We must explore new Ways of Being. We owe it to the planet and all present and future life on it. Capitalism and electoral politics aren't and can't be our answer – by design.
Such powerful writing, Ramona. The best thing I have read since joining Substack. I felt each word in my body. Thank you. We stand together, ever hopeful for better. Another world is indeed possible.
Thank you so much dear Kelly, this made me tear up! This is possibly the biggest thing anyone has told me since I joined Substack. It honestly means a lot and knowing others want radical change as much as I do keeps me going.
My comment is merely on writing form. You say "We" did this, "We" learned that, "We" act or choose this way. Do we? Did we? Are we? Who is "We"? I'm not any of these "We"'s. The "We" form is used to invoke immediate solidarity and communion with the audience. But because "We've" all been so brain hacked using this trick (meaning "I" have) even hearing the word "We" causes instant rebellion and rejection for me instead.
That's okay, but it's more than that. "We" is a way of infinite abstraction, flattening, de-personing, de-diversifying, de-uniqueing people. It's saying "All people are the same". All experiences are the same. Which is the thrust of your article and outlook, that no matter where you go or who you choose, they're all the same, so all the answers are the same, and that's the core problem, right? But I'd ask you to think about this. Is it? Are they? Are two cooks in Western Ireland starting an independent restaurant REALLY exactly the same with the same mores, lessons, life experiences as, say a billionaire from NY going to a NE Prep school? So being raised by hippie parents in a caravan in Montana is REALLY the same as being Tony Blair's Class at Eton? Did "We" all learn exactly the same thing, and behave in the same way, and "we" are all exactly alike, or are we not? For example: you don't seem to be. That's one. Do you find more allies among the different or the same?
"I'm nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? Then there's a pair of us — don't tell! They'd banish us, you know. How dreary to be somebody!" Emily Dickenson
Hi, thank you for your comment! Very interesting angle, and not really one that I share. In many ways, your interpretation of "we" appears to be a polar opposite of mine… I think my article speaks for itself as to who "we" are and why, but I absolutely appreciate there are different interpretations and no two readers will ever perceive a text the same, so I'm happy to explain.
For me, "we" is simply the plurality of humankind in all its diversity. People coming together with with our differences and similarities, our unique personal traits and our shared abilities alike. It doesn't invoke any "infinite abstraction, flattening, de-personing, de-diversifying, de-uniqueing people" for me, quite the opposite. It's a way to find a sense of belonging in a world that is flattening us into nothing.
I don't see how or why "we" must imply sameness, semantically or in any other aspect. It denotes togetherness and implies nothing about the "same" nature of the elements that came together. No two humans are the same in any way, they carry different mutations in our genes, have differences in both physical appearance and inner world - some of the latter being determined by biology, some shaped culturally. Not even two twins are the same. None of our differences stop us from being able to come together and brainstorm our future together. Quite the opposite, those differences are a strength that allows us to throw more offerings into the well we all drink from. We share the same living space - our planet - and that's the only grounds we need to come together.
And actually, I think sameness rarely exists in the natural world, even when things appear "same" at first glance, so why seek it at all? A pod of orcas (killer whales) looks like they're all the same at first glance, but the whales actually differ in behaviour, role in their pod, and physical appearance (each orca can be identified by their unique dorsal fin and markings/saddle patch). If we take your example of two very different cooks - why should they ever be the same? Take a cook inspired by their Jamaican heritage and one trained in classical French cuisine, put them in a pop-up kitchen together and their individual, unique cooking backgrounds will come together to create some truly enjoyable, innovative dishes.
I can't speak as to why the word "we" causes the reaction you're describing in you as that's your personal approach that only you can examine and sit with it. It causes the exact opposite in me, it feels like healing from a lifetime of imposed separation and a veneer of individualism that brought nothing but destruction to this world. I can't and don't want to force a person who was born into middle or upper class and had a completely different life to me - a life I can't even start imagining - to feel like they're in this together with me and see that we all bleed red and deserve to be fed and housed equally. How they feel is their personal choice and they will have to live with their choices and the consequences of their choices to the communities around them. I wish every person would opt to see the world as cooperation instead of separation, but the reality is some will choose separation. The only thing I can do (and any person really) is not let someone else's ideas of separation sway me from trying to come together with others in a bid to overcome the status quo we live in.
