Yes...but!

November 26 2007

Home > Columns >Yes...But! Year 8-3

A look back first. The start of the Twentieth Century saw, in 1902, the conclusion of the last colonial war pitting white against white: diamonds and gold being the issue. Then the Boers in South Africa tried to shed the yoke of British Imperialism which resulted in something new: concentration camps. The Brits put the Boer women and children there, and many died. In 1933 Hitler expanded that sort of incarceration, the first of such prisons where millions were murdered.

In 1914 madness made headlines again with the start of the World-Wide- War, a conflict not resolved until 1945, at the cost of some 70 millions soldiers, Jews, Gypsies, resistance workers, homosexuals, civilians everywhere.

The first half of the 20th century was probably the most violent of all times.

Violence didn’t stop then. The end of the latest mass fighting was the beginning of another unique conflict: our universal war against Nature, waged under the inane and insane cover of prosperity. Globalization gobbled up everything in its path guided by the so-called ‘invisible hand’ the term first introduced by Adam Smith in his “the Wealth of Nations.’

Stealth is the main feature of ‘invisibility’. No wonder therefore, that we did not perceive the threats against everything that had life until it was too late.

Now this latent lunacy is revealing some blatant facts. For the sake of convenience, for the sake of efficiency, for the sake of profitability, we sacrificed our water, our air, our soil, with the obvious result that our health is now threatened by cancers, while our family life has deteriorated thanks to stupid television and other varieties of vacuous entertainment, while ‘old-time’ religion succumbed to sports and gambling with more moneys spent on lotteries than on all charitable causes combined.

Welcome to Century 21, presenting not entirely a rosy scenario. Three dangers are emerging: prepare for Peak Oil, now official: front page news in this week’s Time Magazine and last week’s Wall Street Journal; Monetary Collapse: now a distinct possibility; Climate Change: on every body’s agenda.

There are supposed to be four horsemen of doom, so how about Religion having that dubious honor. I don’t mean the true religion of love and compassion for creation, which, by the grace of God, is still a factor in the world. No, I mean the fanatic kind, so-called Apocalyptic Religion, the sort practiced by those who believe that they can fashion Heaven on Earth, accomplished not by God but by humanity itself. Ever since Oil became our life, we have offered our very bodies to its worship, making it the life-giving spirit of our industrial society.

This sort of religion, never openly expressed as such, is implicit in the sermons of politicians and business leaders expressed through their dogmas of free markets, globalization, technical solutions, financial deliverance and democratic institutions. They promise perpetual bliss and ultimate salvation by the grace of capitalism.

Humanity always expresses itself through some form of religion. Religion is part of our make-up, just as breathing, eating and procreating. We are made to worship, giving honor either to the God creator or the Evil-destroyer. True religion reveals itself in patience, love, peace, kindness, gentleness, self control. False religion eventually eats its own adherents, now increasingly evident. More than ever before, we are experiencing the utter failure of our secular faith-system.

I believe that the human race is at a very critical junction. The United Nations meets in Bali next week to adopt a new policy to replace Kyoto- pronounced “Key- Auto”. Indeed our beloved ‘Auto’ is a ‘Key’ to a more benign future. If the combustion engine were invented today, it would never pass any of our environmental or sanitary criteria.

Can we shift direction at this late hour? Can we, through our example, convince China and India also to drastically reduce the use of planet – perishing products? Can we deny them the benefits we have enjoyed?

I believe that we are at a decisive point in history. America’s foolish optimism has convinced its citizens that house prices would always rise, and has given birth to the most direct challenge to its banking sector, now suffering from its extreme financing folly. Add into the mix the pipe dream of perpetual energy – No Peak Oil Ever, a premise about to topple over the precipice - and we are about to see the collapse of America’s capitalistic castle, built on sand, of which Alberta’s tar-sands only add to the misery.

Fortunately the fading of this phantom fantasy will force us to live along more creation-friendly lines. That’s why I welcome the next recession, and see the arrival of Peak Oil and the subsequent reduction in oil use as a blessing in disguise.

However it’s a blessing only, if we refrain from increasing the use of coal, as China is doing. If we follow that course, all bets are off.