POWERLESSNESS

Personal change doesn’t equal social change.

—WARD CHURCHILL

 

 

 

UNLESS YOU’RE IDEOLOGICALLY BLINKERED, irredeemably selfish, or just plain stupid, it’s pretty easy to recognize that every action involving the industrial economy is destructive. And because the continued existence of the industrial economy cannot be questioned, much less threatened, and because we must always be disallowed from realizing that the problem is the culture, not us (just as in any abusive situation all people must always be disallowed from realizing that the problems are caused by the abuser, not the victims), many of us choose to “fight back” by decreasing our involvement in the industrial economy, by “living simply so that others may simply live.”

So we eat less. We drive less. We do not own a car. We take shorter showers. We live more and more simply. We feel more and more pure.

We’re doing what we know we can control.

Living simply is a good thing to do. Sadly, it in no way stops this culture from killing the planet. In no way is it a sufficient response to this culture’s destructiveness. In no way is it a substitute for actively and effectively resisting actions and policies that harm our (and others’) habitat.

I want to be clear. I’m not saying we shouldn’t live simply. I live reasonably simply myself, but that’s primarily because I only buy stuff I want, and I don’t really want a lot (except I’d love to buy a lot of land to protect it, which would of course be analogous to buying individual slaves to free them, which doesn’t alter the fact that I want to do it). But I don’t pretend that me not buying much (or me not driving much, or me not having kids) is a powerful political act, or that it’s deeply revolutionary. It’s not. Personal change doesn’t equal social change. It’s not a significant threat to those in power, nor to the system itself.

Besides being ineffective at causing the sorts of changes necessary to stop this culture from killing the planet, there are at least five other problems with perceiving simple living as a political act (as opposed to living simply because that’s what you want). The first is that it’s fundamentally as narcissistic and as much a product of magical thinking as Baring Witness or orgasms for peace in that it substitutes private personal actions that accomplish very little in the real world, and a whole lot of wishing (“But if everybody lived simply . . .” they say, to which we can respond, “If we’re going to fantasize about everybody doing something, let’s fantasize about them demolishing the oil infrastructure to slow carbon emissions”) for organized (or solo) resistance. Once again, I’m not dissing simple living. This book started with me shitting in the forest because it makes food for slugs. But I’m not going to trumpet that act as particularly political. Although it does help those particular slugs and the frogs who eat them, it’s not going to slow global warming or stop plastics from being dumped in the ocean. Ultimately it won’t even help these slug and frog communities, because unless the industrial economy is stopped, global warming and global poisoning will kill them.

The second is that it’s predicated on the flawed notion that humans inevitably harm their landbase, in that it consists solely of harm reduction. The world is still a worse place than had you never been born, only this time it’s not quite as bad as it would have been had you not been so pure. But humans can help the earth as well as harm it, and simple living as a political act ignores this. There are other things we can do as well. We can rehabilitate streams, we can get rid of noxious invasives, we can remove dams, we can shut down gold mines that are poisoning water sources, we can destroy the industrial economy that is destroying the real, physical world.

The third problem is that it incorrectly assigns blame to the individual (and most especially to individuals who have no particular power in this system except their ability to consume) instead of to those who actually wield power in this system and to the system itself.

The fourth problem is that it fundamentally accepts capitalism’s redefinition of us from citizens to consumers, such that the “political acts” of the simple living “activists” are not the acts of citizens, with all the responsibilities citizenship implies, but are explicitly the acts of consumers. This redefinition is as wrenching, alienating, demeaning, disempowering, and wrong as this culture’s previous redefinition of us from human animals in functioning communities to citizens of nation-states. Each of these redefinitions gravely reduces our range of possible forms of resistance. Human animals in functioning communities perceive themselves as having a wider range of forms of resistance to threats (both internal and in the case of functioning communities primarily external) available to them than citizens of nation-states, who perceive themselves as having a wider range available to them than consumers.

The fifth problem is that the endpoint of the logic behind simple living as a political act is suicide. If every act within an industrial economy is destructive; and if we want to stop this destruction; and if we are unwilling (or unable) to question (much less destroy) the intellectual, moral, economic, and at least as importantly physical infrastructures that cause every act within an industrial economy to be destructive, then we can easily come to believe that we will cause the least destruction possible if we are dead. Partly because it’s true. The world would be better off without humans who do not actively attempt to stop industrial civilization from killing the planet.

No, that’s not true. Whether or not we “attempt” to stop this culture is irrelevant. Results matter, in this case. The world would be better off without humans who do not actively and successfully stop industrial civilization from killing the planet.

Because the industrial economy is based on omnicide (and you thought it would never get around to consuming you?), to participate in this economy without proactively shutting it down is to be thrust into a double-bind, in fact into the double-bind to end all double-binds (in fact the double-bind to end all life). A double-bind is a situation where you are presented with two (or more) options, and no matter which option you choose, you lose, with the additional constraint that you cannot leave. If we avidly participate in the industrial economy, we may in the short term think we win because we may accumulate wealth, the marker of “success” in this culture. But we lose, because in doing so we give up our empathy, our animal humanity. And we really lose because industrial civilization is killing the planet, which means everyone loses. If we choose the “alternate” option of living more simply, thus causing less harm, but still not stopping the industrial economy from killing the planet, we may in the short term think we win because we get to feel pure and self-righteous, and we haven’t even had to give up all of our empathy (only enough of it to not stop the horrors), but once again we really lose because industrial civilization is still killing the planet, which means everyone still loses. And unless you’ve found a way to leave the planet—which would be an odious abrogation of responsibility anyway—you can’t leave. Except by dying.