Regarding your question do I find more allies among the different or the same, I don't think I can quantify that. I don't consciously think of it, thought I did notice that recently I've been brainstorming ideas with people more diverse and "different" than me than ever before in my life. Another thing I noticed is that there appear to be a large number of people interested in anarchist ideas who spent years thinking no one out there shared their feelings. I'd say the doors to cooperation are open to everyone who wants to enter and imagine an end to extractivism.
Every 'great' civilisation rises to the point of collapse and destroys itself, new ones rising from the ashes. Archaeologists find the evidence, historians tell us the stories, but still we never learn. This time, though, the rise and fall is global. Humans are still the same creatures, motivated by desire, greed, power. Humans either need a leader, or want to be the leader. That model will always end in systems of power, control and oppression. Moving away from capitalism and returning to honouring the land is vital to any meaningful change, even for survival. But I suspect the usual systems would creep back in, as they have always done.
We never learn - until one day we do... I have to believe a different way is possible. Maybe it's too optimistic, but at the end of the day, all we can do is try.
My education in archaeology has been taught from a very linear perspective to human progress. Linearity and appreciation for the rise of "civilisation" is drilled into us as archaeologists, though I'm definitely noticing different approaches now and more nuance to examining the organisation of (pre)historic societies. David Graeber made a significant contribution to that.
I reject linearity now, and I don't think humans will unavoidably cling to power and want a leader or leadership for themselves. We've lived in communities that were structured in completely different ways for most of our history on this planet. It was possible once, it's possible again. Hierarchical power structures that eventually led us to where we're now and finally made us stuck in extractivist ideologies are only a couple of thousands of years old, they first started forming during the Neolithic following the development of agriculture. That's a very long time, of course, but it's not that long in the grand scheme of human (pre)history.
If we don't overcome our desire for power, it's going to lead us all into extinction, human and more-than-human world alike. Little could our leaders or desire for leadership do when our power structures lead us to the point where the air is unbreathable and the soil can't grow crops anymore, so our choice is simple.
I am so thankful for your writing, Ramona, so thankful that you share so generously and unapologetically your fierce clarity. It never fails to fire me up! 🔥🔥🔥
My thoughts are similar; every feeling human knows it and feels it to the core of their being. The animals more than us. The same with the trees. So I follow their lead. They continue on with life, gathering their food, singing their songs, acting in harmony with themselves and their surroundings. I see it every day with the birds, squirrels and Henry the cat.m whom I help feed.
This approach seems counter-intuitive, but we humans need to step aside, get out of the way. It is our hubris that says we can solve the very problem we humans created. We can't. But Nature can and will. She has billions of years of experience. She has wisdom and beauty that we can only dream about.
So, yes, I take comfort in the realization that we are seeing the end of a system that is only about 500 years old. It will collapse soon under the weight of its brutality, its cruelty, its stupidity, and its total disharmony from Nature.
Then a new more harmonious system will form. I will not be around to see it, but I do see the cracks in the foundations of the current system. Change is already taking place.
Thank you, Perry, and I very much agree. It seems counter-intuitive only to those who are not letting go of the only way they've known in their lives, rugged anthropocentrism and exceptionalism. Something we must let go off, as I've written many times. Supremacy and domination can never ever be a viable form of existence, yet we've built a "civilisation" on it and it brought us nothing but alienation and price tags plastered on everything and anything. We must stop lying to our stand separating ourselves from the rest of Nature.
Great piece, thank you! I agree with you, we already live in totalitarian states. I live in the Netherlands but I am from Argentina. As a child, I lived under a dictatorship, and I can tell you, the whole world feels more and more like one. I agree with you that we have to change everything, but how? The painful answer that comes to mind is, first, destruction, then, rebirth, as the famous saying says, you can't make an omelet without breaking eggs. An apocalypse comes to mind. But then, I really want huge numbers of people to die? The other option, maybe, is to build a parallel society, a parallel better world that could eventually replace the existing one when it collapses. But any solution, any possible idea for a better world, includes getting together, uniting.... and that's the difficult part. But that's why I am happy to have found you.
