Earth Crisis Response

An ecological vision for our society is quite a difficult one to advance, since the direction we're headed and the accelerating pace directly contradict such a vision. Over the years, we have become increasingly dependent upon systems that are not ecological in their design. Our food system provides one clear example. This unsustainable mess is subsidized by our federal tax dollars, at the same time our municipal and state policies have favored the over-development of land... leading us to this scary point in time where not only will the food from California be too expensive to haul over, but we won't have the skills or the land to grow enough food to feed ourselves.

When I say that our system is a contradiction to ecological vision, I don't mean the environmental footprint of our lifestyle or the sustainability of natural resources. I mean the idea that we are part of a complex web of life, with interconnectedness that we cannot begin to understand or model. Our actions -- on a personal and collective level -- have consequences, often unpredictable ones. Political issues are inextricably linked to each other even when our political framework keeps them separated. The fact that most people don't know how to garden, let alone farm or save seeds, has profound connections to issues that dominate the headlines and even the political discourse, and yet those connections are never articulated. False webs of understanding are spun for us. Preying on our distrust of Big Oil, the gas crisis is skillfully blamed on manipulation, and the unsustainability of our society is not questioned. The "war on terror" is another such distraction. Serving clearly those whose livelihood is weapons manufacturing, as well as those who need access to remaining oil reserves, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are part of something as sinister as any imperial conquest on this planet.

The extortion of money from the American taxpayer in order to fund these endeavors, including whatever debt we will owe to China for the borrowed cash, means that programs that do help people will never get adequately funded. Indeed, the unsustainability of our economic system is another nightmare currently unfolding. The massive debt at the federal, state, municipal, household, and personal levels is astounding. At some point it has to be paid back, but I haven't quite heard that plan. And we are at a stage where we need massive investment in transitioning ourselves to a more sustainable lifestyle. How much more debt can we take on? And we are borrowing too from our future, sucking up fossil fuels and putting carbon into the atmosphere at increasing rates. How can we even save the cities we've got? How can we protect them from rising seas, how can we power them, how can we feed them?

We need to go back to basics here. Where the Democrats and Republicans are both fully committed to a system of perpetual economic growth, and are happy to talk about technological solutions to any of these crises, always off in the future, the Greens cut to the chase. There is no technological solution to the converging crises of peak oil, climate change, and an unraveling economy. We need to reorganize our lives, redefine wealth, and look more holistically at the web of life that sustains us. We need to find happiness in steady state, local economies that meet people's needs. We need to take a dramatic stand against the idea that we can power our SUVs with other people's food, or subsidize an agribusiness industry that is destroying the world's agriculture, destroying our health, and destroying our planet. We need to take back what's ours and work cooperatively to build viable alternatives to the madness that dominates our airwaves and newspapers and screens.

One of those alternatives is a political party that has an ecological view of the world and is independent of the corrupting influences of money, especially corporate money. That political party exists, and represents a global movement with a vision for a different kind of politics, a different kind of economics, and a different kind of society. But that political party is struggling, just as we all are, trying to go against the strong currents of uninformed, reactionary endeavor. That political party is committed to participatory democracy, and that means you. Please join us.