"Ocean 'dead zones' becoming global problem" #400

[barracuda]

I have no idea what you are talking about.

[justdrew]

I knew ol' Rob Banks, nice guy.

[FourthBase]

Um, if these dead zones multiply and reach a snowballing point of no return, then there's a chance of a global extinction unseen since, oh, the Permian. Just saw it on Nova ScienceNow. Combine that possibility with the methane hydrate implications of "Dimming the Sun", another Nova doc. The worst conditions of 250 million years ago combined with the worst conditions of 75 million years ago. Yikes, lol. I hope there's some miracle earth-saving technology on the horizon.

As for "us and them", I have friends and family who've been connected in one way or another to various spooky/militaristic/elite entities and involved with shit like mind-boggling satellite technology, elite think-tankery, elite investment banking, elite law firms, mind-boggling DoD-funded nanotechnology research, Carlyle-type weapons sales, Nobel-level microbiology, Ivy League paranormal research, possibly-DIA-related military planning, Bush administration legal maneuvers, and so on. At my most paranoid, I've entertained the notion that those people I knew were in the loop. But they're not. (Probably.) It's (probably) just that I am an American, I live in a city with the highest concentration of colleges, and I associate with highly educated people. But the most important part is that I'm an American. America is deeply militarized. If you're doing any kind of significant research, or even if you're just working as a temp for people who do significant research, you're bound to encounter the tendrils of military spooksville. It's like being automatically suspicious of an Israeli who has military experience: Duh, every Israeli has military experience, they have no choice. If you're an urban American, chances are you are surrounded by militarization and spookiness, immersed in it like water, with little to no choice. Are my aforementioned friends and family bad people? Nah, I think they're just misled or indifferent. Does that make them irresponsible? Yes, in a way. But they're only human. What are they supposed to do, fuck shit up from the inside? Maybe they are, lol, and they're not telling me because I'm a dweeb who posts shit on the interweb. Maybe they want to, but are too afraid of the consequences. I don't know. Anyway, they don't know any better. That's the answer, and that's probably always the answer. It's up to me (and you) to find a way to awaken them, not just any old way but the best way, a win-win way. So who's responsible? I am. You are. For not helping them enough to figure shit out. So help them, more. Put your neck on the line. Speak out, smartly, wisely, effectively. That's what I've started to do, for the people I know who don't know any better. I don't harangue them, I don't pry into their lives, I just tell them what I think, what I happen to know, what they probably know deep down but block out. They're listening to me, which is a start. It's okay to touch base with fellow knowers here, to keep yourself honest and up-to-date. But constantly preaching to the choir is fucking useless, worse than useless even. Be useful. Be helpful. The number of truly evil people in the world is small, most of the people who work for the evil people are basically decent, and are merely deluded or indifferent. Get them to wake up, get them to care. It's not over. Cheer up.

[compared2what?]

Sorry, barracuda, but I strongly disagree. wintler made a very important point.

WE are THEY.

Have you ever known anyone who has worked for a defense contractor? I have. Several very nice, kind, loving friends, in fact. My mother, for a few years.

Have you ever known anyone in the military? I have. Good friends. Noble, principled, but ultimately deluded human beings. But I love them.

Investment bankers? Yep. I've known a couple of them, too. I watched the daughter of one play with my daughter at a picnic a few weeks ago.

We're all flawed human beings, and until we recognize THAT as the problem, and stop projecting outward onto nebulous "elites," we're hosed.

Sorry, professorpan, but knowing people who work in those industries/profession -- or for that matter being one of the people who works in one of those industries/professions -- has absolutely jack to do with whether or not one can identify two distinct classes of people within the teeming masses of the earth's population, one of which has vastly greater agency, means and power when it comes to the acceleration or deceleration of the planet-breaking in which almost everyone on earth participates to some extent than the other does.

If such a distinction can be made, and I believe it can, unless the class with the vastly greater agency-mean-power is vastly greater in number and bears a proportionately greater burden of responsibility for its actions than the other class does -- as measured by such common criteria as being required by both law and peer pressure to invest the time, energy, and money it takes to compensate for and/or minimize its share of the destruction -- I'd say there's a sufficiently significant disparity between the two classes for each to regard itself as "we" and the other as "they."

