SAVING THE PLANET

ROBERT HUNZIKER—In time, sea levels will surpass 1-2-3-4-5 feet, and more, but within an unknown time frame. Keep in mind even one-foot of an increase spells worldwide coastal disasters. A Noah’s Ark scenario is not needed to upend coastal cities throughout the planet.

The rule of thumb for sea level rise is: One inch of sea level increase submerges 50-100 inches of beach coastline. So, in plain English, if one-inch equals 4-to-8 feet of submerged beach, in turn, one-foot will submerge 48-to-96 feet of coastline beach. (Source: NASA-Jet propulsion Laboratory). That’s a lot, especially for Miami Beach, where the city has already had to raise streets (Google: “Miami Beach is Raising Streets by 2 Feet to Combat Rising Seas” to see a photo).

CAITLIN JOHNSTONE—One way we can get the population to fall a whole lot faster is by removing all societal expectations from women that they be career girls and mothers at the same time. If we as a society collectively stop subscribing to the ridiculous power-serving notion that it’s possible to be a good mother and obtain all of one’s life ambitions and career goals in the same lifetime, far fewer women will opt for motherhood and will pursue their own interests instead.

Many people on the radical left —including some of its most intelligent voices—are suspicious if not downright hostile to Malthusian and Neo-Malthusian arguments seeking to limit and ideally reduce the human population footprint on the planet. Besides regarding Malthus as a misguided and above all anachronistic upper class philosopher, they advance a series of arguments that rest on  largely irrefutable facts…

In this episode, Chris Hedges focuses on the harsh criticism Michael Moore’s new film Planet of the Humans has received in many quarters, including some with solid ecological qualifications in knowledge and activism. Guest is the film’s director, Jeff Gibbs.  The film is an indictment of a corporate-friendly environmentalist bureaucracy apparently incapable or unwilling of understanding the nature of corporate power. . 

On the show this week, Chris Hedges talks to writer, teacher and activist Victor Wallis about the prospect and need for Ecosocialism. As Vitor Wallis notes, “A disdain for the natural environment has characterized capitalism from the beginning. As Marx noted, capital abuses the soil as much as it exploits the worker.1 The makings of ecological breakdown are thus inherent in capitalism. No serious observer now denies the severity of the environmental crisis, but it is still not widely recognized as a capitalist crisis, that is, as a crisis arising from and perpetuated by the rule of capital, and hence incapable of resolution within the capitalist framework…”