Peak Oil, Energy, and other important issues
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Below are the 11 most recent journal entries recorded in the "Peak Oil, Energy, and other important issues" journal:
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03:11 pm
[Link] | Boy, I have not posted here since May! What a summer it has (or hasn't) been for me. But that is neither here nor there. Anyway, for the first time in a long time, I find myself wanting to post a little something. So, here goes nothing...
One thing that I find painfully irritating about the mainstream media's treatment of faltering oil supplies is how they suggest we solve the problem. We are told repeatedly that technology will somehow miraculously save the day and allow us to continue to on with our "happy motoring" freak show, completely uninterrupted. Improved recovery techniques are among those technologies that will supposedly hold us over in the short term.
The idea is that by building a fancy new deep-sea oil rig, or figuring out how to economically utilize Canadian oil shale, for example, we can unleash a plethora of new "unconventional" resources onto the market and extend the lifespan of the cheap oil era. What I find frustrating is how the media introduces these fancy ideas.
Just yesterday I tuned into some AM radio talk show, and heard what I thought had to be a peak oil expert. He mentioned that many of the world's major oil fields are having trouble increasing production, and that developing nations like China were only making problems worse by increasing global demand even more, among other things. He sounded very promising as a mainstream spokesman for peak oil. Then, all of that stopped. "And so the solution to our supply problem is to look to small, independently-run oil fields which are being brought on-line everyday! Also, oil shales in Canada are becoming increasingly economical with rising oil prices, so we should not forget to look to unconventional resources."
D'oh! This happens quite frequently, or at least as frequently as any media source comes close to acknowledging that there will soon be a problem with oil supply meeting demand. Instead of presenting a solution that involves lowering consumption through drastic lifestyle changes, they simply assure the public that there will be just enough of this "unconventional" stuff to string us along until we figure out how to run Hummers on "sailboat fuel", as my father puts it.
In other words, the media very frequently tip-toes the line between acknowledging peak oil and downright denying it by admitting there are problems with current crude oil supplies, and then insisting that a mystical "they" will produce all the right technology to ween us off the black stuff, and replace it with [insert newest alternative energy buzzword here].
But maybe I am just worrying too much? After all, we have done so much with technology before, why shouldn't I believe that we will fail this time? What concerns me is what we will be leaving behind for future generations.
I am of the belief that oil is an anomaly, and no combination of technology will seamlessly bridge the gap between the cheap oil era and the post-cheap oil era. So, I believe that we should be seriously and urgently working on dramatically reshaping our nation into one that lives sustainably. If we do anything else, then we are simply putting the problems off and forcing future generations to deal with them, and that is simply not fair.
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01:02 am
[Link] | I just got back from my "observation day" as a field canvasser for the New Jersey Environmental Federation. Great organization, they said I'm hired, that's nice and all that. But what I really wanted to talk about were some things I noticed while walking through the "turf" as they (we?) call it.
We spent the day going door to door in Short Hills. For anyone who is not familiar with Short Hills, I'll give you a short description: upper-middle class suburbia at it's "finest". My definition of upper-middle class is a little different from some people's, however: I think of upper-class as the uber-rich, and so the upper-middle class to me are simply middle-class people who have just enough money where they can start putting on their upper-class training wheels and seeing if this stuff is really for them. You know the drill: long windy roads, housing plots just a little bigger than average, with houses that are certainly not small enough to be "common", but for the most part not housing any movie stars or big-name athletes. But definitely former New Jersey Governors.
The first thing that I noticed as a canvasser, and thus a pedestrian, was that THIS ENTIRE COMMUNITY HAD NO SIDEWALKS! So I either had to walk on the street the entire time, or walk on people's lawns. Now, I have been brought up to not walk on people's property like that, unless I really have to. I understand putting work and stuff into your lawn, but I am honestly starting to rethink that mentality. What the hell is your lawn there for then? For me to have a nice cushion to fall on to when you run me over in your hybrid SUV?
