[Dialogue] A P O C A L Y P S E !!

[David Zahrt]

I still have friends in Iowa. This is what I got last week.

*I THINK YOU CAN SEE I'M FORWARDING THIS TO YOU. IT SEEMS TO BE WELL PUT
AND ON TARGET*
*David*
From: Mark Edward*s*
Sent: 10 Feb 2013 18:30:44 GMT
To: IOWA-NATIVE-PLANTS at LIST.UIOWA.EDU
Subject: [IOWA-NATIVE-PLANTS] Food for Thought
Rationally Speaking, We Are All Apocalyptic Now <http://mail.yahoo.com/>
**

>From Robert Jensen
Updates<http://us-mg6.mail.yahoo.com/neo/launch?.rand=eis30cjomtfqb>

*http://truth-out.org/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=14322&Itemid=228*

Rationally Speaking, We Are All Apocalyptic Now

Friday, 08 February 2013 By Robert Jensen, Truthout | Op-Ed
----------
If we are rational and consider objective scientific evidence of
environmental collapse including groundwater depletion, topsoil loss,
chemical contamination, ocean dead zones, species extinction, bio-diversity
reduction and climate disruption, we need to be apocalypticists, argues
Robert Jensen, the author of We Are All Apocalyptic Now: On the
Responsibilities of Teaching, Preaching, Reporting, Writing, and Speaking
Out.
----------
We are all apocalyptic now, or at least we should be, if we are rational.

Because "apocalyptic" is typically associated with religious fanaticism and
death cults -- things that rational people tend not to take literally or
seriously -- this claim requires some explanation.

First, a definition: The term is most commonly used in reference to the
Book of Revelation, also known as The Apocalypse of John, the final book of
the Christian New Testament. The two terms are synonymous in their original
meaning - "revelation" from Latin and "apocalypse" from Greek both mean a
lifting of the veil, a disclosure of something that had been hidden.

Second, the formulation "we are all (fill in the blank) now" has long been
a way to assert that certain ideas have become the norm: "We are all
Keynesians now," said Milton Friedman in 1965, for instance, or to express
solidarity: "We are all New Yorkers now," said many non-New Yorkers after
9/11.

Rather than claiming divine inspiration, we can come to greater clarity
about the desperate state of the ecosphere and its human inhabitants
through evidence and reason. It is time for a calm, measured apocalypticism
that recognizes that the ecosphere sets norms, which we have ignored for
too long, and that we need to develop a new sense of solidarity among
humans and with the larger living world.
So, speaking apocalyptically need not leave us stuck in a corner with the
folks predicting lakes of fire, rivers of blood or bodies lifted up to the
heavens. Instead, it can focus our attention on ecological realities and on
the unjust and unsustainable human systems that have brought us to this
point.

This "revelation" is simple: We've built a world based on the assumption
that we will have endless energy to subsidize endless economic expansion,
which was supposed to magically produce justice. That world is over, both
in reality and in dreams. Either we begin to build a different world, or
there will be no world capable of sustaining a large-scale human presence.

If that's not clear: When we take seriously what physics, chemistry and
biology tell us about the health of the living world on which we depend, we
all should be thinking apocalyptically. Look at any crucial measure of the
ecosphere -- groundwater depletion, topsoil loss, chemical contamination,
increased toxicity in our own bodies, the number and size of "dead zones"
in the oceans, accelerating extinction of species and reduction of
biodiversity, and the ultimate game-changer of climate disruption -- and
ask a simple question: Where we are heading? Scientists these days are
talking about tipping points and planetary boundaries, about how human
activity is pushing the planet beyond its limits.

If we look honestly at the state of the world, it is difficult not to
conclude that we are in end times of sorts -- not the end of the physical
world, but the end of the First-World way of living and the end of the
systems on which that life is based.

I know that invoking the terms "apocalypse" and "end times" triggers many
people's experiences with arrogant religious people who preach about
deliverance fantasies. My message is not about a rapture that can be
predicted, but about ruptures in the ecological and social fabrics that are
underway and accelerating.

No matter how carefully I craft these statements -- no matter how often I
deny a claim to special gifts of prognostication, no matter now clearly I
reject supernatural explanations or solutions -- many people refuse to take
this analysis seriously. Some people joke about "Mr. Doom and Gloom."
Others suggest that such talk is no different than conspiracy theorists'
ramblings about how international bankers, secret cells of communists, or
crypto-fascists are using the United Nations to create a one-world
government.

Even the most measured and careful talk of the coming dramatic change in
the place of humans on Earth leads to accusations that one is unnecessarily
alarmist, probably paranoid and certainly irrelevant in serious discussions
about social and ecological issues. In the United States, people expect
talk of the future to be upbeat, based on those assumptions of endless
expansion and perpetual progress, or at least maintenance of our "way of
life." Even those who realize the danger of such fanciful thinking are
hesitant to speak too bluntly, out of fear of seeming crazy.

A calm apocalypticism is not crazy, but rather can help us confront
honestly the crises of our time and strategize constructively about
possible responses. We can struggle to understand -- to the best of our
ability, without succumbing to magical thinking -- the state of the
ecosphere and the impediments to sensible action in our societies.

This struggle to understand led me to write a short polemic, We Are All
Apocalyptic Now: On the Responsibilities of Teaching, Preaching, Reporting,
Writing, and Speaking Out (in print at
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/148195847X/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER
and
on Kindle athttp://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BAWQO84). The book's message is
simple: The big systems that structure our world, especially capitalism and
the extractive economy, are incompatible with social justice and ecological
sustainability.****

****

Those who have opportunities to write and speak out have a responsibility
to articulate the radical analysis necessary to understand the problems and
begin to identify solutions.

To think apocalyptically is not to give up on ourselves, but only to give
up on the arrogant stories -- religious and secular -- that we modern
humans have been telling about ourselves. Our hope for a decent future --
indeed, any hope for even the idea of a future -- depends on our ability to
tell stories not of how humans have ruled the world, but how we can live in
the world.

We are all apocalyptic now, whether we like it or not.
---------------
Robert Jensen is a professor in the School of Journalism at the University
of Texas at Austin and board member of the Third Coast Activist Resource
Center in Austin. We Are All Apocalyptic Now: On the Responsibilities of
Teaching, Preaching, Reporting, Writing, and Speaking Out is online in
print at
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/148195847X/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER
and
on Kindle athttp://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BAWQO84.

Jensen is also the author of Arguing for Our Lives: A User’s Guide to
Constructive Dialogue (City Lights, coming in April 2013); All My Bones
Shake: Seeking a Progressive Path to the Prophetic Voice, (Soft Skull
Press, 2009); Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity (South
End Press, 2007); The Heart of Whiteness: Confronting Race, Racism and
White Privilege (City Lights, 2005); Citizens of the Empire: The Struggle
to Claim Our Humanity (City Lights, 2004); and Writing Dissent: Taking
Radical Ideas from the Margins to the Mainstream (Peter Lang, 2002). Jensen
is also co-producer of the documentary film “Abe Osheroff: One Foot in the
Grave, the Other Still Dancing” (Media Education Foundation, 2009), which
chronicles the life and philosophy of the longtime radical activist.****

****

An extended interview Jensen conducted with Osheroff is online at
http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~rjensen/freelance/abeosheroffinterview.htm.
Jensen can be reached at rjensen at austin.utexas.edu and his articles can be
found online athttp://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~rjensen/index.html.****

To join an email list to receive articles by Jensen, go to
http://www.thirdcoastactivist.org/jensenupdates-info.html. Twitter:
@jensenrobertw.--
“Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our
circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of
nature in its beauty."         -- Albert Einstein


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