for those fish. It’s been the end of the world for somebody all along."

(Leanne) "One of the stories I tell in my book is of working with an elder who’s passed on now, Robin Greene from Shoal Lake in Winnipeg, in an environmental education program with First Nations youth. And we were talking about sustainable development, and I was explaining that term from the Western perspective to the students. And I asked him if there was a similar concept in Anishinaabeg philosophy that would be the same as sustainable development. And he thought for a very long time. And he said no. And I was sort of shocked at the “no” because I was expecting there to be something similar. And he said the concept is backwards. You don’t develop as much as Mother Earth can handle. For us it’s the opposite. You think about how much you can give up to promote more life. Every decision that you make is based on: Do you really need to be doing that?" (my emphasis)

(Leanne) "If I look at my ancestors even 200 years ago... they didn’t rely on material wealth for their well-being and economic stability. They put energy into meaningful and authentic relationships... I think that extended to how they found meaning in life. It was the quality of those relationships—not how much they had, not how much they consumed—that was the basis of their happiness."

(Leanne) "In order to make these changes, in order to make this punctuated transformation, it means lower standards of living, for that 1 percent and for the middle class... And I think in the absence of having a meaningful life outside of capital and outside of material wealth, that’s really scary."
(Naomi) "If you have a rich community life, if your relationships feed you, if you have a meaningful relationship with the natural world, then I think contraction isn’t as terrifying. But if your life is almost exclusively consumption, which I think is what it is for a great many people in this culture, then we need to understand the depth of the threat this crisis represents. That’s why the transformation that we have to make is so profound—we have to relearn how to derive happiness and satisfaction from other things than shopping, or we’re all screwed."