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Page added on March 10, 2019
Zombie-filled Death Ships
“Each passenger’s carbon footprint while cruising is roughly three times what it would be on land.“
In 1996, the late essayist David Foster Wallace described his excursion on a cruise liner as a “special mix of servility and condescension.” He exhaustively journaled every event, person, and feeling during a seven-night, all-inclusive voyage. In “A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again,” he found it insulting that in the name of pampered luxury you are told what to eat, what will entertain you, what will relax you. No matter how many unlimited shrimp and lobster buffets, Wallace found the repetition so banal as to be infuriating.
When a ship docks for a few hours, cruise lines give passengers suggestions of what to do with their time before returning to the boat. But instead of offering sincere recommendations, cruise lines employ a certain pay-to-play model in which vendors on the island can pay to be recommended.
By registering their companies in foreign countries, cruise lines are able to dodge not only corporate income and property taxes but also labor, environmental and insurance laws. Carnival earns $3 billion yearly and pays zero income tax because they are registered in Panama. For Carnival, Panamanian minimum wage laws cost it from $1.22 to $2.36 per hour, high by industry standards. Royal Caribbean is incorporated in Liberia where the minimum wage is $4 to $6 per day. Norwegian Cruise Lines is registered in Bermuda, where there is currently no minimum wage. According to CruiseCritic.com, crew members in housekeeping or food and beverage may only get $2 a day. Tips make up 95 percent of their income.
All of that is really inconsequential compared to the real horrors of the 30-million passenger, 100-billion-dollar industry, where building an 8–figure ship can pay itself back in as little as 5 years, after which it’s all profits. Each ship has the pollution footprint of a small city, nearly unregulated and unpoliced.
Instead of paying for more expensive but less sulfuric fuel, such as liquefied natural gas, ships are installing “emission cheat” systems, called scrubbers. A scrubber allows a ship to wash cheap fuel and meet the IMO requirements, then discharge the pollutants from the cheap fuel into the ocean.
The two most popular cruise lines, Royal Caribbean and Carnival, both received a D score from environmental advocacy group Friends of Earth, which tabulated the score based on sewage treatment, air pollution reduction, water quality compliance, and transparency.
— Aditi Shrikant, vox.com
The volume of wastes these floating cities produce is large — sewage; wastewater; hazardous wastes; solid waste; oily bilge water; ballast water; and sooty, sulfurous air pollution. Cruise ships can emit as much particulate matter as a million cars every day and the air quality on deck can be as bad as the world’s most polluted cities. Researchers found that the air on the upper deck of the Oceana Rivera, downwind from the boat’s funnels, had 84,000 ultra-fine particulates per cubic centimeter, about a third the concentration measured directly above the stacks. Air quality in London’s busy Piccadilly Circus, using the same recording devices and found 38,400 ppcc. That 84,000 reading is closer to what you might find on a hot day close to the center of smog-choked Delhi or Shanghai.
Pampered passengers produce up to 7.7 pounds of consumer waste per person per day, from supersoft toilet paper to plastic water bottles. Many ships shred their plastic to save space, but some take advantage of the difficulty in monitoring ocean microplastics to discard it with treated sewage and greywater. Because cruise ships tend to concentrate their activities in specific coastal areas and visit the same ports, their cumulative impact on a locality can be significant. In US coastal waters, the Coast Guard has regulations prohibiting the discharge of oil or oily mixtures into the sea within 12 nautical miles (22 km) of the nearest land, except under limited conditions. However, because most cruise lines are foreign registered and because the rule only applies to foreign ships within U.S. navigable waters, the regulations have little effect on cruise ship operations.
In 2015, the MV Zenith, owned by a Spanish subsidiary of Royal Caribbean, dropped anchor near a reef off Grand Cayman. Actually, it was more like “dragged anchor.” The anchor chain “draped across the entire reef, constantly moving back and forth.” The damage was immeasurable. In 2017, MV Noble Caledonia ran aground on an Indonesian reef, removing 1,600 square meters – about 17,200 square feet – of coral. Were it not that corals are declining worldwide due to climate change, the reef might repair itself in 100 years. Now the damage is permanent on any timescales humans can fathom. And these are only among the incidents we know about.
What cruise ships are really about is legal rape of the environment by the wealthiest countries and their one-percenters. Each passenger’s carbon footprint while cruising is roughly three times what it would be on land.
