Society

If we all lived sustainably, could we change the world?

by

The other day Andrew C. Revkin wrote, “Only direct experience seems to trigger change.” By that he meant disasters, deaths, destruction, home loss, looming gas prices, … imminent experiences that make you change your lifestyle right now because you have no other choice. I have no other way of saying this other than that really sucks. Let’s prove him wrong. Let’s change our lifestyles before things get awful. Now.

Redefining Normal

by

The last couple of days I’ve been struggling with how to begin the Green Your Insides Challenge. And then it hit me that I needed to address this: the reason it is so difficult for anyone to green themselves, inside or out, is that society is constantly pushing us in the other direction. We have learned since we were wee tots that we are supposed to want more, want better, want now now now. And usually, we can have what we want… so we do.

Slow Food Nation gains momentum

by

Over 50,000 people are expected at the Slow Food Nation celebration in San Francisco August 29-31. Restauranteer and food writer Alice Waters comments: “We want to lift a loud voice to change our food system. We need to change the ways we grow, distribute, and eat food, which needs to be good, clean, and fair. Things are at a crisis point with respect to health and the environment.”

Hubbert schizophrenia

by

Simultaneously trying to prepare for “the Crash” and to come up with the rent money can be stressful, even for a doomer. … The doomer in me is like the strange uncle I’m embarrassed about but can’t leave home, because he’s me too.

The coming re-becoming

by

Everywhere you turn in this nation, you see a society primed for implosion. We seem unaware how extraordinary the American experience has been, especially in the last hundred years. By this, I don’t mean that we are a better people than any other society — these days, ordinary people in the USA make an effort to appear thuggish and act surly, as though we were a nation of convicts — but for decade-upon-decade, we were very fortunate. Even the Great Depression of the 1930s may seem like a relatively peaceful and gentle “time out” from a frantic era of hypertrophic growth, compared to the storm we’re sailing into now.

“What would my grandfather do?”

by

It’s big things, and small things. I don’t know if these qualities come from growing up in the Depression, being a hard working man, not growing up in the computer age, or just learning to be a good person. But for my grandfather, every decision matters, to ourselves, our family, our friends, our communities, and the world as a whole.

The Vast Wastelands

by

Undoubtedly you’ve been following, more or less, the economic crisis that energy scarcity and the mortgage debacle has largely precipitated. Depending on where you live, you’ve probably also noticed over the past few years the shopping centers, office, and industrial parks popping up continuing the urban sprawl toward the exurbs. While these new bright and shiny, luxuriously landscaped pods of energy waste are well lighted, manicured, and maintained now, all you have to do to see where they will be once they’ve been abandoned for the next wave of urban development is to reverse direction.