The most exploitative commodity today, comparable to tea in 1773 is fossil fuel, Texas tea, dino juice,
bubbling crude, burning water, lube, black gold, oil, petrol. Texas tea is comparable
to black tea as both are liquid and might appear the same color. They are
more comparable and similar in that tea was, and oil is, a means of
exploitation. Tea was a tool for exploitation centuries prior, while oil
is today, only in an exponential fashion. The potential of tea to exploit
was minute next to the potential for petrol to do the same.
There was merely a casual physical dependence on tea.
There is an overwhelming, ever infiltrating, global, industrial, institutional
and individual dependence on petroleum products. It is not a natural
dependence, it is an institutionalized dependence. Today tea, coffee and all things caffeine
make up the most widely consumed beverages on the world. Coffee is second
only to petrol in global trade. Yet, tea, coffee and all things caffeine,
are but a sideline venture in terms of global use and exploitation, compared to
petrol and octane. Caffeine may be part of a nice drink, but petrol is
literally and figuratively in everything.
Today petrol is needed in order to obtain and distribute
everything, even petrol itself. The movement of people is dependent on
petrol. Production and shipment of everything is dependent on
petrol. The tea business and every other
business are all dependent on petrol. Nearly all individual and
institutional energy needs are met by burning petrol and its
accompaniments.
FACT: Over 30% of world's electricity comes from burning coal.
Humanity's existence revolves around petrol and its
accompaniments; the burning of petrol is a global phenomenon. The status
quo of today is interconnected with fossil fuel; it is everywhere, in
everything. All institutions and individuals are dependent on it and use
it. Petrol is everywhere, burned up and
spilled into in the world's environment.
Take a breath, have a sip - it is in there. It is our greatest
entrapment and detractor and yet, also our greatest liberator. There is
no getting away from it, whether one lives next to a processing facility or in
wild seclusion.
Petrol is decayed carbon matter from the distant past buried
under extreme pressures. The decaying
mass is pressurized and over time, creates carbon fuels. Coal is created from the same process and is
essentially oil that has not aged as long and liquefied. A less acceptable theory is that instead of
being pressurized and decayed biomass, fossil-fuel is from much older, Earth
forming, geological processes. Either
way, petroleum is a nonrenewable resource.
Practically all of the world's industry, farming and transportation are
dependent upon this nonrenewable resource.
FACT: Many new chemicals and previously unknown substances came into existence as a result of petrol experimentation. Many petroleum products such as plastics could be replaced or manifested through other renewable, less toxic resources. A short list of petroleum products includes: asphalt, antihistamines, aspirin, cosmetics, disposable diapers, linoleum, insecticides, fertilizers, pesticides, trash bags, bubble gum, shaving cream, crayons, plastics, synthetics, deodorant, dyes, shampoo, toothbrushes, toothpaste, paintbrushes, paint, stain, sun glasses, rubber cement, carpeting, preservatives, lotion, lip balm, balloons, toys, and on and on.
Oil enables the exploitation of
people. Petrol disrupts ecosystems and
beings through it toxicities, as well as enables war. The result of global institutional and
individual use of petrol is directly a polluted environment. Indirectly, the global use of petrol results
in war and olgarchical collectivism.
Tea was not nearly as integral to living in 1773, as oil is
today. In 1773, the commodity of tea and
the surrounding institutional exploitations came to symbolize institutions
treading on individuals. Today the
symbolism is the same, only exponentially magnified in petrol. The oligarchical collectivism, the institutional
confluences and integrations around petrol, are more intricately intertwined
and more significant in numbers.
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