Overpaid or financially independent, the average cruise taker is not a pensioned postal worker, but a 30- to 39-year-old pulling down a high five- or low six-digit annual salary. In wealthy countries where governments tell their citizens to fear and revile other peoples and places, cruise lines offer the illusion of secure vacation travel. If you don’t want the risk or hassle of booking hotels, rental cars, tour guides and restaurants in unfamiliar destinations with a language you don’t speak and a culture you little understand, or care to, then for about the same price as an economy flight and all-inclusive resort you can get all that taken care of and have the security of familiar, unchanging culture constantly surrounding you. So what if your unchanging culture is the worst form of throwaway consumerism? So what if it is killing sea birds, whales, and dolphins? So what if you are flouting the Paris Agreement (which cruise lines finagled their own special exemption to)? So what if by purchasing your ticket you enter a tacit agreement to end homo sapiens evolutionary line this century? You only live once, right?
Tell that to your grandchildren.
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133 Comments on "Zombie-filled Death Ships"
Go Speed Racer on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 11:19 am
They forgot to mention the part
about how there is always some cruise ship with
a bubonic plague breakout and all the passengers
come back sick.
My theory on this, is disgruntled workers making $2
per day, go down to the fresh water tanks and
throw in some diseased baby diapers to get
even with the rich greedy American passengers.
Davy on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 12:23 pm
I have never been on a cruise ship and plan on never being on one.
AFDF on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 1:20 pm
me neither i don’t want to be floating around with a bunch of other people. i went sailing once in a big while though
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW9fOEJ0vEs
JuanP sock on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 1:30 pm
AFDF on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 1:20 pm
Davy on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 1:39 pm
I do not have the time to go on ocean cruises with liberal dumbasses. I have vast estates, in North America and Europe to oversee and manage, with herds of happy, well-fed animals and orchards that go on for miles.
Plus, I have to moderate PO.com. Without my steady, fair and balanced hand, the pricks would take over and I have pledged my life, such as it is, to prevent that no matter how many hours each and every day it takes. I could moderate their extremism from the deck of a cruise ship true enough, but I have a yacht of my own, which, again, I am simply too busy moderating here to spend the kind of time on I would like to.
Just so you all know, my yacht is carbon neutral. We have mexican rowers that provide its engine power, and we burn extremists in the ships boiler to provide clean, carbon neutral electricity for our electric can-openers and our 20 inch big-screen TV.
Not Davy on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 1:42 pm
Davy on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 1:39 pm
JuanP on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 1:42 pm
I do not have the time to go on ocean cruises with liberal dumbasses. I have vast estates, in North America and Europe to oversee and manage, with herds of happy, well-fed animals and orchards that go on for miles.
Plus, I have to moderate PO.com. Without my steady, fair and balanced hand, the pricks would take over and I have pledged my life, such as it is, to prevent that no matter how many hours each and every day it takes. I could moderate their extremism from the deck of a cruise ship true enough, but I have a yacht of my own, which, again, I am simply too busy moderating here to spend the kind of time on I would like to.
Just so you all know, my yacht is carbon neutral. We have mexican rowers that provide its engine power, and we burn extremists in the ships boiler to provide clean, carbon neutral electricity for our electric can-openers and our 20 inch big-screen TV.
AFDF on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 1:45 pm
i hate supertard becuase he’s PC crap at the same time he said he’s not a libtard
and he called (((supremetard))) sky daddy
he said muzzie aniamls are “extremists”. how about islamic extremists?
i wish aswang would hurry with his lemon party binge and come back to attack supertard
JuanP sock on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 2:01 pm
AFDF on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 1:45 pm
JuanP on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 2:03 pm
i hate supertard becuase he’s PC crap at the same time he said he’s not a libtard
and he called (((supremetard))) sky daddy
he said muzzie aniamls are “extremists”. how about islamic extremists?
i wish aswang would hurry with his lemon party binge and come back to attack supertard
Gaia on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 3:15 pm
This article is rubbish.
JuanP on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 3:17 pm
Looks like I win another debate davy.
LMAO at the dumbass!
Davy on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 3:35 pm
JuanP the only debate you are winning is your obvious mental condition. You have verified it by your actions.
Davy on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 3:42 pm
Looky there. I flushed me a covey.
heh heh, heh heh heh
Glenn Morton on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 3:50 pm
If you don’t like crusing, don’t go on them, but quit being a party pooper for everyone else. Sheesh, the environmental movement has become my strict aunt telling everyone else how to live their lives.
