Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
We are currently facing the most severe migration crisis in history. But this is only one dimension of a broader civilizational crisis. Thus, anti-racist movements should not focus solely on issues of human mobility rights, but also build new paths of solidarity with societies in the geopolitical Global South.
These are people who found a tiny and overcrowded raft, floating on the open ocean, safer than their homes. See what you can do where you live — you probably can’t do much, but you might be able to do a little.
Meaningful action on climate change today means nothing less than widespread paradigm shifts across social, economic, political, cultural, and built infrastructures.
As I write this, the bodies of hundreds of people are being pulled from the water off the coast of Libya, after two boats sank, drowning women, men, and children migrating in desperation from places like Syria, Bangladesh and sub-Saharan Africa.
One of the elements of the Twitter conversation this week, after the body of the three year old Syrian boy Aylan Kurdi was found on a Greek beach, was an attempt to shift the language about the Syrian tragedy and those fleeing it, from “migrants” to “refugees.”
“I think what we’re standing for is something that no longer exists…” says Nielle, “beautiful, pristine farmland, wonderful water, fresh air.”
The agendas that are set so solemnly for international (or global) food and hunger problems cannot be used at the sub-national or local administrative level, which must analyse its own problems and find practical solutions, All too often, catering sensibly to the food needs of urban populations is ignored by policy makers, while economic ‘development’ (more infrastructure, more financing, more consumption, more personal mobility at the cost of public transport) is welcomed. The provisioning of food and the planning for shortening and localising food supply chains is usually abandoned by public administrators to the ruthless methods of the market
Mass migrations, or more specifically mass culture replacement, is one of the more troubling aspects of peak energy.
