Talking about sustainability has become the ecological equivalent of putting ‘love’ in cards to elderly relatives whose house price you are keeping an eye on.
May 2, 2022·edited May 5, 2022Liked by Andy Kenworthy
More solid work Andy. It's horrifying to fully accept but the facts seem to tell us with no real prospect of being wrong that our civilization is whistling through the air, having overshot the top of the cliff some time ago and until we hit the ground we aren't going to see change. My old excuse to play by the systems consumptive rules was that we need to hit the tipping point (this was when I assumed that contemporary levels of climate and ecological impact would see a multilateral change in global politics and economics - I was a hopeful youth) ASAP so we can steer civilization into a better trajectory at the soonest possible time. This was justified using the logic that delaying the civilizational tipping point with constant loss of ecological function and biodiversity would mean that urging it on rather than delaying would leave us with the best planetary function to work with when the eco-rapture arrived. All those naïve mental gymnastics have now failed me. The perverse result is that now I'm more committed to so-called sustainable choices such as trying not to fly, cycling everywhere I can, growing as much of my own food as possible and avoiding unnecessary consumption (which probably still leaves me with a footprint equivalent to 10x a Tony Wrench footprint) but I no longer think these actions are making a tangible difference. The best reasoning I can come up with is that it's a good upbringing for my kids and might make them more resilient to the future. So this leaves me in a very foreign moral landscape. I think I'm probably doing these things mostly to a swage the cognitive dissonance of a middle aged and stumbling conservation biologist who is seeing the justification for their career crumbling around them. Perhaps this ramble is just my way of confirming to myself that so called 'sustainable practices' are now just therapy for the sadness that our predicament creates.
If I can sum up - we convince ourselves that 'it will get better' whilst doing nothing to make it so. The planet will self correct and likely kill off humanity in the process.
NGO's work on the principle that ambition is progress, when in fact just the opposite is true.
How weird. You’ve just told us all something that is clear and terrifying (for some) Andy yet we’re commenting like you haven’t. The threat is so big and we are standing right up against it but if we keep our eyes closed …
Great piece. Have you seen the "Strong Sustainability for Aotearoa" report from 2009 which has some helpful distinctions and great graphics for communicating around this reality: http://bit.ly/2CF3VOI
I've enjoyed these insights. Particularly with recourse to the marketisation of the green lobby.
I would suggest that the 'if you can't beat them' narrative does, as you mention allow a guilt free consumerism, a countervailing response to that which it seeks to redress.
A most interesting read is the shock of the anthropocene. This book details the early skepticism of industrial progress and understanding of environmental consequences of carbon and the changing manufacturing processes damaging to the natural world.
It was known in the 1700"s that the forces unleashed had the potential for very detrimental outcomes. Similarly Hammond and Hammond wrote a book on the Town labourer 1760-1832 which gives chilling insights into the cotton factories, and others: Blake's satanic mills which foreswore moral integrity at the altar of profit. 15 hour days in the coal mine for 5 year old children, assuaged by Burke and the philosopher's of the day
The wealth inequitably distributed allowed for and aided by the enclosures in Britain saw the whole sale clearances of English and later Scottish working people.
And it's in this light we foreshadowed the colonialism through the exploitation of our own indigenous people.
It's in this light I provide a mea culpa, the strength, in many ways of this erroneous thinking and consumerist mind set, is formidable. Individual units as designed deliberately by Hoover and others has made pinning the tail on the donkey difficult. Many and most agree something is wrong, but providing a comprehensive cohesive narrative that brings people together is problematic. It has been designed so, and here I think you could reflect, forgive me if this was inherent within the articles. But at the level of a working class man I have no land, I have no recourse to survival other than a system I know to be unjust, without spiritual reverence and in contradistinction to that path I would wish to follow and live within.
Alienation has long assumed a loss of control of the methods of production, I would suggest it is more to do with a loss of direction to truly follow one's own path, ala Tony Wrench.