Davy on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 3:56 pm
“What cruise ships are really about is legal rape of the environment by the wealthiest countries and their one-percenters.”
Us one-percenters don’t do cruise ships. There beneath us.
Eternal Darkness on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 4:02 pm
If environmentalists really cared about saving the planet, they should stop saying one thing and doing the opposite. It’s too late to stop climate change, overpopulation etc. Without us, the Earth will survive.
JuanP identity theft on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 4:18 pm
Davy on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 3:42 pm
JuanP on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 4:19 pm
Looky there. I flushed me a covey.
JuanP identity theft on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 4:21 pm
Davy on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 3:56 pm
JuanP on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 4:22 pm
Heh heh, heh heh heh
JuanP on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 4:22 pm
“What cruise ships are really about is legal rape of the environment by the wealthiest countries and their one-percenters.”
Us one-percenters don’t do cruise ships. There beneath us.
JuanP on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 4:26 pm
Heh heh, heh heh heh.
makati1 on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 6:25 pm
Well Glen, don’t worry about it. Your “living your life” is ending the human species on this planet. Not your problem, right? Fuck the next generation as long as you get to “live your life” in a wasteful, immoral way.
Most Americans believe as you do and don’t really give a damn about their kids or grands. So be it. 2100 = No humans on the planet. Live ones, that is. But lots of rats and roaches.
Chrome Mags on Sun, 10th Mar 2019 8:52 pm
“The volume of wastes these floating cities produce is large — sewage; wastewater; hazardous wastes; solid waste; oily bilge water; ballast water; and sooty, sulfurous air pollution. Cruise ships can emit as much particulate matter as a million cars every day and the air quality on deck can be as bad as the world’s most polluted cities.”
That’s disgusting!
Outcast_Searcher on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 12:06 am
Go Speed Racer: Last time I was at the doctor, he suggested I get a hep A shot.
I looked at the material, and asked why the hell I should need that, since I don’t travel to third world countries or engage in dangerous behavior.
Then he said, “If you eat out much, KY has had a major increase recently in Hep. A cases. The cause is almost certainly the help not washing their hands after they go to the bathroom. We’re becoming a third world country.” And then I thought about the big influx of illegals, and it made sense.
Always being nice and tipping well doesn’t protect one from that.
Go Speed Racer on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 1:29 am
Damn. Thanks for the warning Mr. Outcast
The liberals, like Pelosi and Hillary,
have flooded the country with yucky
illegal aliens.
Now we need the
Liberaltitus A virus immunization.
There is also a
Liberaltitus B virus immunization.
For more information about
getting immunized against
Liberaltitus A & B …
check out this link !!
https://www.webmd.com/vaccines/features/hepatitis-vaccines#1
Francisco Cheraboga on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 5:39 am
outcast_searcher
I’ll be keeping an eye out for you. Just imagine your surprise when you bite down only to discover a unique flavoring, courtesy of my semen added to your meal just before serving to ensure the seasoning is as fresh and organic as possible.
We call this our Donald special and we reserve this delicacy for only the most deserving patrons, like you.
Enjoy.
Francisco Cheraboga on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 5:42 am
Speed racer—
Please forgive the oversight. Needless to say, you’re on the Donald special patron list as well.
Free Speech Forum on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 7:18 am
The US used to be a moral peaceful free country with a balanced budget, but today it is a bankrupt immoral warmongering police state.
Americans used to believe in freedom, but now they want to ignore the disaster of the USSR and fix problems with decrees without considering that government laws create unintended consequences.
The USA spies on friends, overthrows governments, and sanctions, arms, and bombs enemies. US wars then lead to debt, refugees, terrorism, and tyranny.
US debt leads to inflation.
Refugees lead to a divided country and laws against hookah bars, sky lanterns, and eating cats and dogs.
Terrorism leads to a police state and more wars.
When inflation and debt slow the economy, welfare is expanded which increases the debt, raises taxes, rewards laziness, kills the work ethic, destroys the family because females decide to marry the state instead of a man, and leads to girls becoming sluts, or boys becoming fags or going postal which leads to gun control laws.
Government laws lead to more crime. If only murder and theft were illegal, obeying the law would be easy, but no one respects the law when everything is illegal.
Most of the problems of today would be solved by embracing what worked in the past.
People were born in the past without birth certificates.
People could travel without passports.
