John Grauer
Though my degree is in English, my specialty really is in literature and science; simply put, I use texts to examine how people react to scientific advance both individually and collectively. So I was fascinated when Edward O. Wilson asked in a recent issue of Resurgence: “Is humanity suicidal?” It is easy to see why someone would ask this question when you see an urban landscape cluttered with new, large SUVs and other polluting gas guzzlers, littered with people and clogged with toxic chemicals. From my viewpoint, though, Wilson’s phrasing does not quite get to the nature of the problem.
If you just look at the horrendous circumstances currently facing western civilization, it does indeed seem like suicidal behavior. Such a view, however, ignores the circumstances that typify the life cycle of civilizations. Herbert Spencer, though little known now, was one of the key figures in Victorian England in the application of evolution. He was the one who is largely responsible for the application of evolution to psychology, history, economics, etc. He argues that civilizations, like individual creatures and species, have life spans. They are young, they mature, they grow older, and they die. The same man who coined the phrase “survival of the fittest” and applied it to business also cautioned that all social groups eventually die. Current notions of societies and businesses that keep on growing perpetually would be laughable to him. Many educated late Victorians understood this, and sensed that England was at the top of a slippery slope, at the height of its maturity, and would begin to decline.
Spencer even said what would happen when humans moved past the age of industrialism. He said that the change will come when western industrialist citizens begin to realize that they no longer have to devote all of their best years and the best hours of their days to work in and serve the industrial machine as an end itself. When this time comes, he said, people will begin to work simply to satisfy the needs of life. After that, people will spend the rest of their time meeting their higher and creative needs. When this happens, he noted, people will no longer see “work” as the focal point of their lives—it will no longer dominate them or define them.
So here is the issue for us: how do we want to live, in the face of the industrial civilization that is dying all around us? Do we want to be part of the past that is dying or the future that is trying to be born? We all know the problems: humans collectively are rapidly running out of fossil fuel in a civilization that is based on such energy; they are destroying the natural environment through pollution and poisoning the planet on which we live; they are covering the planet with humans (and everyone here knows what happens when you put too many rats in a cage designed for just a few rats); they are killing species at an unprecedented rate; and the list of problems we face in this century goes on and on.
To make it worse, industrial society is pursuing unlimited growth with all of the mania of an older athlete who tries to deny the aging process and is determined to play at the same youthful performance level. This maniacal desperation is one of the telltale signs that industrialism is declining. Unfortunately, like the Roman empire not long before its fall, industrial society is becoming increasingly overextended in its grasp to dominate all. Jerry Mander, also in a recent Resurgence article, says: “THE ULTIMATE GOAL of economic globalization is that every place on Earth should be more or less like every other place on Earth. Whether it’s the US or Europe or once-distant places in Asia or South America, all countries are meant to develop the same way: the same franchise fast food, the same films and music, the same jeans, shoes and cars, the same urban landscapes, the same personal, cultural and spiritual values – monoculture.”
The nature of industrial society is that it needs warm bodies to exist, to power the machine, so it can spin out monoculture to all points on the planet. Industrialism cannot live without massive numbers of people to produce goods, buy goods, and then dispose of goods perpetually. As such, it promotes dependence. Western industrialism by its very nature encourages people to be dependent and not independent. It needs for people to work most of their lives to feed the industrial machine. It requires people to be indebted to it. It expects people to crave more and more money to provide for the essentials of life. It demands people to pay for most of their lives for housing, for energy, and for food. And this unending dependence is the price of admission to the cocoon.
The movie “The Matrix” gives the perfect metaphor for the real, truly dependent people that constitute our society–they are metaphorically and almost physically plugged into the Matrix. They are so swept up in the vision of reality created by industrialism that they are incapable of recognizing the glitches in the Matrix, and understanding the importance of such anomalies. For those of us who do not wish to spend our lives in such lies, we must learn, to paraphrase Carlos Castaneda, to shut off the internal dialogue that reinforces the illusion of the Matrix, so we can see the world as it really is.
But once we take the red pill, then what do we do? Most seem to advocate staying within the system to change it in some way. Work for change varies widely, from the mild to the extremely radical. A key thought behind such endeavors is the idea that society has become bloated, corrupt, and ineffective.
But suppose that idea is not true. Suppose instead that western industrial civilization is simply in its old age and is beginning to die. If it has indeed run the course of its natural life, then all of the protests we plan cannot breathe life into something that is dying. If it is dying, then do not be like the old vain industrialist citizen still trying to act like a young person; instead, let it die with dignity. And instead of wasting time on the past, plan for a life apart from the life support systems of industrialism. Look into what comes next. Then unplug.
As in “The Matrix,” many will cling to the past, and try to prolong it as long as possible. Let them. Others will want to unplug, but they will not know how. They will look for an alternative that really works. Give them one. Rethink education, food, clothing, communication, power, and housing from a post industrialist perspective.
Take housing, for example–such as the Mcmansions surrounding most cities today. They are made with massive amounts of energy and exotic materials created in distant locations. But even after they are finished, they cannot work without the lifelines of industrialism, including centralized power, water, and sewage. If these systems stop because of a natural disaster such as a snowstorm, the owners must leave their houses. What a waste!
So, when you begin to unplug from the Matrix, follow the advice of Charles Long’s How to Survive without a Salary: “Perhaps the most direct answer to an economy that has abandoned its workers is for workers to abandon the economy, seceding one by one to make smaller, independent economies, family arrangements, neighborhood co-ops, alternatives to the consumer machine…. If the global economy has lost its way, let it go. Declare the larger economy a big mistake and start anew. This time, make it small enough to work for you.”