Consumerism and Sustainability
A number of people have commented on the post of frequent blogger Dan C. writes:
The problem IS the money. As long as your solution involves selling and buying something, then you are dependent on the System of systems and centralized currency. Ask yourself if your ‘green’ solution can be implemented locally with local materials and without money from outside interests. If not, it isn’t truly sustainable, it’s just Marketing. Marketing is a religion, fostered by belief in perpetual growth and owned by centralized authority.
It’s certainly true that we’re trained to be super-consumers. As always, Dan makes some excellent points about the underlying nature of the problem we’re all trying to solve. But two things:
1) I’m not so sure that the world would be a better place with seven billion Henry David Thoreaus living solitary, introspective, and misanthropic lives in crude huts.
2) Even if that simplicity would, in fact, be better, it seems quite impossible to turn back the clock and try to get there. From the end of World War II coming forward, Western Culture has aggressively taught us that we’re pathetic losers if we don’t have the right hair, the right car, vacation in the right countries, and, if we’re guys, sleep with women who look like Scarlett Johansson. It’s asinine, and it’s unsustainable, but it seems to sum up human civilization right now.
The problem Dan, is most renewable energy projects need some outside monies to get past the first hurls, this involves either VC investors or the government. I work in the hydro realm of renewable energy which always starts out “underwater” even though hydro can be environmentally benign; also the licensing and permitting phase is expensive and does take longer than for other forms of renewable energy. If hydro had the same playing field as wind and solar we would be installing 10,000mws of hydro right now. There is no need to turn back the clock, just convince the American main stream that solutions are available and don’t need to cost as much as it is exploring new technology at this time. That aspect better comes from industry than government anyway.
Dan C. you could not have express this any more succinctly. There exist more than enough evidence that the technology exists for all of humanity to live sustainably comfortable. But the profit incentive is standing in the way of such a global conversion. The predatory establishment will do its worst to insure that we remain dependent on unsustainable products by forcing the majority to work, earn a meager wage in order to pay perpetual debt and to also cyclically purchase goods which have inherent obsolescense. We are raised to believe in this unsustainable lifestyle as the best that ever existed and few ever investigate if there is a much more liberated, happier and sustainable existence which is already attainable.
Not sure what Dan C. has said or eluded to in other posts but it is important to look at money itself. We currently have a totally FIAT system of Federal Reserve Notes that we are FORCED to use. Our “dollars” have nothing of intrinsic value backing them up. For those who don’t know, The Federal Reserve System is neither Federal nor has any reserves. It is a PRIVATE BANKING CARTEL that has way too much power over our lives. We have had this CENTRAL banking system since 1913. Our dollar has lost approximately 96% of its purchasing power since and is near its final collapse. Bear in mind that a central banking system is one of the main planks of Communism so please please please stop bashing free market capitalism since we really don’t have that. This issue is crucial to understand if you want a clearer understanding of many of the other problems we face (including energy) which corrupt central banking underlies. I like the prospect of renewable energy (especially solar) because we can become less dependent on CENTRALIZED utilities. No more centralized government control playing favorites with oil companies/utilities or ANYONE. END THE FED!! No more centralized banking system. Allow for competing currencies backed by silver or gold or something other of intrinsic value. There are some good documentaries on the subject probably on google: The Fiat Empire, America Freedom to Fascism but the best book is ‘The Creature From Jekyll Island’ by G. Edward Griffen. Please study this subject if you have not.
I think we are wise to remember that ‘Money IS NOT the root of EVIL’ whereas ‘the excessive LOVE OF MONEY often is’. By excessive I mean when we are willing to diminish the freedom and liberty of others in a quest to acquire that money. Money itself is as benign as the seashells that Native Americans once used as the same, it is just a tool for keeping track of the exchange of labor and goods.
I like to embrace commerce as a global conversation I can have with my fellow earth dwellers, most of whom I will never know in any other way. Sure, I like to use local products whenever they work for me but I feel no need to reject any product out of hand. I respect the marketers right to market and sell and hold only myself responsible for my reaction to their free actions.
True money may or may not have intrinsic value. The seashells on a beach used as counting tools have some intrinsic value as beautiful objects but they don’t nourish our bodies or fuel our machines. Their primary usefulness was as ‘counting tools’. Rulers, states, and others like to create such ‘counting tools’ out of something with no more intrinsic ‘value’ than a piece of toilet paper (or the ink or electrons of an accounting entry) and arbitrarily assign to them a real value (i.e. nourishment, fuel, etc.) which they are able to control and adjust. Their reason for doing this may be noble or ignoble but the result is always that they take control over the lives of others and thereby diminish freedom and liberty at large.
As a lover of life, freedom and liberty I try to live consciously knowing that we are one interconnected humanity and to limit my exposure to the manipulations of those who do control what is now most commonly used as ‘money’. Isolationism is one means to do so, to be sure . . but even Thoreau, I have heard, brought his dirty clothes home for his mother to launder.
Thanks for the comments. Everyone is thinking. That’s the first step.
Some points:
Socialism is not communism is not fascism. Socialism is just working socially to solve problems, such as your local library, your highway system, and your police department.
Localism does not mean isolation. It means minimizing the requirements for trade in order to survive. It doesn’t even require people to live in huts. A city can be localized to some extent. We just have to stop thinking that the solution to everything is to buy something, and especially stop thinking that we have to use money to conduct trade.
