Societal collapse is the best thing that can happen right now, capitalism will not save the workers nor the environment. Only a complete revolution can save the workers, the environment, and the future of humanity.
Do you actually think that?
As though we just do societal collapse on Wednesday and then start living our best lives on Thursday?
If capitalism is allowed to continue it will render humanity extinct. If we collapse now, and are reduced to a fraction of our population this century, humanity may live.
I don’t enjoy that being the best option we have at this point. It brings me no joy. But what brings me less joy is knowing that we won’t even make a choice. We will continue blindly waddling along and as capitalism consumes the world, we will wonder who will save us. And no one will.
Is anyone actually claiming that we’re on a path to extinction? That’s hyperbole.
This type of thinking is not constructive in any way.
As though we just do societal collapse on Wednesday and then start living our best lives on Thursday?
Commenter never said that. So you’re just strawmannning. Do you honestly think capiatlism and consumerism will do an about face and start taking care of the rapidly degrading environment? If not, it would seem that we then we need to change how we behave, soon-- right? Accelerationists are at least doing something, even if it may not be the right plan, while you are whining to keep the exact status quo going thats killing us all, and doing nothing to improve things .
To use a metaphor: dont criticise the fat guy working out at the gym while you youself are sitting on your butt, are also fat and have ice cream on your face. If you want to criticise, get off your ass and get to work on something better. Otherwise shut it and let the adults figure out how to save your ass while you do nothing.
I didn’t say that the commenter said that. Ironically, you’re just strawmanning.
Anyone suggesting that societal collapse is a good outcome doesn’t really understand what societal collapse entails.
I also didn’t suggest that capitalism will save us - that’s another straw man.
Your metaphor is disingenuous.
This commenter is the fat guy eating burgers all day trying to bring on a coronary because it’s inevitable so you may as well get it over with, all while claiming that’s a better outcome than wasting time and effort at the gym trying to lose weight.
I’m not an accelerationist, but they aren’t wrong.
it’s not that I want a collapse, but at some point soon(very soon) the only answer will be for a collapse.
I stopped fighting against corpos years ago because the only way to stop them would restrict my freedom and take me away from my family. all I can do now is to stay informed, plan, and educate myself and family.
I’m not rich. I have no bunker. my mind is sharp. my goal is to survive what comes next. not because I want it to happen, but because corpos won’t stop and my government sold me out long before I was born.
Better to understand it is inevitable and prepare for it instead of sticking your head in the sand about it.
I’m afraid it’s not going to save anyone, because it’s going to be a collapse with many casualities mainly on the side of the poor, not a revolution. I imagine it as a social disaster. The rich will be ok.
The rich will be ok and their kids will repopulate earth. With a plow, a hammer and a sicle. Oh the irony…
Richfolk are known for their strong survival skills.
My odds are on them being the first ones killed and looted when the shit really hits the fan.
Societal collapse doesn’t guarantee anything for people who want any kind of revolution
Except it might not. In fact it might increase the dependency on fossil fuels as supply chain and the electrical grid break down.
If you take a look at history, you’ll notice a pattern:
- civilization/empire/society/whatever X begins forming
- X is at it’s peak, it’s situation is pretty stable and prosperous
- event Y starts
- as a result, X’s situation begins to worsen
- X has fallen completely, it’s previous members now struggle with disease, famine, and political instability
- whoever survives begins to form a new civilization/empire/society/whatever
- repeat
And honestly, I don’t think that the left at it’s current state is anywhere near strong, large, or unified enough to be the one to rise from the ashes. It’s better to do what we can now, and save the revolution for when we are able to actually succeed at it.
We’ll burn down capitalism one piece at a time.
You know what would be useful in a societal collapse? Electric vehicles and solar panels.
Hopefully peppers aren’t building zombie busses because they’ll be useless in 6 months after the oil stops flowing.
An ev with a charger panel and bicycles will be useful indefinitely.
Solar panels and batteries require massive supply chains. They require our rarest minerals and highest tech, with highly educated workers to develop and produce and state of the art clean rooms and factories.
If we stop producing them, the current stock will be useful for like 50 years tops. Then it’s back to fossil fuels, I’m afraid. Diesel generators last for a long time, and they’re easier to maintain and produce.
I remember i read a doomer theory stating we should be stockpiling coal for the humans that remain to rebuild society since there is nothing we can do at this point and fossil fuels is the only thing that will outlast the collapse. I’m not that pessimistic, but i can see what they mean.
Lol, Diesel can on average only be stored for 6 to 12 months before degrading. Good luck with that.
If a collapse ever happens I’d rather have solar panels and an EV. Fuel production and transport would instantly grind to a halt and the existing fuel goes bad soon after.
Yeah, it’s true diesel degrades quickly, but oil does not. Depending on where you live, you could more quickly set up a low scale refinery than a solar panel manufacturing workshop. Most likely, people would use coal in most places without access to oil in short distance since it’s more widely available and simpler to use.
The doomer theory variation I read is that we’ve played out most of the accessible fossil fuels. If society has to rebuild, they have no way to get past the stage of fossil fuel use, because advanced extraction like fracking would not be possible. The very things that made our society possible, are bridges were burning as soon as we cross them. There is no rebuilding
When society collapses, upwards of around 95-100% of us die. That’s reality.