And herein lies the challenge and the obstacles. Daily I am devoid of true meaning, happiness with the subsequent negative effects upon my mental health. I strive not for more 'product' but that over trumpeted concept of freedom. That which sees a man make his own choices towards sustaining a life. I cannot educate my child, I cannot sleep under the stars and I cannot plant that which I should wish to ingest. The system so rigged book makers would not take bets is almost indomitable, it is the almost which gives hope.
Yet I concede my earlier youthful read, learn and change shall come is as naive as I was at the time. Yet the kernel of that thought holds a truth within and without, true freedom would be, to be. It is no coincidence that we massacred the native Americans for therein a vision, undoubtedly fallible to even romantic eyes, illuminated a vision that could redeem our western values.
So what am I trying to say?
Simply, this beast, snorting horrid hysterical naked, has straitjacketed the best minds of mine, previous and sullies future generations.
The challenge once recognising this, is to provide the tools for its undoing. Therein lies the challenge... This beast sleeps in the hearts of those who have profited in excess, and so they shout the loudest to proclaim it's virtue. Millionaires in my time have become billionaires, the disinformation, misinformation spew forth distractions and sideshows and dead cats.
A powerful enemy so disguised cloak those within and recruit those who would wish to see a better world. That's it's true strength. Gas lit we turn in on each other.
Ps keep writing... I love your work and I share the articles in a hope we can coalesce to form a coherent voice....
Ecan has spent $150 million on an environmental plan to manage their region's water based on the Canterbury Water Management Strategy 2009 - a 1990s drought relief plan developed by the Canterbury Mayoral Forum'.
The plan achieved temporary statutory primary via the Ecan Act 2010. The Ecan Act was passed under urgency to fast track massive irrigation schemes depleting braided rivers and polluting near pristine aquifers.
The plan will not become operational until the end of 2024 and compliance with the plan to be achieved 10 years later.
Some Ecan councilors are beginning to realize there is no evidence the ($150 million plan) is working or will work as it is based on models and OVERSEER.
Fencing streams, planting trees, and land based predator control is the only visible response by Ecan. All singularly useless responses after knowingly promoting the unsustainable irrigation development.
More solid work Andy. It's horrifying to fully accept but the facts seem to tell us with no real prospect of being wrong that our civilization is whistling through the air, having overshot the top of the cliff some time ago and until we hit the ground we aren't going to see change. My old excuse to play by the systems consumptive rules was that we need to hit the tipping point (this was when I assumed that contemporary levels of climate and ecological impact would see a multilateral change in global politics and economics - I was a hopeful youth) ASAP so we can steer civilization into a better trajectory at the soonest possible time. This was justified using the logic that delaying the civilizational tipping point with constant loss of ecological function and biodiversity would mean that urging it on rather than delaying would leave us with the best planetary function to work with when the eco-rapture arrived. All those naïve mental gymnastics have now failed me. The perverse result is that now I'm more committed to so-called sustainable choices such as trying not to fly, cycling everywhere I can, growing as much of my own food as possible and avoiding unnecessary consumption (which probably still leaves me with a footprint equivalent to 10x a Tony Wrench footprint) but I no longer think these actions are making a tangible difference. The best reasoning I can come up with is that it's a good upbringing for my kids and might make them more resilient to the future. So this leaves me in a very foreign moral landscape. I think I'm probably doing these things mostly to a swage the cognitive dissonance of a middle aged and stumbling conservation biologist who is seeing the justification for their career crumbling around them. Perhaps this ramble is just my way of confirming to myself that so called 'sustainable practices' are now just therapy for the sadness that our predicament creates.
If I can sum up - we convince ourselves that 'it will get better' whilst doing nothing to make it so. The planet will self correct and likely kill off humanity in the process.
NGO's work on the principle that ambition is progress, when in fact just the opposite is true.
How weird. You’ve just told us all something that is clear and terrifying (for some) Andy yet we’re commenting like you haven’t. The threat is so big and we are standing right up against it but if we keep our eyes closed …
Great piece. Have you seen the "Strong Sustainability for Aotearoa" report from 2009 which has some helpful distinctions and great graphics for communicating around this reality: http://bit.ly/2CF3VOI
I've enjoyed these insights. Particularly with recourse to the marketisation of the green lobby.
