“If what we want is to stop the destruction of the life of this planet,
then what we have been doing has not been working. We will have to do
something else.” Something else, as in something really else, as in “now for something completely different” else. Not the same old tricks in a new shade of muddy green." - Tim Bennett

I think I'm noticing a trend. As the state of the planet continues to degrade apace, there's a sense that we're seriously running short on time. There seems to be not only a growing sense of unease about the situation we're in, but a growing willingness to speak about it in a very personal way. Perhaps it was the honesty and bravery displayed in the What a Way to Go documentary, that refused to tack a "happy chapter" onto the film; and that this has emboldened more people to speak honestly about the situation and reveal personal worry...fear...anger...confusion. I admire the bravery of each of these souls willing to speak their truth.

David

Rick Dubrow: "No Happy Chapter Here" (Cascadia Weekly, Dec. 5, 2007)
"So what’s my reality?
It’s very gloomy. ...The sad reality...is that our environment continues to degrade ...
I am repulsed by the health of our environment and an economy/culture that denies its responsibility for
its continued deterioration. But I will not ignore its symptoms and deny reality. I will not live numb and
distracted, even if remaining awake hurts.
My truth is that we’re in a world of hurt and that baby steps need to be left for babies."
On the Level

Robyn DuPre: "Where Am I Going and Why Am I in This Handbasket"? (Re-Sources Fall/Winter 2007 Newsletter)
"It's not about your children anymore - it's about you. That's right, it is not about the future anymore. It is about now. It is time to save the world for yourself...It's no longer about some far distant future. It is about now and I, for one, am scared awake and wondering how to get out of this hand basket my culture has created. It is time to act, to change our lives while perhaps salvaging the things that we say we care about: community, our children, big trees, clean cold oceans, fresh tomatoes. Really, our actions matter. Be part of the change today. Please."

Tim Bennett: "I Don't Know" (What a Way to Go blog: Conversations with Todd, December 6, 2007)
“I don’t know how best to help, Todd. Every time I publish a blog…
every time… I’m terrified. Will this blog help? Will it hurt? Will it
serve the life of this planet? I don’t know. All I know is that I stuck
in my picket pin. I said that I would show up and say what’s true for
me. So I keep doing it, even though it scares the shit out of me. But I
don’t know. This conversation right now… should I write about it?
Should I publish it? Will it help? Sally and I have both noticed that
often, when we express our own fear, our own confusion, our own sense
of helplessness or grief or despair or anger, the people around us
react strongly to that. As if they depend on us to remain steady and
calm. It’s like, ‘Shit, we’re staring into the collapse of fucking
civilization! Tim and Sally have been staring it down for years now.
They’ve even made a movie about it. If they can’t hold it together, how
the hell do I?’”

“So what can I say that will help? I have to say what’s true for me,
and what’s true for me is that I don’t know what I’m doing half the
time. What’s true for me is that I’m often terrified. What’s true for
me is that I’m grieving. What’s true for me is that I am so angry that
I want to scream. Does it help, to say that? Does it help people to
know that? So that maybe their own confusion and fear and grief and
anger can be normalized, rather than held as somehow weak, or somehow
wrong? Does it help? I don’t know!”
Conversations with Todd

Carolyn Baker: Redifining Positive: Collapse from Beyond the Human-Centric Perspective (CarolynBaker.net, December 6, 2007)
Any person who wants to "maintain a
positive attitude" in this culture-the culture of civilization that is
killing the planet-killing people and things that we all love-that
person is not only irrational and deeply afflicted with denial, but he
is exactly like a member of an abusive family system in which physical
and sexual assault are occurring in the home on a daily basis, but that
family member insists on "thinking good thoughts" and resents anyone
and everyone who says what is so about the abusive system.
CarolynBaker.net

George Monbiot: A Sudden Change of State (The Guardian, July 3, 2007)
Reading a scientific paper on the train this weekend, I found, to my
amazement, that my hands were shaking. This has never happened to me
before, but nor have I ever read anything like it. Published by a team
led by James Hansen at Nasa, it suggests that the grim reports issued
by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change could be absurdly
optimistic...I looked up from the paper, almost expecting to see crowds stampeding
through the streets. I saw people chatting outside a riverside pub. The
other passengers on the train snoozed over their newspapers or played
on their mobile phones. Unaware of the causes of our good fortune,
blissfully detached from their likely termination, we drift into
catastrophe.
Monbiot.com

George Monbio: What is Progress? (The Guardian, December 4, 2007)
The government proposes to cut the UK’s carbon emissions by 60% by
2050. This target is based on a report published in 2000(3). That
report was based on an assessment published in 1995, which drew on
scientific papers published a few years earlier. The UK’s policy, in
other words, is based on papers some 15 years old. Our target, which is
one of the toughest on earth, bears no relation to current science....But I am not advocating despair. We must confront a challenge which
is as great and as pressing as the rise of the Axis powers. Had we
thrown up our hands then, as many people are tempted to do today, you
would be reading this paper in German. Though the war often seemed
impossible to win, when the political will was mobilised strange and
implausible things began to happen. The US economy was spun round on a
dime in 1942 as civilian manufacturing was switched to military
production(25). The state took on greater powers than it had exercised
before. Impossible policies suddenly became achievable.

The real issues in Bali are not technical or economic. The crisis we
face demands a profound philosophical discussion, a reappraisal of who
we are and what progress means. Debating these matters makes us neither
saints nor communists; it shows only that we have understood the
science.
Monbiot.com