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Are We Willing to Start Living for Others?
"... walking is much healthier than jumping to conclusions or running off at the mouth"
-- Record-Courier "SoundOff!" comment
During a discussion of sustainability at a recent breakfast caucus of the Healthy Transportation Task Force of the Kent Environmental Council, my friend Larry Cole remarked that technologies for far more efficient internal combustion engines – which could make substantial contributions to the sustainability of world energy supplies – have existed for a long time, but have been ignored or resisted by the auto industry.
Sustainability (never a goal of the auto industry) is an infant concept, first proposed in 1987 as ‘Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.' Its similarity to the "seventh generation" philosophy of the Iroquois has been noted: chiefs must always consider the effects of their actions down through seven future generations.
In US capitalism, sustainability is often parsed as a "triple bottom line" – increasing profits, improving the planet and improving the lives of people. Some critics question whether increasing profits is compatible with improving the planet or people's lives.
But there is general agreement that sustainability is about planning our actions today to ensure a liveable world for future generations. The city of Kent has a Sustainability Commission and a Sustainability Plan; Kent State University has a Sustainability Task Force. The USEPA has a Sustainability Program.
But how do we do sustainability? How do we address our human destiny – either for local communities or for the 6.7 billion people on our frail little planet? Although we have incredibly advanced technologies, our economic, political and social systems are proving totally inadequate for governing ourselves or managing our powers in sustainable ways.
Sustainability is founded on altruism – caring for others. Auguste Comte (1798 -1857) coined the word, proposing that we should ‘live for others' – vivre pour autrui – instead of living for God, or money, or self-gratification.
Living for others can be based on religion (Christianity "love your neighbor", Islam "give alms"), humanism (Do unto others ...), family loyalty ("He's my brother), as a freestanding moral virtue (It's the right thing to do) or the evolutionary imperative (alone we die).
And sustainability – the altruism of caring for all others down to through many generations – is for all practical purposes socialism: how we as societies or as a species manage our commons – the resources, risks, and challenges we share in common with others.
Over the past decade I have been alarmed by an increase in what I will call "missionary conclusions" jumped to by many so groups religious, commercial, technical, military, Left, Right, and Extraterrestrial. These conclusions – unsustainable and un-altruistic – go something like this: "We know the truth, (the whole truth and nothing but the truth) and know what to do to create the right future for everyone. Others who do not accept our truth or support our programs may – indeed should – be forced into compliance – for their own good as well as that of future generations – with whatever coercion or violence it takes."
We hear this conclusion in proposals for escalation of the war in Afghanistan: the only right way forward is to punish the terrorists of Al Qaeda and/or Taliban with a bigger and better war with more soldiers, bombs and drones.
We see this in the conclusion that the best we can do to control a nation we suspect is building a nuclear bomb is deterrence by threat of obliteration by our nuclear bombs. (Dale Butland: "Living with a nuclear Iran", ABJ, 10/14/09 http://www.ohio.com/editorial/
We hear this conclusion from those who fear that illegal immigrants or the undeserving poor might cost us money, or that giving everyone health care might raise our taxes. Sustainability through altruism is also healthier than jumping to conclusions in another sense: caring for others, mutual help and interdependence have repeatedly proved to be more effective and durable in human societies than force and selfishness. Our human fitness to survive to seven generations (or even to the next generation) may be impaired if we keep jumping to short-term, local and self-centered conclusions. Who should decide what sustainability goals get priority? Scientists, technologists and statisticians? Congress? the US President, the Pope, the UN, Generals at the Pentagon, the Free Market, guided by Wall Street CEOs? 2 billion Christians? 1.6 billion Muslims? So far we haven't even agreed what realities we are dealing with (e.g:. global warming, energy consumption, wars, 6.7 billion people, pandemics, genocide, GM foods, etc.) How will we ever agree on a reality we want for future generations? Instead of jumping to short-term conclusions about how the world should be, and running off at the mouth about our own incorruptible truths and others' scurrilous lies, we need to walk with others in the real world and talk about what we see – altruistically, sustainably – calling on our basic human kindness, sense of justice and ideals of freedom to help one another. It won't be easy. There is a strong current of YOYO (You're On Your Own) running though our society. Our democratic practice of political accountability has been overwritten by a culture of consumerism and the buying of political compliance. Our economy is largely controlled by myths about free-markets and the individual's freedom to make money and not pay taxes. Many people believe that God commands certain outcomes, and that they must force God's will on everyone. Do we want sustainability? Are we willing to live for others? Walk. And tune in around AD 2250.