That’s why Musk is backing Trump and Putin and trying to turn the world into Thunderdome. EVs will reign supreme.
you would get murdered for those rather quickly, i’d imagine. what would be useful is to get far away from strangers somewhere defendable near fresh water.
That would be only one of the many competing reasons for my murder.
I do have camping gear, woodworking hand tools, a good bike, I know how to shoot and clean fish+game and cook, and I have knowledge of some remote areas with sparse populations including their flora.
On paper it all sounds good, but I would likely die miserably in the first Canadian winter.
Even if you did everything right there isn’t that much wildlife to live off of. A single human requires a vast healthy wilderness to live off of foraging only.
Maybe. I’ve wondered about that. It’s easy to imagine a Mad Max scenario with bands of raiders looting all potentially useful technological remains, but does solar change that? You can’t as easily steal that without destroying it. You can’t just put it to use without some technical knowledge. It’s not immediately useful to loot.
Destroy, sure.
societal collapse
Ah yes, that thing that has us laboring to chase meaningless plastic crap we’re brainwashed into needing instead of growing our own food and maintaining our own shelters as small, purposeful communities, all so the owners of this society can siphon our energy while poisoning the earth, all to live like wannabe gods above us.
No more penis Space tourist rockets? What a loss…
I dont think you would like what comes after societal collapse. It’s easy to pin society as just capitalism, but collapse will mean more than just the economic system. Democracies will collapse and entire regions will cease to exist. Food scarcity and mass migration will result in extreme regimes that will defend their territory, and a bunch of nomads who have to live with the constant worry of where the next food and freshwater source is. Not to mention the constant fighting over geopolitical issues (imagine current day scaled up exponentially)
Yes, we should fix our economic system, but societal collapse is not an end result we ever want.
Humanity is fucked. My sympathy lies with the animals.
Because most of us are relatively comfy and we’re so focused on surviving the day, week, or month (if you’re really lucky), that we don’t have time to even consider the effort needed to organize and focus on overthrowing those in power. The system working as designed.
That’s all of us unless you’re an executive in a multinational corp, or work for the oil and gas industry.
We’ve all been ramrodded into this reality by a handful of giant Corporations, over the last 100 years.
Yeah I agree. But I could have chosen more fuel efficient cars when I was younger. Bought less shit I didn’t need. I could’ve done more. Yeah it’s not entirely my fault, we’ve been thrown into the gauntlet, what can you do if you wanna live? But the children born now, or God forbid even later are going to find themselves in a hellscape of an economy and ecosystem. And my heart goes out to them because they’ll get less than I had, less freedom, less upward mobility, less drinkable water, less food, less breathable air, and be more fucked by everything. The longer we push it, the worse it gets for the people who had less to do with it.
Animals are fucked! We decimated 75% of wildlife in 50 years, and it is still growing
That’s old news, no? I recall reading that basically from 2°C there is no more economic growth, what means a lot of people are thrown under the bus. From 3°C there is no more economy, meaning no food, heating, fighting everywhere. From 4°C there is basically no more humanity.
That sounds pretty extreme. I’d be Interested in reading that article, if you can find it.
It’s mild hyperbole, but it’s not far off from best-guess speculation. It’s well and regularly covered in IPCC reports. Have at.
https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/syr/
I’m looking at the Full Volume, and on page 71 you can see
With about 2°C warming, climate-related changes in food availability and diet quality are estimated to increase nutrition-related diseases and the number of undernourished people, affecting tens (under low vulnerability and low warming) to hundreds of millions of people (under high vulnerability and high warming) … Climate change risks to cities, settlements and key infrastructure will rise sharply in the mid and long term with further global warming, especially in places already exposed to high temperatures, along coastlines, or with high vulnerabilities (high confidence).
At global warming of 3°C, additional risks in many sectors and regions reach high or very high levels, implying widespread systemic impacts, irreversible change and many additional adaptation limits (see Section 3.2) (high confidence). For example, very high extinction risk for endemic species in biodiversity hotspots is projected to increase at least tenfold if warming rises from 1.5°C to 3°C (medium confidence). Projected increases in direct flood damages are higher by 1.4 to 2 times at 2°C and 2.5 to 3.9 times at 3°C
Global warming of 4°C and above is projected to lead to far-reaching impacts on natural and human systems (high confidence). Beyond 4°C of warming, projected impacts on natural systems include local extinction of ~50% of tropical marine species (medium confidence) and biome shifts across 35% of global land area (medium confidence). At this level of warming, approximately 10% of the global land area is projected to face both increasing high and decreasing low extreme streamflow, affecting, without additional adaptation, over 2.1 billion people (medium confidence) and about 4 billion people are projected to experience water scarcity (medium confidence). At 4°C of warming, the global burned area is projected to increase by 50 to 70% and the fire frequency by ~30% compared to today
However, if you really want to get into it, you can read the Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability Full Report. It has a lot more details about the effects of climate change on all parts of the world, but it’s also a 3,000 page pdf.