Rage Building

Contribution from a reader:

Curious to hear your reaction to all this election ridiculousness north and south of the border. Stupid democrats picking an old white guy running mate to counter American racism. Stupid republicans patronizingly picking a woman to try and steal votes, not because she has any significant policy credentials other than Alaskan oil and anti-abortion interests. What a doomed country.

Back home, redneck Harper salivating to call an election and cowardly convictionless liberals avoiding his phonecalls.

... Feeling angry that these are the political choices people have given themselves.

--

Thanks for writing Mentat Mulq (nice ring to it?). Yeah I share your rage on a lot of this. I think it's exceedingly cynical that McCain picked this new Thatcher as his running mate. I know nothing about this woman really (pro-life but somehow will back the war I'm sure) but it just seems to be a way of grabbing some Clinton voters who obviously (if they fall for it) are unable to read or make decisions for themselves. They deserve what they get if they are sore losers. I hope that McCain gets hammered for this choice but I still think that he's going to be the next President of the United States.

By the way, are you noticing the insane degree to which this election is being covered? It feels like if you watch TV long enough or search the Internet enough you'll find info on how Barack Obama's tie selection is him reaching out to Coors Light drinkers (the new demographic that matters this year). It feels like every move means something and that there are plans within plans within plans. I'm just pretty blown away by the degree of analysis. It's like we have nothing better to do at the end of the world.

And as for the Canadian election, it's a case of deja vu. If it happens this fall, Harper will win a minority government and then in a couple of years (and another 100 soldiers killed in Afghanistan) claim that the House of Commons isn't working and will win another minority and so on until people wake up and go out and burn down Parliament.

My thought is just that we need to take control of as much as we can and stop thinking that these leaders are going do be our saviours.

Oh Jesus (and the humans that exploit you) what have you done to us? Your cross has taken all our power away and institutionalized it just when we need it the most.

Harper Visits

Yesterday (or was it, time stops mattering when you're online) Prime Minister Harper visited Hamilton to announce some coin for healthcare in the province. He's getting generous because we've got an election on the way. So he chose to come to Hamilton, that bastion of un-Progressive (did you notice how quickly they dropped Progressive?) Conservative blue.

Wait! Hamilton never votes conservative and likely never will, until perhaps the economy and state are failing them and they decide that the Conservative's latest scapegoat (Jews, Arabs, homosexuals, criminals) is a lot better than freezing in the dark. Hamilton votes NDP and occasionally, on the mountain, Liberal. So what gives?

Harper was trying to ensure that the Liberals fail to take seats in Hamilton. He wants to suck votes away from the Liberals to the Conservatives and ensure that the NDP comes up on top. Many voters flop between Liberal and Conservative (I know what's wrong with them?) but NDP voters never flop to the Conservatives, they would be more likely to embrace delusion and choose the Liberals instead. The Liberals will lose votes from people who go where the money goes and the NDP is likely to prevail helping Harper to get an edge on seats in parliament once the next government is formed. He's a pretty smart guy, his visit to Hamilton was planned with the election in mind.

But of course all this election drivel, and I'm as guilty as any of us, keeps us from talking about the real issues like climate change and the problem of civilization. That'll suit Harper just fine.

Farm Thoughts 3

Don't push your luck. You have to be realistic about what you can achieve. Never take on too much because you'll end up doing everything a little less well. Unless you have a large enough community that is but even then you have to accept that there are limits.

Last night the three sheep got out as we were trying to corral them back to their home pen for the night. It was sunset, probably too late to start. The sun was a magical orange, the colour you get when you mix orange juice and cranberry juice. Stunning, but they all are once you learn to look. We had done this over a dozen times before but these sheep are skittish and you never know what they're going to do. They rounded the corner and saw us, in our usual places. That was enough. They quickly turned away and broke out into a field.

By this point, another pair of farm inhabitants, our horses turned up to check out what these crazy humans were up to. The sheep proceeded to cut into the horses' fenced in field; fenced for horses not for small sheep.

An almost-tragically comical scene developed. Both horses reared up and were hot on the sheep's heels. Did they mean to kill these small, black intruders? Were they just playing? It seemed real enough to us. The earth shook under their mighty hoofs. I have to admit that I laughed as the scene worsened.

Happily for the sheep, they escaped the horses. Trapped against a fence they blazed a trail straight for me and my trusty dog, Buck. Scared from their ordeal they broke through our line. Buck just watched them pass while I was almost bowled over. My moment, missed.

The sun was dipping ever lower and the shadows grew longer and longer. The sheep made it up the road to the neighbour's house. They led us on a bicycle chase there, no luck. Then they disappeared as we herded them back to the house. Searching for black sheep by flashlight proved fruitless and we retired to our beds.

These sheep were scared and never much cared for us anyway (the feeling is mutual). We thought we might never see them again as the coyotes hunt in darkness. But after a four hour morning search we found them with the help of a dozen smiling neighbours. Eventually they became trapped in a fenced in swimming pool and we lassoed them and bundled them into a truck for the journey home.

A monumental waste of time. Hours gone from our brief lives. I wish the sheep nothing but ill but really how can I blame them? And they did make me laugh, when they met the horses. What would life be without a few chases now and then?

Still my lesson in this is not to overextend oneself. To realize that there comes a moment when you have too many animals, or things or tools or clothes. We do not always need to grow and spread like a cancer. Perhaps there is a wider lesson in all this.

Hallelujah!

But will it be enough and fast enough?

It's clear that civilized humans don't really give a shit about the planet. It's not really our fault, we aren't advanced enough and we believe in instant gratification at all costs. We'd much rather jet off to the sunny south and fuck the consequences. Of course we still want the best for our children which doesn't really make sense when we are guaranteeing them a miserable future. I really can't understand people on this one. I guess they have too much faith in technology and I have none.

