Ecological Extremism: A Debate

[Walfaeder]

So, N-Europe, I was wondering what your thoughts are on the subjects of Deep Ecology and Eco-Fascism. For those needing a little light shed, here's some Wiki articles that'll easily equip you with enough knowledge to develop a stance and opinion;

Deep Ecology

Ecofascism

Futhermore, here's the Wiki page of Pentii Linkola, the Mussolini of Ecofascism, as it were.

 

It's of particular interest to me what you folk think, as the very concept of this forum is built around the world of cutting-edge technology, Mankind in a dissassociative yet thriving form.

Before this message begins I ought to state my position on this topic initially. I follow neither practice or theory, but they're currently the subject of my personal learnings at the moment, hence my willingness to engage in debate over them. I'll post my developed opinions should this thread take off.

 

Deep Ecology is lauded by some as a Hippy concept. It's easy to see why, any serious attention paid to the restoration and protection of the natural world is oft mocked in the face of seemingly more important socio-political topics. What stands between Deep Ecology and your average Green philosophy is as the name suggests, it's intents are Deep. To not look at a Green stance as an insular field but understand how it ties in with all aspects of our society and by extension, economy.

Do you think were such a theory given a chance, it could make a difference? Discuss.

 

The prime doctrine of Eco-fascism is naturally an extreme concept. The proposition within this theory is that in order to restore the natural ecological order of this planet (and with it, crushing the impact of Man's catalysm on climate change) we, as a species, must go against our nature and seek to limit and actively depopulate Earth.

 

Basic calculations suggest that the planet in its arable form could sustain 1.5 billion people, but naturally the concept of Eco-fascism is calling for a disgusting loss of human life, the largest genocide in history - billions. Considerably dwarfing Holocaust figures it goes unsaid. So from a Humanist perspective, it's obviously wrong. What, however, of matters of depopulation outside intentional means? By this I mean War, Pandemic and Natural Disaster, the triumvirate of social destruction!

 

I ask you, General Chit Chat, what do you believe would be the prerogatives for a considerably depopulated Human race in light of such a catastrophe.

Would we seek to return to exactly what we have now?

Or would be reappraise what went wrong, seek a greater unity with the world we live on and hope to benefit from the experience?

Again, please discuss if you have a mind to.

 

 

PS Has anybody read the works of Julius Evola? I'm curious whether they're of interest.

[M-PG71C]

As far as history is concerned, this is the longest real peace time man has ever experienced since Pax Romana. With that stated, it won't last forever. Wars will always happen for as long as man seeks out resources. Power struggles will always happen because of man's desire to be better and absolute. Greed, lust, whatever other kinds of "sins" exist will always be there as an obstacle and as such, consequences will exist.

 

In the very root of it, we're repeating the same mistakes but in a different context. After WWII the world powers stated a genocide of that magnitude will never happen again. I call bullshit on it though. It has happened several times prior to the Holocaust in various countries, United States included. It'll happen again, where though is anyone's guess. Could be a great European power, could be a oil-driven country in South America, Russia, or the Middle East. Hell, lets not even go that far and take a look at the disaster in Darfur.

 

The world is unpredictable and there are a lot of power players out there who, if they wanted something done, it could be done.

 

If it means taking the next great war and putting it in a enviromental context so they can achieve economic success (or any kinds of other "success" I don't want to think about too deeply into) then they'll probably do it.

 

Whatever may be the case, it'll happen sooner than later. War is inevitable, people being killed in the name of nations and idelogies is inevitable, people profitting from war is inevitable, and the same families who are typically involved of the above will be involved again and that is also inevitable. If they put it in the context of "saving the world through green genocide" then that would be the same war we have fought before but in a new context.

 

Of course, the issue is can they sell the idelogy to the masses...which I don't see anybody even remotely intelligent taking this seriously.

 

Could be wrong though.

 

Of course, I'm not scared of the above. I'm more worried about information control. You can't keep information from the people....but you can create context for the information given, thus you're controlling the reality of the information given. Freedom of speech and information exists and always will....but it has limitations. If the powers to be wanted to control information and freedom of speech, all it has to do is create context for it and have it accepted in society as a truth.

 

Which then it is nothing more than a sly form of censorship but since nobody knows any better and everyone accepts it as truth, and everybody reporting it is reporting the same context, it is deemed as truth, even though it is either exaggerated or false.

 

There are always ways to limit society, people will always find ways.

 

Of course, it gets much more deeper than this but I don't want to bore people. In a couple more years I'll have my B.A. in Political Science and then I can move into my Masters so hopefully I'll learn more about things like above in a broader context.