Thank you and I too am happy we've found each other! Thanks for bringing up Argentina and your personal experience of dictatorship... This sort of perspective is so important to talk about.
We organise online and offline. After all, everything, any physical action, ultimately starts with an idea, and those ideas have to be shared through any available channel we have. The days when we were told to "stay in our lane" and we obeyed in fear are over and done with. This is the long game, I personally think the key will be cultivating a completely different, community-oriented, anti-extractivist mindset through several generations.
Huge numbers of people are already dying, only their death isn't considered crime and violence in the hierarchical system that doesn't value life. Take any country and you'll dig up tens of thousands of deaths per year due to inaccessible or inadequate healthcare, lack of housing, corrupt justice systems, air pollution... The apocalypse is already unfolding while we're served the idea that we live in the best and safest times in human history.
We're just refusing to go down with the ship we never consented to board in the first place.
Quite the treatise on humanity. I couldn't agree more though. The United States is finished but they just don't know it yet. Trump and company will just hasten its demise.
The same could be said for the U.K. and Ireland because it's always the same game over and over again. With Europe caving in, England wallowing in the mud, not knowing which way to go, it's only a matter of time before they drag us all down with them.
I fight as much as I can with what I have and I would be happy to take up arms against the oppressors, just like my ancestors did hundreds of years ago. But I don't think it will go down like that in my lifetime. I expect that my fight will eventually be with the elements as I struggle to find food and shelter in my old age after the governments all collapse, taking their economies with them.
When the food runs out in the stores and the hungry hoards run mad, I will do my best to escape into the wilderness to wait it out or die in the process. That is how I expect the modern world to come to its end. A lot of people will die. A lot more than the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and Lebanese we are witnessing right now.
I used to think I wouldn't live long enough to see it, but I no longer think that now. I think it will happen within the next twenty years, and I feel so bad for my children and grandchildren who will have to suffer through it all or die in the process.
The end of the old colonial world is here. What will rise out of its ashes will be a lot, lot worse.
I remain optimistic that what will rise from the ashes won't be worse. You know what they say, it always gets worse before it gets better! I believe we're capable of working together and reimagining the way we live, hence this article… A big question for me is how long/how many generations will it take to foster a mindset that won't seek hierarchy and domination. That's something that won't happen in my lifetime and I worry about my children. At the same time, I believe I can give them theoretical and practical knowledge that will help them lead a fulfilled life as a part of a healthy ecosystem.
Many will die in the years to come, you're not wrong, only I think many of those will be the oligarchs whose lives aren't built on real-life skills, but cheap labour and subjugation of others. You can only do so much with your money and status once your surroundings value the ability to grow crops and build shelter more than they value banknotes and imaginary digital numbers. Many poor who already spent decades scrambling to survive under capitalism are more prepared for a life with bare minimum resources. We all have to keep honing our skills that can contribute to a community.
I didn't think I would see the end of an empire in my lifetime, yet it's happening. Just 15-20 years ago none of us could have foreseen the state of the world, yet we're now facing ridiculously fast changes. We can't surrender ourselves to despair. At the end of the day, I let go of thinking about myself, I'm no more valuable or deserving of survival than anyone else. I think of us all, and every action is like planting a tree that I myself might never see grow and mature, but someone, sometime will benefit from it, and that's enough for me.
More truths. You have more optimism than I do. I do agree with you that the morbidly wealthy world of the oligarchs will come to an end in our lifetimes but I am not as positive about the results. I have seen too many bad things that humans are capable of when it comes to survival and the selfishness of the individuals seemed to always outweigh the individual heroics of those who tried to make things better.
That doesn't mean that I am a cup half empty person so much as a realist. Especially when it comes to the Americans. As a society, they are by far the most selfish bunch over all compared to most of the rest of the world. I may live here but I will be only too happy to watch it all fall down and something else take its place someday soon. The world may be the better for it when it happens.