This brings me to my next issue: isolation. The sidewalk thing really didn't bother me because the street is basically one big sidewalk with the occasional car every 20 minutes or so. Thru-traffic was very minimal, and the reason for this is because there is simply no reason to go through that part of town unless you live there or have some sort of business to do. The few streets that I personally canvassed were literally in the very upper-left corner of our little map, and were so tucked away that geriatrics could perfectly whither away without having any sort of contact with anyone besides their housekeeper. And whither they did. And then there are the people who do not open their doors, and instead stand behind their young children and tell them how to say that their parents aren't available. Cute.
One fantastic example of isolation can be seen in the elaborate backyards that people insist on having for themselves. With gigantic fencing and private jungle gyms, these pieces of landscape are pretty much detrimental to any hope of forming a sense of community in what was supposed to be the quintessential expression of community for upper- and middle-class Americans. Sure, maybe the neighbor kid comes around on Tuesdays and Wednesdays or something, but where is the communal aspect there? The "beauty" of Short Hills is that its residents can just buy themselves out of life! You don't have to see anyone who doesn't live there or fold your laundry, and your kids play within 50 feet of your door so that they don't have to experience anything that might show them a speck of reality.
Similarly, the fact the elderly people can camp out there for the rest of their days is equally awesome. I won't ask the question of what happened to multi-generational family dwellings, and instead I'd just like to consider why we do this to ourselves and others. At one house, a housekeeper answered the door, and invited me in to see the two oldest looking people I've ever seen. "Grandma and Grandpa", as I like to call them, were sitting next to each other in their own separate armchairs, adjacent to a television that I am pretty sure they had been watching every single hour of the last twenty years. I gave him the first three sentences of my spiel, and then he miraculously got out of his chair and escorted me to the door without saying a word! While he shut the door, I heard him say "why did you let him in?" I understand wanting some privacy, but witnessing that scene made me consider why we don't live older generations and keep them around as a source of wisdom and general awesome. This leads me fantastically to my next point.
You know what? Walking around for this job is going to be the best thing that happens to me this whole summer. I think that people seriously overlook how helpful something like that can be. I've been watching the news more and more often so I can keep myself misinformed along with the rest of America, and so I have seen a disproportionate amount of osteoporosis and other "my body is breaking" medications, along with energy drinks and Nutrisystem miracle-diet commercials. In this era of personal automobiles and Popular Science articles about side effect-free stimulants, people pretty much overlook the value of some good old fashioned work and sleep. Of course, I shouldn't be so pessimistic: they can't even overlook it to begin with, because from birth this is all that most of Americans nowadays have known.
It's pretty simple: if you walk around or somehow workout during the day, you move your body and so get exercise. This is good for your body in so many ways, and also, it makes you tired! So, you can then get a nice refreshing, full-night's rest, and do the same thing pretty much every day! But don't tell patriotic consumers that.
One of the best commercials (for a mattress, incidentally) I have seen recently starts out with a bunch of women putting on makeup under their eyes, with a narrator saying something like "people don't need to fake a good night's sleep". I couldn't agree more with that message. But instead, Americans are completely happy to pop a pill and fluff up their exterior appearance while having no clue what is really going on.
Man, I am really killing it with the segues tonight. I want to start talking about this corny Red Tea Snapple commercial that I have been seeing a lot recently, and how it is a pretty good metaphor for people accepting commercial jingles and taglines as facts. However, that would make a dang good post all on its own, so I'll save that for later and go to bed. Night-night, world.
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05:40 pm
[Link] | Gas prices continue to rise to new records every day, and we haven't even hit the summer driving season yet. I'm beginning to think that those analysts who said that global oil production peaked last year may be right.
Whether or not that is correct, the big problem that is causing gas prices to skyrocket is refinery breakdowns. Check out this article on Bloomberg.com. Refineries around the nation are either in terrible condition or straight-up shutting down. Now, the oil and refining industries are not stupid: they know how to keep refineries running and they know how to anticipate the summertime spike in oil demand. Similarly, they know that we are going to be soon facing a peak in global oil production, and thus dwindling supplies. As I said in my last post, they are all about maximizing profits. So, what does that mean they are doing?
