PeakOil is You
Anger at past generations
Anger at past generations
by Ayame » Sat 27 Mar 2010, 02:30:23
I was wondering if anyone else feels slightly annoyed and disgusted with being lumbered with the tab of peak oil by previous generations. In most cultures you are taught to respect your elders as they are meant to be 'wise'. Personally I look at my grandparents and parents with disdain. My grandparents keep on asking me what went wrong with the world. I explain about population, resources and peak oil and then my grandmother laughs and says 'they will think of something'. Maybe it is amusing for her at 92+ as she is very much on her way out of this world. I always wonder why it is 'they' must think of something, afterall the romans and mayans and all great civilisations that ever collapsed never managed to think of something. Last time I snapped whilst she was laughing and told her that it wasn't very funny for the young people. Also whenever I mention peak oil my grandfather makes a disapproving grunt, last time he actually told me to stop talking about it. My parents aren't much better. They are in denial about the whole thing. Whilst they were busy procreating and making me they never thought once about limits to growth. My mother went on holiday to the great barrier reef when she was around 30 and we have numerous decorative pieces of coral around the house that she picked up and walked off with (whilst it was still living). To me it seems incredulous that people were so naive back then. Did they not ever stop to think what thousands of people doing so might impact on the environment? It seems that I am a different breed to most people. I can't help feeling angry at past generations though. It's not them that are going to bear the full brunt of their foolishness, it's their children or children's children. Somehow it just seems unjust.
- Ayame
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Re: Anger at past generations
by pablonite » Sat 27 Mar 2010, 03:00:42
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ayame', 'M')y mother went on holiday to the great barrier reef when she was around 30 and we have numerous decorative pieces of coral around the house that she picked up and walked off with (whilst it was still living). To me it seems incredulous that people were so naive back then.
Nice rant!
I got some bad news though, your all victims but most of all you!
You can attribute almost everything you mention to one factor and that is change. Why all the change anyway?
You might think it's evolution, history just unfolded that way, a totally unpredictable course of events that led us all to the grand mess!
Well, think again but try and look at it this way...
http://nord.twu.net/acl/dialectic.html
This is the ONLY explanation for how we have come to be disgusted with the very things that brought us into this world and protected us at our most vulnerable moments in the first place. You should look at it a different way and try to feel some empathy and respect for your grandparents, admit it - you enjoyed those pieces of coral just as much as they have and no - it wasn't wrong for her to pick them IMO.
Seriously, talk to the old man about THIS theory and see if you start making some progress with him
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pablonite - Tar Sands
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Re: Anger at past generations
by mos6507 » Sat 27 Mar 2010, 03:22:17
It's hard to be angry with people who simply didn't realize what they were doing to the world. I mean, before 5 years ago I didn't have a clue about peak oil, and another 5 or so years prior I didn't give much thought to carbon emissions. Go back a little further, maybe to the mid 80s and before that nobody was bothering to recycle.
That people continue not to "get it" as the warning signs are blaring is a source of constant frustration, but just as many younger people don't get it as older as far as I can see. Younger meaning the 30 and 40 something yuppies who are in my town who think they are doing the world a favor with screwing in CFLs in their oil-heated McMansions or driving a hybrid Tahoe.
The one time I got really angry at my mom, though, was I brought her a news report talking about sea-level rise predictions for Florida that indicated that her home down there will be underwater for sure. She skimmed through it and said something along the lines of "but that's going to take 100 years!" That sort of response just wreaked of selfishness. That we could casually dismiss the untold damage that sealevel rise alone will do to the earth just because we won't live to see the worst of it. And this coming from someone who pats herself on the back for giving to charities like Greenpeace and the MSPCA.
I'm quite certain that there is a contingent of folks who already know at some basic level that we're screwed, but they've decided that there is nothing that we can or should do about it. Just keep putting cards on the house of cards until it falls. These were ideas that were fairly well explored in Dan Quinn's Ishmael. This sense that the way things are is the only way things could ever be, and we must continue the plan even if it means going straight over a cliff, because to rebel is to be cast into the gutter.
I think that's why people react so badly to being told about doom, since the knowledge won't help at all if they don't feel there is anything that can be done to mitigate it. Acknowledging it will only make them feel miserable (think: Avatar Blues). If they can at least visualize the worst of it occurring after they've had their fun, then they can put it out of their minds. I think that's morally unacceptable. I don't think we should all run out and blow up dams and cell phone towers like Derrick Jensen calls for, but I do think everyone has a moral obligation to at least start walking the path to freedom, as the Dervaes calls it.
That people continue not to "get it" as the warning signs are blaring is a source of constant frustration, but just as many younger people don't get it as older as far as I can see. Younger meaning the 30 and 40 something yuppies who are in my town who think they are doing the world a favor with screwing in CFLs in their oil-heated McMansions or driving a hybrid Tahoe.
