We Are All Fossil Fools, But Wising Up
Wake up and smell the Tex-ass tea, ya’ll
Fools for love
We are all fossil dependent fools. We are persuaded we have no choice; most cars still require stinky gas, our food is over-processed and packaged. We want that stuff on Amazon and don’t see the pollution everywhere, every day.
The truth is we want to love ourselves, so we buy into the idea of treating ourselves. We get sadder and sadder in our depression, as we stuff down the reality of our addictions. But we don’t stop.
And, we are working so hard at being good. It is so very easy to be gullible. It is so very easy to believe we are all doing our best, consuming only what we need.
We can easily ignore all the massive, deceitful greenwashing of fossil fuel companies since the term “green-house effect” was retired.
Far more massive and far-reaching than the effects of big tobacco, greenwashing make trashing the Earth your problem, your responsibility. It was not the pollution profiteers’ problem. In fact, for them, as long as trees can make clean air and water for their elite retreats, it has been a huge boon in their personal fortunes.
But, even more impactful, is that politicians and leaders gobble up the free lobbying money that the industrialists of the world provide to keep control or capital and power.
The forgotten people
This led to the crash of 2008, the backlash against elitism, the biggest wealth gap in over a century, the election of an immoral moron and authoritarian, (at least one), and COVID-19, to name a few things.
It’s easy for a politician to make promises to a forgotten people, because everyone who does not benefit from massive wealth disparity is forgotten, no matter their politics.
That is, their common good is ignored, although their votes are fought over.
But, given all of that, you are still pretty much a fossil fool and tool.
People won’t listen to gloom and doom. Even when it is true. They want sports, and glamour, and gossip, and whatever it is that a Kardashian does.
Don’t ask me. I did see that infamous Pepsi commercial where Kylie Jenner solved racism, or capitalism, or something, but beyond that, someone please tell me what value-added celebrity culture is adding to the world?
My guess is that it’s distraction, which will kill you when you’re not looking.
Billionaires on the air
I don’t even like Oprah anymore. And, she’s probably the least offensive billionaire of all.
When people wake up, however, it most often happens in an unusual way. It can happen when someone dies of COVID-19; or an injury or illness that they couldn’t get help for due to hospital over-crowdedness. Or they firsthand have the storm, fire, flood, heat-wave, famine, or resulting diseases and distresses of our climate crisis and extinctions.
Once we wake up, how will we know it’s a real nightmare and not just a bad dream?
For those who may survive, we will know because our senses will tell us. And, we will know because a tipping point is coming where people suddenly change their collective psychology en masse.
On the airwaves, we will see less celebrity and billionaire worship, and more respect for those who actually want to clean, and clear, the air.
We will suddenly see the truth, as obvious as it always has been. We are an interdependent world with no wiggle room for stupid, energy-sucking fights like race, sex/gender, and class distractions.
If we can’t learn to solve these, we can’t cooperate to solve the rest.
Then all the things we’ve heard about for years will be obvious. We should not use toxins for fuel. We should welcome diversity of persons and plants, and in fact have them plant and grow together with biodiversity. (what to do about immigration!!) We should have no person above the law. We should green our cities, and limit our populations to sustainable carrying capacity.
We should not eat animals, but grow them, from genetically engineered cells.
We should cheer equality, because oppression and exploitation always create trouble, backlash, and violence.
Domination hierarchy will eventually go the way of other outdated ideas.
Today, smug, self-righteous people will sneer at the idea that they would ever have participated in inequality. Yet, it was the norm. “Superiority” was the accepted “truth” for thousands of years.
Being a “better class of people” is a lie we took to like a billionaire to a super-hero status.
Will ten billion people have the value of a billion, trillion trees?
When you realize that you are of no more value than the trees that give you food and breath, you will realize your belonging. When you realize what life is, you will be truly, pro-life.