Consider this. If people are going to be using less and less oil after peak, why would companies go around spending millions of dollars to upgrade and maintain refineries? That's right: refineries are being allowed to go to crap because companies know that in coming years, they will become useless.
At least, that's what I happen to believe. I am also of the opinion that oil and refining companies are incredibly knowledgeable about peak oil so that they know exactly how to control the market for their benefit. So with the major breakdowns happening right now, I believe that peak may be very imminent - I'm talking within a year or two - if we haven't hit it already. They know that their industry will soon be obsolete and in lower demand, so they are letting their older refineries waste away.
Anyway, that's my opinion. All I know is that I am glad that I am informed, in decent physical shape (for walking and biking), and don't have any big travel plans for this summer. Good luck with your driving, America!
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01:26 pm
[Link] | The following post is not meant to endorse some sort of conspiracy theory or grand scheme to pull the wool over the publics' eyes, although that possibility should not immediately be ruled out. Rather, it is simply a reflection of some my own views and thoughts, and I think that this provides a useful perspective on many events we see in the world today.
In today's captitalist, consumer-driven American society, it is important to take the time to investigate the many functions of the corporations that help us through our lives. Arguably, the most important mission of a corporation is to find ways to maximize profits in whatever ways they can. They are not, for the most part, running around doing whatever they want with no consideration for the laws and good of the people (yes, I realize how optimistic that statement is), so they have to get creative with what they do.
This sense of creativity can include things such as advertising with persuasive language, maximizing the visibility of their product, requiring you to use their product, making competing products look bad in comparison, getting celebrity endorsements, and selectively using statistics that make their product look good. These are only a few out of many tactics that companies can use to sell their product and thereby increase profits. With respect to peak oil, it is useful to consider some of these tactics more critically.
If tomorrow, the majority of the nation woke up with an extensive knowledge of peak oil, then I suppose that oil consumption would drop dramatically and people would find ways to change their lives so as to use less and less oil. This can be viewed very simply using supply-and-demand economic theories. If people realized that oil supplies were not infinite and in fact might soon not be able to meet their demand, people would seek to permanently lower their demand so that they would be able to cope with dwindling supplies. To rephrase: if people were knowledgeable about peak oil, more people would use less oil.
This means, less people buying oil, and in turn, less money for oil companies. So how might an oil company solve this problem of lowered demand? One solution is to advertise that supplies are in fact not going to decrease, or at least not for a very long time, and that people can in fact continue to consume increasing amounts of oil with no problems or consequences. Again, to succintly rephrase that: if oil companies advertise huge oil supplies, then the public will continue to consume.
This raises the question of who is using the correct information regarding oil supplies. In my opinion, the articles that I have read that predict peak oil production to occur in the near future seem to be much more trustworthy. They frequently cite a plethora of varied sources, and in doing so, they appear to be much more open in their research. They allow for anyone who cares to check on their work, come to their own conclusions, and sometimes directly criticize and refute their reports with a comment feature that some websites include. On the other hand, many oil companies either make blanket statements that they fail back up, or cite studies that they have done themselves or have funded in some way. Again, this is just my opinion, and I encourage everyone who reads this to read a variety of articles from different sources and come to their own conclusions.
Another tactic that companies can use to maximize their profits is to require you to use their product. Electronic companies do this by making proprietary adapters and then requiring third-party manufacturers to license their design in order to produce cables, for example. Products like the "Swiffer" series of dusters and mops require that you purchase their own disposable, replaceable parts that carry out the cleaning task. Car companies use special parts that can only be purchased directly from the manufacturer. So in a similar fashion, if oil companies can require that you use their product as opposed to other products, then they can maximize their profits.