People can learn how to drive without driver licenses.
Business that don’t have business licenses will go bankrupt if they provide bad service.
People won’t starve if they don’t have food stamps.
People can find cheap doctors in the world without Obamacare.
People won’t have a vested interest in driving dangerously if there are no liability insurance laws.
Would crime rise if everything was legal?
Why do you need the government? Can’t you talk to people who bother you? Could you sue someone? Could you just move away?
Think.
A free country that went to war with a evil dictatorship should not become a police state. Thieves cannot take the moral high ground and criticize robbers.
The USA is an immoral bankrupt warmongering police state now.
Americans have learned nothing from history.
Americans have no rights anymore and the US is no longer a democracy.
Americans think every problem should be solved by decree and force now, but every solution causes another problem.
Americans think the government is made up of holy men. Americans think anyone becomes a saint when they wear a costume, badge, and a gun.
The solution for problems should be what worked in the past.
Americans say that rent control should be used to reduce high rents instead of reducing regulations.
When regulations lead to a bad economy, Americans think that the homeless should be put in jail and businesses should be given bailouts.
Instead of allowing people to feed the homeless, Americans think feeding the homeless should be outlawed.
Instead of getting rid of welfare, Americans think food stamps should be expanded.
Instead of getting rid of minimum wages that cripple the ability of the US to compete on the world market, Americans think the US should increase the minimum wage and start a trade war by enacting tariffs.
When food stamps lead to increased debt, Americans think that taxes should be raised.
Americans think the only way to attend college is to have student loans, but student loans raise the cost of tuition.
Instead of ending wars, Americans think that the wars should be increased.
Tyranny has failed everywhere. China used to encourage people to have kids, but after China became overpopulated, China had an one-child policy.
The USA is supposed to be a free country. The reason the Americans fought the British was because Americans wanted to be free.
When our overlords make a decree, they always sell it as a minor temporary law that only affects Muslims, junkies, sex offenders, homosexuals, illegal immigrants, or blacks. The 1% doesn’t mention that the law will become permanent and more draconian.
No one cares if owning cows are illegal, yoga pants are illegal, teen driving is illegal, or smoking is illegal. The problem is what happens when your job is banned, the government steals your house, tortures your family, or sends you to the concentration camps.
Are you just going to take it?
The elites are trying today to make Americans dependent children by outlawing everything and giving them food stamps. Once Americans are weakened and the US Ponzi economy implodes, the ruling class will then send the 99% off to the gulags to be starved and killed.
Governments are not kind. Governments have killed millions of people in Nazi concentration camps, Soviet gulags, the Chinese Great Leap Forward, and the Cambodian killing fields.
Liberty is not something that only benefits other people, but not you. Freedom benefits everyone.
Tyranny is not something that only punishes other people, but not you. Tyranny punishes everyone.
Freedom is good.
Tyranny is bad.
This is no joke.
History repeats and the signs are everywhere.
Anyone who supports the government is just a tool of the elites.
Nothing will change, though, because anyone who warns of the dangers of debt, wars, and tyranny will be banned, censored, get an IRS audit, arrested, or killed.
How can any American sleep at night now or look in the mirror without feeling utterly disgusted and ashamed?
What country is this?
Wake up.
Think.
Pass the word.
Davy on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 7:25 am
“Radical simplicity in times of crisis”
https://tinyurl.com/y5vv5h8g the ecologist
“I want to explore the possibility that radically reduced but sufficient consumption could be both manageable and consistent with a high quality of life, provided we are prepared for such circumstances, both as households and communities. For those who find deepening crisis a plausible future, I contend that embracing a simpler life in material terms should be strategy to take seriously as a means of increasing resilience in turbulent times.”
“But what if, in advance of collapse conditions, households and communities began voluntarily downshifting their material living standards, increasing home-based production and self-sufficiency, sharing more, cutting out superfluous consumption and waste, and preparing for far more austere material futures? Affluent culture In order to thrive in these more austere futures – whether voluntarily embraced or externally imposed – it seems clear that a deep re-evaluation of affluent material culture is required.”
“Frugal hedonists The interesting thing is that a growing subculture of ‘voluntary simplifiers’ and ‘frugal hedonists’ are choosing these material practices not because they have to, but because they want to. In other words, they are exchanging superfluous stuff for more time to do things other than consume… and they are finding that it is a good trade.”
