I went searching for the state of the art for the eco activist. You have to give credit to these people. To think that wanting to breathe fresh air and to stop the damage caused by completely unnecessary economic activity has become criminal and scornful seems crazy. It’s like getting a nice bowl of soup in the morning and protesting that nobody spit in it or put out their cigarettes there. Not only is the world upside down, the people who have it there are shaking us by the ankles trying to get every nickel they can out of us and the last thing they want to hear are any complaints.
According to Le Monde, In the UK, they are simply imprisoning equal protesters. Apparently, since the new conservative government took over there in 2022, they have been passing law after law against exactly how many people can be it a protest and how much time they are allowed to give. For example, in December 23, people were imprisoned for speaking out for approximately 30 minutes. The basic idea was just stop oil, apparently the new laws and sentencing acts say that this is enough to take these people off the street and put them behind bars. Some of these sentences can be up to three or four years.
Statewatch.org talks about meetings held in March designed to curb the activities of such groups as Ende Gelände, Extinction Rebellion, Just Stop Oil, Last Generation, Plane Stupid and Soulèvements de la Terre, all of whom engage in typical protests such as blockades, hunger strikes and abusing vehicles. Though they say that these actions are in and of themselves not particularly harmful, they are much more interested in future actions caused by people who are aware of their protests.
The United Nations, as well they should, seize these actions as state repressions. And it goes on to say that it is a combination of physical repression, media propaganda and of course legal actions all designed to curb people from fighting against the exploits of big business in their search for resources and profits. Meanwhile, the business people are not really interested in anyone standing in their way. Time is money and they have rights and licenses and that’s all anyone needs to know.
The actual picture is pretty gloomy but there is a fight for the other side. According to UNICEF.org, Polina Zhoglo, a student from Belarus, was invited to speak at the United Nations COP28 summit which was held in Dubai. Zhogolo is an attractive girl and is certainly a welcome face to make a speech.
There’s also an article by rescue.org naming names of some extremely well-meaning young people, all of whom also take wonderful pictures. This is not to take away from any of their activities, it is just to say that there are people doing something for the environment and perhaps their stories need to be told.
Euronews.com also gives praise to young people adding their energy and intelligence to the fight against climate change. This mentions people who write children’s books in the hope that those of us who come in the future might be smarter than the ones we have now.
My opinion of this situation is simply that ceremony and praise is exactly what is not needed. The arguments at hand are whether or not we believe that economics is more important than ecology. According to all scientific sources, and I count myself at least anecdotally as a scientist in all of this, climate change is real, we are experiencing a mass extinction, the world is changing into something very violent for life and yet, we can’t slow anything down even a little bit. The cause of all of this human action are economic slavery and that no one who has the possibility to make laws seems to want to stop it. People in power will never stop being in power by themselves because they didn’t rise to positions of power by being easily stopped.
The enemy is money. The enemy is competition for money. Competition for money means there are competitions for resources. If the entire world is based upon competitions, no one is allowed to make a conscious thought about whether these competitions should even exist. Is it necessary to continue profit seeking even when the obviousness is that we are destroying our home by the activity? Why is this so hard to comprehend?
Recently I had a moment reading about how several European countries are distancing themselves from Russian oil. Norway for example, according to one commenter, believes itself to be above the argument about supporting the war in Ukraine. They say that Norway has its own natural resources and therefore is not dependent on the Russians. To me, I can’t even see this as an argument. Why are we exploiting resources? Why can’t we just grow food?
It is one of the great puzzlements of my own life how conservatives love to get into popularity contests. It has something to do with grouping people together. It’s like Donald Trump dismissing his competition simply by calling them names. Schoolyard stuff to be sure but it works. Labeling someone a protester and then saying protests are bad and passing laws against it seems to put into action where paramilitary people have the right to put their hands on folks ostensibly for voting. Once you start bringing the police into the voting world, you can no longer have a vote. Once you say that ecological protest is completely the opposite for all of those god-fearing law and order voters, well, who’s next? I say the war in Ukraine is about anti-Semitism. Can I be the only one who understands this connection?
The point of it is that the argument for a clean environment must be unilaterally accepted. It’s not a matter of public vote, it’s a matter of existence. If someone came to me and asked me if I would like cancer, like getting a subscription to a magazine, I would probably say no. If they told me it was cheap, even free and they would be happy to give me cancer if I would just agree to sign my name, I would say no. Would you agree to be run over by a car even for a good cause? Would you agree to kill yourself because there was a sale on coffins? I really don’t think too many people would vote for their own death if they were at least given the opportunity to understand what they were voting for.
I find this all very vulgar. I find it all distressing to say the least. I cannot understand why the stench of poison has to be in my nose everyday. I cannot understand why I must be forced to endure a disease which exists and festers in places where people congregate in large numbers must come out to me even 25 km from civilization. I cannot understand why the deaf, dumb and blind people who transport this disease along with all of the insanity of town out to me can never be the subject of attention. I cannot understand why polluters are seen as good people.
I have nothing but praise for people who stand up and say what they believe in. I have more praise for people who simply do not support the petroleum industry in any way. I support people who refuse to drive cars. I support people who refuse to eat meat or smoke factory cigarettes. I truly support people who choose clothing that do not come from exploitative sweatshops. I admire people who eat seasonally and do not believe that they are entitled for food to travel 10,000 miles just so they can have an elegant meal. I admire people who understand what they are doing and truly do not support the death business. I certainly hope the readers of the Utopian! can understand this point of view. And if you didn’t understand it before, I hope you do now.
For the Utopian! Connie Cucamonga reporting.