You know what's a funny thing, believe it or not, I haven't been called an optimist many times in my life before the last year or so! Quite the opposite, I was a textbook nihilist and walking pessimism. I wasn't even the glass half empty person, I was more like a "there's nothing left but a few drops at the bottom and everything sucks" type of person.
I look back at it from today's position and see that I was like that because I was horrendously afraid and that fear has consumed me and paralysed me. I was disempowered. What changed is other like-minded people reassured me that we can stand together and work together. Suddenly I wasn't shouting into the void anymore, there was a whole community (online and offline) that shared my concerns and hopes that was unwilling to be silent ever again.
I really think the key is to concentrate on cultivating a healthier collective mindset and relearning life without rugged individualism and hierarchy that serve profit-making. It's a long game. The longest game we've ever faced in our lives. Committing to it and relearning familiar things is unlike anything we've faced before.
I was seeing something very different in Ramona's piece; she seemed (I hope!) to be calling for true global solidarity - & that includes for the people in the U.S. who have spent their lives resisting the white supremacist, capitalist, settler-colonial status quo. They exist & are part of this conversation. I grew up in the southeast U.S. & have lived in the north of Ireland for 19 years now. The lack of interest that UK/Irish/European people (especially in left/anarchist circles) have in acknowledging & collaborating with & helping grow the resistance in the States always disappoints me. Their struggle is the same - but they're doing it sans national healthcare & most other social welfare safety nets, in the face of extreme voter suppression/gerrymandering (which distorts even electoral politics), with Zionist corporate media blaring & corporations given more rights than humans... I'd love to be part of a fight that grapples with & incorporates that reality rather than pushing it off the back of the boat & sailing on.
I can't disagree with anything here, this is indeed how I see things. I just made quite a long reply to Terrance above, so not to repeat all of it, I'll just add that I've noticed the lack of intersectionality and internationality you're talking about. Of course, there are variables within different communities that stem from their respective political and historical realities, for example my lived experience is that Slavic societies have even less inclination to connect the dots and examine global colonial ties than Ireland/UK/Western Europe.
Western Europe-wise, there are definitely huge shifts in consciousness happening in the last few years and particularly in the last year when Zionism got into the spotlight once again. The conversations I've been having about decolonisation in Ireland would have been impossible just a few years ago, and now I'm finding allies everywhere. A different world is being born in front of our eyes.
Global solidarity is the only thing that can change our predicament. Colonialism gets normalised and entrenched through fragmentation of our realities. And I must say the majority of the (anarchist) thought that deeply influenced me came from Indigenous voices of Turtle Island, and those voices are still very unheard in Western Europe.
Btw, where are you in the north? If you ever want to meet and discuss things in person, just let me know. There are many of us in the north who share these ideas.
Everyday feels like a dance now between hope and feeling like it's too late.
But either one I feel at any moment I'm acting and planning the same. Even if I die a horrible death in the extinction of our species, I'll do it helping whoever i can while it happens, in any way I can.
I'll go down with the ship releasing the love that we hold, believing it goes on to feed whatever comes next.
If it's the end of us, or the beginning of a new us, it takes the same movements and intentions, because whatever follows is still a continuation of what we leave. That's been the affirmation keeping me from fear and despair anyway. Working so far!
Thank you for all the words and love you keep releasing, it helps strengthen our affirmations. ❤️
Thank you, dear Marwa! If some of the anarchist ideas in this article resonated with you, I have a book recommendation that might interest you. "Islam and Anarchism: Relationships and Resonances" by professor Mohamed Abdou. He's an anarchist and scholar who taught at several universities (and of course, was vilified for his support for Palestine in the last year). It's a very interesting work from a perspective that's not commonly covered. https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745341927/islam-and-anarchism/
Succinctly put! Even though I don't personally subscribe to either Christ or Buddha and choose to see my reality through a simple animistic lens, I absolutely understand where you're coming from. Happy to say I met both Buddhist anarchists and Christians who argued that their religion (as it originally was before it got corrupted by top-down power) was incompatible with civilisation.
There is much to sit with and sleep on in this posting. I’m digesting it. Thanks for writing this.
