Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Peak Shrink has an interesting post on The Tyranny of Positive Thinking, a review of Barbara Ehrenreich’s book Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America. In it, she expresses the same frustration I’ve felt when dealing with our cult of positivity.
Should climate activists and feminists support campaigns to slow population growth? Laurie Mazur says that alliance will strengthen the movement. Ian Angus strongly disagrees …
-A March Round-up of What’s Happening out in the World of Transition
-Transition on ‘One Planet’ on BBC World Service
-Transition Sunshine Coast delivers EDAP
-“Genuine resilience results from expanding the human footprint”. Discuss
Time Magazine recently had an article (Why the Tea Party Movement Matters) that looked at the latest manifestation of populism in the United States, with widespread discontent at the state of the US economy and the US political system, particularly the lack of transparency evident in many government initiatives ranging from the bail-out of the financial system to proposed changes to healthcare, along with discontent about costly wars in the middle east that seem to be never-ending.
KrisCan talks with designer Ken Eklund, the creator of World Without Oil, an online game that dealt with the first 32 weeks of a global oil crisis where players were encouraged to contribute stories, podcasts or videos that chronicled their experience of an imagined reality…
-Arctic arch failure leads to sea-ice exodus
-World’s temperature record to be re-analysed
-In India, a Clear Victor on The Climate Action Front
-Is Arctic methane on the move?
-Methane Releases from Arctic Shelf May Be Much Larger and Faster Than Anticipated
-Climate scientists must be ruthlessly honest about data
-S&P Rally Slowed by Fastest Cash Depletion Since 1991
-Economists: Another Financial Crisis on the Way
-Thousands rally on campuses, streets for schools
-China’s worthless economic statistics
-Murray Bookchin on Growth and Consumerism
-Swaps and Robbers
-We’re all PIGS now
-The Great American Bank Robbery
This is the story of Transition Tales, a small group within Transition Town Totnes. One of the aims of this project is to raise awareness within Primary and Secondary School children of the transition solution of community led response to the twin challenges of Peak Oil and Climate Change by creating positive stories.
Could it be that “thinking positively” is contributing to our blindness and inaction around energy issues, environmental degradation and economic devastation? I’ve hammered this point home in a number of posts, the most widely read being “Do You Have a Panglossian Disorder?.” Now, a trenchant social observer provides a clear outline of how that may well be so, elaborating on the ‘dangers of positive thinking.’
Salon’s Andrew Leonard has just published Bringing subprime sexy back, a review of Michael Lewis’ much anticipated book The Big Short, a follow-up to his wonderful Liar’s Poker. Before I get started here, let me say that I think Michael Lewis is great—I have quoted him here at DOTE—and I’m usually OK with Andrew Leonard too.
We live in a world of deep inequality, and the gap between the rich and the poor is widening. We in the rich world generally agree that this is a problem we ought to help fix—but that the real beneficiaries will be the billions of people living in poverty. After all, inequality has little impact on the lives of those who find themselves on top of the pile. Right?
-Empires on the Edge of Chaos
-Majoring in Idiocy
-Climate-Resilient Industrial Development Paths
-Can we design cities for happiness?
-What Every Environmentalist Needs to Know About Capitalism