So how might one be required to use oil? To answer this, all you need to look at is the suburban environment that the majority of Americans live in today. Think about everywhere you go, and how you get there. The other day I was in Buffalo seeing my friends' band play, and after the show we decided to get some food. I asked if they knew of any place nearby, and they responded by saying the easiest way to get to any food was by driving. This wasn't because they were far away: I ended up going to a place that was less than a mile away. The reason was that the streets that were between me and my destination were so congested with automobile traffic that to roam them as a pedestrian would be almost suicidal. Similarly, much of our food travels hundreds of miles before it gets to our tables, and the average American with a car drives some 12,000 miles a year, much of that simply commuting to work day in and day out. Without getting into the specific politics, oil and other companies were able to successfully lobby the government in the years after WWII to make the car-dependent suburb our national housing policy, and this has resulted in an extremely profitable situation for oil companies.
In fact, according to energytomorrow.org, 97% of our transportation is fueled by some sort of oil.
Finally, with regard to our suburban living arrangement, oil and other companies have succeeded in downplaying the advantages of any alternatives. When the national housing debate was at its pinnacle, there existed people who advocated living arrangements other than suburbs. This included multi-family public housing with strong community and pedestrian-accessible elements. Outspoken critics of these alternatives, such as the infamous Joe McCarthy, denounced these alternatives as communist, and insisted that any man who lived in a suburban home had no time to be a communist because there was so much to do. Companies have also succeeded in stigmatizing mass transportation and walkable, densely populated cities in many peoples' eyes.
Also, there are conveniently stigmatized labels for anyone who might try to live their life without oil and with as much regard for the environment as possible. These labels include "hippie" and "bleeding heart liberal". This makes it convenient for people to write-off anyone who might show interest in the facts behind oil and its pervasiveness, and allow most people to continue their dangerous habits with a sense of superiority.
To conclude, it is very important to consider the motivations of any corporation when they try to "inform" you. Much of what they do revolves around increasing profits, and so they will try to do whatever they can to get you to use their products. If that means telling people they have more oil than they really do, they might do it. If that requires making people dependent on oil, then they might do it. If that requires stigmatizing and downplaying alternatives to using oil, then they might do it. So please, always listen with a critical ear, and remember what Socrates said:
"The unexamined life is not worth living."
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11:59 pm
[Link] | I present you with a quotation from a transitionculture.org interview with Richard Heinberg, who is described as being "one of the world's foremost Peak oil educators". That being said, I was startled to see just how accurately his answer described my situation.
"Do you see that the [peak oil] movement’s perspective or focus has moved away from purely focusing on graphs and depletion curves to looking beyond that?
Yes, and that’s a natural evolution. I think anyone who first becomes acquainted with the idea of peak oil first probably has to go through some psychological adjustments (laughs)! Probably the typical stages of grief, denial, anger and all that and very often an obsession with the facts themselves and trying to become knowledgeable about those facts, internalise the information and then verify the information so they can be sure of this. After all, they are probably in the process of reorienting their lives and their priorities and they may be trying to convince their friends and family about this and they need to have better information and get all the facts straight so they can do that.
Typically the learning curve is very steep in the first few months of peak oil awareness. Once that information is verified and internalised, the next stage is “what are we going to do about it�?? Now we have enough people who have gone through that process of learning and begun to think about what we can and should do about it that there are lots of opportunities and answers and strategies being pioneered and thought through."
The italics represent my own personal emphasis.
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03:37 pm
[Link] | I just finished watching the 80's documentary Anarchism in America, and it really got me thinking seriously about anarchism. Many people use anarchy as a synonym for chaos or confusion, and this usage is simply ignorant. Anarchy is an ideology and philosophy that at its core is about human beings being fully responsible for themselves. It insists that humans can control their own lives without a specialized ruling class or any other hierarchical structures. Instead, anarchism advocates decentralized, cooperative communities in which all members are equally involved in decision making, and producing and maintaining infrastructure, for example.
Unfortunately, the American public has adapted over the years to being reliant on centralized government officials to make decisions for them and carry out projects; this in turn has made people wary of anything that threatens to take away their government. It takes an open mind, patience, persistence, responsibility, and respect for others to achieve an ideal anarchist society, and these qualities are severely lacking in most Americans.
Last night, I also watched the documentary "The Future of Food", which can be found on YouTube easily enough, split up into about seven parts. It does a fantastic job of investigating the current status of agriculture in America and around the world, specifically in the area of genetically modified, or GM, crops. Some of these crops are dangerous to our health, and the business practices that come with this territory are sketchy, to say the least. So check out this documentary and get questioning.