I appreciate this very much! Thank you for reading.
Such powerful writing, Ramona. The best thing I have read since joining Substack. I felt each word in my body. Thank you. We stand together, ever hopeful for better. Another world is indeed possible.
Thank you so much dear Kelly, this made me tear up! This is possibly the biggest thing anyone has told me since I joined Substack. It honestly means a lot and knowing others want radical change as much as I do keeps me going.
My comment is merely on writing form. You say "We" did this, "We" learned that, "We" act or choose this way. Do we? Did we? Are we? Who is "We"? I'm not any of these "We"'s. The "We" form is used to invoke immediate solidarity and communion with the audience. But because "We've" all been so brain hacked using this trick (meaning "I" have) even hearing the word "We" causes instant rebellion and rejection for me instead.
That's okay, but it's more than that. "We" is a way of infinite abstraction, flattening, de-personing, de-diversifying, de-uniqueing people. It's saying "All people are the same". All experiences are the same. Which is the thrust of your article and outlook, that no matter where you go or who you choose, they're all the same, so all the answers are the same, and that's the core problem, right? But I'd ask you to think about this. Is it? Are they? Are two cooks in Western Ireland starting an independent restaurant REALLY exactly the same with the same mores, lessons, life experiences as, say a billionaire from NY going to a NE Prep school? So being raised by hippie parents in a caravan in Montana is REALLY the same as being Tony Blair's Class at Eton? Did "We" all learn exactly the same thing, and behave in the same way, and "we" are all exactly alike, or are we not? For example: you don't seem to be. That's one. Do you find more allies among the different or the same?
"I'm nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? Then there's a pair of us — don't tell! They'd banish us, you know. How dreary to be somebody!" Emily Dickenson
Hi, thank you for your comment! Very interesting angle, and not really one that I share. In many ways, your interpretation of "we" appears to be a polar opposite of mine… I think my article speaks for itself as to who "we" are and why, but I absolutely appreciate there are different interpretations and no two readers will ever perceive a text the same, so I'm happy to explain.
For me, "we" is simply the plurality of humankind in all its diversity. People coming together with with our differences and similarities, our unique personal traits and our shared abilities alike. It doesn't invoke any "infinite abstraction, flattening, de-personing, de-diversifying, de-uniqueing people" for me, quite the opposite. It's a way to find a sense of belonging in a world that is flattening us into nothing.
I don't see how or why "we" must imply sameness, semantically or in any other aspect. It denotes togetherness and implies nothing about the "same" nature of the elements that came together. No two humans are the same in any way, they carry different mutations in our genes, have differences in both physical appearance and inner world - some of the latter being determined by biology, some shaped culturally. Not even two twins are the same. None of our differences stop us from being able to come together and brainstorm our future together. Quite the opposite, those differences are a strength that allows us to throw more offerings into the well we all drink from. We share the same living space - our planet - and that's the only grounds we need to come together.
And actually, I think sameness rarely exists in the natural world, even when things appear "same" at first glance, so why seek it at all? A pod of orcas (killer whales) looks like they're all the same at first glance, but the whales actually differ in behaviour, role in their pod, and physical appearance (each orca can be identified by their unique dorsal fin and markings/saddle patch). If we take your example of two very different cooks - why should they ever be the same? Take a cook inspired by their Jamaican heritage and one trained in classical French cuisine, put them in a pop-up kitchen together and their individual, unique cooking backgrounds will come together to create some truly enjoyable, innovative dishes.
I can't speak as to why the word "we" causes the reaction you're describing in you as that's your personal approach that only you can examine and sit with it. It causes the exact opposite in me, it feels like healing from a lifetime of imposed separation and a veneer of individualism that brought nothing but destruction to this world. I can't and don't want to force a person who was born into middle or upper class and had a completely different life to me - a life I can't even start imagining - to feel like they're in this together with me and see that we all bleed red and deserve to be fed and housed equally. How they feel is their personal choice and they will have to live with their choices and the consequences of their choices to the communities around them. I wish every person would opt to see the world as cooperation instead of separation, but the reality is some will choose separation. The only thing I can do (and any person really) is not let someone else's ideas of separation sway me from trying to come together with others in a bid to overcome the status quo we live in.