27 Comments so far
Show AllIndeed, howsabout some real conservative conservation?
If we are not alone, which of course we are not, and if we are living in unity, then to give is to receive.
Doing things for yourself is a necessity. Doing things for others is a luxury.
Doing things for others is a kindness. If you want to be happy don't let them know who did it.
"Who should decide what sustainability goals get priority?"
The people that must pay for and live with the consequences of those decisions, no one else.
Like it or not only rich nations can afford to talk about sustainability, conservation and the enviornment.
"Who should decide what sustainability goals get priority?"
Well, right now it's Geithner and Bernake. The idea that accountability exists on planet earth must be amusing to the financial elite who have successfully trashed the planet (all except for their gated communities and the "national" parks).
Job had it right. The crooks hardly ever get caught.
"Like it or not only rich nations can afford to talk about sustainability, conservation and the enviornment."
Basically, non-industrialized societies already practice sustainability out of necessity, yet are also plagued by corrupt elites, who carefully construct scarcity in the midst of plenty to keep the people down, in chains, enslaved. So you might suggest that those people hang onto their sustainable ways, which isn't easy because they know others "live better". And you might suggest they focus on purging their corrupt elites, to achieve abundance once again, as they deserve. You might demand that rich governments support this agenda. This I consider a huge responsibility of the industrial nations. The result would be people living in these non-industrial nations, relatively free from oppression, living sustainably, and with their cultures/traditions intact, with economic status right above the poverty level, where research has indicated that happiness peaks.
The industrialized ones have it much harder. They live beyond where happiness peaks, in the "post-happiness" dead zone. They have petro-opiate addictions which they have to punt along with even more corrupt elites, that "gotta rule the world". It's next to impossible for petro-addicts to push their governments to help themselves, much less help people in non-industrial countries. So we see China and India and other countries lurching into industrialization so we can have a much bigger petro-orgy, with four billion participants instead of one. Spectacular! None of us can help ourselves!
That would seem reasonable, but the poorer nations actually are talking about it, and some are leading what little action has actually taken place.
Great article but I still see one problem here. We can't live for others if we don't take care of ourselves and build up the proper care to help others out. It's like prescribing a medicine that you don't know if it works or not. Even Jerry Springer was right when he said "Until next time, take care of yourself and each other."
Yesterday, I had an interesting discussion under the article by David Michael Green "Big Bad Government Is Coming to Get You" on taking care of oneself vs taking care of others. rtdrury brought up an excellent point about finding a way to strike a balance between taking care of oneself and others. Perhaps it's possible that there is a lack of enough motivation for enough people to take those daring risks to push for the changes we desperately need. In one way or another, most of us are guilty of it and have our weaknesses that must be corrected.
We must also ask ourselves how far we can go in being altruistic before we find our efforts being wasted with no gratitude to show for it. We can preach sustainability to others but if we continue to ignore the policies that reward guzzlers while punishing conservationists, our efforts are wasted and we all suffer.
Good comment Jennifer! The United States and every other "developed" nation has declared by its actions that "our way of life is non-negotiable" which is as much as saying that the biosphere on which all of life on this planet depends for its continued existence can go to hell.
Once upon a time our ancestors acted like they believed that the oceans of the world were like a limitless toilet into which they could dump all their waste with no future consequences. They were abysmally ignorant--we have no such excuse.
The Amazon and Indonesian rain forests which mankind is destroying by everything from petroleum exploration to lumber harvesting and cattle grazing (so we can eat more and cheaper Big Macs and Whoppers?) is a major force in regulating planet temperatures and protecting rare and valuable species of plant and animal life.
