Industrial Civilization is the most powerful and most widespread manifestation of civilized culture there has ever been. So many people across so many formerly distinct cultures and geographical areas are now part of it that it is hard to imagine there being anything else; and, for so many people having known nothing else for their entire lives, it is hard to imagine that anything could improve on it. Surely all we need to do to provide humanity with a liveable, safe and clean future is to improve Industrial Civilization in some way, through better use of technology, fairer voting systems, better labour relations and so on. But, of course, this doesn’t stop civilization being what it is – a means of maximising the power and wealth of a selected few through the continuation of the very systems that have caused so much social and environmental misery throughout the history of this gargantuan edifice; whatever it takes, and whoever and whatever has to be harmed in the process.

A controversial statement, most definitely, but one that I am sure you will at least have sympathy with, if not wholehearted agreement once you read what comes before it in the latest Earth Blog essay.

It’s not often someone comes along and attempts to strike out something we hold so dear in our minds, not to say our very essence, in such a vehement way; but then again, as I make clear, nothing is so destructive, so insidious, so calamatous as that thing we have for so long held to describe all that is good: civilization.

Feel free to disagree, but please don’t ignore it — you at least deserve the chance to get the other side of the argument.

http://earth-blog.bravejournal.com/entry/27929/