In December 2011 David Attenborough speaking on the Andrew Marr programme caught everyone's attention when he used the word 'fascist'.
He was speaking about global warming, pointing out that there are three times as many people on earth as when he started making programmes, what a startling fact.
David Attenborough BBC excerpt:
"There isn't any question that the North pole is warming. It means extinction for Polar Bears really.
"What we should be trying to do is to reduce the rate at which the planet warms, we aren't going to be able to stop it and all we can do is to slow it down.
Geo-engineering is a very difficult thing because what it means is you allow one nation or indeed one very small group within a nation to decide what is going to happen to the whole globe.
"They may say we are very confident about the science but what about all those other people down there who are having it imposed upon them, it's dare I say it, fascist," David Attenborough said.
Personally I hear about global warming every day and over Christmas I decided that I don't want to be reminded of it any more. Unfortunately I have to be. It seems we all have to be.
In fact the Guardian March 2011 quoted Yann-Arthus Bertrand, the world photographer, creator of the environmental movie Home talked about the necessity of losing the ego and the desire for material possessions.
“When it comes to our planet, none of us want to believe what we already know,” he told the Guardian.
Then, take Ellen MacArthur who in 2009 gave up sailing to concentrate on encouraging sustainability..Here an excerpt from a BBC interview in 2009.
"I never thought that anything in my life could eclipse sailing, I didn't think it was possible.
"But after being in South Georgia, after learning these lessons I suppose, and the more I researched into it, the more frightened I got and that has really scared me to the point that I can't go back to sea and go around the world again because this really matters."
“I realised that on land we don't see things as precious any more. We take what we want.”
Then there are many people talking about the Great Turning, David Korten economist and activist, Joanna Macy eco-philosopher, Buddhist scholar to name two, who for instance speak about turning the idea of capitalist growth to system for sustainable life
One interpretation Joanna Macy gives is that the actions we are seeing like the occupy camps, soup kitchens, tree actions, demonstrations are slowing down the growth concept.
The second strand are alternative structures such as learning from old cultures such, holding the land, growing food, new ways of measuring prosperity. There are big movements such as the Incredible edible movements doing this, permaculture groups such as Holmgren and Mollison in Australia.
But structures need to be deeply rooted, Joanna Macy says in terms of values to succeed, so there has to be and is, she says, a shift in consciousness, science, chaos theory, quantum, ancient wisdoms, about the interconnectedness of humans and a revolution. This being a reason to get us up every morning. Along the same lines, a sustainability course is being run in Bristol, the Shift course with a permaculture course starting up in January.
Related: The Great Turning Times
The Global Consciousness project at Princetown University
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