The krill and plankton which is being decimated by ocean pollution produces the oxygen needed to sustain all life. The Appalacian range which big and dirty coal is determined to level serves as a water purification system for the Ohio and Mississippi watersheds with implications for all of the mid-section and the east coast of the United States.
For what is this devastatiuon being carried out? Greater quarterly profits, stock holder dividends, or feeding the military-industrial complex's insatiable appetite to devour resources so they can kill more people and destroy more things?
The only thing wrong with this earth is the humanity it contains. As I mentioned in another thread recently, somewhere between the stone-age hunter-gatherer and extinction there has to be a better more balanced way of life.
Poet
Poet, excellent comment !
When I read your post, I was reminded of what it means to be truly happy. Our ancestors did indeed make some of the worst mistakes when they could have stopped and thought "Are we really happy doing this or are we just craving for that temporary satisfaction and allowing ourselves to crave for more without the limits?" Nowadays, we and our younger ones are finding it difficult to escape the reality. Putting profits before quality production and companies slitting their own wrists by putting stockholders before employees even when it was the employees and not the stockholders that kept the company afloat is often a sign of desperation. What you said and what I learned in finance back when I was in college reminds me of the thought that a slow but steady growth based on both caring for ourselves and each other would give us all long term happiness rather than that insecure feeling of fear of unhappiness that leads to long term unhappiness. There are a lot of great ideas out there to reverse the damage such as cutting down on Big Agri subsidization and bringing back small farms to get back to producing healthier foods, going local more often, getting rid of the war on drugs and legalizing hemp for industrial use, striving for better fuel efficiency, and expanding public transportation. The obstacle appears to be politics in the way.
Jennifer sez:
"The obstacle appears to be politics in the way."
****************
My own estimatuion is that the problem is primarily immortal corporations whose only mandate is to make profit and who have the constitutional rights of personhood to pursue such without the either the liability or the vulnerability of real people like yourself and me. This corporate personhood is what is behind environmental, political, educational, religious, cultural, and academic degradation.
Poet
Eliminating corporate personhood has been an interesting idea to research. Doing that in theory has its pros and cons. The pros we all know are that corporations would stop getting treated like "special" people with lopsided tax breaks and loopholes. The only con I see is that people shilling for bad corporations would say "See, they're no longer having personhood so we can treat them differently and no longer do they have to pay the same rates as people having that much." I would still choose to eliminate the corporate personhood so that we can rein in top management that turns corporations into financial monsters.
P.S.: I was surprised to once learn that even Robert Bork, despite his anti-abortion crap, was supportive of eliminating corporate personhood.
Long ago a diabolical ruler forced his prisoners into two caves, in each cave was a large pot of soup in the center. The prisoners were only allowed the use of spoons that were two feet long. Unfortunately the spoons were too long for the prisoners to reach their mouths and feed themselves. The ruler delighted in the thought of his prisoners slowly starving as they stared at the soup, and sure enough one group did in fact starve.
But the other group thrived. That angered the ruler. He asked, "How is it that the others starved and you are healthy? How could you feed yourselves?"
"We learned to feed each other" was the reply.
A perfect parable for libertarianism! Hear, hear!
Bumper sticker: "KAPITALISM KILLS KIDS!"
Democratic Socialism is the only way out of this nightmare; at least it would be a start if it gained in popularity after a TRUE UNDERSTANDING of what it stands for was reached by the working class: EQUALITY! (What a concept!) No more CEO's making $2K per MINUTE while most workers have to have 2 - 3 jobs to make that in a MONTH!
http://www.dsausa.org/pdf/widemsoc.pdf
Studies show that the rate of change is accelerating rapidly. Information and communications is fast changing the world. Young people are not normally afraid to experiment and seek the truth wherever it lies. Older Internet illiterates are fossilizing. If we can preserve net neutrality, it is going to take less time for positive change to occur. We will know when we get there when liberal and progressive government substitutes conservative government. The conservative money-power has set formidable obstacles to democracy, but these are steadily falling.
Caroline Arnold says many thoughtful things. So do many people. The point is we are now in an out-of-control insanity that by the day gets more and more irrational and insane.
We need to do something ... together ... and something simple.