[Walfaeder]

Of course, the issue is can they sell the idelogy to the masses...which I don't see anybody even remotely intelligent taking this seriously.

 

Could be wrong though.

 

Mhmm, I'd accuse you there of thinking from a social bound. The concept of green ideology is no more far fetched, and indeed less extreme than many sopho-political systems seen the world over.

While speaking from a person of our time and place it's unlikely, to suggest in a different circumstance only a dunce would find said ideology applicable is naive.

 

Your statement on the ethics of war is all in essence correct, though it deviates from the concept I was getting at. And that is Post such a war (assuming it is a War that affects us first, and not Pandemic or Natural Disaster) how would a reappraisal of such an ideology progress?

 

In reference to Julius Evola, perhaps you could benefit from reading this. Based entirely on the extracts I've read, it's an interesting dissertation from a man who went on to influence Fascisti; Metaphysics of War: Battle, Victor & Death in the World of Tradition by Julius Evola.

[M-PG71C]

I give you that, people of our time would find it probably "stupid" but who is to say future generations would find it as the same? People change, cultures change, and thought perception change. I agree actually.

 

Meh, I was just eleborating if war is used in a "green genocide" matter it would be no better than any war previously, just a new idealogy behind it. I tend to get on tangents (and often off-topic) in stuff like this.

 

Hmmm....I'm always reading political/military books. I think I'll give this one a go, it could enlighten me. I'll defintely go find it on Amazon. Thanks!

[Walfaeder]

You're welcome. Evola interests me, like all good Philosophers of the modern age, he was batshit insane. His concept of Radical Traditionalism, while totally impractical as a model for our current society, sounds admirable (at least, to someone such as myself), to quote;

"Radical Traditionalism seeks to revive pre-modern values of "the Indo-European Tradition" concerning the spiritual aspects of life. In contrast to modern culture, which they see as marked by materialism, mechanization and urbanism, radical traditionalists promote traditional and local culture and folklore, respectful treatment of the earth and animals, and small-scale organization of society (distributism, localism)."

 

As for your statement on Green Genocide, you're correct. As a means for War, it's certainly no less justified than any other potential casus belli. While the only way to get a green ideology to work is to have the body politic unify with it, the old saying "the only position of power a minority group has is through the use of violence" has proven itself time and again to be sadly true.

[M-PG71C]

I can't lie, I wouldn't mind something like that. Western civilization is marked with many problems, all of which lie with glutoney and obsession. Then again, it does have some unique advantages, especially in concerns to its later developments.

 

But I have to admit, I'm also a person driven with trying to climb up in society, trying to become more knowledgeable in many facets of life (which will become extremely important later on for my job), and I do like material things quite a bit. I wonder if people like me could adjust to a new lifestyle like that or would we be stuck in our ways? Hmmm....that's actually interesting.

 

Heh, I remember my Professor using that quote. I remember him stating no-one took al-Qaeda seriously or even acknowledged them until they took down the world trade towers. Untill they resorted to violence, they were just a irrelevant minority group. Funny how swift things change.

[jayseven]

Yo. Your last paragraph in the OP is what interested me most. Considering I've only just woken up; sustainability is probably the most logical compromise between the humanistic and the planet-worshipping ideas. Culling any species is always going to be frowned upon, and any control we implement over nature is generally overlooked until it directly impacts upon us humans -- look at China's method of lowering their population.

 

Erecting laws hither and thither to pursuade the population doesn't work as well as, as you said, each individual accepting the notion that doing x or behaving y is a morally correct way to be.

 

I didn't really read up on the subject or anything, but I think technology would continue to increase in order to try and increase efficiency and blahbalh. Sorry, just realised the irony of all of this, when i;m sitting here in bed half-naked. Yeah. I don't know what I'm talking about. No idea. Pass.

[Dyson]

Total case of tl;dr here.

[Supergrunch]

Hmm, I have to say I've always been slightly sceptical of some of the foundations of even standard ecology - the idea of artificially maintaining an unstable state of high biodiversity always seemed a bit odd. That said, there are countless advantages to greater diversity, but I don't see why these can't be achieved to at least some extent by saving species that are dying out (and it's not like we'll ever have saved all of those), rather than by cutting down shrubs on sand dunes to maintain a deferred climax. As for deep ecology... well. It seems all very morally pure (hence the hippy accusations, I suppose) but I can't see it achieving a great deal, and on closer examination, it's more than a little crazy. I'd argue that humans today are pretty much an r-selected species, (that's right - I disagree with Wikipedia!) and it's futile attempting to stop them dividing. Humans have an ecological niche, and they occupy it well... it just turns out that that involves them dividing like mad. Plus, I don't think it's necessarily selfish to prioritize humans over other animals - we are humans, so it's somewhat understandable.

