Dealing
With Peak Oil Depression
By
Peter Goodchild
17 December,
2007
Countercurrents.org
Explaining
the problem of dwindling hydrocarbon resources to seven billion people
is hard enough, especially since my computer tells me that there are
only seven hundred people really concerned about the topic. (I don’t
include people who believe modern technology is going to save us from
ancient sins.) But when I turn off the computer, put the books back
on the shelves, and call it a day, I still have to deal with the fact
that it is depressing to think that I myself am saying goodbye to the
very world in which I grew up: New England in the 1960s, perhaps the
closest thing to heaven that has ever existed on the mortal plane.
For many
who have experienced the epiphany of the petroleum bell-curve, a sense
of despair is the common after-effect. How does one accommodate oneself
to that realization of dwindling material resources? And oddly enough,
it is often the most astute, those who have the most to offer, who are
in that very position of having to navigate the darkness.
It’s
odd that the word "depression" is used most commonly to refer
to two things: a state of mind characterized by unhappiness and a host
of secondary symptoms (fatigue, insomnia, sexual dysfunction, irritability,
excess salivation, psoriasis, etc. etc.) and an economic state characterized
by low prices, low wages, and a generally stagnant economy. But the
fact that the word has these two uses is not solely due to the convenience
of a certain Latin verb.
The two uses
of the term actually have much in common, simply because the individual
and the world are a reflection of each other. The individual is the
microcosm, the outer world is the macrocosm. Any ill, therefore, that
befalls the one is likely to befall the other.
But there
is a paradox in the concept of "progress." On the one hand,
it is possible to say that there was no real idea of "progress"
before about the eighteenth century. It would be very hard to wade through
literature before that time and come up with any clear evidence of a
belief in progress — the assumption that "life gets better
and better" as humanity passes from savagery to barbarism to civilization.
That idea of progress was very much a product of the Industrial Revolution.
It may be said to have died at some time around the First World War,
when "the war to end all wars" turned out to be merely the
start of many.
The paradox
arises from the fact that the idea of "progress" is also related
to the sense of "vision," the feeling that "tomorrow
will be a better day," the impression that there is hope, that
there is light, that there are horizons of green grass and blue skies.
In "The
True Believer," Eric Hoffer quotes Hermann Rauschning, describing
the aftermath of the First World War and the rise of Nazism, who says,
"The feeling of having come to the end of all things was one of
the worst troubles we endured after that lost war." On a saner
note, we might consider the statement in Proverbs: "Where there
is no vision, the people perish." It seems that the difference
between the 1960s and today is precisely that problem of belief in the
future.
Edward Gibbon
wrote a book called "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire."
Paul and Anne Ehrlich wrote one entitled "Population Resources
Environment." Except for a space of about two millennia in the
subject matter, the two books seem to be telling the same story, that
of unlimited, mindless expansion leading to an inevitable collapse.
A significant factor in this destruction is humanity’s eternal
belief in the wisdom and benevolence of its leaders. The thought that
we are led by fools and thieves implies so much injustice that the mind
refuses to harbor the idea.
There is
in all of us a great desire for a "people." There is also
a great desire for a "land." "Wo bist du, mein geliebtes
Land?" — "Where are you, my beloved land?" —
is a line in a poem set to music by Franz Schubert. Although in our
own times there is something doubtful about the admiration of fertility,
faced as we are with too many people and not enough land, it is easy
to understand the ancient prophets who spoke of an imagined country
where one could live without war or hunger, and where one’s children
could be as numerous as particles of sand.
For me the
essence of "depression" in the economic sense becomes visible
when I am in the center of a city and I see someone walking toward me,
dressed in the costume of a rabbit or some other animal. He or she waves
at me and hands me an advertising brochure. What runs through my mind
first is not that the costume is probably hot and unpleasant, nor that
the job is low paying. I am struck, rather, by the fact that the job
is so lacking in honor and dignity.
The "peak
oil" problem is linked to a number of economic issues. In general,
economics is a morass that is better avoided. Nevertheless, the depletion
of oil and other resources comes at a time when the average person is
already beset by the evils of globalization and the resulting massive
unemployment. The two problems of oil and employment are synergistic.
The owners of department stores may be wondering what they will lose
first: the customers or the transportation.
The concept
of "under-employment" is important — in the sense of
a shortage of working hours, and in the sense of a failure to fully
employ human talents. But equally problematic is something that might
be called "tolerated employment." It is hard to find work
that is honest or dignified, so everywhere I see people choosing what
remains: to do something, during the long stretch from dawn to dusk,
that will be "rewarded" with a paycheck, but something that
is merely permitted, tolerated, tossed at the worker as a bone is tossed
to a dog. A century ago, there was a kind of joy in working in the fields,
knowing that there was a family waiting for the products of that field.
There was a joy in hammering nails, a joy in the gentle whir and thud
of a loom. Now there is no joy, and those who are employed must count
themselves lucky to be facing another Monday on the job.
Having taught
so many students, I know what they face nowadays when they are pushed
out onto the streets. Not so long ago, I used to tell them they needed
a good resume. Years later I had to tell them that they needed to post
their resumes on job sites on the Internet, although the number of posted
resumes was infinitely greater than the number of meaningful jobs. Those
students never believed me when I told them they had to work hard, and
I myself never really believed what I was saying. If they were lucky,
they would be tolerated. Basically, they were unwanted, unnecessary,
and unwelcome in capitalist society.
Finding a
new world for tomorrow means finding a way of life that respects Nature,
a life that is more attuned to the land, the sea, and the sky. There
is no way for any small group of people to reduce the immense power
of the multi-trillion-dollar global economy, although it will disintegrate
by itself over the next few years. For now, there is only one direction,
and that is out.
We must literally
step out of the global economy — and by "we" I mean
those few who are clever enough to be saved, those few who make the
effort to pack their bags. We must stop being part of "society."
Ultimately, I suspect, it would be best to give up using money, at least
money as we now know it, since it is money that chains us to the global
economy — although at the moment there are so many rules, from
building codes to tax laws, that make it difficult to provide oneself
with food, clothing and shelter without spending money. The details
are uncertain, but the general picture is not too hard to draw. I envision
a world where people can open the front doors of their houses and greet
the sunrise. I imagine a world in which people can live with nobility,
dignity, and grace.
Peter Goodchild is the author of "Survival Skills
of the North American Indians," published by Chicago Review Press.
He can be contacted at [email protected].
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