The good news is that there are other options.

One option—the option I perceive as the most real, fundamental, necessary, and most importantly life-affirming—is not to die, but to get rid of the industrial economy.

Of course it’s not really fair of me to say that this option doesn’t include our death, because it does: it involves the death of our socially created selves, a death which, since it’s been emotionally and sometimes physically beaten into us that this culture is more important than life—and all indicators are that nearly everyone within this culture acts more or less incessantly on this almost entirely unexamined belief—is far more frightening to most of us than a real, physical death.

Another way to say all of this is that before we can get rid of the industrial economy, we ourselves must die. Not physically, but metaphorically. We must be broken. Our civilized selves must die. Our identification with this culture must be broken. The imbecile with a high IQ inside of us must die. All so that we can remember how to think and feel for ourselves, so our native intelligence—which includes our connections to the land who gives us life and supports us—can begin to return.

Note that I’m not saying we all have to go through this death and rebirth before any of us begin the necessary work of bringing down the industrial economy. Not everyone—or even enough people—will wake up, and in any case there isn’t enough time (“Damn straight!” say the polar bears, migratory songbirds, large fish in the oceans, small fish in the oceans, the oceans themselves, rivers, icecaps, and indeed life on earth). I’m merely saying that on an individual basis undergoing that process can lead to more effective resistance, and of course once the process has passed certain critical points, can lead to greater happiness, joy, self-awareness, and, paradoxically, peace.

For me, I needed to break—to die—because I was still a child, still a slave, still, in fact, an enslaved child. In order for this culture to continue, we must all remain children, we must all remain slaves, we must all remain enslaved children. In order for our souls to survive, and in order for us to meaningfully resist, we must grow up. And we must remove our chains. That’s not easy, as so much about this culture infantilizes us, and so much teaches us to be subservient to power. Education, for example. I wrote a book about how schooling teaches us to give ourselves away to those with power over us, to sit in chairs and face forward, to wish our lives away. Advertising certainly infantilizes us. Our romantic relationships are quite often infantile, as so many people in this culture look to their partners as substitute parents, projecting onto their partners all of their unmet childhood needs (I’m not the first to comment that the rush of falling in love could very well be this projection, which is bound to disappoint; I’m sure you’ve known people who’ve gone partner to partner, always searching for the one who will complete them). That’s what the culture wants us to want (and certainly, for example, most popular music reinforces this: singing about romantic love is fine, but where are the songs for other parts of our lives, songs for snowfall, songs for death and grieving, songs for birth, songs of despair, songs of rage against the machine [oops, I guess those do exist], songs of family, songs of community, songs to welcome the salmon home after their long journey in the sea?). This infantile craving starts early because our family relationships are structured so horribly that we never get the healthy (group/tribal) parenting we need, and then we never grow up emotionally, and forever yearn for someone, anyone in authority to take care of us and make decisions for us.²³⁸ And those in authority are only too eager to make those decisions for—or rather most often against—us. The political and judicial systems pound subservience into us. Or how about film? What do films teach us about activism and resistance? Have you ever noticed that a stock plot point in movies with an activist hero is that usually about two-thirds of the way through the film the activist’s romantic partner must become jealous of the activism, and either leave or threaten to leave the relationship? What was the last film you saw with an activist in a loving supportive relationship, perhaps with a partner just as impassioned, one with a partner who encourages the protagonist to become better, more effective, more militant? Contrast the shitty, unsupportive, tension-filled relationships normally foisted upon film activists with the supportiveness and affection nearly always shown by the partners of film sports heroes or film high school teachers. What is the real lesson being imparted here? That activism is lonely. Teach at a tough high school and your partner will have your back (and be all over your front), but become an activist—work to dismantle systems of oppressive power—and you’ll never again have sex: you might as well join the conservation convent or priesthood.