+++++++++
[Comment repost from today's "Peace is With Enemies" headline article about the truth-telling labels created and promoted by Gush Shalom.]
And the Rebbe [Rabbi] said, as recorded in the Talmud:
"DO NOT TREAT PEOPLE THE WAY YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE TREATED, ... AND ALL THE REST IS COMMENTARY."
For the Western world, the saying is [and it is not in scripture as generally believed]:
"TREAT PEOPLE THE WAY YOU WANT TO BE TREATED."
[Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.]
If we all committed to and personally used these two variations of the same moral ethic as our own daily measure, and assessed leaders and policies as following or not following these Golden Rules, which every tribe, culture, nation purportedly ascribes to in similar form throughout every area of the earth, we would not long tolerate the barbarities and greed that we support by our silence. Our own behavior, thinking, and responses would change and likely that would have an effect on the responses of others.
Practiced consistently, eventually we would be a lot closer to fairness, justice, compassion, understanding, kindness, generosity ... and peace based on a simple, but morally profound standard, which is considered one of the few Universal Ethics, is very familiar, is frequently quoted and referred to, but then regularly and egregiously violated.
Thank you and may many blessings be yours, Gush Shalom, for constantly demonstrating that you believe, follow and act on this [dual] Universal Moral Principle/Ethic.
/cm
P.S. ... and because after several years of envisioning and honing to find the simplest action and the most well-known piece of Common Ground that all of us accept, from early learnings, as part of our belief systems, and on which we can globally and personally act every day ... if anyone is interested in helping to launch and implement a global movement called:
THE PEOPLE'S PLANETARY ALLIANCE FOR CO-CREATING THE ERA OF THE GOLDEN RULE, please contact me to find out more about a very simple, global plan ... for starts:
miracleyes1sd@aol.com.
... and why not?
Carol Littlebrant
James Kenneth Galbraith sums it up pretty well:
"The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness."
The first rule of loving others is to love ourselves. It is only by inner transformation that we become able to care for others. Once we begin to open our hearts, it becomes natural to want to share good things with those around us, and we begin to express ourselves by serving the common good. This passion to serve, lives in every heart, but in most, it is under lock and key. Have you ever noticed that in disasters, people forget about their selfishness and all work together to survive? Severe shock wakes us up to our humanity, but sadly, most of us go back to sleep when the shock is over.
Who should decide what sustainability goals get priority?
In a just world, this would be a simple accounting question. In our world, it is moot. The people with the power to modify policies to reward altruistic behavior consistently CONTINUE to reward selfishness instead. I have always lived unselfishly and have been robbed, ridiculed, rejected and ostracized from positions of influence at work and family. Being rather stubborn, I maintained that behaving unselfishly is the only way to go, even if many see you as a mark. Whether most people do it or not is not relevant to me. It's really quite simple. If most people continue to be selfish, we are toast.
Thank you Alexander, Ceasar, Napolean, Genghis, Hitler, Teddy Roosevelt, Wilson, Hoover, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nixon, Carter, Bush (both of them), Clinton and Obama for saddling us with Paulson, Summers, Greenspan, GEITHNER and the like. The rest is pissing in the wind.
I am sick and tired of hearing crap about what we need to do to change all this around. We know THIS change HAS to come from the top. They can't pass the buck on the end of humanity and civilization to the average, unempowered person. It is squarely on the shoulders of the big greedsters.
Now tell me about when you think they'll change their ways.
Not in this lifetime.
But the auto industries which have ignored the importance of sustainability would have paid the price and now be history if it wasn't for the government. The free market and people wanting change and voting with their purchases would have destroyed the companies in Detroit for their neglecting the importance of sustainability. It is the government that bailed them out.
I would agree with much of this article except for the implication that supporting increased federal government power is the same as living an altruistic life. That's really quite a stretch especially considering that for all the nice government programs there is an equal amount of incredibly destructive and murderous programs. I wouldn't consider bombing people to be altruism and I wouldn't consider not supporting who is responsible for it, even if they claim to be changing their ways, as a form of selfishness. I would not support national health care, believe it or not, because of concern for other people, friends and family as much as for myself. It's possible to disagree with this perspective but someone can't equate supporting government programs with altruism like this author because that shows the same close-minded attitude about other political perspectives that is described in this article.
