REMEMBERING THE SENSATION OF HOPE
Below the text is a recording of the essay.
Two years ago I finished a documentary called THIS GOOD EARTH.
By the end of editing, I was certain that the only way to save the earth, ourselves and all other living things was to immediately stop the carbon corporations from exploring, digging, mining and pumping gas, oil and coal. In the final moments of the film, we point our finger at the oil CEO’s and recommend that they should be accused of crimes against the earth, against humanity and the unborn. The rule of law must be used against them now. The idea seemed reasonable but only a haunted dream.
In that the profit crazed capitalism we live within gives no quarter to life over profits, the carbon corporations public relations exercises would continue to convince the vast majority of people to capitulate or sit on their hands or turn away, continuing to live their snug lives. In this capitulation to capital, to lies, to endless propaganda they would be sacrificing their children and especially their grandchildren to a hellish existence. I began to wonder how we as a species, unlike any other species, would purposely allow ourselves to be destroyed.
I was distressed. I had lost the last few threads of hope for sufficient change to stop the coming catastrophe. Month by month, watching the ever worsening news about new licences given to search for resources in Native American lands, in pristine Alaska, under the sea including the North Sea and under the Poles, combined with the hottest summer ever recorded, melting ice sheets, destroyed forests and on and on while listening to the facile excuses of the politicians who are one way or another in the pockets of the corporations or their neoliberal ideology. In what ways could I express a reasonable hope?
A week ago I was with a gathering of 30 people, all of whom are attempting to find ways to provide sustainable food to our small town, as the climate and therefore the food crisis continues to close-in around us. For the first time I witnessed people willing to share ideas and perhaps actions to liaise with others in ways that would increase our overall wellbeing. As with the Covid crisis, many people are beginning to understand the advantages of collaboration, of collective action and new forms of embracing other’s practices.
Soon after, just across this past weekend, I worked with about 30 young people from 10 countries on a project about democracy, as last Friday, 15 September was the UN proclaimed International Day of Democracy. The young people’s kindness, warmth, openness, positivity, and hope for a better freer future with justice and equality for all, were plainly expressed, filling older people, including myself, with real hope for their humanity and desire to make a better future.
And then a few days ago I read that the state of California is taking five oil corporations to court over their reckless refusal to tell the world, starting in the 1950’s their research had revealed they were certain that 70 years later (today) the earth would be entering a broiling future, capable of destroying civilization as we know it. Many other states have rallied to support the Californian governor.
Are these oil monsters stupid? Careless? Uncaring? Self-defeating? Or simply making decisions driven by avarice and greed? Of course their lawyers are saying these things should be settled in congress not in courts. This maybe because they own the politicians but not the judges.
So here I am, for the first time in many years feeling ever so slightly lighter, thinking that combining the life-force of young people with the fight against the barons by energetic middle-aged people willing to remember their commitment of service to the people, and with some older people who can use their accumulated experiences and perhaps a modicum of wisdom, to unite and force the bad guys into the courts and out of our governments, we together may not only remember what hope is, but actually rediscover the sensation of it.
This is the audio version..enjoy