This is most emphatically NOT a call to “drop out” of the world’s systems. The old-school survivalist mentality- where one puts on camouflage gear and fills a bunker with canned goods and automatic weapons somewhere in the woods- isn’t suitable. There’s no corner of the globe- not even a cave in Afghanistan- where we can hide from the consequences of our interactions. It’s just like what is demonstrated by The Doppler effect, or Six Degrees of Separation. We have to get to the simple understanding that we are all tenuously clinging to this tiny speck of dust we call Earth which floats in a vast galactic sunbeam- the only dust mote in this corner of the Universe with any life at all on it. These realizations mean that we as a race [the Human race] need to grow up- now- and face our interconnectedness and the importance of sharing it responsibly.
We need to recognize that the hunter-gatherer mindset of corporate trading and predation is merely the latter-day invasion of the post-Roman barbarian hordes. They swoop in and take what they want, leaving behind devastation- and they do it on a global scale. The only difference is that the horned helmets have been replaced by suits, and the war axes with briefcases. Every man for himself isn’t going to work any more. The view is too narrow and shortsighted to make any sense for the longterm well-being of the population at large. We must preemptively remove ourselves from the corporate grid before the corporate players begin to operate at a loss, shut down their function, and remove large pieces of our support systems from play. We must interconnect as communities of responsible human beings, and create a webcentric system of self-sufficient supply, trade, and social connectivity. This is not about socialism, but actual free trade- capitalism the old-fashioned way, without the corporate cronyism pillaging the economic landscape.
We have the ability and the beginnings of the brass tacks to build self-contained and sustainable communities capable of trading with other self-contained sustainable communities. We can rebuild our micro-manufacturing base, remove our dollars from the Dollar Stores, and begin investing our time and money in CSAs and local craftspersons. In terms of energy efficiency and sustainability, we need only look as far as the nearest “hippies”, alternative schools, and universities. The pioneers of low-impact living have been doing the work since the 70s. As far as retrofitting and revamping the systems we have this is the perfect time, with infrastructure that is crumbling and an economy that needs boosting.
When I was still an active Rotarian, the former President of Central Hudson Electric Company came to speak. He talked about how CH only maintains the lines for the Hudson Valley, as of that time, and a large corporation out of Texas owns all the generating plants here in NYS. He talked about how the load on the lines and the systems’ infrastructure wouldn’t be able to keep up with the demand. During the Q&A afterwards, I asked him what he foresaw as being the best system for power generation for the future. He said what I’m saying about all of our systems- communities need to create their own micro-generation systems and sell their power back to the grid. The young Jason West was sitting next to me, and when he became Mayor of New Paltz, he had solar panels installed on the Village Hall, and reed beds at the sanitation plant. New Paltz is much better off for those efforts.
The systems we need to create, like the ones in New Paltz, will be high-tech/low-tech. We can build comfortable and attractive, energy efficient underground houses, recycle our water, and plant vegetables on the roof. We can participate in CSAs and get better food, more cheaply. We can build urban high-rise farms- glass towers filled not with desks and computers but vegetables and fruit trees. We can minimize the corporate and Big Oil controls on our daily lives by removing the long-distance delivery goods from our daily lives. In short, we can reinvent the way we do things, and maximize our joy in the process.
We are the parade that the politicians like the good Mr. Obama get in front of. Let’s make it a great one.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
1