Total case of tl;dr here.

Then don't post anything.

[Aimless]

I ask you, General Chit Chat, what do you believe would be the prerogatives for a considerably depopulated Human race in light of such a catastrophe.

Would we seek to return to exactly what we have now?

Or would be reappraise what went wrong, seek a greater unity with the world we live on and hope to benefit from the experience?

Both. Or rather there would be people striving towards both goals; let's not pretend the entirety of humanity could be united in anything.

 

As a very loose concept I think that China's one-child policy is somewhat admirable, but even from my limited knowledge their implementation leaves a lot to be desired. I feel there should be a greater sense of responsibility attached to parenthood, though, especially as I see so many immature parents bearing children for questionable reasons; social expectation, family pressure, a tourniquet for a fracturing relationship or, in the very worst cases, monetary benefits.

 

I try to be a Green person in my own small ways — recycling, saving energy, etcetera — but I don't think I'd elect for a simpler, technology-free life. For one thing this life is all I've ever known, and at a personal level I'm fascinated by cutting-edge technology. However, I don't think the latter is necessarily opposed to nature, so rather than trying to strip it all away we should instead be investing heavily in developments that will help both humans and the planet as a whole. This is a bit of an extreme example, but what if we were eventually able to terraform another planet? Not only would we be making life spring from something 'dead', suddenly we'd have a whole lot more room to work with.

 

Of course the immediate focus should be saving the Earth. Actually, no, that isn't entirely accurate. The planet will recover from the worst we do to it given a few millennia rest, so by trying to preserve it right now what we're really doing is saving ourselves.

[Walfaeder]

But I have to admit, I'm also a person driven with trying to climb up in society, trying to become more knowledgeable in many facets of life (which will become extremely important later on for my job), and I do like material things quite a bit.

 

Technology interests me as a tool. At some point during my travels I realised I was honestly happier when I was living out of a backpack. When I got home I threw out a hell of a lot of stuff. I have clothes, books, this computer; aswell as various smaller items of technology such as a Phone, Mp3 Player and Camera. If it's portable, than towards that end I am still materialistic, I suppose.

The difference being I don't buy for the sake of buying anymore, as I used to. Taking games as an anology here, I'm sure we've all gone and bought a game we didn't really intent to, just for the sake of playing something new. That's no longer something I can justify.

 

I remember my Professor using that quote. I remember him stating no-one took al-Qaeda seriously or even acknowledged them until they took down the world trade towers. Untill they resorted to violence, they were just a irrelevant minority group. Funny how swift things change.

 

Exactly, amazing really.

 

[...]sustainability is probably the most logical compromise between the humanistic and the planet-worshipping ideas. Culling any species is always going to be frowned upon, and any control we implement over nature is generally overlooked until it directly impacts upon us humans -- look at China's method of lowering their population.

 

Erecting laws hither and thither to pursuade the population doesn't work as well as, as you said, each individual accepting the notion that doing x or behaving y is a morally correct way to be.

 

You're correct to that end, Humanity is quite predictable when all is said and done.

 

Total case of tl;dr here.

 

See here folks, this is the kind of person that justifies Green Genocide.

 

artificially maintaining an unstable state of high biodiversity always seemed a bit odd

 

Agreed, it'll take more than that. It'll take a complete social shift to take such a concept in its stride.

Your concept of the Human race as R-selected is interesting, however I disagree. Our mass reproduction is not a response to threat but a product of success.

 

However, I don't think the latter is necessarily opposed to nature, so rather than trying to strip it all away we should instead be investing heavily in developments that will help both humans and the planet as a whole. This is a bit of an extreme example, but what if we were eventually able to terraform another planet? Not only would we be making life spring from something 'dead', suddenly we'd have a whole lot more room to work with.

 

Of course the immediate focus should be saving the Earth. Actually, no, that isn't entirely accurate. The planet will recover from the worst we do to it given a few millennia rest, so by trying to preserve it right now what we're really doing is saving ourselves.

 

A popular theme of Science Fiction is abandoning Earth once we've destroyed its biosphere. Let's hope we can resolve our issues with this planet before going on to ruin another.

[Shino]

I agree with Aimless in most points, and it would be counter productive to go back to "simpler" ways when we're know reaching a state of technology and culturally ready to integrate our needs with that of the planet.

 

The Green Genocide is, in the most positive view, overkill. In my opinion, as we increase the quality of life of the population it ironically lowers the population. And if it comes to such extremes there's a lot better ways of doing other than genocide (seriously, wtf?).