“It seems a low but sufficient material standard is enough to live a good life, but this requires post-consumerist attitudes to material culture that recognise the limited role of material things in producing human wellbeing. As the pioneering environmentalist Henry David Thoreau once wrote: ‘Superfluous wealth can buy superfluities only.’ He is one amongst many throughout history who have advocated enlightened material restraint as the pathway to genuine happiness and freedom. A prosperous descent? The same material living standard can be experienced very differently depending on the ideas and values one brings to experience. Mindfulness matters. Getting those ideas and values right is therefore of critical importance, especially in an age when crisis and collapse are plausible futures. There are, of course, even more fundamental reasons to embrace the values of frugality and material sufficiency – justice and sustainability. According to the ‘ecological footprint’ analysis, the world would need more than four planets worth of biocapacity if the global population had the same material demands and impacts per capita as Australians.”
Davy on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 7:26 am
Voluntary simplicity has been the backbone of my personal Real Green movement. I am pushing relative sacrifice. This means downsize and reconfigure according to your local not some established criteria. This local means where you live and who you live with. This means adapting consumerism. Don’t quit consumerism instead use consumerism to help you leave the status quo. There are so many very useful products that can enhance your departure from the status quo. Find them and save them. They are normally items with a future and contain longevity and generally simplicity. Some may be high tech and complicated like some renewables systems. Others are simply old technology like a cider press.
Voluntary simplicity in relative sacrifice means stop the superfluous leisure activity. Are the road trips and family vacations needed? Can your leisure be made local and focused on your leaving the status quo? Gardening and animal husbandry can be leisure activities. Gathering natural products in the environment around you. Hobbies that can give you enjoyment like fermenting spirits. Let Localism, seasonality, and intermittency in relative sacrifice influence leisure because often leisure is the only thing you can successfully simplify. The status quo has you by the balls with the rest of your life.
You must avoid dramatic changes to your life or else you may disrupt your life and actually lower your effort at leaving the status quo. Some of the lucky can make dramatic changes but most can’t. The status quo is not your enemy it is instead a tool. Lay low and yield to the greater forces that seek confrontation. If protest are your thing fine but for many they are not going to be productive uses of time and resources in preparation for a future that will likely be with less. Personally I don’t think protesting can do much anymore in regards to positive change. Self-organizing forces above human management are taking the planet and the system down. Late stage capitalism and corrupt liberal democracy is nearing an end game. I see no other system besides localism worth being part of.
Real Green embraces simplicity by realizing such activities are not the best use of your time and money. Real Green will likely apply to older people because the youth have passions and desires that don’t match voluntary simplicity. Not all but most young are going to have to do what young do. Real Green is for those who have seen the world and been there done that. Real Green is about community and making an impact. If you can support your neighbor. Buy food from him even if it is more expensive. Utilize services locally to strengthen localism.
Voluntary simplicity is not new it is just been forgotten. If we look back 100 years we find it. We find it similar but at a different point. Then it was complexity that was new but now it is simplicity that is new. In the 1920’s many people still lived simple lives but had access to increasing complexity. We need to realize we have complex lives with the ability to simplify.
The hard part of simplifying is practicing sacrifice. A trip to a warm beach is tough to forego but the rewards of living local and finding a new way of life can make up for it. Practicing relative sacrifice means some trips are still part of the agenda. If a family does these things you may still do them but in decreasing amounts. Instead of a trip every year skip a year or two. The Real Green movement is not about a new higher power either. It is about incorporating your high power into the drive for personal and planetary health. This may mean reducing church efforts that are not real green. It may mean not driving to your place of worship every week.
The biggest real green simplification is reducing transport related activities. If you can stop the car culture then you are more real green than most. If you must have a car then combine trips and reduce discretionary transport. Real Green also stays healthy. A healthy body means eating simple and working out. Workouts keep you in shape and are beneficial activities that are simple with significant results. Finally, realize Real Green simplicity is going to be hard. Efforts at Real Green simplicity are going to fail and that is where the relative sacrifice comes in. The status quo will wear on you everywhere you turn from family to requirements to survive. It is those little efforts you make to resist the status quo and adapt the status quo that matter.