Regarding your question do I find more allies among the different or the same, I don't think I can quantify that. I don't consciously think of it, thought I did notice that recently I've been brainstorming ideas with people more diverse and "different" than me than ever before in my life. Another thing I noticed is that there appear to be a large number of people interested in anarchist ideas who spent years thinking no one out there shared their feelings. I'd say the doors to cooperation are open to everyone who wants to enter and imagine an end to extractivism.
Every 'great' civilisation rises to the point of collapse and destroys itself, new ones rising from the ashes. Archaeologists find the evidence, historians tell us the stories, but still we never learn. This time, though, the rise and fall is global. Humans are still the same creatures, motivated by desire, greed, power. Humans either need a leader, or want to be the leader. That model will always end in systems of power, control and oppression. Moving away from capitalism and returning to honouring the land is vital to any meaningful change, even for survival. But I suspect the usual systems would creep back in, as they have always done.
Not necessarily a reason not to try, I might add. But humans being humans...
We never learn - until one day we do... I have to believe a different way is possible. Maybe it's too optimistic, but at the end of the day, all we can do is try.
My education in archaeology has been taught from a very linear perspective to human progress. Linearity and appreciation for the rise of "civilisation" is drilled into us as archaeologists, though I'm definitely noticing different approaches now and more nuance to examining the organisation of (pre)historic societies. David Graeber made a significant contribution to that.
I reject linearity now, and I don't think humans will unavoidably cling to power and want a leader or leadership for themselves. We've lived in communities that were structured in completely different ways for most of our history on this planet. It was possible once, it's possible again. Hierarchical power structures that eventually led us to where we're now and finally made us stuck in extractivist ideologies are only a couple of thousands of years old, they first started forming during the Neolithic following the development of agriculture. That's a very long time, of course, but it's not that long in the grand scheme of human (pre)history.
If we don't overcome our desire for power, it's going to lead us all into extinction, human and more-than-human world alike. Little could our leaders or desire for leadership do when our power structures lead us to the point where the air is unbreathable and the soil can't grow crops anymore, so our choice is simple.
I am so thankful for your writing, Ramona, so thankful that you share so generously and unapologetically your fierce clarity. It never fails to fire me up! 🔥🔥🔥
My thoughts are similar; every feeling human knows it and feels it to the core of their being. The animals more than us. The same with the trees. So I follow their lead. They continue on with life, gathering their food, singing their songs, acting in harmony with themselves and their surroundings. I see it every day with the birds, squirrels and Henry the cat.m whom I help feed.
This approach seems counter-intuitive, but we humans need to step aside, get out of the way. It is our hubris that says we can solve the very problem we humans created. We can't. But Nature can and will. She has billions of years of experience. She has wisdom and beauty that we can only dream about.
So, yes, I take comfort in the realization that we are seeing the end of a system that is only about 500 years old. It will collapse soon under the weight of its brutality, its cruelty, its stupidity, and its total disharmony from Nature.
Then a new more harmonious system will form. I will not be around to see it, but I do see the cracks in the foundations of the current system. Change is already taking place.
Thank you, Perry, and I very much agree. It seems counter-intuitive only to those who are not letting go of the only way they've known in their lives, rugged anthropocentrism and exceptionalism. Something we must let go off, as I've written many times. Supremacy and domination can never ever be a viable form of existence, yet we've built a "civilisation" on it and it brought us nothing but alienation and price tags plastered on everything and anything. We must stop lying to our stand separating ourselves from the rest of Nature.
Great piece, thank you! I agree with you, we already live in totalitarian states. I live in the Netherlands but I am from Argentina. As a child, I lived under a dictatorship, and I can tell you, the whole world feels more and more like one. I agree with you that we have to change everything, but how? The painful answer that comes to mind is, first, destruction, then, rebirth, as the famous saying says, you can't make an omelet without breaking eggs. An apocalypse comes to mind. But then, I really want huge numbers of people to die? The other option, maybe, is to build a parallel society, a parallel better world that could eventually replace the existing one when it collapses. But any solution, any possible idea for a better world, includes getting together, uniting.... and that's the difficult part. But that's why I am happy to have found you.
