Friends, we need to talk.
About love, life, coronavirus.
About hand sanitiser, air pollution, the meaning of life.
About toilet paper.
About the meaning of hot, heat, and fuck that’s hot.
About this doozie of a situation we’re in.
About Me! Me! Me! I want it! Now!
About all these things.
And more.
Shall we begin, dear friends?
Ok. Let’s do it!
Grab a stiff drink or a Kombucha and belt yourself in.
*
Once upon a time—the 1960s to be precise—in New Zealand, a little country at the edge of the world, Jo Crabb wanted to use the family oven for some baking.
This is how it worked back then:
“…you had to make at least two things at once, otherwise you were ‘wasting the oven’. Or, if the oven was already on, you were allowed to do some baking; you weren’t allowed to heat the oven up to do just one thing. Economy. It wasn’t the Depression: this was the 1960s. We weren’t poor, but those were thriftier times. It was just normal. Isn’t it funny how ‘normal’ changes?”
It sure is.
Can you imagine doing that kind of thing today?
I can’t.
So why don’t we?
Stop for a second, and ask yourself this question, honestly: Why wouldn’t you do this today?
Then, scroll on past the cute doggie.
Did you come up with any insights as to why you don’t double dip in the oven these days?
Is it because energy is too cheap?
Is it because ‘What the hell is wrong with you for even suggesting such a crazy thing’?
Is it because you’re living in a society where everyone aspires to do exactly what they want to do, exactly when they want to do it, to hell with the consequences?
(If you’re scavenging in rubbish bins for calories, you are not concerned.)
Or Is it that the consequences of our actions (e.g., turning off a light) are not immediately visible? Immediately obvious?
Is that the problem?
I mean, come on! What are the consequences of leaving the light on in an empty room, right?
To most of us, there are no consequences.
No-one tells us off if we do it. Our power bill is barely affected. We can take the hit of a few extra cents a month, maybe a dollar or two, without even noticing.
Powered by the world’s average energy source mix (a mixture of coal, solar, hydro, wind, etc.) it’s probably a few grams of CO2 per light bulb per day. A tiny tiny amount.
It sounds trivial. Why should we give a fuck?
Turning that light off in that empty room will not change the course of humanity.
It’s true.
But what happens when one billion people leave a light on in an empty room for an hour a day? A computer on overnight? Run the washing machine when it’s only 1/4 full?
Why is this “business as usual” so addictive, so soothing?
Is it because we can?
Is it the plausible deniability involved? (Who me? I’m a good person, I am, I’d never do a thing like that!)
Again, is it simply the lack of consequences?
*
Imagine if someone punched you in the nose each time you left a room without turning off the light.
Imagine if every time you switched off a light, the CO2 created during it’s on-time was pumped up your left nostril at high-speed, rather than being released in some far-away, invisible, unimagined place?
Or that you could choose the person that got it up the nose?
Or you could send it to a random person with a compulsory note attached to it with your address on it.
There’d be a lot less lights on in empty rooms, methinks.
*
What is missing in our imagination that makes us such magnificent sheep in this group passivity epidemic?
Does 51% of a country’s population have to have their life almost destroyed in at least one apocalyptic climate event before the mess we’re in sinks in?
(A good question to ask the next Australian you bump into.)
*
Reality bites in times like these. In times with dodgy viruses floating around.
We as a species have come to an implicit understanding—almost a subconscious hunch, never mentioned in polite society, in fact never mentioned at all—that consumption of stuff, necessary or otherwise, keeps the wheels turning.
And we are prepared to keep those wheels turning no matter what.
We are getting ready to put them back into overdrive once the viral peak is over.
It’s like a big world-wide perpetual motion machine based on group unthinking about the looming shit-show.
The planet is an afterthought.
The planet is currently taking a deep breath of its freshest air in years.
But humanity will not be deterred.
Growth is waiting in the wings, and we want it again!
Imagine if we decided to use this surreal world-wide coronavirus mess to reset to zero. To make better decisions about the future. To not kick-start all those idling coal-fueled factories in China. To decide that the new shitty made-in-China sofa we thought we wanted is not perhaps as important to our existence as previously imagined. That we don’t really need a fucking iPhone 27. That walking and taking the bus are things. That flying across the planet is a luxury, not a god-given right. That an SUV is not necessary for driving to the supermarket twice a week. That life is actually richer with less stuff, less noise. That we are destroying the wobbly platform we float precariously on, like a rodeo cowboy on a bucking bronco.
Hahahahahahahahahahaha yeah right!
*
Deep in the dirty soul of our collective delusion lies the quote that does not speak its name:
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it”. -Upton Sinclair
It is found hiding in the cellar with its buddies: overpopulation, inequality, nationalism, and stupidity.
It’s quite a party down there.
*
Be a better person. Turn off the goddam light. Cancel the sofa. Don’t worry. Be happy.
I dare you.