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02:27 am
[Link] |
Problems with ethanol
This is sort of an update to the previous post I made about ethanol production. In that post I completely forgot to mention the dangers that are associated with ethanol. Even if those figures were ever reached and were able to marginally offset our dependence on foreign oil, the very fact that so much corn and other crops were being grown would be just as or more problematic as the oil we are trying to wean off of.
Ethanol production threatens to drive food prices up, destroy fertile land, and waste water that humans could be using much more responsibly. I found this MSNBC article to be particularly interesting. It begins to talk about how potentially harmful biofuels could be to our environment and food supply. After reading that, you may want to check out this article, which goes into much more detail on the environmental risks and does a wonderful job of citing all of its references.
Until I post again...
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10:05 pm
[Link] | Here are some good examples of the news media completely failing to relay the full picture to the public:
I happened upon this article from a link on theoildrum.com, and some of what the article said in the last few paragraphs left me extremely angry. So, I used the "comments" box at the end of the article to send the following message:
I enjoyed reading the article "Why a one-day gas 'boycott' won't work", however, I have some issues with the last few paragraphs. First of all, I am appalled by the disgusting promotion of consumerism when you say to make May 15th "Shop for a higher mileage car day". Do people in this country really need more reminders to consume? You then continue to say that the best way to cut consumption is to get a more efficient car. If you cannot see how that is lying, then I cannot understand how you or anyone else respects you as a journalist. The best way to cut fuel consumption is to not use any fuel at all. You should tell people to walk, ride a bike, or use mass transit instead of telling them that they should continue to use their fuel-wasting personal automobiles. I hope that someone is able to read my comments and able to write a more responsible and correct article.
I received the following reply a few hours later:
Well, you're right. I suppose we should have included a line about giving up cars altogether. But this can't happen all at once: for some people, doing without a car is a hardship.
Like all solutions to complex problems, there is no one single fix. Getting people into higher mileage cars seems like a good first step.
Thanks for your note.
Rgds
jws
How could they simply gloss over such a simple-yet-understated point? The conclusion that "the best way to [reduce per capita gasoline consumption] is to improve the efficiency of cars on U.S. roads" is so fundamentally illogical that I am surprised the computers at MSNBC didn't explode as soon as this article was posted online! I also like that he pointed out that, "for some people, doing without a car is a hardship." Holy shit! That's the freakin' point! People are going to have to learn to live without cars, whether they want to or not. Why not challenge your readers a bit and have them consider reality?
Anyway, my next target is yet again MSNBC, although I am sure that similar articles can be found on any major news-conglomerate website. The article, Answer Desk's DIY oil price forecast, seeks to answer the question, "Where will the price of oil stop?" It does so in the most insane fashion possible: they comment that while theoretically prices could increase ad infinitum, the magical market will always ensure that when prices get too high, the supply will be raised by simply increasing production in order to drive prices down. The article fails to mention that one day it will be impossible to increase production, no matter how much money we throw at the capitalist's altar. After that, the article actually proves somewhat useful by listing a few factors that affect oil prices, although it certainly is not comprehensive.
These are examples of wildly irresponsible journalism that totally skip over making crucial points, at the expense of the publics' future. So remember to always be critical of the information you are given, especially that which comes to you in easy-to-digest news clips and sound bites!
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04:55 pm
[Link] | "Ethanol production energy in the US is expected to grow from 5 billion gallons per year in 2006 (325,000 barrels a day) to 10 billion at the end of 2008. A bill has been presented to Congress to produce 25 billion barrels of ethanol in the US in 2012. The US Corn Growers Association has set a goal for the production of 15 billion barrels of ethanol in 2015. The US produces about 6.8 million barrels of crude oil a day, and consumes more than 21 million." This was taken from an article on Dar Al-Hayat, a newspaper out of Beirut, Lebanon. The numbers are right there, and I am sure that most people will glaze over them without even realizing what they mean. If corn growers reach their goal or 15 billion barrels a day, they will be making around 5% (as I so roughly calculated in my head) of our current crude oil consumption. And of course Americans won't be happy using the same old paltry amounts of oil: they will want to use more and more! So by 2015 that won't even be approximately 5%, it will be less. See the problem? Don't say I didn't warn you.