Davy on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 7:33 am
“Wind-solar pairing cuts equipment costs while ramping up output”
https://tinyurl.com/y6oygb9e renewable energy world
“A western Minnesota wind-solar project is among the first of its kind in the country but won’t be the last. A trailblazing wind-solar hybrid project in western Minnesota could be a preview of what’s to come as renewable developers look for new ways to bolster projects. The project, developed and owned by Juhl Energy, is among the first of its kind in the country to pair wind and solar on the same site. A 2-megawatt turbine and 500-kilowatt solar installation share an inverter and grid connection, reducing equipment costs compared to two separate projects. The pairing is expected to start producing power this month. Lake Region Electric Cooperative in Pelican Rapids, about 30 miles north of Fergus Falls, will buy the power for its approximately 27,000 members.”
shortonoil on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 8:01 am
Cruise ships are now lard infested, floating eating orgies. Go on a cruise and you will see more spare blubber than was on the White Whale. Just watching the overinflated, bibulous, monstrously obese things called passengers stuffing themselves for seven days is disgusting. Not many of them even take the time out from eating to get drunk. Cruises have become an absolutely revolting display of human over indulgence, and gluttony.
Sissyfuss on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 9:30 am
Agree Shorton, the very nature of a cruise vacation is one of gluttony and over imbibing. Can’t think of anything I would enjoy less other than being impaled.
Davy on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 9:38 am
Humper pumper No. 9.
Davy on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 12:59 pm
Hey everyone. I just had a great idea.
I vote we make two permanent links at the top of PO dot com. One titled ‘All About Davy’, and the other one titled ‘Davy’s Copy and Pastes From Over at Zerohedge’. That way I could stop spamming the news threads with my 2000 word salad essays, and the rest of you guys could discuss the topics without my constant bickering at y’all.
A win win for the board.
What do y’all think about that?
AFDF on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 1:08 pm
Davy on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 7:26 am
yeah ok embrace ur maginot line techsok supertard
i hope matako is not dead, we needhim
Anonymouse on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 1:17 pm
How about voluntarily checking yourself in the fucking nuthouse exceptionalturd salad?
That would be a a good start, dont you think?
Real Green on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 2:13 pm
This is for you anon and AFDF (JuanP):
I follow energy and system issues daily and find myself much more optimistic about renewables especially now with the combination of renewables and hydrogen. My view is we need all of the above with adapted behavior to mitigate a coming decline. I have a renewable system myself and love it. In fact I am expanding it. The system is not cheap and it takes significant demand management efforts to maximize the system. I am on the farm most of the time so I gather as much solar power as the weather allows through switching between solar and grid. I make an effort to save my batteries so I don’t run the system at night. Batteries are there for grid failure. I am doing daytime solar gathering. I also have a wood boiler for home heat and hot water. I harvest my own wood which is also expensive in a relative sense considering how cheap grid power and propane still are.
I practice energy efficiency efforts with most purchases. My personal activities follow conservation efforts. If I drive I try to combine supply runs and avoid discretionary trips. I waste as little food as possible. Most food waste goes to the dogs, chickens, and compost. I have gardens, orchard, and grapes. We can food. I raise animals on a rotational grazing system with multispecies. The animals are grass fed. I have livestock guardian dogs that offer me security too. I make a big effort to limit driving. I am participating in consumerism but mainly with a focus on prep. I am buying tools and supplies with a future for the time when we may not have consumerism as we know it. I also spend considerable time with maintaining environmental restoration efforts with native grasses. I promote healthy habitat. My point here is not to brag about myself. I am blessed to be able to do this. This means I humbly except the challenge to try to be greener in a way I call real green. I can do this so I should as a obligation to nature.
I go a step forward with my personal activity which revolves around embracing efforts at sustainability and resilience. This means physical fitness and health. It means intellectual pursuits. It means prepping for the loss of systematic support of a globalized world. I am motivated to less affluence as a value statement. It means a spiritual approach to the planet and the web of life.
I am a doomer but much less a doomer than I once was. My doom now focusses on longer term because I still see population, consumption and the planetary system as problematic with unsustainability and decline. Systems cycle and in the super cycle we call human civilization I feel we are late stage with capitalism and our human fabric that we call modern society. That said this does not necessarily mean immediate collapse although that is a possibility. I do greatly worry about the geopolitical situation and our tendency to weaponize the world.
Personally I am dedicated to being a monastery of sort for the next generation working towards a hybrid syntheses of the best of the old and the new ways of life. This includes a library and collections of tools to that effort. I am trying to live locally, seasonally, and with intermittency in a delocalized on demand world. This unhealthy world is moved through a deep social narrative of profit and discretionary pleasures. I am using this destructive human behavior to leave it. I am acknowledging this way of life is the Anthropocene and survival means adapting to a late stage human world that defines the Anthropocene.
