[Ludi]

Ok, I want to apologise for my unclear and rather cryptic initial post.

What I'm interested in seeing is what we can do now, today, as global citizens to work toward a solution to the problems we see looming before us. What can we do now to implement these ideas people are posting? How do we educate our respective governments or international agencies about the realities of oil depletion and rising prices?

Macsporan,can you tell us how to implement your proposal?

Remember, I'm not interested in what we "hope" will happen, but rather in what we can do now.

Liamj, can you suggest how we can get this information out to people more effectively? What can we do now to implement your ideas about open source?

[Doly]

You've asked the million dollar question, Ludi.

I think the best answer would have two parts:

1) Collect all sorts of specific information about things that could make the transition easier, at all levels: individual, small business, big business, local government, national and international levels. I have already made a first approach to these sort of documents, specific to the city of Brighton, UK. You can see them at www.powerswitch.org.uk

2) Put that information in the hands of the relevant people. Who is the relevant people depends, obviously, on the level we are talking. The information on what to do at the individual level should be targeted at the public in general, the information for small business to the managers of small business, etc.

I don't really know much about the practical steps involved in 2. If anybody knows, please post the answers here.

[Macsporan]

Buy yourself a manual on how to function as political pressure-group in a democratic society and do it.

Contact and ally with like-minded groups throughout the country.

Do whatever you can to put our ideas, both scary and constructive, into circulation.

Hold meetings, street-marches, hand out pamphlets, media stunts, talk to everyone you know every chance you get, give talks in schools, colleges and universities, lobby federal, state and local politicians, give interviews on the radio, put up posters in your front yard, print bumper-stickers, raise funds, play "Guess the Spy".

You know, all that stuff.

Yes I know, its hard, its boring, you have to associate with ugly people you don't particularly like, and folks can get tetchy...but hey that's the way things get done in the world.

And to anticipate your next impertinant question, no, I'm not doing it myself because I can't.

My health is very poor, but I am happy enough to offer encouragement to others, and be an oracle to anyone who might care, one way or an other, what an obsure Australian invalid might think about the future of the world he briefly inhabits and shares with others.

[doufus]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', 'O')k, I want to apologise for my unclear and rather cryptic initial post.

What I'm interested in seeing is what we can do now, today, as global citizens to work toward a solution to the problems we see looming before us. What can we do now to implement these ideas people are posting? How do we educate our respective governments or international agencies about the realities of oil depletion and rising prices?

[spudbuddy]

For starters - to encourage or demand a mandate on a global basis to embark upon a reduction of energy use.
The larger the scale, the better.
This requires a new model of international economic activity that is not based on growth, or without limits to growth.
In other words, a contraction.
This is imperative, because necessary conservation of resources will not happen effectively enough simply with reduced consumer demand.

On the political front and worldwide, the issue of globalization needs to be addressed...
Globalized producers are the reason that goods move around the planet the way they do.
I'm looking for a worldwide political will that confronts energy use as a liability...and that can exercise the necessary restraint.

Ultimately this means control of the market...and not the market controlling itself.
Governments need to be called out...to address this without dithering or dickering over "ism's". A market is not free at all when it creates so much slavery.
Take your pick...slavery to energy consumption, slavery to sprawled communities with so few transportation choices...slavery to ridiculously low non-liveable wages.

In plain terms...the end of "cheap" goods that cross 10 or 15 thousand miles on their way to market.
The corporate economy of scale has created the currency that even makes this possible.
Governments need to be answerable to their constituents...corporations certainly are not.

There are three major economic regions on the planet...Southeast Asia, Europe, and North America.
Each of these three regions needs to reclaim control over their own areas, and draft an economic model that works for them, one that requires drastically reduced energy consumption.

On local levels (especially in North America)...new building codes, mass transit, contracted walkable communities, more energy-efficient vehicles, regionalized food production, a shift from agribusiness to agriculture, organic instead of petrochemical, local and regional manufacturing...community economies that belong to communities...and not to corporations.

All these things begin with an exercise of public will.
Enough public will creates a political will.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('spudbuddy', 'F')or starters - to encourage or demand a mandate on a global basis to embark upon a reduction of energy use.
The larger the scale, the better.
This requires a new model of international economic activity that is not based on growth, or without limits to growth.
In other words, a contraction.
This is imperative, because necessary conservation of resources will not happen effectively enough simply with reduced consumer demand.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Macsporan', '
')
And to anticipate your next impertinant question, no, I'm not doing it myself because I can't.

[deconstructionist]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Macsporan', 'B')ush is powerful largely because no one is challanging him.

[Macsporan]

Deconstructionist,

Yes! This is what we need.

Have you got you're new bike yet?

Tell us about it.

'Lead by example' is very important.

Keep up the good work.

[basil_hayden]

Isn't the whole point of becoming self sufficient (i.e., debt free, off the grid, living simply) the way everyone on this globe can create a solution?
Obviously some of us are closer to this ideal and some of us are further away and need to do some work.


This ain't gonna come from up top, it'll start at the bottom...

[Liamj]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', 'O')k, I want to apologise for my unclear and rather cryptic initial post.

What I'm interested in seeing is what we can do now, today, as global citizens to work toward a solution to the problems we see looming before us. What can we do now to implement these ideas people are posting? How do we educate our respective governments or international agencies about the realities of oil depletion and rising prices?
...
Liamj, can you suggest how we can get this information out to people more effectively? What can we do now to implement your ideas about open source?

