thanks Alex, I'm working with the Flemish Greens, and have potentially big news after the 22nd <g>
Michel On Mon, Jun 10, 2019 at 12:48 PM Alex Foti <alex.f...@gmail.com> wrote: > Dear friends, > > dystopia is near but can still be averted. we shouldn't dive in to despair > when movements like Greta's FFF and London's XR and huge surge of greens in > Germany and elsewhere point to the fact that the people are finally ready > to ditch fossil capitalism. i've recently lost (very suddenly) my beloved > dad. so my outlook to life is dark. still he'd have wanted me to fight on > even in the face of crushing odds. since last summer i went back to climate > activism and was surprised to discover that many of my age (GenX) and > millennials i know had done the same, in milano and elsewhere. green is the > new red. p2p postcapitalists should join green parties, methinks. > > > > > On Sun, Jun 9, 2019 at 5:59 PM Michel Bauwens <michelsub2...@gmail.com> > wrote: > >> thanks for reading Slater's loss of faith apocalyptic warning letter >> below, >> >> Michel >> >> ---------- Forwarded message --------- >> From: Mathijs de Bruin <math...@mathijsfietst.nl> >> Date: Sun, Jun 9, 2019 at 12:04 PM >> Subject: Climate crisis >> To: >> >> >> Dear friends, >> >> Not much of an update of my part. Tears are in my eyes as I’ve read >> Matthew Slater’s post (forwarded below). Knowing him as one of the >> strongest ‘possibilitists’/optimists who has been working on realistic >> options for a livable future. >> >> I don’t know what to make of this, how to interpret this, how to deal >> with this. I do know, that his words are not lightly spoken. I do think we >> should worry. I feel that our solution(s) are not in maintaining wellbeing, >> as much as in sticking together. I want to hold your hands as the tsunami >> is coming, feel your embrace. See what is the best we can do, as *our* >> world is failing. >> >> To me, in this context, even knowing (and: doing!) what should be done. >> To choose survival, together, is worthwhile challenge. Even though the >> fruits of our labour might not be the utopic reality we long and strive >> for. It might be a different one: parting with grace, embracing what is to >> come, overcoming despair and: building on what is (or might be) left. >> >> “Alles van waarde is weerloos.” >> — Lucebert >> >> With love, >> Mathijs >> >> *Van: *"Matslats - Community currency engineer" <matsl...@fastmail.com> >> *Onderwerp: **matslats.net <http://matslats.net>: Climate crisis* >> *Datum: *9 juni 2019 om 10:27:07 WEST >> *Aan: *math...@mathijsfietst.nl >> >> >> <https://cdn.blog.ucsusa.org/wp-content/uploads/polar-vortex-2019-Jan-29.jpg> >> >> I suspected for a long time that our civilisation wasn't viable. When the >> banks crashed in 2008 I paid attention to a lot of apocalyptic reporting >> that said we came *this* close to economic Armageddon - whatever that >> meant. As I better understood how capitalism is a stupid dogma preached >> increasingly only by self-serving, vain sociopaths >> <https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/give-and-take/201310/does-studying-economics-breed-greed>, >> how it requires exponential consumption of resources >> <http://www.missingtheforest.com/capitalisms-problem-exponential-growth-in-a-finite-system>, >> and how it has failed to respond to increasingly shrill science-based >> warnings, I came to expect an ugly financial and/or climate collapse as >> inevitable in my lifetime. >> >> I was alarmed in early April 2018 when the polar vortex broke >> <https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/02/27/north-pole-temperatures-soar-past-freezing-beast-east-blasts/> >> and Europe froze, but Jem Bendell's paper, Deep Adaptation: A map for >> navigating the climate tragedy >> <http://www.lifeworth.com/deepadaptation.pdf> didn't alarm me too much. >> His favoured theory was a multi-breadbasket failure (MBBF) within 5-10 >> years; the melting of sea ice at the north pole would disrupt the weather >> so much that that grain harvests in Russia, USA and Canada would all fail, >> and that this would probably lead to societal collapse. Fair enough, I said. >> >> Jem's instincts can be uncanny. Last week I heard the news that the polar >> vortex has shifted over from the less cold north polar ocean to greenland, >> where more ice remains, and this has meant near incessant rain for grain >> farmers in USA. By the end of the planting season, only 60% of the fields >> had been planted, and much of what was planted had drowned. This plus >> drought in Australia >> <https://www.world-grain.com/articles/11664-australian-wheat-output-falls-to-11-year-low> >> and >> a long Russian winter >> <https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-25/russia-s-wheat-crop-under-threat-from-miserable-start-to-spring> >> means >> that we are facing MBBF this year. >> Suddenly I'm not so sanguine. My last ten years work on complementary >> currencies has been an expression of optimism I didn't feel, that it was >> possible for people to self organise and run society differently. I felt >> even if there was the smallest chance of it being meaningful, in the face >> of such suffering, working to change the system was meaningful. Now without >> time to change the system, its hard to find purpose. We've been sunning >> ourselves on the beach until the tide went out waaaay to far, and now we >> see the froth of the tsunami on the horizon. Its too late to install the >> early warning system, too late to reinforce our houses, now we've only got >> time to run and to hope. Its time for me to admit that the system I was >> working to change for the better will be destroyed and all my work will be >> dashed on the rocks. Its too late to build a decentralised energy grid; too >> late to redesign finance; too late to build a better food system, too late >> to restore our national manufacturing base; too late to restore our soils, >> agriculture; too late for carbon capture technologies too late to dismantle >> the fossil fuel leviathan; too late for every hope I clung to; from last >> week to this, I don't know who I am any more. >> >> Climate science is far from exact, but when it starts playing out we'd be >> foolish to say it was wrong. But there's a leap from "crops will fail" to >> "society will collapse" which is another field entirely. A sensible society >> could still take steps (that's what Deep Adaptation is about) not so much >> to reduce carbon emissions but to ensure that resources are shared. But our >> society is very far from sensible, or even aware of what is coming. A real >> but manageable hunger crisis, perhaps comparable to the special period >> in Cuba <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vs6xoKmnYq8>, will be >> compounded by shock, blame, #ClimateGrief >> <https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/gy48d4/environmental-grief-climate-change-anxiety>, >> and opportunist elites profiting from pain. >> >> So this winter the global grain reserves will be eaten and as in 2011, >> the poorer countries will probably experience political unrest fueled by >> high food prices. Since the north pole is past its tipping point, next year >> will almost certainly be worse than this, so about 18 months from now, a >> LOT of people will be freaking out. More than ever before, the food we eat >> will be taken directly out of the mouths of the starving. >> >> Some people are predicting human extinction >> <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqIt93dDG1M>, but that seems a rather >> abstract loss to me. My chest is heavy and my gaze constantly drifts >> because I'm grieving the failure of our wondrous civilisation, >> contemplating the expansion of needless suffering, and turning to face a >> difficult future. >> >> ---------------------- >> >> Please share this link on social media if you like it! >> >> http://matslats.net/climate-crisis >> >> >> >> >> -- >> P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net >> >> Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss: >> http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation >> >> Updates: http://del.icio.us/mbauwens; http://friendfeed.com/mbauwens; >> http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens >> >> >> >> >> -- P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss: http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation Updates: http://del.icio.us/mbauwens; http://friendfeed.com/mbauwens; http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens
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