I am trying to lay low under the radar so to speak. I am trying to collapse in place. When I say collapse it is more in regards to dropping out of the unsustainable and non-resilient where I can. I practice relative sacrifice which means I adapt to the “is what it is” of family and community. I have to use the car, internet, and industrial food system so I do but with caution and efforts to leave it. I try to educate where I can but not in a pressured way. I tell people this is a way of life I find enjoyable. I am mentally ready for conflict because I know at any time security could deteriorate. I have systems and supplies in place for collapse. I am not going to live like a hardcore doomer and my prep efforts are a way of life I enjoy. I am academically inclined to read about energy, systems, and environmental decline.
These efforts do not make me better. It is more an experiment with an alternative to the unsuitable status quo. It gives me a personal mission in search of meaning which I think can benefit others. I have given up on late stage civilization narrative of meaning but realize I can’t leave it. I focus on the grass roots. People can make a difference locally and personally and hopefully some of that will bubble up. We are on a gradient down in my opinion but not necessarily a steep gradient. That is not for us to know yet.
AFDF on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 2:16 pm
anontarded
attack supertard harder!
Davy on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 2:18 pm
“Economists Cut Global Growth Forecast In Half, Admit Slowdown “Has Taken Us By Surprise”
http://tinyurl.com/y5meotjw zero hedge
“This is probably the last chart that Mario Draghi wants to see. Bloomberg economics’ global GDP tracker has been downgraded to its slowest pace since the financial crisis, with world economic growth slumping to 2.1% on a quarterly basis. That’s down from 4% in the middle of last year. And while there’s a chance that a US-China trade deal, the Fed’s “pause”, and a fading of the pressures plaguing Europe might stave off a global recession, Bloomberg economists Dan Hanson and Tom Orlik said the risks appear to be tilted toward the downside. “The risk is that the downward momentum will be self-sustaining.”
AFDF on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 2:20 pm
oh man oh man
supertard is trolling us
where is that god forshaken aswange/matako?
Real Green on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 2:21 pm
“Does anyone still think societal collapse is far-fetched?” No, “but”, I have been actively studying this daily for 18 years now. I am actively walking my talk. I have come to the conclusion collapse or not is the wrong way to look at it. Yes, the whole ball of wax could go tomorrow for many human and geologic reasons but where humans fail the understanding is with location, time frame, and processes. Human’s want closure in abstract ways. We are confused by abstractions and the actual. We dream and fantasize with science and logic. We confuse complicated with adaptive and emergent of the complex. Understanding of the complex with its nonlinear and its influence by chaos and entropy is beyond human and supercomputers. This decline could very well go on for years with localized failure and centralized triage both with the global and regionally. There is plenty of low hanging fruit left. We have plenty of wealth transfer and infrastructure cannibalization ahead. We also have a plenty of constructive change with knowledge, technology, and industry to combat the systematic destructive change associated with a paradigm shift of a late term civilization that is collapsing. The potential is there to power through decline for years if we do not blow ourselves up in the process.
I am on the fence on where we are going. It is much like my early religious journeys that lead to philosophical, theological, and comparative thought journeys. These finally ended up somewhat mystically in that who the frig knows what is what beyond a point. The more you know the more you understand how little you know and often you long for the simpler times as a sheeple. Is it really better to know you don’t know or just be a sheeple and live? Anyway I have come to the conclusion that those who argue for and against a collapse are both wrong. I especially see though with packaged agendas as wrong. Many of their facts and some of their rationale is truth based but where they are wrong is the package and the belief that they alone are right and just and the others side wrong and unjust. This is just more of the folly of the dualistic human mind reaching form meaning in a swamp of existential drift. I have come to the conclusion that the status quo is not resilient and not sustainable but with no certainty of time frame. This condition is following the trajectory all ecosystems and human civilizations have. It is a bubbling in a rhyme of cycles both planetary and human.
