With Liberals Like These, Who Needs Conservatives?

Right wing or left, if you’re a consumer, you’re causing collapse

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We live in industrial-consumer societies. We can’t simply just ‘shrink’ because so many of the consumer goods we use require mass industrial production. The economics just fall apart if people aren’t buying as much, or if there’s problems with the supply chain providing one component or one material.

— Prof Jem Bendell, 2024

In my rural town, the affluent are creeping in and opening up kombucha stores. A neighbor recently cleared away a garden to put up a batting cage. A recent fireworks display choked the town field with putrid smoke. We just can’t seem stop being wasteful humans. Being consumers.

But we need to be. We need to shift to being producers. On a small scale, local level — producers of food, alternative fuels, community support, climate resiliency, adaptive infrastructure. Kombucha will not stop the exponentially worsening natural disasters. We can’t consume, argue, or even vote our way out of the rapid energy descent that’s coming, the social and…