voluntary destruction.

Late night on Monday. How to resolve this feeling of hope with feelings of resignation.

It provides an opportunity for Joe Q. Citizen to be a star for a moment in the sky of opinions about how to do things should be done right.

Witnessing the process of our supposed democracy occurring through token public consultations is what constitutes as the process these days. That and the occasional opportunity to choose a new gang of capitalistic crooks and assassins to run our city and the province every few years, whenever an election is decided to be called again.

Its also a process of appearing to diffuse authority to the public through arms-length organizations gathering the data from the people to appear as though a legitimate forum of voicing an opinion is represented. Meanwhile, my suspicion is that the verdict has already been decided. The company seems questionable.

To provide input into the process of deciding the future of this province’s natural resources for example…

Wow, where to begin really.

Its an export oriented, final cash-in on the last few remnants of nature in the province, maybe its just time to bend over and let the corporate thugs and ill-mannered capitalists do the rest for the ‘sustainable wise management of the province’s resources’.

Or maybe its about acknowledging that the future is about having resources left to manage, and hopefully those resources won’t be as messed up by climate change as the scientists are making things out to be… I don’t think that forests grow too well under water and mining in scuba suits is kind of annoying.

Well, where do we go from here?

3 years of ‘government consideration’ and a final product. Let’s just hope it reflects a questioning of the growth model and some account to the big pictures… of interconnections between man and nature in the ecosphere and the important role that we each play in it somehow… and the important role intact forests and clean water and clean sources of energy will play in the future.

In the meantime, we should questions our daily actions of driving around in guzzlers and our dependence on unsustainable systems, Te day that is coming sooner or later when we will need to change our ways or suffer irreversible global consequences.

The future is a creative time to try out new ways of social organization to be sustainable and we’ll all need to work together. Either we do it the right way (whatever that is, hopefully in balance with the carrying capacity of the planet) or we sign our fate over to the destruction of civilization as we know it… and maybe that wouldn’t be so bad after all. I just hope that we can still grow food and live lightly on the earth so that future generations can too.

So what will happen? Maybe the voluntary planning committee knows.

Do the right thing. Participate. Question.

And be optimistic in the face of great obstacles.

It is the only sane thing to do.

This article appears in Jun 12-18, 2008.