The ‘comfort’ of modern life is not making anyone happier than when they are working at reasonable manual labor and producing their own foods. In fact, the stress of trade and capitalism has made everyone overcompetitive and fearful of losing what they have, with no ‘backup’ plan of what to do when the money isn’t readily available.
Humans can be useful to their environment. They don’t have to be net consumers always. This is only a recent development in the history of homo sapiens.
There are a lot of things we can do that don’t require new sources of energy. Conservation should always be the first choice, not the forced choice. Be elegant in your thoughts on energy. Don’t just try to tap into a lucrative market that is based on billions of people doing nothing useful.
Dan, let me say straight up that I share your values as to the importance of sustainable living. Your approach to sharing this value however seems seriously flawed.
First, words with the suffix -ism are very specific things and by definition have to do with systems or states based on doctrines, theories beliefs, and the like. Your definition of Socialism is lovely, but incorrect, The American heritage definition is “A social system in which the means of producing and distributing goods are owned collectively and political power is exercised by the whole community.”
While we can certainly admire the discipline and success of socialist beings such as bees or ants we are neither. Socialism will always fail because it is antithetical to human nature. Human nature is selfishness. If we understand that there is really only one of us then by our very nature we act sustainably. Since the understanding of this true self is buried deeply within our collective psyche we generally act instead in a manner which serves whatever we fathom as our self (e.g. our family, our community, our country etc.). This also generally means that we act without regard for those of us not a part of our perceived self.
This is why I believe that the best way to foster sustainability and secure the future of our world is by limiting the ability of the few to control the many. It matters not what political system is in place, the few in power will always be attempting to satisfy their selfish nature and the many will be the ones to pay the price. The way to limit the power of the few is to limit their control of the pursestrings. The way to limit their control of the pursestrings is to assure that they are only able to spend what they have saved. Jefferson and many of the United States founding fathers understood this perfectly which is why they specifically stated in the Constitution that only silver should be used as money. Despite this, those in power have found ways to take control of the money with the last nails in the coffin pounded in by President Johnson, when he took the silver out of our coinage and by President Nixon, when he removed the last link of our currency to gold.
As an example as to how this has worked in the past, had the true price of gasoline been established by the free market instead of having been kept artificially low by those in power through war and other means, it is doubtful that Hummers and the like would have been of interest to the public and therefore would neither have been of interest to manufacturers.
Obviously, there are other issues, While anarchy is a grand idea, I am doubtful that it would foster sustainability. Liberty and limited government offer the best means to achieve the same.
A USAF sargent once asked “what makes planes fly”
It is money!! not wings or the lift thing it is money!!!
I fully understand Dan C’s wording.
But doing?
Go Amish?
Yes I could be capable of that together with a woman like Scarlett. But that is no solution for 6.5 billion people.
When the fossils are depleted we must mimic photosyntesis and create an industrial carbon cycle.
“Yes I could be capable of that together with a woman like Scarlett. But that is no solution for 6.5 billion people.”
Why must we HAVE 6.5 billion? I will readily agree with George Monbiot that “those who cry overpopulation are shifting the blame from the rich to the poor”, but there is a different concept to be considered. What are people FOR?
Some cry about their “pursuit of happiness” or their “liberty” as though these things are tangible. The only tangible evidence we have is the rate of consumption; the ACTIONS of people, not their wants. We can all WANT resources (Scarlett?), but those resources are limited. Most companies have a department called “human resources” that treats people as liabilities rather than resources. Human beings can be useful WITHOUT technical energy inputs other than food. Technology can make things more comfortable, but just because we CAN consume everything doesn’t give us the right to do so, especially when our technology simply magnifies the rate of consumption (see http://www.thestoryofstuff.com ). Are humans going to be Net Useful to the future (improving the world more than they consume resources) or are they going to continue as in the past: using fantasies and numbers to justify the rape of the planet.
Don’t get me wrong. Technology is beautiful use of the human mind. The problems come in when we go overboard. Petroleum allowed us to feed many more people than we should have. Now we have to figure out how to deal with that predicament. Can we come up with a better solution that feeds everyone while putting more back into the soil, or do we have to reduce numbers, or do we have to come up with some other magic solution? Chances are, a combination of things will help, but will our leadership have the fortitude and courage to implement all of them soon enough to avert the coming failures of the System of systems? Doubtful. In light of that, most people will probably either die from lack of resources or while fighting over resources. We can implement alternative energy, but if the equipment requires global trade to maintain, it will be useless. Therefore, the focus should be on local sources of power/technology and minimized trade and minimized use of resources.
Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach him to sell fish and the oceans boil with propellers. THAT’S the damage of “the right to market”. Humans don’t have the capability to make choices when the marketers hide the true costs and use sophisticated techniques to push our automatic response buttons. The idea that we are making choices is part of the exploitation. Belief in our “liberty” is what gets us to fight wars for oil that help the heroin trade. We have to learn to control our urges with cooperative, local help for each other, not by feeding our urges until the resources are gone and the planet is a wasteland.
In part I succeded in provoking Dan C to further explain his philosophy. Thank you!
However, I am intensely working against the idea to bury billions of tons of CO2 in the underground. Half a century ago “the solution of pollution was dilution” by building higher chimneys. We never learn, now “the solution of pollution is dilution” by digging dirt downunder.
I did hope that Dan C hade something to say about CCS, Carbon Capture and Storage. For me it is a non-solution, even a hoax, that politicians all over the world are talking about as a means of continuing business as usual.
CCR, Carbon Capture and Recycling is not for free, but a reasonable price for us to pay for sustainably using nonfossil hydrocarbons.