[Macsporan]

Good ideas these, my little monster, but why the sting in the tail?

They might work, they might not, but their chances of success are zero if no one does it.

Call me old fashioned but I still have faith in my fellow humans and in democracy, and both my grandmothers are dead so I'm not going to last long in a chaotic PO.

Also you're wrong about how history shows that these things don't work. They can work very well if many people act to ensure they do.

JF do it.

[Liamj]

I have faith in most of my fellow humans, and you're right Macsporan that 'these things' (if meaning cooperative endevours, even v.rarely but not recently major political ones) DO work at least some of the time. Thats great, gives me hope, is the very reason think we should be aiding that sector.

But democracy? I don't think it works, don't think its capable of bringing about useful change.. more wars for oil, more tax breaks on SUVs, sure, more locking out refugees from nations already stripped of resources, sure, democracy has got those covered just fine.
But global cultural change and voluntary simplicity, sharing with ppl you'll never meet (Rimini Protocol)? I dont think so.

[rogerhb]

One of the marvels of the Rimini Protocol is that if you follow the protocol and other countries don't, you will actually be in a better situation than the BAU crowd.

So you could argue that every individual who voluntarily changes his lifestyle in accordance with reducing oil footprint will be better off than their neighbours who try to maintain the status quo and keep on digging themselves into debt to do so.

[Liamj]

Not only could you argue it rogerhb, i think you'd be right. Every year prepeak spent living a less-consuming lifestyle is perhaps the best training for every year post peak, and triply so for how we raise kids. Thats why i'm trying to do it.
The only thing i'm declining is the obligation to lobby, nag, pester and persist in selling a message i think will arrive anyway.

[holmes]

I currently have 3 parcels of land. soon to be 4. One is 20 acres. 1 is downtown with good garden area. the newest is going to be 250 + acres.
the 3rd has poor solar gain with limited garden acreage.
the new one-
I would like 350 if I can get the surrounding parcel in it. This is out in prime ag country and a 2 acre garden with horse graze. This new acreage will be earthships and agriculture. THis is the way to begin. buy land if you can afford it. Grab the land and build up. If you have the land base in your city. Most dont anymore go for it. however as we see local sustainabliltiy depends on historic land management. and this historically has condemed many areas to the dependency on the grid and food handouts.

talk to people that have a vision and land. If they dont fit your "perfect" world than u werent meant for tribal living. Its about commonality not idealogy.

[retiredguy]

As I see it, the only hope is to create a grassroots organization that would be large enough to be politically/economically significant.

To do this is a formidable task, but it has been done in the past: anti-slavery movement, women's sufferage movement, anti-Vietnam war movement.

The problem with peak oil is that it is a complex issue. Some folks see the issue from a survivalist perspective. Some think it can be solved by drilling more wells. Others see conservation and alternatives as the solution.

The critical task is to determine what issues around which you want to build your organization. They have to be simple and general enough so that they resonate with the average man-on-the-street.

Let's say the organization wanted to make conservation its cornerstone issue. What types of conservation are you going to champion? Abandoning the suburbs? Not driving a car? Driving a smaller car or hybrid? Heating with alternatives? What ever choice you make, you will alienate some group of people.

It's a long shot, but one issue that could work would be to use the growing opposition to the war in Iraq. To do that, however, would require convincing the masses that the war is really the opening salvo in a much larger and more serious war over resources, oil in particular. That we need to reduce or eliminate our use of fossil fuels to avoid another world war.

This is going to be difficult, because the government's spin doctors are going to fight this interpretation vigorously.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('retiredguy', 'A')s I see it, the only hope is to create a grassroots organization that would be large enough to be politically/economically significant.

[holmes]

there should be no wasting time planning with the present civilization. It is failing as all empires before. It must be done detached from the present swarm. it is our responsibility not the gubmint or corporations they will TALK about it. Its up to the "tribes" to do it. It is not in their best interest to do anything about overshoot or decay.
A total break away. Ludi has read beyond civilization I reccomend all that post on this thread to do the same and get back to us. it has to be done by the young being coached by the old. there is no other way except grassroots style. using the internet or what have you to communicate and get the groundwork begun.

[backstop]

Ludi -

I'm in. Have been for longer than I can remember clearly . . .

I doubt Iraq is the issue though.

Divisive of potential support - victims too foreign and Laden-like -

Consequenses of withdrawal actually risk mayhem -Saudi/Iran/Syria/Jordan/Kuwait/Turkey(NATO mutual defence obligation)
(not a justification for failing to mount orderly withdrawal ASAP)

Also, if it came to it - TPTB can withdraw - buy oil on global market (no change there then ?)
and rob movement of momentum.

RG is right to focus on the complexity of Peak Oil both in single interest groups and in the hands of status quo propagandists.
(Farmers round here get it straight off -
Post Peak declining stocks = less there, more remote, deeper, more crud, = less produced each year= more expensive each year).
But that's without industry propagandists' obfuscations anywhere in sight . . .

What is needed IMHO is an umbrella issue which :---

encompasses Peak Oil plus other critical issues,
has massive extant global support, both popular and political,
has the highest of scientific accreditation globally (acknowledged at G8 by Bush)
demands radical change in cutting fossil fuel dependence sustainably,
poses a dire, well-proven intensifying threat to the US, and
played a central but so far ignored role in New Orleans' demise.

Ideas ?

My two pennorth.

regards,

Backstop