Thank you and I too am happy we've found each other! Thanks for bringing up Argentina and your personal experience of dictatorship... This sort of perspective is so important to talk about.
We organise online and offline. After all, everything, any physical action, ultimately starts with an idea, and those ideas have to be shared through any available channel we have. The days when we were told to "stay in our lane" and we obeyed in fear are over and done with. This is the long game, I personally think the key will be cultivating a completely different, community-oriented, anti-extractivist mindset through several generations.
Huge numbers of people are already dying, only their death isn't considered crime and violence in the hierarchical system that doesn't value life. Take any country and you'll dig up tens of thousands of deaths per year due to inaccessible or inadequate healthcare, lack of housing, corrupt justice systems, air pollution... The apocalypse is already unfolding while we're served the idea that we live in the best and safest times in human history.
We're just refusing to go down with the ship we never consented to board in the first place.
Quite the treatise on humanity. I couldn't agree more though. The United States is finished but they just don't know it yet. Trump and company will just hasten its demise.
The same could be said for the U.K. and Ireland because it's always the same game over and over again. With Europe caving in, England wallowing in the mud, not knowing which way to go, it's only a matter of time before they drag us all down with them.
I fight as much as I can with what I have and I would be happy to take up arms against the oppressors, just like my ancestors did hundreds of years ago. But I don't think it will go down like that in my lifetime. I expect that my fight will eventually be with the elements as I struggle to find food and shelter in my old age after the governments all collapse, taking their economies with them.
When the food runs out in the stores and the hungry hoards run mad, I will do my best to escape into the wilderness to wait it out or die in the process. That is how I expect the modern world to come to its end. A lot of people will die. A lot more than the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and Lebanese we are witnessing right now.
I used to think I wouldn't live long enough to see it, but I no longer think that now. I think it will happen within the next twenty years, and I feel so bad for my children and grandchildren who will have to suffer through it all or die in the process.
The end of the old colonial world is here. What will rise out of its ashes will be a lot, lot worse.
I remain optimistic that what will rise from the ashes won't be worse. You know what they say, it always gets worse before it gets better! I believe we're capable of working together and reimagining the way we live, hence this article… A big question for me is how long/how many generations will it take to foster a mindset that won't seek hierarchy and domination. That's something that won't happen in my lifetime and I worry about my children. At the same time, I believe I can give them theoretical and practical knowledge that will help them lead a fulfilled life as a part of a healthy ecosystem.
Many will die in the years to come, you're not wrong, only I think many of those will be the oligarchs whose lives aren't built on real-life skills, but cheap labour and subjugation of others. You can only do so much with your money and status once your surroundings value the ability to grow crops and build shelter more than they value banknotes and imaginary digital numbers. Many poor who already spent decades scrambling to survive under capitalism are more prepared for a life with bare minimum resources. We all have to keep honing our skills that can contribute to a community.
I didn't think I would see the end of an empire in my lifetime, yet it's happening. Just 15-20 years ago none of us could have foreseen the state of the world, yet we're now facing ridiculously fast changes. We can't surrender ourselves to despair. At the end of the day, I let go of thinking about myself, I'm no more valuable or deserving of survival than anyone else. I think of us all, and every action is like planting a tree that I myself might never see grow and mature, but someone, sometime will benefit from it, and that's enough for me.
More truths. You have more optimism than I do. I do agree with you that the morbidly wealthy world of the oligarchs will come to an end in our lifetimes but I am not as positive about the results. I have seen too many bad things that humans are capable of when it comes to survival and the selfishness of the individuals seemed to always outweigh the individual heroics of those who tried to make things better.
That doesn't mean that I am a cup half empty person so much as a realist. Especially when it comes to the Americans. As a society, they are by far the most selfish bunch over all compared to most of the rest of the world. I may live here but I will be only too happy to watch it all fall down and something else take its place someday soon. The world may be the better for it when it happens.