As you may or may not recall, the concept of mandated recycling by the consumer arose in a very fucking snaky way from what was getting to be a dangerously popular social and environmental justice movement targeting corporations. In, IIRC, the early '70s. It was around then -- and I don't know if it was the first such action, or just the first such action that made a big enough impression for me to remember it -- there was a big to-do when Friends of the Earth "returned" some mediagenically large number of plastic bottles to Schweppes, as part of an ongoing protest and awareness raising campaign.

Nor do I remember how many years it took before awareness-raising turned to broadcasting the received wisdom that each and every individual on the planet we all share must do his or her duty as its caretaker by recycling the non-biodegradable packaging in which the stuff he or she needed in order to sustain his or her life -- such as food, or energy-inefficient equipment without which he or she couldn't do his or her job, or sacrifice his or her life to heat or cold exposure -- was sold.

But it wasn't many. I mean, years. They, if you'll forgive the locution, transferred perceived ownership of the terrain on which the problem both occurred and could be solved to the consumer, all wrapped up in the appealingly egalitarian and ego-validating concept of recycling and environmentally friendly lifestyle choices by the individual.

And that was and is a load of shit. Some planet-breakers are more equal than others, and until we recognize THAT as the problem, and stop projecting outward onto the nebulous mass of our environmentally unenlightened peers-but-inferiors, we're hosed.

[wintler2]

So much either-or, so little both-and-more. The number of people involved in the neutering of 70s revival of ecological conciousness is much higher than any description of elites i have seen. A small number of people may have plotted the memetic paths, a larger group can only have seeded it, a much much larger group parroted it, sold the tokenism as true and embraced the lack of change it covered for. Some would blame only the elites who supposedly planned it, i would blame them and all who aided and abetted. Its a big planet, we have comprehensively fucked it over, theres plenty of responsibility to go around.

By all means target the elites, i see those actually doing that work (rather than just coining TPTB-fear as rationalisation for passivity) as valuable allies. But it is not the only struggle. We personally also have to come terms with our collusion in the violent charade and change, otherwise we can only perpetuate our servitude.

[compared2what?]

So much either-or, so little both-and-more. The number of people involved in the neutering of 70s revival of ecological conciousness is much higher than any description of elites i have seen. A small number of people may have plotted the memetic paths, a larger group can only have seeded it, a much much larger group parroted it, sold the tokenism as true and embraced the lack of change it covered for. Some would blame only the elites who supposedly planned it, i would blame them and all who aided and abetted. Its a big planet, we have comprehensively fucked it over, theres plenty of responsibility to go around.

By all means target the elites, i see those actually doing that work (rather than just coining it as a rationalisation for passivity) as valuable allies. But it is not the only struggle. We personally also have to come terms with our collusion in the violent charade and change, otherwise we can only perpetuate our servitude.

Obviously, large numbers of people play a part in the establishment of near-universal received wisdom. For example, by receiving it ,with or without skepticism. I didn't mention it because I thought it kind of went without saying, but I'm with you for the first paragraph.

After that, I don't understand what you're suggesting. What elites? There are people whose decisions and actions spread enormous amounts of poison all over the world. They are a comparative minority. That doesn't make them elite. It makes them a small group of people who are responsible, in concrete terms, for a disproportionate bulk of the problem.

Also: Come to what terms? Make what changes? With whose violent charade are we colluding? To what or whom are we perpetuating our servitude?

[barracuda]

It's odd, but on occasion I've been known to rather enjoy perpetuating my servitude.

[wintler2]

It is easier if you can.

[wintler2]

..After that, I don't understand what you're suggesting. What elites? There are people whose decisions and actions spread enormous amounts of poison all over the world. They are a comparative minority. That doesn't make them elite. It makes them a small group of people who are responsible, in concrete terms, for a disproportionate bulk of the problem.

I was using the word 'elite' because seemed common, care to suggest a better term & definition?

Also: Come to what terms?

Coming to terms covers alot, begins with admitting & owning own dependence on (eg. for my case) brown coal fired electricity generators owned by private equity, then deciding how to fight the amorality of it and our multiple other items of trade with our suicidal economic system.

Make what changes?