But today I read how air travel costs are going through the roof. And not just in Europe or Canada but the US--that bastion of subsidizing destruction (well we love killing the planet just as much don't we--think tar sands).

Our last hope, considering that we are not going to take any meaningful action, is that we are going to hit natural limits which will prevent us destroying the planet. Oil will just become too expensive, uranium will just be too costly to extract, we just won't be able to clearcut all the trees because our chainsaws will be out of fuel.

But we gave it a good shot didn't we? Was it worth it?

Redefine Poverty

We desperately need a new conception of poverty. We need it to prevent the destruction of our planet, our one and only home. We need it more than we need solar power, more than we need organic food, more than we need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. To embrace this new conception of poverty would be to embrace these important moves and more. It would be truly revolutionary.

Currently civilized humans view poverty as our greatest enemy, a thing that must be banished from the earth. Mention poverty and most people think of the filthy family, often with dark skin, thin from undernourishment, in the small run-down shack with no rooms and worse, no appliances or television, cooking over a fire and eating mostly vegetables. People shudder that they should end up in such a situation. They will climb over anyone, invest their money anywhere, do anything to prevent themselves dropping into poverty. It is one of the scariest fates in the world.

Or so we are told.

What we need is more poverty. Poverty is sustainable, our current lifestyle is not. One definition of poverty is telling: the state of having little or no money and few or no material possessions. In our culture poverty is about not having stuff. You're not actually suffering when you can't buy that new computer, no matter what the advertisements say.

If every person on earth lived like the average North American we would need several earths to provide for these people's appetites: private vehicle, meat-based diet, extremely large home, energy to heat during cold months and cool during warm months, countless and continuous possessions. We don't have several earths, we only have one home and we share it with many other beings. We can no longer deny that our lifestyle is destructive and must be abandoned.

I know a man who grows most of his own food and rarely earns a wage. He barters for what he needs and recognizes, as I do, that humans need three simple things: food, shelter and community. Beyond that is excess. He would be considered in poverty if you asked the state. He likely makes somewhere around the $2 a day that is the World Bank's criteria for being in poverty. But he is healthy, well fed, self-sufficient with a roof over his head. If more people would live like him, climate change might not even be a concern and more people would actually be healthy instead of self-destructive as this culture teaches.

So I'd like to propose a new conception of poverty. You are in poverty if you do not eat healthy nutritious food that you mostly produced yourself. You are in poverty if you do not have a humble and clean space to call your own, a place that keeps you warm during the cold months. You are in poverty if you pollute your body with chemicals and eat animals that were ill-treated during their lives. You are in poverty if you do not live in a supportive and respectful community of humans, people who understand and respect reciprocity. You are in poverty if you don't realize that you are already beautiful. You are in poverty if you don't see the link between your survival and that of the land. You are in poverty if your goal in life is to gather small pieces of paper that have no value beyond what people with guns tell us they have. You are more in poverty with the more things that you acquire.

Look/Lock Down

The Olympics are an interesting metaphor for the world. Here we have the most opulent, most expensive and most secure event the world has ever seen. In fact these games might be the last to reach such dizzying heights. Perhaps this is the peak from which the only way is down, back to sanity, back to reality.

In the end, a relatively small portion of the earth's human population will witness and take part in this (we're told) highest sporting event demonstrating the best of humanity. Lay down your arms and pick up your Nike shoes and your dryfit clothing. In Beijing will gather the strongest, the fastest, the most accurate and the most daring humans who have ever lived. They do their jobs so well. And we all need a job, a purpose, don't we?

And all the while the ominous smog hangs above the city like a noose. This is the dark heart of human civilization. While things seem so good, it's becoming increasingly difficult to ignore that we are paying a heavy price for the heights we have reached (if heights they may be called, perhaps depths would be more appropriate). China's rapid "growth" has made it a toxic soup. Algae blooms and clogs the shoreline of the mighty city. Rotten air obscures the skyscrapers. All this has happened before and all this will happen again. North American cities were the first to poison themselves. Now we share this pleasure with the rest of the world. Ain't globalization grand?

The Beijing games will help us to forget climate change, economic meltdowns around the world and rising global food costs. Much like a news story on Britney Spears, the last thing that must happen is for people to concern themselves with the future. Carry on with your lives. The authorities have everything under control.

But the wolf is at the door.

Who will be the first athlete to fall victim to a heart attack at the Beijing games? All that particulate matter on clean, efficient, pink, virgin lungs doesn't always lead to the podium. Wouldn't it be better to run through a forest and leave behind the gold, silver and bronze?

How fast will the protectors of civilization, the armed guardians, smash in their first skull? Will we all rejoice together even through this violence? Why do we even need policing? Are we incapable of living together? Why should someone tell us how to behave under the threat of violence? Oh yeah, there are far too many of us and we are taught not to share. So police are a fact of life.

In the end do you even remember one event from an Olympics past? Was it a defining moment for you? Did it touch you? No, I can't say I ever bought the advertising and I think you didn't either. Will this year be any different? Who cares about all these fools running and jumping for my entertainment? We should be running. We should be jumping. We should be raging.

The Olympics blind us with bright lights. If you're always looking up you can't see the murky pools around the base of our enterprise. Look down.

Obama's Middle East

Robert Fisk is really a good read. He really offers an "unusual" perspective on the Middle East (why did they stop capitalizing it anyway, have you noticed?). And he's old enough that he doesn't care what people think anyway. Here he is on Obama and what his arrival heralds for the Middle East. Stay tuned!