A TIME TO REBUILD

We have spent the last few years in a constant state of trauma and crisis and forced to react to threats. It's time to seize the moment and rebuild.

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The state of the modern world is turmoil.

As someone who has spent the last six years studying and diagnosing the problem, and warning about an impending crisis that will more than likely change everything, I recognize this as a side-effect of a slew of problems and decisions that have been ignored and covered-up. Looking at the condition, it’s obvious how interconnected all of these crises and problems truly are. The ravages of neoliberal capitalism, partnered with the constant energies of patriarchal white supremacy, have led us to the precipice of destruction and left us squarely in the crosshairs of history.

The first step is realizing this. Wrestling with it. Starting to piece together parcels of information that have either been concealed or just never uncovered in the first place. Rewriting history’s draft, shifting from a top-down story that lionizes powerful individuals and treats regular people as disposable pawns and the narrative as inevitable and infinitely justifiable, to something that makes sense of how power protects and proliferates itself.

Then, it’s a matter of making choices.

Even when the choices aren’t clear, the nature of them is. We now have the massive task of deciding how the world should look, where it should go, how it should operate. These are the most giant and consequential of choices. Simply typing them out gave me pause because to name them is to marvel at their complexity and importance. It would so much easier if we didn’t have to make these decisions. If we could only outsource these choices to people “better” suited for them, people more capable. But that impulse has gotten us here, hasn’t it? Subject to the whims of a wealth class that is more interested in protecting their own interests and the interests of the donors that fund them.

It is a large task we face. A life-defining one. But if you’re like me, and you make your choices in a similar way, it helps to break them down. Not necessarily in a pro’s and con’s list, but more in an immersion or examination that hopefully makes my principles and values more apparent and connects them to the choice.

And, in this case, that operation does wonders.

The crises we must address are many. There is the erosion of democracy in terms of systems that have been coopted, corrupted, bought off. Our representatives serve largely as rubber stamps and moveable impediments to the agenda of the wealth class in opposition to the agenda of the masses. Our government does not work for us and has not worked for us for so long we have mostly learned to expect nothing less than a total betrayal.

That has created an environment ripe for manipulation and radicalization. People have learned to distrust - rightfully, mind you - systems of power, and have either checked out or flocked to charlatans who sell them the illusion of populism in service of the wealthy who created the issue in the first place. They have been perpetually radicalized to the point of being willing to overthrow democracy itself or carry out horrific violence against the wealthy’s political enemies.

This isn’t simply an American phenomenon. It’s a disease that has spread throughout the world. It first appeared, at least in an obvious sense, in areas where liberal democracy was the most nascent or vulnerable. In Russia, where the wounds of the Soviet Union and neoliberalism are still bleeding, illiberalism took hold decades ago and was cultivated and supported by a global capitalism that was just happy to have the nation’s resources and complicity. Vladimir Putin used that situation to create a power base he could spread around the world, cultivating relationships with Right Wing individuals and creating reactionary movements that would coordinate their efforts and slowly and aggressively attack liberalism. When he believed th etime was ripe, he attacked Ukraine, striking a blow to the neoliberal global order he wants to either destroy or takeover.

Authoritarianism has grown in every corner of the world from this as it feeds off distrust and disillusionment. The current order is crumbling and alternatives are necessary, particularly as larger crises stemming from these problems and their consequences grow worse. COVID-19 highlighted the issue, made it apparent there were no structures in place to deal with novel problems and were struggling with anything besides producing consumer goods and worsening exploitation. Climate change, which is an absolute game changer, is an umbrella that brings together all of these problems while exacerbating conditions. If it isn’t dealt with it will only make things exponentially worse.

Now. It is obvious what the problem is. Greed and imbalance of resources and power. Greed, of course, is a longstanding human condition. It can be dealt with, it can heal, it can be addressed. But it is not a political issue. It’s a driver. A consequence. A side-effect. We can work to curb greed within ourselves, within our communities, sure, but that is only part of the choice.

To make this world better it is going to take an address of the material conditions that brought us here. A realignment or redistribution. Something that rolls back the destruction of the neoliberal crush and wave. Something that at least makes the system work better so that we might quiet this infection and fever and avoid the worst possible outcomes.

The answer relies on the introspection of addressing greed and self-dealing, these things that are within our control, but also taking that healing and then moving it into action in our politics and in reform. Politics and systems of power must reflect who we are and what our values are rather than inform us of who we are. That is out of balance. Out of whack, honestly, and it is destructive and dangerous and perverting. It is a polarity that must be reversed. That must be corrected.

We must free ourselves of this cycle of reacting. These crises - everything from COVID to the Ukrainian War - keep us off-balance, living in constant terror and confusion. If it isn’t attacks on democracy it’s attacks on public life. Shootings. Mass murders. Domestic terrorism. White supremacist authoritarianism relies on keeping us in a constant state of reaction and fear. This keeps us from building our movements and communities and from addressing our own feelings and states of being. Eventually though, we can steady ourselves, find peace and calm to reflect and determine, and then act.

Authoritarianism’s kryptonite is just that. Action from the individual and from the masses in a productive way. In construction. Fascism and Nazism and all of the associated ideologies of authoritarianism relie on us giving over power to the fear and then simply accepting or helping to advance the agenda of destruction. It is about breaking down everything we know and replacing it with a new reality forged in the favor of these monsters.

Now, on the precipice of a new year, of a new age really, it is on us to find moments of peace and safety to not only restore ourselves, but to begin building concepts of a better future and better versions of ourselves.

We are not safe, but we can be safe.

We do not live in the world we deserve, but we can live in that world.

As long as we react, we lose. If we can begin to act, if we can begin to heal, we can get there.

It’s time to get to work.