Because I have been reading the essay collection The Great Regression at work during my lunch break, I didn’t read it at all during my vacation last week (And while I fully intended to catch up and keep up with comments here and all your wonderful blogs, that didn’t happen. If the road to hell is paved with good intentions, I am putting down some mighty fine pavement!). But today I got to get back to the book.
One of the essays I read today is called “Europe as refuge” by Bruno Latour who takes an entirely different perspective on the root cause of everything that is happening now — climate change. The ”Enlightened elites” knew what was what back in the 80s/90s and ever since it has been a move to get what they can while they can so they can fiddle while Rome burns (or in this case, the planet). It is an interesting premise and I am not certain that I am convinced it is the root of the problem, but it certainly is part of the problem.
Here’s a little passage to give you something to chew on:
When political analysts try to grasp the current situation, they use and abuse the term ‘populism.’ They accuse ‘ordinary people’ of indulging in a narrow-minded vision, in their fears, their naive mistrust of elites, their bad taste in culture, and above all in their passion for identity, folklore, archaism and boundaries — let alone a culpable indifference to the facts. These people lack generosity, open-mindedness, rationality; they have no taste for risk (ah! that taste for risk preached by those who are safe wherever their air miles permit them fly).
This is to forget that ‘ordinary folk’ have been callously betrayed by those who have abandoned the idea of truly bringing about the modernization of the planet with everyone else, because they knew, before everyone else, better than everyone else, that this modernization was impossible — for lack of a planet big enough for their dreams of limitless growth.
The truth about globalization as it has happened and climate change have to be denied, and the elites have to keep denying it for as long as possible so they can build their fortifications to survive the coming disaster. Basically, we are all being thrown under the bus. That has been the plan from the beginning.
I don’t know. Maybe it’s true, maybe it’s partly true. Maybe I don’t want to believe it’s true because a betrayal of that magnitude is heartbreaking and how does a person recover from that?
It does seem to be true that you can be treated nicely now if you can pay for it. Because my knee is swollen and gets worse when down, I paid for “business class” seats when we went to Spain and back (the seats are made like pods and you can put your feet up or lie down all the way) and that bought us a variety of nice things in addition to the seats–amenities that everyone should have (but the main amenity is that there’s less standing in line and it’s less crowded).
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Jeanne, so sad that often these days good service and being treated with dignity is a privilege that has to be paid for rather than something we are all deserving of.
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I agree with you that betrayal of such magnitude is heartbreaking to even consider! But isn’t money equal to power? I mean in today’s world, it is money that provides access to things that should be universal for all – good health care and good education, yet only a few really can afford it!
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cirtnecce, money didn’t always equal power but it has come to that, hasn’t it? You still can’t buy happiness though 🙂
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An interesting perspective. I hope he’s wrong, but it is true rich people can live in a cocoon and be unaware of ‘real’ life.
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Michelle Ann, I hope he is wrong too. Rich people have always been able to live in a cocoon, it seems like the cocoons are getting really big though!
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Though there is criminal denial going on, I tend to think that the global elites are no where near competent enough to pull off the conspiracy that the author contends.
I usually adhere to the maxim that there is no need for conspiracies when incompetence and negligence is so rampant.
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I generally agree, Brian. I read recently that the journalists’ mantra is that if it’s a choice between conspiracy or stuff-up it’s usually stuff-up! I usually put it another way, that it is usually sins of omission rather than commission. Sounds like most of us take a (slightly?) more generous view of human nature.
Still it would be good to see more intelligent leadership from our leaders rather than hubris or fear of losing their jobs. And to see more of the general population prepared to engage with analytical journalism.
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I think that that’s interesting and perhaps true of some people. But I suspect that they have been reacting in exactly the same way as the rest of us. Even people like me have been aware of climate change since the later 1990s, and yet most of us do very little practically to counter it, and that is the sad truth. Blaming elites seems a handy way to dodge our own responsibility.
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Sorry to get political but your President seems to be intent on throwing the rest of us under the bus with his reduction of funding for the EPA and reduction of emissions targets
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