But, whatever, I just watched a video this week of Penn and Teller's show which basically tried to say people were selfish for opposing GM foods because they will help starving people. Of course the fact that the companies are some of the most dependent on the government for subsidies and regulatory capture, and that terminator seeds are clearly not in the interest of helping poor farmers, and the experience in India of the government monopoly and the GM seed industry, would all be more than enough for anyone like Penn who considers himself "libertarian" to be strongly opposed to GM foods, was not enough to stop him from pointing the finger at people who don't have the same political perspective as him for being "selfish."
So I guess everyone, whether a corporate shill like Penn, or a big gov pusher like the author, loves to point the finger at others for their selfishness regardless of the obvious contradictions and hypocrisy in their self-righteousness.
What is it about nations?
Where I live people are with the rarest exception at least cordial with each other. I drive the rural roads and pull over a lot and stop to check out things. Countless times, other drivers pull up alongside and ask, "need any help?" Being the cantankerous independent individualist SOB that I am, for the most part I never do need help, but I sure make a point of thanking them for asking.
A few years ago I was out in the middle of nearly nowhere when my motorcycle ran out of gas (boy was I stupid!). A farmer down the road had a can of gas I paid him generously for. Turned out the same thing had happened to him years earlier. He could have cared less that I paid him; he just wanted to help. I believe that most people are like that.
Nations, like corporations, lack empathy. Most humans possess it. It is an evolved strategy over hundreds of thousands of years. Eat the state, and kill the corporations. These artificial constructs are killing humanity. "Corporate personhood"? Next thing you know my computer will be granted citizenship and the right to vote.
Meanwhile, to Swami monkeypooh---
Your Socratic parable of the cave(s) is priceless. I knew the solution instantly. Decades ago I met a Rhesus monkey who lived in a large cage his Owner kept him in. In the kitchen of his home. The Owner would place "treats" at the top of the cage that were invisible to the monkey but he would find them nevertheless. Sometimes, the "owner" would put his monkey out in the back yard with his dog. The monkey could hoist himself up on a laundry pole, which the back yard dog could not do. Every once in a while the monkey would drop down from his pole and toy with the dog. The dog was bigger but it always lost the wrestling match.
Love your pets. And protest boredom. A two-foot spoon!
Where I live, semi-feral cats appear out of nowhere wanting me to feed them. I used to raise cats. It gets worse as winter approaches and the nights grow colder. The Mandans in their permanent structures in the Upper Missouri kept a soup pot going nearly eternally. Who cooked the soup in your parable? Who grew the garden? NOT the villain. Heh heh.
-30-
"How will we ever agree on a reality we want for future generations?"
Cut the elites out of the loop for starters.
I would submit that the institutionalization of "planned obsolescence" and both the economic and psychological effects are worth looking at.
Planned obsolescence must adopt a NIMBY blind eye to the fact that its fundamental premise incorporates a high percentage of waste written into the paradigm.
The phrase, though rarely used any more, should perhaps be reintroduced as the modality represetns what would seem to be a substantial link between the belief system, personal and collective reasoning, links with aesthetic values such as 'fashion trends'. The latter, in terms of popular awareness (consumption) cover the advertising on everything from lawn aesthetic vis petrochemical use to cosmetics and the competition itself for the awareness of the public.
I am reminded of the period in which there was media coverage of a 'syndrome' (in caring about others as self) of 'fatigue' among activists attempting to address crisis situations in other parts of the world. Those activists were ans still are struggling to address a situation in which planned obsolescence reveals its basis in denial of voice to any who are not part of the production engine.
When I read comments here through the lens of that consideration, I see traits of planned obsolescence.
Human nature changes measurably only over hundreds of generations. Human nature varies little between individuals: we are all descendants of a handful of families a few thousand years back.
However, human nature is thoroughly spring-loaded to contingency. If you want humans to act differently, just treat them differently.
Human altruism is circumstantial. So it can be arranged.