Collapse of Industrial Civilization « Speaking Truth to Power

Ernest Callenbach: Last Words To An American Decline

By carolyn, on May 7th, 2012%

We live, then, in a dark time here on our tiny precious planet. Ecological devastation, political and economic collapse, irreconcilable ideological and religious conflict, poverty, famine: the end of the overshoot of cheap-oil-based consumer capitalist expansionism. If you don’t know where you’ve been, you have small chance of understanding where you might be headed. So let me offer a capsule history for those who, like most of us, got little help from textbook history. Humans tend to try to manage things: land, structures, even rivers. We spend enormous amounts of time, energy, and treasure in imposing our will on nature, on preexisting or inherited structures, dreaming of permanent solutions, monuments to our ambitions and dreams. But in periods of slack, decline, or collapse, our abilities no longer suffice for all this management. We have to let things go. . . . → Read More: Ernest Callenbach: Last Words To An American Decline

What If Collapse Happened And Nobody Noticed?

By carolyn, on May 3rd, 2012%

The poorest and most vulnerable die first, out of sight, and everyone else just does what they can to survive. Peoples’ priorities change: they concentrate on getting by from day-to-day rather than planning for the future. They stop getting married. They have less children or none at all. They live for today. They work harder for less. Taxes go up even as basic services are cut. Long term unemployment has been conclusively linked to greater mortality and susceptibility to illness, physical and mental. Would many of these people not still be alive today if were not for austerity measures and declining middle class opportunity? Isn’t that a die-off? It’s been said that having children is a referendum on the future. Based on global birth rates, I think the human race is collectively registering a vote of “no confidence.” . . . → Read More: What If Collapse Happened And Nobody Noticed?

American Dystopia: Welcome To The 2012 Hunger Games, By Rebecca Solnit

By carolyn, on May 2nd, 2012%

Sending Debt Peonage, Poverty, and Freaky Weather Into the Arena . . . → Read More: American Dystopia: Welcome To The 2012 Hunger Games, By Rebecca Solnit

The Earth Is Full, By Paul Gilding

By carolyn, on April 8th, 2012%

The reason is we have now reached a moment where four words — the earth is full — will define our times. This is not a philosophical statement; this is just science based in physics, chemistry and biology. There are many science-based analyses of this, but they all draw the same conclusion — that we’re living beyond our means. . . . → Read More: The Earth Is Full, By Paul Gilding

The Survival Value Of Oral And Written Traditions, By K.B.

By carolyn, on March 24th, 2012%

Traditional societies that have survived so long in natural TEOTWAWKI conditions – in Australia, Central Asia, South America, North America, Siberia, and many others right up to our day all share one thing in common with regard to the young: educating youth through stories that impart the values and character necessary to not only survival but constructive outlook and moral self-worth. . . . → Read More: The Survival Value Of Oral And Written Traditions, By K.B.

Spread Reckoning: US Suburbs Face Twin Perils Of Climate Change And Peak Oil [Excerpt], By Maggie Koerth-Baker

By carolyn, on March 23rd, 2012%

Sprawling metropolitan areas like Merriam, Kans., face fundamental challenges from global warming and the end of easy oil . . . → Read More: Spread Reckoning: US Suburbs Face Twin Perils Of Climate Change And Peak Oil [Excerpt], By Maggie Koerth-Baker

Why The American Empire Was Destined To Collapse, Nomi Prins Interviews Morris Berman

By carolyn, on March 9th, 2012%

America was founded within a conceptual framework of being in opposition to something—the British and the Native Americans, to begin with—and it never abandoned that framework. It doesn’t really have a clear idea of what it is in a positive sense, and that has generated a kind of national neurosis. I mean, we were in real trouble when the Soviet Union collapsed; in terms of identity, we were completely adrift until the attacks of 9/11 (just think of how frivolous and meaningless the Clinton years were, in retrospect). War is our drug of choice, and without an enemy we enter a kind of nervous breakdown mode. . . . → Read More: Why The American Empire Was Destined To Collapse, Nomi Prins Interviews Morris Berman

Cash Of The Titans: Against The Noxious Fantasy Of Limitless Growth, By Phil Rockstroh

By carolyn, on February 22nd, 2012%

The concept of endless economic growth, accepted as sacrosanct by both U.S. mainstream political parties, and internalized as the dominant mode of mind by the general population of the corporate/consumer state is mirrored in the exponential mathematics of a malignancy. Cancer, if given voice, would proclaim itself to be a believer in “free market values”…devoted to the principle of endless growth…until, of course, it would silence its own voice by killing its host. Likewise, all life seeks limits or prematurely dooms itself. . . . → Read More: Cash Of The Titans: Against The Noxious Fantasy Of Limitless Growth, By Phil Rockstroh

Toward Purpose And Meaning In A Too-Late World, By Douglas Carhart

By carolyn, on February 19th, 2012%

We can agree that the modern industrial age has certainly severed our sense of connection to nature, and even to ourselves. Cheap fossil fuels gave us the illusion we could dominate, subjugate and use the natural world for our own ends, and in the process we forgot that we are a part of the world, not above it. It cut us off from our sense of our own natural selves and our sense of community with our neighbors. After 150 years of fossil fuel driven growth we have forgotten what this sense of connectedness feels like. Perhaps my dream says, “Prepare the ground for its return, build the bridges of connection. In the future this energy will flow again.” . . . → Read More: Toward Purpose And Meaning In A Too-Late World, By Douglas Carhart

The Fight Of The Century, By Richard Heinberg

By carolyn, on February 16th, 2012%

As the world economy crashes against debt and resource limits, more and more countries are responding by attempting to salvage what are actually their most expendable features—corrupt, insolvent banks and bloated militaries—while leaving the majority of their people to languish in “austerity.” The result, predictably, is a global uprising. This current set of conditions and responses will lead, sooner or later, to social as well as economic upheaval—and a collapse of the support infrastructure on which billions depend for their very survival. . . . → Read More: The Fight Of The Century, By Richard Heinberg

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