Which part of your life are you talking about? Cos all are likely to be affected. Transport is an obvious one - if you think a 50km commute is essential to reaching enlightenment, then changes might include more use of carpooling/bike/PT and spending one evening a fortnight putting truth into oil co billboards. For food it might mean learning to cook from scratch and finding out which of your neighbours are gardners. I'm not claiming to be a guru of what anyone should do, am surprised if you can'r see any need to change.

With whose violent charade are we colluding?

Eh? How about the one advertised on nightly news, where your taxes funding Halliburtons dividends are somehow making the surviving Iraqis still in Iraq somehow free. Really your payoff is cheaper oil cos all oil exporters know Uncle Sam is more than willing to kill thousands>millions to "defend our way of life"/enforce USdollar hegemony, but its tactless to mention that while selling you 'green' motoring and laxatives.

To what or whom are we perpetuating our servitude?

To the corporatised production systems that supply your goods and services, most of them cheapest cos more 'efficient'/use more fossil fuels (over labour), dump pollution, are anti-labor rights, use unconstrained harvesting and monocropping.. If you've got no idea where you food comes from our how you might grow any of it yourself then you are more than metaphorically in servitude to the supermarket system. If you are afraid of the dark but can only make light by paying ConEd whatever it asks, you are also a slave, more of own ignorance than ConEds cunning.

[compared2what?]

..After that, I don't understand what you're suggesting. What elites? There are people whose decisions and actions spread enormous amounts of poison all over the world. They are a comparative minority. That doesn't make them elite. It makes them a small group of people who are responsible, in concrete terms, for a disproportionate bulk of the problem.

I was using the word 'elite' because seemed common, care to suggest a better term & definition?

Yes: The people who control the private equity that owns the brown-coal fired electricity generators and other, assorted planet-breaking power-providers our dependence on which you advocate admitting and owning. I'm not sure what you mean by "owning" though. Whatever it is, it seems to preclude plainly stating that there is an identifiable class of people (the ones who control the private equity) who own the physically real and geographically locatable plants that will continue to destroy the natural world as long as they continue to operate, irrespective of how much responsibilty any individual outside of that class takes for the statistically insignifant contribution to that destruction he or she has made in the course of using and/or consuming goods and services the manufacture, sale and/or provision of which relies on environmentally destructive technologies. Because unless so many people take so much responsibility that living at a Unabomber-lifestyle level of energy independence becomes the rule rather than the exception, a true taking of personal responsibility would entail admitting that unless you are in that class of people -- let's call them "they" -- the pleasant feeling of personal empowerment that comes with living as environmentally responsibly as your means and circumstances permit is not the same thing as either having or exercising enough real power to have a significant impact on a problem you aren't causing and can't solve personally. Which is not to say you are powerless to address it through, for example, community organizing, mass boycott, media campaign, political activism both within and outside of the system, etc. But those all require group identification as "we" by people who are in general agreement about what "they" they're up against. So I still don't understand the advantage of rejecting those terms when discussing an issue about which we're in a greement wrt the general lay of the land, since I too define the problem as being one caused by and benefiting only:

the corporatised production systems that supply your goods and services

of which I am not ignorant but aware, which includes an awareness that I don't control those systems. They do. And it's irresponsible not to admit that, from my perspective.

[wintler2]

Wow, now thats a chunk of text!

I was using the word 'elite' because seemed common, care to suggest a better term & definition?

Yes: The people who control the private equity that owns the brown-coal fired electricity generators and other, assorted planet-breaking power-providers our dependence on which you advocate admitting and owning.

Thanks, can we call them PE Energy Corps for short?

I'm not sure what you mean by "owning" though.

Taking what measure of responsibility you feel is yours for the harms that are done for your dollars, and making changes to reduce and even god forbid make amends for them.

Whatever it is, it seems to preclude plainly stating that there is an identifiable class of people

Not true at all, I would love them to be identifiable, I just don’t think throwing around empty and inaccurate labels helps. There are no clichés in detail.

(the ones who control the private equity)

Not all polluting electricity generators are owned or controlled by private equity, many belong to governments, pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, banks – are you saying all these are the same thing?

who own the physically real and geographically locatable plants that will continue to destroy the natural world as long as they continue to operate, irrespective of how much responsibility any individual outside of that class takes

You are arguing that we are impotent, which I believe is wrong.

for the statistically insignifant contribution to that destruction he or she has made in the course of using and/or consuming goods and services the manufacture, sale and/or provision of which relies on environmentally destructive technologies.

