The series on “global transformation” is as powerful a presentation of the global challenges before us as any I have seen. Thanks for sharing this remarkably effective vehicle for raising awareness and providing some understanding of the distinctly human-derived predicament in which humanity appears to find itself in these early years of Century XXI.

Always,

Steve

I guess I should say that my main reason for being gloomy, is the fact that I have, for a very long time now, been quite able to grasp – and understand – the connection between western-style capitalist consumerism and ecological devastation of great many forms. Now, – I’m a social anthropologist by education. And if there is one thing modern scholars should do, it’s to take an interest in the globalization of western capitalist cultures and value systems, and after they’ve done that, they should sit themselves down and think. After doing so, they should all sit down and think twice. — “What’s happening here, why is this happening, and what might be the likely outcome of this? Any thought? – No? Well, never mind.”

It’s like: You do not necessarily have to be a red indian in order to understand that the white man’s lack of spiritual / intellectual connection to Mother Nature is a problem. … Sorry all; I do not know of any better analogy.

I sincerely hope you’re going to watch the rest of the series as well. – All in all, it may come as a real eye-opener. One can only hope so, I guess.

‘Cause the fact remains the same as before: the globalization of western, capitalist-consumerist cultures and value systems continue. And there seems to be no stopping this development. As it is: it’s only FAIR ANOUGH that EVERYONE is to be able to enjoy the lifestyles of Americans, Australians, Japanese, and Scandinavians. This is the ultimate goal, of course.

I just want you to know that the 1st episode of “the Planet” just screened here in Australia on one of the public broadcasters.

I have to say it was a brilliant documentary. Although now I know why many of your posts are a little gloomy. It made me feel so anxious ! I couldn’t sleep after seeing it. Some of the academics in interviewed where very good at encapsulating the main environemental challenges. We have some very big problems on our hands. There’s not a moment to waste.

Keep doing what you are doing and work hard at it.

Tonight, for example, Jane Goodall and Al Gore will be on the same stage at an event in New York City. Things are finally beginning to happen……..

It seems the ONE thing we cannot do is take up the position of the NY hairdresser. To me, that is simply an irresponsible non-response.

All the best,

Steve

That series works online for me. There’s an initial page that has to load in for maybe 20 seconds, then the video appears and starts playing after another 20 or 30 seconds. I’m going to try to watch a lot of it in the next few days.

As for people just “accepting fate,” well, it’s a problem for sure. So it seems the solution lies in looking for things people can do or focus on which help them feel some sense of control over what’s going on, some sense of power to have an impact. Also, anything which simply fosters hope would be closely related, I think.

Now, just what those things might be, is a good question. If you get an internet connection at home one day, I’ll again urge you to start your own blog. Any additional blogs that can focus on some combination of population and the economic issues we talk about here can work together and would help fill a real void. We hear so much about saving energy (consumption), but so little about population and the problem of constant economic expansion.

Yet there are only a handful of blogs which really focus specifically on those things. (e.g., blogs with a lot of content on population are basically just GIM, Trinifar, Sustainable Population [new... see blogroll], and one I recently found – http://www.howmany.org/ – which seems to be hiding from the world :-/ ) So, obviously I’m biased, but I think services like WordPress offer a great opportunity today, given an internet connection, for people to broadcast these issues to the world. It’s a bit of a challenge, then, to get the world to listen, but the tools are there in a way they weren’t just a decade or so ago.

I don’t want to discount commenting here and on all sorts of other sites as well. Leaving comments in discussions and other places around the Web helps spread the word about as efficiently as anything.

These days I tend to be kind of Internet focused when I think about things like this, but I’d be interested other sorts of ideas anyone has for helping people feel they can make a difference. I guess the first thing that comes to mind for me would involve forming groups (political activism, educational groups, etc.) to take action, so speak, etc. Any other ideas?

As far as I’m concerned, quite frankly, I couldn’t agree more. This simple statement really gets to me. It’s the exact thing I fear the most. I fear it’s only natural that people get overwhelmed with all this troublesome information we’re recieving here, and decide to “accept fate” or something. – For the basic fact of understanding, instinctively almost, that making a real change here is going to prove too difficult to handle; an order too tall to imagine, so to speak. And therefore ignore all warnings.

I’m sitting at my friend’s computer, and realize that watching this TV series on a computer may be more of a problem than I imagined. But anyway: I just can’t tell you how impressed I am with the series! For lack of words, I mean: yeah, for lack of superlatives. – I’m absolutely amazed.

PART 1 [global transformation]: http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/240704

PART 2 [natural resources]: http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/240712

PART 3 [plants and animals]: http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/244668

PART 4 [time to make a choice]: http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/244675

PART 2 [Natural resources]: http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/240712

PART 3 [Plants and animals]: http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/244668

PART 4 [Time to make a choice]: http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/244675

- —

Yes. The whole series is now available. I can only repeat myself here: this is one awsome production, and highly recommendable.

Enjoy the unenjoyable. …

I heard a fascinating interview on NPR (a national public radio provider in the USA — we do have them) . See the guy’s blog: http://noimpactman.typepad.com/blog/

It has to do with an experiment in living sustainably in the center of one of the largest urban environments in the world: Manhattan, NYC.

Thanks for all you are doing. My words are hanging up in the threshold of language at this moment.

Perhaps I should simply say that I believe what is occurring now, thanks to you, Jason Godetsky, Trinifar, Deborah Byrd, Magne, Bruce McClure, lhereg, Dave Iverson, David I. Pimentel and Paul R. Ehrlich is beyond praise.

Sincerely,

Steve