The need for a few questions
I’ve been watching the unfolding story of our global economic problems with a growing sense of foreboding.
People are running round trying to prop up the system without realising that it might just be time to question a few of the basic assumptions that underlie that system.
The one I think needs to be addressed with priority is the fixation with growth and how to restart it. We have only so much planet, and we have been burning through the available resources with abandon. You can only grow for so long, sooner or later you run out of room to grow and resources to grow with. That’s the problem, we’re trying to do something that just isn’t possible and if you get into a fight like that, you won’t be the one left standing at the end. Reality is always right and denying that basic fact just stores up trouble.
It’s time to start moving towards a path based on what we can sustain, it will be slow and challenging, but there really is little alternative and the clock is ticking ever louder.
We also need to realise that we need to start questioning the assumptions that underlie our methods and beliefs in all areas of our lives, putting our heads in the sand and allowing others to think for us is no longer an option.
Dare we begin to compare this to the fall of Rome and, in our denial, are we and our leaders guilty of fiddling while Rome burns?
Thanks for this insight, Richard. Indeed we must begin to reconsider the basic assumptions of how we live – our wasteful lifestyles and reliance on big corps for sustaining life must be reengineered back to the basic principles of nature. Indeed I see it very much like the fall of Rome.
I think you’ve offered a great analogy. Rome is indeed burning and our leaders are doing worse than fiddling — they’re stoking the fire itself!! They will steadfastly refuse to turn in a sustainable direction until the planet has been burnt to a crisp and then they’ll look at each other and say “How did this happen?”