Convenient statistics are irrelevant to ethics.

Because unless so many people take so much responsibility that living at a Unabomber-lifestyle level of energy independence becomes the rule

Nice pissing in the discourse, such extremism is not required.

rather than the exception, a true taking of personal responsibility would entail admitting that unless you are in that class of people -- let's call them "they" -- the pleasant feeling of personal empowerment that comes with living as environmentally responsibly as your means and circumstances permit is not the same thing as either having or exercising enough real power to have a significant impact on a problem you aren't causing and can't solve personally.

Who said anyone could do it personally? Too many ‘savior’ films perhaps?

Which is not to say you are powerless to address it through, for example, community organizing, mass boycott, media campaign, political activism both within and outside of the system, etc.

I’m torn between Duh! and Now we’re getting somewhere!

But those all require group identification as "we" by people who are in general agreement about what "they" they're up against.

Does it? It would be nice, it would almost definately help, but it is far from essential, as past centuries of social reform show.

So I still don't understand the advantage of rejecting those terms when discussing an issue about which we're in a greement wrt the general lay of the land, since I too define the problem as being one caused by and benefiting only:
Quote:
The corporatised production systems that supply your goods and services
of which I am not ignorant but aware, which includes an awareness that I don't control those systems. They do. And it's irresponsible not to admit that, from my perspective.

I think its irresponsible not to know who & what you're talking about, and cartoonish cliches obscure us working who They are.

[Ben D]

I think its irresponsible not to know who & what you're talking about, and cartoonish cliches obscure us working who They are.

Interesting opinion,.. speaking for myself, it would seem that a prerequisite understanding of 'what' and 'who' you really are, is required before the question of knowing 'who and what' the other is, can be responsibly asked?

What and who are you?

[crikkett]

but... come on, you know damn well who 'they' is... the people who've made all the choices, the people who DECIDED it would be OK to dump toxic waste in the oceans forever, that it would be OK top spew vast amounts of pollutants into the atmosphere. That shit never went out for a vote. Some people decided to do industry this way, because it was cheaper for them.

And again, that 'they' includes 'you'. You've known this was a problem. You voted every time a piece of plastic slipped in to or out of your grasp, and every time you emptied a bucket of soapwater down a storm drain instead of a toilet, and every time you started your car.

[barracuda]

And again, that 'they' includes 'you'. You've known this was a problem. You voted every time a piece of plastic slipped in to or out of your grasp, and every time you emptied a bucket of soapwater down a storm drain instead of a toilet, and every time you started your car.

...and apparently everytime you took a shit or exhaled carbon dioxide. And it doesn't matter if you're poor, either. Clean up your mess! You're responsible! Quit despoiling the earth, 'cause the corporations need it.

Ridiculous. This is the kind of attitude which ends with the privatized ownership of all water and air, for the "good" of "everyone". And its likely on its way already.

Get over it. If the .corps were taxed based upon their pollution co-efficient and charged monetarily for real responsible cleanup of their messes and the messes caused by their products, this conversation would obviously be unecessary. They made the money, didn't they? It won't happen, because that would lessen their profits, or put them out of business. So the politicians won't allow it, and we are to blame in their stead? Great.

Listen, its a war. And just like war, the transnationals need money, and the public (proles) pay the price in money and lives. Somebody 'round here's been drinking the Kool-aid.

[crikkett]

Ridiculous. This is the kind of attitude which ends with the privatized ownership of all water and air, for the "good" of "everyone".

No Asshole, it's the kind of attitude that a self-cleaning organism would have: learn from mistakes, adjust to new knowledge, cooperate for the betterment of all. People like me clean up after snotty shits like you because otherwise we'll choke on your crap.

It's called maturity which requires taking responsibility for your part in the state of things, and a willingness to take part in the/any solution. If for you that means wailing on the Internet about how nobody's doing anything to punish polluters I hope you snap out of your shiftless despondency long enough to bother to actually do something to change things for the better, and remember to recycle your plastic as you go.