In the past few days, I’ve read and watched a few things that have really effected/re-enforced my thinking. I started re-reading Pablo Neruda. He was a Marxist poet from Chile who abhorred fascism and fought in Spain against Franco. He died in 1973 a few days after the death of Allende and the rise of Pinochet in Chile. He was ill but essentially gave up on life when he heard of the coup.
Not all of his poetry is protest, but a series in Canto General (1950) talks about the US government. The US history of supporting fascism against communist or vaguely socialist governments in South America is well documented. I always assumed that it was the rabid fear of communism that motivated these policies but, as the Cuban nationalisation of sugar plantations proved, the fear was as much economic. The US has systematically raped South America of resources and supported fascist dictatorships to ensure that this was possible.
Then the other night I watched a program about infighting between the FBI and the CIA and how neither organisation was able to foresee September 11. Apparently, there had been warnings. Direct warnings. The Germans (specifically Gerhard Schroeder) had told the US government that terrorists were going to hijack commercial planes and use them as weapons. But the most interesting aspect was the connection between the Bush family and the Saudi Kingdom. US policy has been to ignore the Saudi stance on terrorism and human rights. The CIA was instructed not to spy on Saudi Arabia because they were an ally. The policy is shaped primarily by American petroleum interests in the middle east. That former President George Bush, current President George W. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney have amassed fortunes from their dealings in the Middle East should be cause for considerable concern. I had always suspected that the leftist argument, that the Gulf War was primarily about oil, was hyperbole but the evidence and the “prior art” of US foreign policy has kind of confirmed the idea.
In pursuit of economic advantage and stable markets, the US has directly contributed to the misery of millions. The life that is enjoyed by the West is propped up by the rest of the world. It is no wonder that dissidents across the world want to destroy the US and see the taking of civilian life as justified. The complicity of the West (its people not just politicians and governments) in the imperial relationships maintained with “the rest of the world” is being brought into question.
I had dinner on Friday night with a friend who had just returned from New York. He was complaining that the Ralph Lauren t-shirts that he bought for $10 US cost $139 in Australia. For a t-shirt. Apart from the obvious question of brands and marketing that leads to a t-shirt being so fucking expensive, he couldn’t understand why everything was so cheap in America. I couldn’t say anything. He wants to move to Massachusetts where gay marriage may become legal. But while the US debates the issue of same-sex marriage and nice liberal ideas they actively suppress basic human rights (economically and militarily) around the “Third” world by giving tacit support to right-wing regimes. In the pursuit of cheap t-shirts (cheap labour and resources) the US (and every other developed nation) engages in economic imperialism. Suppressing the liberal-left in the “Third” world has encouraged the extreme-left and extreme-right to oppose Western influence.
Anyway. Now I’m reading Beautiful Lies (Quarterly Essay, Issue 9, 2003) and it’s really depressing. In the past few years, actually, for about ten, I have loathed the US foreign policy and the destruction of Australian culture. But I had never considered the Australian contribution to world misery. Regardless of the scale of our contribution we have supported the US in Vietnam (which in 1954 had ousted the colonial French and was by all rights a sovereign nation). We turned our back on the actions of Sukarno and Indonesia in East Timor because he was so fucking insane and supported by the CPI and China. We supported the US in Iraq, twice. I would not be surprised to find that our involvement in Pacific nations, especially Papua New Guinea, is also questionable.
The main thrust of the essay is environmental. But it is a discussion that encompasses immigration, our colonial history, our notion of ourselves as a people, and generally the lies that sustain our concept of self and our way of life. It isn’t so much a series of ideas but the understanding that each of these is interlinked and that we can’t understand or address one without the other. It is obvious in a sense. The difficulty is that the government and the way in which we have been taught to think and learn is compartmentalised.
Basically, there must be a wholesale shift in thought. The essay is Australian in scope though it would equally apply to other industrialised nations. Flannery argues that we must reduce our needs by 60% and by that I assume that he speaks of manufactured goods, water and the unsustainable consumption that we generally engage in each day.
The use of solar energy is a prime example. There are government subsidies that support the purchase of solar panels and not only can it be used in tandem with the grid but excess energy can be sold back to the power companies thus reducing the need for coal-burning electricity. While there is the maintenance of panels and batteries the solar option is generally low maintenance and pays for itself. Currently, research into storing the energy in a hydrogen form will mean doing away with batteries – reducing the number of heavy metals in the environment.
I’m not sure about my commitment. I generally don’t try to take a stance because I know that I will break it… plus living in an apartment, that I rent, in the city, makes it very difficult. But there is something essential in all of this.
I was studying the Australian poet Judith Wright this semester. She was a founder of the Australian Conservation Foundation. Her poetry is diverse but toward the end, she had come to a philosophical realisation that perhaps the reason for human existence was to wipe ourselves out. To destroy the planet. If the universe is itself (or at least the planets) subject to gradual decay then perhaps we fulfil some grand scheme. It was interesting that someone devoted to the land their whole life would come to this conclusion. She was deeply saddened and disillusioned.
My difficulty is that it is all connected. Literature and poetry, in particular, are important to me because they speak directly to my soul. Or to put it in less questionable terms, language, as used in good poetry, helps me to better understand myself. The problem is that I can no longer divorce the way I live from the nebulous idea of a soul. I can’t keep trashing my body, I can’t keep supporting (through silence) the abuse of people and I can’t contribute to the destruction of the environment.
If this seems utopic or evangelical it’s only because, from what I can tell at the moment, things are fucking dire. It isn’t just environmental. Look at the politicians – those steering the boat. To quote a favourite film: “This city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportion.” “…dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria!”
I don’t know what to do. What can an individual do? When was the last time any kind of social protest affected change? Gandhi? He was probably just representative of greater change – most likely a symbol perhaps a catalyst at best. How many people have to hit the streets before those that represent and speak for us decide not to send soldiers abroad? When you look at the numbers who marched against the latest war in Iraq and add to that the lazy bastards like me who supported them but didn’t join, there is a vast undercurrent of dissatisfaction – and it gets ignored. What the hell is going on?
The only thing that I can think of is writing. And I don’t think that polemics is suited to me.
In one of the most poignant parts of the essay Flannery also discusses the inherent conflict between environmental concerns and population policy. Flannery advocates a smaller Australian population. Around 8 million, less than half our present number. So how do we balance our environmental needs with humane immigration policy, with refugee situations that our nation in its support of the United States and other nations has contributed? How can we send troops to Vietnam and then find ourselves amazed at the flood of refugees?
I’m not sure whether there is an answer to this question.