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04:05 pm
[Link] | I just thought that I'd post a few links to some government reports on peak oil for anyone who sees this to read.
Update (5/15/07): So I realized today when I called Congressman Bill Pascrell Jr.'s office that I misread one crucial word in the following Wikipedia article. The resolution that I refer to was simply filed, or introduced, not passed. It currently has 9 co-sponsors in the House (the 110th Congress), so I urge everyone to contact there representative and urge him or her to support this resolution.
This first one is a resolution that was passed in the House of Representatives in 2005. It basically is a summary of the findings of a peak oil "caucus", or committee or task force, composed of Representatives that people elected to represent their best interests. What I find so disturbing about this is not the sense of urgency that is conveyed, but that these findings were not made massively public on news stations all around the United States. If the findings had been something like "terrorists know how to use the subways" or "elian gonzalez still exists" then we would have heard about it day in and day out for weeks, I imagine. Instead, this monumental bill simply gets pushed to the side as though it were completely worthless. Disgusting.
Also, here is a link (in PDF format) to what is usually referred as the Hirsch Report. Robert Hirsch is listed as the primary author, and so it is commonly attributed to him. Anyway, it was commissioned by the US Department of Energy, and the main conclusion is that the US needs at least a decade of deliberate efforts in order to mitigate the economic and social consequences that peak oil will have. Yet another example of our elected officials failing to tell us what is going on.
So it is with examples like these that I urge people to be extremely critical of our government and what the government tells them. I may sound like some paranoid fool or senseless teenage rebel, but over the years we have been lied to, and will be lied to again in the future. It is not un-American to question the government: it is at the very heart of this country that the people be allowed to express dissent, and have checks-and-balances in place to keep elected officials in line. The media hardly gives us the full story, so it is up to you to do your own fact-finding and questioning in order to truly be a responsible member of this "democracy" we have. Otherwise, you are just a fool being shepherded around by the bigger fools that you elected.
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01:15 pm
[Link] | originally posted on 4/23/07
I am extremely upset: I was born almost twenty years ago into a world that has made all the wrong choices, and my generation is going to have to deal with it. The thing that really gets me is that it is hard for me to take a step or live for a few minutes without thinking about how some part of my life is fucked because I've been forced to live like this.
For example: In almost two weeks, I will be driving back home to New Jersey after a semester of college, and once there, I will most certainly need to get a job. In fact, this situation is certainly not unique to me: millions of college students around the United States will be doing the very same thing. This fact will actually please most college students, but for me, these things represent three things out of many others that infuriate me.
First: The fact that I am in college. This era of hyper-specialization, 9-5 slavery, suicide-inducing levels of stress, exorbitant amounts of debt, war veterans chasing down promises, and useless education are fueled by the modern college. The fact is, so many people feel that their survival depends on being accepted to a good college so that they can get a degree and thus enter the workforce at a higher level then their less-educated peers. It turns out, however, that you cannot eat a diploma, even if you try spreading it over some "legal tender" toast, and this is one reason why college confuses me. This is not to say that college is completely and utterly worthless: there are many benefits that college brings, and higher education should not be abandoned completely. However, many people should realize exactly what they are getting with their college education, what they plan on doing with it, and whether or not what they plan on doing actually makes any sense a few years down the road.
And how about the professors? I am going for a certification in Adolescent Education, and so far, I have not heard a single education professor say that we need to focus on giving students realistic views on our world energy crisis. I would venture to say that this is because of their utter ignorance, making them completely unqualified to be preparing the teachers of tomorrow.
