Upon Reflection

I will be 65 in less than a month.  Official retiring age.  Pensioner.  Over the hill and put out to grass.  Put one’s feet up, take it easy.  All phrases from society’s accumulated images of a brief golden sunset.  Except it is likely to be neither brief nor golden.  People are living much longer, and wealth is only ever provided by those who do useful work.  Please don’t confuse money with wealth.  Wealth is a good meal, warm clothes, a violin lesson, a massage or shelter from the rain; money is an accounting system very open to corruption.

So at 65 it is a good time to take a reckoning of what I have achieved.  I never wanted to be rich or famous, which is just as well, as I never came close to either.  I wanted a happy life full of experiences rather than full of material things.  I wanted a beautiful environment more than a palace.  I wanted a family and a few close friends rather than a host of acquaintances.  I think I have done rather well.

Of course I was heavily influenced by the culture I grew up in of the 60’s and 70’s.  The hippie era, and the songs.  By the words of Donovan “Tread so light as not to touch the grass, breathe the air so slowly as you pass”, and the more truculent words of Dylan in “Times they are a-changing”.  A time of protest songs and gentle flower-power revolution.  And what did my generation achieve of its goals?  Very little.  In fact perhaps quite the reverse, and perverse, outcomes of those lofty hippie ideals.

Having enjoyed the glow of idealism and free love (I missed out there), my generation corrupted into the the most destructive and avaricious generation the planet has ever seen.  I can’t tell you how profoundly disappointed I am.  I can’t tell you how angry I am that so many suited up to be come corporate lawyers and captains of industry in the systematic rape of the planet.  Far from the caring and sharing ethos, so many embraced the ‘greed is good’ creed.

Which brings me to the ongoing catastrophe of climate change.  I’m sure my dear readers could see that coming.  And I have been reflecting on what my generation has achieved.  Being science based I have greatly enjoyed the amazing advances in understanding the physical and natural worlds especially the advances in the instruments and theories to explore the cosmos.  Nearly all the rest is negative.  The disease of gross consumerism, the increasing gap between the rich and poor, the triumph of capitalism over community, the lack of compassion and willingness to help those in need or even desperately in need, the rise of cold corporate power and its grip on the political system, the inhuman logic of accepted economics, the world agreements and treaties enshrining trade and the free market as the dominant principle not to be compromised by such details as the planet turning to toast …….  I could go on and on.  And you probably think I that I already have.

I used to think that some whiz-bang technological fix would save the world.  It was a comforting thought, but ultimately unrealistic and too little too late.  I used to think recycling and some windmills would save the day, but it’s just nibbling at the edges.  I used to think that if the green parties got into government it would all be OK.  How foolish.  How naive.  The whole philosophy of continuous growth, the biblical idea of humans having dominion over the natural world, the structure of governments, the culture of individualism, the idea the commons is the free trash can of industry, the supremacy of free trade in the world legal system, the governments of the world either corrupted or held hostage by corporations, ….. OMG it’s worse than I though.  Massive dominant cultural assumptions and economic systems have to be swept aside even before we have a chance of addressing the problem of keeping the world habitable.

Decades have been wasted.  Pollution and carbon dioxide increase even faster than the dire predictions.  There have been some heroic attempts to stem the tide such as Norway with a large percentage of wind power and Germany and Spain with the uptake of solar and alternative energy.  And in Australia?  Almost nothing except window-dressing.  And the present government anxious to be seen as furiously active whilst doing nothing.  Do I advocate revolution?  You bet I do.  It cannot be achieved without discomfort and pain, but I sincerely hope it can be achieved without bloodshed.  The ‘do nothing’ alternative is really frightening even to the point of extinction.  Yes, it is possible we could make the planet uninhabitable for humans.  Fungus and bacteria will survive, and I have a lot of faith in cockroaches, as they have already survived hundreds of millions of years and more recently intense human persecution.

So upon reflection, I am content with my life, but afraid for the future of my children and grandchildren.  I will be gone before the dire consequences of my generation’s extravagances have to be paid for.  For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.