Discuss: Forget Shorter Showers

I’m very glad to see this point of view in print (if a few months late). These “individual actions” are the PRIVILEGE of those who have nothing to loose and are actually quite comfortable with the destructive system we have. Activism for them is a leisure activity. How many people are really willing to spend the extra time and effort to organize hundreds of people and devote themselves to years of hard work? Not many in the first world - who are ultimately benefit the current system which is so devastating to so many in the developing world. 

Collective action is the only way major social change has ever occurred, but it is far more difficult- and risky- than individual action. The new “green consumption” model of “activism” is not solving the life-or-death issues of environmental destruction or the exploitation of human labor. All it does is make people FEEL BETTER about themselves while accomplishing nothing.

The daily actions taken by thoughtful people to lessen their demands on natural resources are dismissed far too recklessly in this article.  The sorts of actions he rails against are political statements as much as they are practical ways to live more sustainably.  Tomorrow when millions of people bike to work (for example) they will be partaking in a visible and healthy political act that won’t put money into the coffers of the industries and governments that Mr. Jensen somewhat fairly rails attacks. The cavalier attitude he takes will be effective in generating some controversy readership, but will be counterproductive in working towards a more sustainable society.

if tomorrow all of us [including those in the developing countries] stop consuming the modern ways[ie industrial products and its derivatives] then addressing climate change and environmentalism has some use.

wit regards to climate change the fundamental problem remains whether rich industrial countries inhabitants are willing to change their wasteful lifesytle in every ways. i think the answer is still a resounding NO so forget it…Derrick Jensen points is valid.

In regard to “whether rich industrial countries inhabitants are willing to change their wasteful lifesytle in every ways”: The bad news is still a resounding NO (and “tan” you might be right about that). The “good” news is that they may not have any choice soon, if we keep going down the slop from one bad crisis to another.

I prefer to live simply and starve government and industry of my money, which is their lifeblood. A proportion of that waste and destruction is in service of my consumption. Reduce my consumption and I reduce my share of their waste.

The dichotomy that I find in these discussions is a false one. The article never states that personal, invidivual actions should be stopped,nor that they lacked import or impact. The article’s challenge is that they are not enough.
I keep reading a sort of finger pointing and defense of either the macro or the micro politics. Neither is sufficient to accomplish the goals of positive change that puts us in tune with Earth. The flaw in the each is the belief that the other action is somehow wrong. Both are necessary and neither is sufficient.
Believing that we can somehow separate ourselves into subgroups is as false as any other attempt to separate us from the very real fact that we are of Earth. Earth is our primary referent – not nations, not governments, not ethnicity, not race, nor any of groupings we have used to define ourselves. Our true definition is that we are of Earth, earthlings if you will, and that we have manifested these other categories and institutions from our own minds.
To believe that our personal action is sufficient and divorce ourselves from our connections and responsibilities for the governors we have, the businesses that we have, all of the major institutions we have is just as off reality and incomplete as to believe that the consumption changes we make at home are independent of a larger context and have no impact. It is not either short showers (representing individual actions) OR marches (representing group actions;) is it:
Shower up, suit up, and show up for the march and along the way realize that Earth is the primary context.

Well said Brad. The question now is: How do we get people to “Shower up, suit up, and show up for the march and along the way realize that Earth is the primary context”, and how do we do that sufficiently “in mass” so that we actually create real change?

More questions:

What did “state of the world” reporters know about the unsustainability of greed-driven overconsumerism?

When did they know it?

Why have they waited until 2010 to take stock and speak the truth that many too many of them have known for a long while?

Our colossal failure to speak truth to power is allowing the most greedy among us to ruin Earth’s environment and deplete its resources.