I would suggest that the 'if you can't beat them' narrative does, as you mention allow a guilt free consumerism, a countervailing response to that which it seeks to redress.
A most interesting read is the shock of the anthropocene. This book details the early skepticism of industrial progress and understanding of environmental consequences of carbon and the changing manufacturing processes damaging to the natural world.
It was known in the 1700"s that the forces unleashed had the potential for very detrimental outcomes. Similarly Hammond and Hammond wrote a book on the Town labourer 1760-1832 which gives chilling insights into the cotton factories, and others: Blake's satanic mills which foreswore moral integrity at the altar of profit. 15 hour days in the coal mine for 5 year old children, assuaged by Burke and the philosopher's of the day
The wealth inequitably distributed allowed for and aided by the enclosures in Britain saw the whole sale clearances of English and later Scottish working people.
And it's in this light we foreshadowed the colonialism through the exploitation of our own indigenous people.
It's in this light I provide a mea culpa, the strength, in many ways of this erroneous thinking and consumerist mind set, is formidable. Individual units as designed deliberately by Hoover and others has made pinning the tail on the donkey difficult. Many and most agree something is wrong, but providing a comprehensive cohesive narrative that brings people together is problematic. It has been designed so, and here I think you could reflect, forgive me if this was inherent within the articles. But at the level of a working class man I have no land, I have no recourse to survival other than a system I know to be unjust, without spiritual reverence and in contradistinction to that path I would wish to follow and live within.
Alienation has long assumed a loss of control of the methods of production, I would suggest it is more to do with a loss of direction to truly follow one's own path, ala Tony Wrench.
And herein lies the challenge and the obstacles. Daily I am devoid of true meaning, happiness with the subsequent negative effects upon my mental health. I strive not for more 'product' but that over trumpeted concept of freedom. That which sees a man make his own choices towards sustaining a life. I cannot educate my child, I cannot sleep under the stars and I cannot plant that which I should wish to ingest. The system so rigged book makers would not take bets is almost indomitable, it is the almost which gives hope.
Yet I concede my earlier youthful read, learn and change shall come is as naive as I was at the time. Yet the kernel of that thought holds a truth within and without, true freedom would be, to be. It is no coincidence that we massacred the native Americans for therein a vision, undoubtedly fallible to even romantic eyes, illuminated a vision that could redeem our western values.
So what am I trying to say?
Simply, this beast, snorting horrid hysterical naked, has straitjacketed the best minds of mine, previous and sullies future generations.
The challenge once recognising this, is to provide the tools for its undoing. Therein lies the challenge... This beast sleeps in the hearts of those who have profited in excess, and so they shout the loudest to proclaim it's virtue. Millionaires in my time have become billionaires, the disinformation, misinformation spew forth distractions and sideshows and dead cats.
A powerful enemy so disguised cloak those within and recruit those who would wish to see a better world. That's it's true strength. Gas lit we turn in on each other.
Ps keep writing... I love your work and I share the articles in a hope we can coalesce to form a coherent voice....
Yours a dreamer, but I'm not the only one...
Ecan has spent $150 million on an environmental plan to manage their region's water based on the Canterbury Water Management Strategy 2009 - a 1990s drought relief plan developed by the Canterbury Mayoral Forum'.
The plan achieved temporary statutory primary via the Ecan Act 2010. The Ecan Act was passed under urgency to fast track massive irrigation schemes depleting braided rivers and polluting near pristine aquifers.
The plan will not become operational until the end of 2024 and compliance with the plan to be achieved 10 years later.
Some Ecan councilors are beginning to realize there is no evidence the ($150 million plan) is working or will work as it is based on models and OVERSEER.
Fencing streams, planting trees, and land based predator control is the only visible response by Ecan. All singularly useless responses after knowingly promoting the unsustainable irrigation development.