Our resistance to the planet’s destruction—this resistance is often called environmentalism—is of course servile to its core. Our activism consists almost exclusively of begging those in power to go against the requirements and rewards of this omnicidal economic and political and cultural system and do the right thing, something we know they will never do with any consistency, something we know they cannot do with any consistency, because to do so would cause the entire economic system (based as it is functionally upon unsustainable and exploitative activities) to implode. We never demand they do the right thing. And we certainly never force them to do the right thing. And God forbid we actually cause the right thing to be done using our own power. That would be too scary. So, we beg them to remove dams. We don’t demand they remove dams (or else, what? What are we going to do? Have an orgasm? Take a naked picture of a woman to try to seduce them into removing the dams? Dress up as salmon and have a die-in? That will surely put the fear of Nature into them and force them to do the right thing! Oh, I know: we’ll threaten to vote against them, in favor of someone else just as beholden to large corporations . . .). We don’t force them to remove dams. And God forbid we remove the dams ourselves. Similarly, we beg those in power to reduce carbon emissions. We don’t demand they reduce emissions (And what are the alternatives? Sign an online petition saying they’re mean and nasty? Or would that be too aggressive? Would that be assigning blame? Maybe we’ll demand they reduce carbon emissions or we’ll meditate and send them waves of pink bubbles of love. That will show them! Or how about this: I just read on a Christian pacifist website that to attempt to force those in power to not commit atrocities is to not have faith that the Holy Spirit can reach and convert even them. So there’s another course of “action” for us: we can sit on our fucking hands and wait for God to do the work for us. We don’t force them to reduce emissions. And God forbid we simply destroy the infrastructure necessary for them to emit this carbon dioxide, depriving them of the ability to heat the planet. We as activists are almost entirely servile. And don’t just suggest that this means we need to assume positions of power within this omnicidal system. As I’ve shown in numerous books, those “in power” are and must be themselves servants to the machine-like social structures called corporations, and beneath that to the machine-like social structure called civilization, to The Machine.

Even more than servile, our activism is infantile. It’s characterized by magical thinking, denial, fear, narcissism. Just tonight I received a request to attend a conference on sustainability. The organizer also requested I critique his writeup. I commented that he said nothing about fighting back, to which he predictably responded that fighting back never works (ummm, wasn’t there this little thing called the Fall of Rome that was hastened just a tad by those nasty barbarians (read indigenous peoples) “fighting back”? There are plenty of examples of people or groups successfully fighting back, and in any case, I don’t perceive our other activism as coming anywhere close to working: if any of our activism worked, the world wouldn’t be getting dismembered before our eyes). I also commented that throughout this entire document that purported to be about sustainability he never once mentioned concern for the natural world, or indeed mentioned the natural world at all. He responded that he didn’t want to express concern for nonhumans because he was afraid the conference would then be perceived as a get-together of “tree-huggers,” something he evidently considered a bad thing. So let me get this straight: he’s going to put on a conference ostensibly about sustainability that avoids talking about stopping those in power from killing the planet and in fact avoids talking about the planet at all—the real, physical planet, filled with nonhumans—remember that? I shared the exchange with a friend, who said, “This is all so typical of the Left, of the so-called resistance: earnest, useless, and full of fear. This is a big reason we always lose.”

I won’t be going. Nor will I be baring it all for peace, nor having an orgasm on December 22 (at least not for any reasons other than the obvious).

More infantilism. Just today I received this description of a talk by feminist “theorist” (scare quotes around theorist because her theories are, well, you’ll see) Sally Miller Gearhart: “Gearhart described herself as a ‘recovering activist,’ [implying, of course, that activism is an addiction to be kicked] relating a turning point in her life in which she decided to avoid negative thinking. . . . Although Gearhart had once fought [sic] to preserve the California redwood forest, living next door to a logger and helping to build her own driveway, which required [sic] chopping [sic] down redwood trees, resulted in a reevaluation. In particular she described an instance of loading a truck with redwood logs, feeling the power of it and realizing [sic: read, projecting] this was how men felt. She said she did not know if it was bad that men felt this power and did not think it was wrong that she felt it. She suggested that perhaps visualizing and fantasizing might be more productive than demonstrations in the end.”

This is of course insane on many levels. Naturally, humans consume trees and other plants and animals to survive—but there’s literally a world of difference between doing that humbly and well, and turning old growth into junk mail circulars, or “requiring” the killing of trees for a driveway. I never cease to be appalled and amazed at the level of idiocy required to conflate every real human need with corporate, capitalist rapaciousness: it’s the collapse of all meaningful distinctions. And am I the only person bothered by her seeming to enjoy the power (that’s power over for those of you keeping score at home) she wielded to kill others for her convenience? By power she’s clearly not talking about the joy of doing physical labor (in part because I’d be willing to bet my life that she didn’t load the truck by hand, but merely ordered and oversaw the mechanical killing and transportation of the trees, consequent to their presumed sale), but rather the power to dominate. I must admit I’m disgusted by those not repulsed by subjugating others. But the real reason I include this reference to her has to do with her last sentence, where she believes that visualizing and fantasizing might be more productive than demonstrations. Sure, demonstrations can be just slightly more physical manifestations of magical thinking (If literally millions of people march against the US invasion of Iraq, that will stop the war, or at least give the Democrats the backbone to end it, right? Right? Pretty please, with sugar on top?), but at least demonstrations require action in the real, physical world. Such is not the case with visualizing. One reason our “resistance” accomplishes so little is that so much of it consists of a bottomless well of infantile, self-indulgent self-deception. But there’s something even more disturbing than all this about her comments. Please note that she does not seem to mind killing, but only when she gets to kill those lower than her on the hierarchy, those she can kill with impunity. To subjugate those who cannot fight back is okay, and gives a feeling of power, but to stop those who are systematically destroying life on this planet is “negative thinking,” or really, unthinkable.²³⁹

We need to grow up.