[Iun]

This idea reminds me of the plot in the novel "Rainbow Six".

[Walfaeder]

This idea reminds me of the plot in the novel "Rainbow Six".

 

I blame this post for the heroic death of my thread.

[M-PG71C]

^^

 

LOL! Yeah, I think that post did it. Well, here's a healthy bump for it.

[Daft]

As far as history is concerned, this is the longest real peace time man has ever experienced since Pax Romana. With that stated, it won't last forever.

 

What exactly do you mean by "peace time"? We are still involved with America in a war in Iraq. Canada's freedom of speech is being completely undermined by the Canwest corporation. The civil war is STILL going on in Burma after 60 years. Similarly this year sees the 60th anniversary of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There's also the civil war in Afghanistan. The Columbian armed conflict. The Somali civil war. Not to mention the war in Chechnya. These are just some of the conflicts that are actually still going on.

 

And what about situations that aren't even mentioned like with the Kurds? With 25 to 30 million people dispersed throughout Southern Turkey, Northern Iraq and the West of Iran, the Kurds have undergone brutal oppression by foreigners since the Middle Ages.

 

Their suffering is most evident in Turkey, home to 17 million Kurds: over the past 30 years, Turkey has launched a civil war against them and the PKK (Kurdish Worker’s Party), sending in their army to raid 3,000 Kurdish villages throughout the country, killing thousands of civilians and leaving over a million homeless.

 

And China's human rights are beyond appalling.

 

I really could go on and on and on. Just because war isn't centralised doesn't mean we live in a time of peace.

[Walfaeder]

What exactly do you mean by "peace time"? We are still involved with America in a war in Iraq. Canada's freedom of speech is being completely undermined by the Canwest corporation. The civil war is STILL going on in Burma after 60 years. Similarly this year sees the 60th anniversary of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There's also the civil war in Afghanistan. The Columbian armed conflict. The Somali civil war. Not to mention the war in Chechnya. These are just some of the conflicts that are actually still going on.

 

And what about situations that aren't even mentioned like with the Kurds? With 25 to 30 million people dispersed throughout Southern Turkey, Northern Iraq and the West of Iran, the Kurds have undergone brutal oppression by foreigners since the Middle Ages.

 

 

 

And China's human rights are beyond appalling.

 

I really could go on and on and on. Just because war isn't centralised doesn't mean we live in a time of peace.

 

 

The key difference is they're factionalised conflicts. While your post was detailed and admirable, it misses the point of M-PG71C post.

[Daft]

The key difference is they're factionalised conflicts. While your post was detailed and admirable, it misses the point of M-PG71C post.

 

Surely all conflicts are factionalised. Even if battles are fought under religious banners or the flags of countries they are still factions of humanity. Why should a conflict need to be defined by the parties involved?

 

Also, China's human rights record and the virtual media dictatorship in Canada are hardly factionalised.

 

The idea that we live in a time of relative peace is an illusion.

 

Which is backed up by the point M-PG71C made, "You can't keep information from the people....but you can create context for the information given, thus you're controlling the reality of the information given. Freedom of speech and information exists and always will....but it has limitations. If the powers to be wanted to control information and freedom of speech, all it has to do is create context for it and have it accepted in society as a truth."

 

As Cynthia McFadden, an anchorman for I think CBS, so poiniently pointed out after report on the controversy surrounding racy photos of a teenage Disney star, this is “Just another distraction to keep our minds away from the things that really matter.†We see stories like this on the news all the time. If it isn't some rubbish about Britney Spears then it is some other waffle about Mr Canoe man and his attempted fraud.

 

The reason this is done is to de-democritise democracy, and it is done to great effect:

 

In theory, democratic societies take special care to build robust and democratic media systems, because voters need quality journalism to make informed decisions. But in recent decades, the United States has done the reverse. Since the early 1980s, when President Ronald Reagan embarked on a course of radical deregulation, US media policies have ushered in an age of unprecedented consolidation, with chains and conglomerates pushing small, independent, female and minority-owned media companies out of business.

 

As for "the issue is can they sell the idelogy to the masses", society has been numbed into not caring.

 

We recognise the debasement of standards, we see the signs of intellectual decay. Yet we do nothing. And our inaction is our complicity. Each time we shrug helplessly in the face of diminished expectation, we are greasing the slope of an already rapid collective decline.

 

Every shrug, every mindless utterance of baseless fact – every time we roll our eyes at the depraved state of media but continue to watch – we contribute. We look around and see the problem. We sadly shake our heads. And then we go about our lives. We are the reasons behind unreason.