Global Warming is Causing Extinction of the Political Species
by Prof. Denis G. Rancourt
Caucus - The Political Magazine of the Students, University of Ottawa, Vol.6, Issue 3, February-March 2006, page 10 (
LINK)
A CASTRATED ANIMAL loses its territo¬
rial and reproductive drives to become pri¬
marily concerned with its consumption. En¬
vironmentalism is being used to neutralize
citizens that would normally be politically
engaged in proportion to the magnitude of
current problems. Mainstream treatment of
global warming, from media reports to Dis¬
covery Channel documentaries to Canada’s
Two Tonne Challenge, and its measurable
influence on public opinion and concerned
citizen involvement are records of an effec¬
tive program of indoctrination, away from
direct challenges to concentrated and insti¬
tutionalized power and towards personalized
involvement that is in harmony with capi¬
tal’s undemocratic control of the economy
and resources.
Consciousness regarding environmental
problems leads to a large array of reactions
on a multidimensional continuum that in¬
cludes at least two end points: to concentrate
on one’s own consumer and lifestyle choices
and to encourage others to do the same, to
treat the problem from the perspective of
individual psychology, or to act politically
to remove the power structures and institu¬
tions that are the societal root of the prob¬
lem. While it is true that ecological lifestyle
choices and effective political commitment
are not necessarily contrary; just as one can
be a meat-eater and a dedicated environmen¬
tal activist, or a vegan vegetarian enrolled in
an MBA program; environmental conscious¬
ness can be and is manipulated away from
any consequential attack on the status quo.
The apolitical variety of environmental in¬
volvement is strongly encouraged by capital
and its government shadow, via everything
from foundation funding to media coverage
to government programs to responsible cor¬
porate citizen endorsement, etc.
And let us be clear, the status quo is a
world run by profit-driven investors and
corporations, backed by military might, that
are by far the main destructive forces on the
planet. If we shed our privileged perspective
for a moment and let go of the absurd notion
that the greatest threat to humankind is glo¬
bal warming and associated climate changes,
we might see the Empire and its satellites for
what they are, we might see war crimes and
exploitation on a scale that would perturb
even a global circulation model theorist.
The best measure of these crimes is not
anthropogenic C02 emission. There are
more graphic statistics than that. There are
real and immediate regional and continen¬
tal-scale environmental consequences that
are best measured by their impacts on life,
human life in particular since we inhabit
every environment. These include: the
effects of economic sanctions on national
populations, declared and undeclared wars
of occupation, US state-sponsored terror¬
ism (most other terrorist networks pale in
comparison), the effects of capital mobility
(in both First and Third Worlds), the effects
of First World financed corruption, the ef¬
fects of capital exploitation via national
debts, the effects of First World imposed
economic structural adjustments, the effects
of forced market, work-force, and resource
access on the terms set by capital (i.e., so-
called globalization), the consequences to
native inhabitants of being in the unfor¬
tunate situation of living on resource-rich
territories, the effects of television, mass
media, and advertising on the human spirit
and on family and community, etc. These
translate into traditional environmental
measures such as: depleted uranium pol¬
lution on regional scales (ugly stuff' if you
plan on having a family in the next thou¬
sand years), chemical industry accidents
in populated areas, deforestation and as¬
sociated water table losses, agri-business
impacts on soil depletion, water pollution,
food safety, habitat destruction, ecological,
biological, and societal consequences of
human pharmaceutical use, etc.
Communities based on the quality of
human connections, not serving corporate
greed or manufactured dreams of wealth,
fame, and immortality, and tied to the needs
of others and their dependence on a shared
environment, are sustainable and environ¬
mentally sound. The environmental move¬
ment itself is an expression of this vital
human thrust but, as informed First World-
ers, we cannot simply behave as though an
ideal world of collaborating communities
of sensitive individuals were possible under
the present regime of madness. We need to
force our governments and corporations to
stop destroying the web of such communi¬
ties that spontaneously wants to create itself.
We have a responsibility to risk as much as
we can in being as effective as possible in
dismantling the power structures that will
otherwise turn our planet into an illusion
of heaven for few and a real hell for every¬
body.
The enemy is not individual stupidity or
any human trait. The enemy is the very real
network of exploitation and mind control
that we have allowed to take root in our so¬
ciety. We must take it out, action by action,
reaching deeper and deeper with every new
tactic and strategy. We must be as conscious
of our mental and political environments as
we have become knowledgeable of atmos¬
pheric chemistry. Let us be environmental at
home and political - far beyond voting and
postcards to MPs - at work. Consider that
we are at war. This is a war, literally. It is
insane. It could destroy the planet. It’s time
to be radical; to uproot the cancer of undem-
ocratically controlled investment capital and
to disallow capital and military invasions.
Radicals needed. Environmentalists go
home.