I now look to the small and local for meaning. If I look to the macro of the global and planet it is mainly for enjoyment and an edge on what is ahead for my local. I am preaching a new way that is “REAL” green as opposed to fake green. I have often relate to it as the cobalt blue you see when you leave the turquoise green of the shallows. This blue and green I have seen deep diving in the ocean. This real green involves relative sacrifice that seeks to use the status quo to leave it. It seeks a mixing of old and new to salvage and triage a new way of life that is more in harmony with planetary cycles but also acknowledges we are in a new human created Epoch. There is no way to escape this new planetary situation. You live with globalism or it will reduce you to a fuel to power its advancement. Utilize it by yielding to it but also coopting it with a judo lifestyle. Leverage it but realistically. If you think this guarantees you safety and offer power you are wrong. It offers you wisdom and this wisdom will steer you away from trouble. Collapse in place or find a new place if yours has no future. If you can’t then make the best of it. No one will get out of this alive and everyone is at risk of their own localized collapse. You can make a difference in your local. Most will mean nothing in the bigger picture. If you think protesting matters fine if that brings you satisfaction but protest generally will die and be consumed by a self-organizing process beyond human control.
I am over 50 and no longer young enough to carry a fight. I seek to make a last stand and teach and train those who will live a new reality in the not too distant future. I want to leave a monastery and a refuge of knowledge and tools for someone who comes after me. I am talking about hospices for the pain and suffering of those with no hope but also lifeboats of hope for those who can hope. I am not sure if any of this effort will survive but I find enjoyment and meaning with this effort. It is also human nature as a man and one who is the eldest to lead and protect the women and the children. I am ready to fight and die here but I have no desire to go to battle fighting someone else’s fight there. I am not sure if I am right but it feel right and I draw my power from nature in my local. My fight is for nature not myself. I am very digital but if that is gone tomorrow I still have my local with nature, my animals, and my people. Now is the time to clear the deadwood in my opinion. Live life fully and if you are capable of enjoying life then do not waste a moment. Pain and suffering are ahead. Opportunities for the heroic are ahead but also tough gut wrenching decisions that represent catch 22 tradeoffs for a world as we know it that is coming apart at the seams. Rise to the occasion but if you don’t it really doesn’t matter. We pretend we are exceptional until we are not.
Mitch on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 2:42 pm
This ‘Real Green’ character sounds to be every bit as delusional and hypocritical as Davy is.
AFDF on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 2:44 pm
realgreen is supertard troll character
annonymouse-the-tard-aka-fmr-paultard on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 2:46 pm
basically he flew planes dropping bombs on taliban and got tons of money for 10,000 acres in the ozard and now he “live within his means”. and document his lifestyle
he’s doing it to troll us serfs
Real Green on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 2:51 pm
This is for you mitch (JuanP):
Yes, the process will likely be a die down of billions. How fast that happens is the big question and biosphere determinant. A quick or slow die down will likely be very destabilizing for human and planet alike. An optimal reduction would proceed over the next 80 years where the human foot print drops to 1 or 2 billion with a drop that is manageable in regards to degree and duration. This 1-2 depends largely on consumption also. Population drop alone is not the answer. Consumption must also drop readically for a real green footprint to develop. I am very pessimistic a proper population reduction can be managed yet, it is possible once a crisis develops maybe people will seek cooperation and agree to draconian steps at population and consumption reductions.
When I refer to real green I mean with the individuals or small communities. Real green will not operate at a higher level in the current late stage social narrative. Wisdom and consensus is not there for this kind of movement. What we get is things like Trump on one end or the Sunrise Movement on the other. Trump denies science and seeks increased consumption as an indication of wellbeing. The Sunrise people just wants to redistribute wealth and pretend they can do that with a low carbon clean footprint. You know all technical and efficient. These Sunrise people don’t deny the science they are just delusional on the science of the solutions. They are not in agreement on less affluence and less tech. They want more tech and claim they can deliver more affluence with a low carbon world.
No movement that preaches affluence through consumption is a valid real green movement. Only less affluence and more respect for the material combined with rich spirituality suffices. Respect for the material is in regards to living a life in tune with the planetary cycles and the web of life. There are high value materials that can make this type of life real green. The rich spirituality is based upon the same but represents high value behavior reflecting wisdom of the way of the planet. This means behavior that scales to the ecosystem and is respectful to other humans.
Cloggie on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 3:29 pm
“This ‘Real Green’ character sounds to be every bit as delusional and hypocritical as Davy is.”
Because he is Davy.
Style = signature.
Cloggie on Mon, 11th Mar 2019 3:34 pm
It’s official, self-driving cars are racist:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-6795741/Driverless-cars-likely-HIT-people-darker-skin.html
“Driverless cars are more likely to hit people with darker skin because too many white people are used to train object recognition technology”