You know what's a funny thing, believe it or not, I haven't been called an optimist many times in my life before the last year or so! Quite the opposite, I was a textbook nihilist and walking pessimism. I wasn't even the glass half empty person, I was more like a "there's nothing left but a few drops at the bottom and everything sucks" type of person.
I look back at it from today's position and see that I was like that because I was horrendously afraid and that fear has consumed me and paralysed me. I was disempowered. What changed is other like-minded people reassured me that we can stand together and work together. Suddenly I wasn't shouting into the void anymore, there was a whole community (online and offline) that shared my concerns and hopes that was unwilling to be silent ever again.
I really think the key is to concentrate on cultivating a healthier collective mindset and relearning life without rugged individualism and hierarchy that serve profit-making. It's a long game. The longest game we've ever faced in our lives. Committing to it and relearning familiar things is unlike anything we've faced before.
I was seeing something very different in Ramona's piece; she seemed (I hope!) to be calling for true global solidarity - & that includes for the people in the U.S. who have spent their lives resisting the white supremacist, capitalist, settler-colonial status quo. They exist & are part of this conversation. I grew up in the southeast U.S. & have lived in the north of Ireland for 19 years now. The lack of interest that UK/Irish/European people (especially in left/anarchist circles) have in acknowledging & collaborating with & helping grow the resistance in the States always disappoints me. Their struggle is the same - but they're doing it sans national healthcare & most other social welfare safety nets, in the face of extreme voter suppression/gerrymandering (which distorts even electoral politics), with Zionist corporate media blaring & corporations given more rights than humans... I'd love to be part of a fight that grapples with & incorporates that reality rather than pushing it off the back of the boat & sailing on.
I can't disagree with anything here, this is indeed how I see things. I just made quite a long reply to Terrance above, so not to repeat all of it, I'll just add that I've noticed the lack of intersectionality and internationality you're talking about. Of course, there are variables within different communities that stem from their respective political and historical realities, for example my lived experience is that Slavic societies have even less inclination to connect the dots and examine global colonial ties than Ireland/UK/Western Europe.
Western Europe-wise, there are definitely huge shifts in consciousness happening in the last few years and particularly in the last year when Zionism got into the spotlight once again. The conversations I've been having about decolonisation in Ireland would have been impossible just a few years ago, and now I'm finding allies everywhere. A different world is being born in front of our eyes.
Global solidarity is the only thing that can change our predicament. Colonialism gets normalised and entrenched through fragmentation of our realities. And I must say the majority of the (anarchist) thought that deeply influenced me came from Indigenous voices of Turtle Island, and those voices are still very unheard in Western Europe.
Btw, where are you in the north? If you ever want to meet and discuss things in person, just let me know. There are many of us in the north who share these ideas.
As usual, Ramona, you left no drops spilt.
Everyday feels like a dance now between hope and feeling like it's too late.
But either one I feel at any moment I'm acting and planning the same. Even if I die a horrible death in the extinction of our species, I'll do it helping whoever i can while it happens, in any way I can.
I'll go down with the ship releasing the love that we hold, believing it goes on to feed whatever comes next.
If it's the end of us, or the beginning of a new us, it takes the same movements and intentions, because whatever follows is still a continuation of what we leave. That's been the affirmation keeping me from fear and despair anyway. Working so far!
Thank you for all the words and love you keep releasing, it helps strengthen our affirmations. ❤️
Thank you, dear Marwa! If some of the anarchist ideas in this article resonated with you, I have a book recommendation that might interest you. "Islam and Anarchism: Relationships and Resonances" by professor Mohamed Abdou. He's an anarchist and scholar who taught at several universities (and of course, was vilified for his support for Palestine in the last year). It's a very interesting work from a perspective that's not commonly covered. https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745341927/islam-and-anarchism/
Succinctly put! Even though I don't personally subscribe to either Christ or Buddha and choose to see my reality through a simple animistic lens, I absolutely understand where you're coming from. Happy to say I met both Buddhist anarchists and Christians who argued that their religion (as it originally was before it got corrupted by top-down power) was incompatible with civilisation.