Someting else we are all in together

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

not so you would notice but we all live on the one planet; i disagree with Monbiot's conclusion, the planet is at slight risk from us, we are the species at risk from a self created extinction as we make the planet more and more unliveable ..

the data he uses shows our happy forgetfulness of serious threats and responsibilities

[Serial_Apologist]

I think he talks sense: our materialism (in the original Greek sense) needs urgent re-grounding. Music and other arts are one way; going out and experiencing the multisensory gesamtkunstwerk of a woodland, especially at this time of year, another - one that involves less consumption around here than what I'm doing right now.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

yep me too just spent an hour in the May sunshine, clouds and wind cleaning my psyche ...

[aeolium]

I think he talks sense: our materialism (in the original Greek sense) needs urgent re-grounding. Music and other arts are one way; going out and experiencing the multisensory gesamtkunstwerk of a woodland, especially at this time of year, another - one that involves less consumption around here than what I'm doing right now.

I htink it's easy to decry materialism and consumption if you can afford to, i.e. you have enough. If you are among the many who struggle to afford basics or have sometimes to go cold in winter because they cannot afford to pay high fuel costs, the merits of policies like subsidising solar panel installations through surcharges on fuel bills can be hard to see. That is why, essential though policies to reduce carbon emissions are, they will never carry popular support unless they are combined with policies of social justice. They should for that reason never be considered in isolation.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

not so you would notice but we all live on the one planet; i disagree with Monbiot's conclusion, the planet is at slight risk from us, we are the species at risk from a self created extinction as we make the planet more and more unliveable ..

the data he uses shows our happy forgetfulness of serious threats and responsibilities

Reading it makes me ashamed to be British - nay, ashamed to be human.

[Serial_Apologist]

I htink it's easy to decry materialism and consumption if you can afford to, i.e. you have enough. If you are among the many who struggle to afford basics or have sometimes to go cold in winter because they cannot afford to pay high fuel costs, the merits of policies like subsidising solar panel installations through surcharges on fuel bills can be hard to see. That is why, essential though policies to reduce carbon emissions are, they will never carry popular support unless they are combined with policies of social justice. They should for that reason never be considered in isolation.

I agree - I meant dialectical or historical as opposed to materialism in the moral sense.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

whale poo

mebbe that big carrier can sink a few Japanese whalers instead of being a white elephant! once they have some planes on it of course .....

[teamsaint]

I htink it's easy to decry materialism and consumption if you can afford to, i.e. you have enough. If you are among the many who struggle to afford basics or have sometimes to go cold in winter because they cannot afford to pay high fuel costs, the merits of policies like subsidising solar panel installations through surcharges on fuel bills can be hard to see. That is why, essential though policies to reduce carbon emissions are, they will never carry popular support unless they are combined with policies of social justice. They should for that reason never be considered in isolation.

It doesn't seem to be very easy to decry materialism and consumption if you are very rich though.
Just as importantly the issues around consumption are surely as much about equality of consumption, as about the endless (politician driven) push for economic growth in countries such as the UK, which patently produce considerably more than the level of basic needs , if properly distributed. The inequality is itself the driver for more (possibly) unnecessary economic growth.

Policies of social justice need to be international in scope, importantly accounting for our exploitation of developing world resources which subsidise our own consumption.

( Which rather negates, to an extent, my own point about UK production being adequate already!).

Of course, economic growth is perfectly possible without further over exploitation of resources.