Second: Driving is destructive, and yet I find myself forced to do it. It seems that I have a choice to make: adopt a responsible lifestyle of extremely minimal car usage, or continue to be a moron. As much as I hate to reduce things to being dichotomous, these really are the only two choices that can be made. The only reasons that one would continue to drive their car around are that they are aware of the facts and ignore them, or they are just totally unaware. The trouble is that the majority of Americans, including myself, live in suburbs that exist solely because of the convenience of the personal automobile. This sends me into a whirlwind of anger, because I have reviewed literature, thought over things carefully, educated myself, and come to a conclusion that I feel to be worthwhile, and I am nearly powerless to act on it. Meanwhile, the rest of America is completely happy to watch news about Anna Nicole Smith's baby for hours on end in between trips to the mall and hour-long commutes to work.
Third: I find myself obligated to find employment for this summer. I will again concede that I am not against the concept of putting in a good day's work in order to sustain myself. After all, money doesn't grow on trees, right? Just now, I discovered the irony of that saying! Of course money doesn't grow on trees: it grows in the banks of the Fed and then gets used to enslave us. But do you know what does grow on trees? FOOD! It's funny how this revelation keeps coming up: not a single person on this earth needs a single cent, yen, peso, ruble, pound, euro, or any other piece of money, but they do need food. Not to say that there can't be a decent and just economy that uses money, but I think that people really need to get their priorities straight and consider alternatives as well.
And how about the whole system of capitalism and consumerism that we pray to with our paychecks? Can anything positive be said for our "service" or "post-industrial" economy that profits on the blood of third-world countries? I challenge anyone who is reading this to try, for one week, to only by products that are made in America. How about all of the ugly societal problems that are brought on by designer clothes, MTV, Las Vegas, cable news, the housing industry, fad diets, and unattainable ideals that are projected everywhere? Buy, buy, buy has somehow become a remedy for all of our problems, and yet it is what has caused most, if not all, of them. Money can't buy me love, can't buy me happiness, and it sure as fucking hell can't buy me.
Before I got on the money-tangent, I was complaining about my need for employment. There is a decision that I must make: do I seek employment that might be more entertaining but require commuting by car, or do I limit myself to only places that I can walk or drive? If I am going to have any self-respect at all, I will surely have to limit myself to places in my community. But what about the shoe store that my friend will be working at, where we made tons of money last summer? Well, that place is a good 25-30 miles round-trip, so I should probably go so far as to convince my friend to quit! Or is that too far? As you can see by all of these questions, it is tough for me to ever come to a decision quickly, and often the decisions I make could be looked down upon or wildly misunderstood by almost everyone else. My mother asked, "so you are going to work at Border's Books and Music at the mall this summer, right?" And I responded that I probably would not, because driving my car would be an irresponsible use of oil. She could not even fathom my response, even though I have told her many times about peak oil and its implications. Of course, I could use public transportation, but the nearest bus station for the mall is a good 20 minute walk from my house, and then I would probably be on the bus for almost an hour before I reached the mall. So, a round trip commute of almost 2 and a half hours? Sounds like a gigantic waste of time to me.
As you can see, even the smallest consideration brings about a deluge of questions and concerns. The whole "Matrix" metaphor is beginning to make more and more sense to me. I almost wish that I had a blue pill to take so that I could just forget all of this and revel in the type of bliss that only comes from ignorance. Please don't think that I am some delusional kid on some sort of Neo-boner, either. There are just a lot of people out there who could all do a little bit of thinking and learning, and the people who are making decisions for them are making sure that they keep us dumb. After all, you can't make very much money if people start practicing realistic consumption.
I am fed up with having to deal with the consequences of the mistakes made by the boomer generation and those before them. If only we could bring all the youth and meaningful people to Mars and start over, and leave the soon-to-be-retirees to wallow and rot in this hell-hole they have created. Do you feel the contempt that I have for those who are encroaching on my life because they failed to make informed decisions? This is where the concept of "respect" comes in: if we are to be truly respectful of every human being, then we would be doing everything in our capacity to preserve the earth as much as possible for the generation that is being born today. But this is not happening, and thus people today are giving the biggest possible "FUCK YOU" to the next generation.
So, in conclusion, stop being fucking stupid and change. It will make things easier for all of us.
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rayhinton's journal