The one time I got really angry at my mom, though, was I brought her a news report talking about sea-level rise predictions for Florida that indicated that her home down there will be underwater for sure. She skimmed through it and said something along the lines of "but that's going to take 100 years!" That sort of response just wreaked of selfishness. That we could casually dismiss the untold damage that sealevel rise alone will do to the earth just because we won't live to see the worst of it. And this coming from someone who pats herself on the back for giving to charities like Greenpeace and the MSPCA.
I'm quite certain that there is a contingent of folks who already know at some basic level that we're screwed, but they've decided that there is nothing that we can or should do about it. Just keep putting cards on the house of cards until it falls. These were ideas that were fairly well explored in Dan Quinn's Ishmael. This sense that the way things are is the only way things could ever be, and we must continue the plan even if it means going straight over a cliff, because to rebel is to be cast into the gutter.
I think that's why people react so badly to being told about doom, since the knowledge won't help at all if they don't feel there is anything that can be done to mitigate it. Acknowledging it will only make them feel miserable (think: Avatar Blues). If they can at least visualize the worst of it occurring after they've had their fun, then they can put it out of their minds. I think that's morally unacceptable. I don't think we should all run out and blow up dams and cell phone towers like Derrick Jensen calls for, but I do think everyone has a moral obligation to at least start walking the path to freedom, as the Dervaes calls it.
- mos6507
Re: Anger at past generations
by mos6507 » Sat 27 Mar 2010, 03:23:48
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pablonite', '
')Seriously, talk to the old man about THIS theory and see if you start making some progress with him
')Seriously, talk to the old man about THIS theory and see if you start making some progress with him
Yeah, he'll stick one of these on your head.
What a one-trick-pony you are, pablonite. All NWO, all the time.
- mos6507
Re: Anger at past generations
by Ludi » Sat 27 Mar 2010, 07:04:19
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mos6507', 'I')t's hard to be angry with people who simply didn't realize what they were doing to the world.
I think it is willful ignorance, because the environmental movement started about the time I was born with the publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Spring. Environmental information was relatively mainstream by the mid-70s. So I have been exposed to information about limits to resources for almost half a century. I don't know how everyone else missed it.
But I agree it is not useful to blame other generations, though I can understand why people do feel anger at older folks like me.
I think people widely have the idea that "Someone will think of something" (see OP) or that someone else will take care of the problems. Folks also don't want to change if their neighbors aren't, so there's this idea that everyone has to magically change at once or the action is useless. You see this idea presented all the time here at po.com. Of course there's no mechanism in place for people to magically change all at once - change comes because some people start changing and then others follow. Action regarding limits to resources has not been very widespread, because it's counter to the way we live, which depends on growth.
It also doesn't make much sense to be angry at our elders if we're still not doing anything differently. Most of us still live relatively "normal" first world lives, because it takes real effort to live differently. We'd rather someone else make that effort.
- Ludi
Re: Anger at past generations
by ColossalContrarian » Sat 27 Mar 2010, 10:07:06
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ayame', 'I') was wondering if anyone else feels slightly annoyed and disgusted with being lumbered with the tab of peak oil by previous generations. In most cultures you are taught to respect your elders as they are meant to be 'wise'.
I was on the same rant you write about up until this week actually.
I'm constantly disgusted by the lavishness my Grandmother lives in while I sweet it out 55+ hours a week and live in an apartment across the street from Section 8 housing.
It's obvious that if I hadn't over indulged I might be in a better position but my position isn't that bad so I deal with it and don’t blame my Grandmother but future generations… What will they blame us for?
My anger at my Grandmother's generation where in her instance she only worked at most 15-20 years her entire life (she’s 84) and is sitting pretty on my grandfathers pension (who passed away) -yet at the same time she complains that it's not enough and that the democrats are taking all of the money she wishes to pass to me. I would like to have money passed to me but in all honesty I don't count on it. I'm mostly just angry that she's had a free ride for so long. I've posted in the past my anger toward older generations and how generational warfare is taking place.
An unexpected event happened this past week for me, on the 23rd. I had to take my Grandmother to the hospital because of a life threatening drug combination that the doctors missed. I was the only person available in the family to take my Grandma to the hospital. When I went to pick up my grandmother she looked terrible. She should have called an ambulance but at the time I just carried her to my car and drove her to the dermatologist she had an appointment with. The nurses took her in right away and the doctor did a biopsy and gave her some meds.
When I saw my grandma I was scared. She looked awful. I think it’s her fault for not contacting the dr’s sooner but still I feel like the right thing was done even though the same entitlements may never be available to me.
That day really made me question my stance on Medicare and such. It will suck to not have it when I need it but it’s nice for those we love now.
- ColossalContrarian
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That sounds facitious, but it's true you may not even be here if your mother had known everything you do now.
Well then they should rename our species homo moderately sapiens. I guess I expect too much. 
Cooking is my therapy, since I can control it 100% from start to finish.