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"If I formed my analysis based on my lived experience I would be misguided as fuck and unwilling to form empathy for anything that exists outside of my personal struggle. That’s the goal of capitalism, to individualize the self and have tunnel vision anger for what’s visible in front of me."
[Follow the "self interrogation" tag to find my previous answers to questions #1-4.]
Here's #5, finally:
If I could do this, why am I not doing it right now? If not now, when? What's my excuse for waiting?
By "this", question #5 refers to question #4, regarding limiting my own personal consumption to my own personal sustainable share of global production.
In answering question #4, I consulted an actuarial table to find my expected lifespan, and decided I would reduce my own personal consumption over the course of my natural life by 3-4% per year until I reached Green Communism by the end of my life.
So what's my excuse for dragging this out over the course of 29.0 years?
It's really about the other commitments I've made in my life. I can cut my own spending by 3% next year, and another 3% the next, without cutting into the commitments I've made to my career, to the two most important people in my life, and to the three pets I've adopted. Over the next seven years, as I approach retirement, these commitments will begin to fall away. Instead of sharing two homes (house with T, condo with K), I expect to reduce to one home at some point between age 55 and 60. These three pets are all entering the second decade of their lives, and will eventually pass away. And then I will retire from my career, at which point my consumption will drop anyway to fit into my post-retirement income.
It clearly would not be possible for me to continue any of these commitments if I were to immediately cut my consumption by over 90%. I could not afford to live in the DC area, so I'd have to quit my job, sell the house, stop sharing the condo. T would probably keep the pets if I dove below the poverty line. I'd have to move to a cheaper part of the world and find a new job.
I can aim to move toward Green Communism, but I'd have to break my life to do it immediately. And, Green Communism isn't something I can accomplish by myself anyway. I'd be setting an example for the rest of you, at best, but global warming and mass extinctions would continue. Living sustainably is something we all have to do together. And it would take time for all of us to do this, even if we wanted to. It would probably take as long as a human lifetime to reorganize all of our systems of government, production, and distribution to live within a rational ecological footprint. My own back-of-the-envelope plan for getting rid of fossil fuels would take 30 years to fully implement.
So, I'm not expecting any more of myself than I'd expect of humanity. Over the next 10 years I'll stop getting any of my energy from coal, and I'll cut my overall consumption of stuff by >30%. Over the following 10 years I'll stop getting any of my energy from oil, and I'll continue to cut my overall consumption by >60%. Over the final 10 years I'll stop getting any of my energy from natural gas, and I'll finish cutting my overall consumption by >90%. There will be time to adjust these goals if it turns out my share of sustainable global consumption is more or less than it would be today.
I'm embarking upon my own personal journey toward living Green Communism. It would be great if the rest of the human race joined me, but I'm not waiting for y'all. Yet, I'm also treating myself and those I care about with compassion, instead of unilaterally breaking my life and disappearing into a different world all at once.
After we all decide to begin this journey together, if we ever do, it will take the rest of our lives to get there. We can't just click on "OK" to load the next page. This loading screen is gonna take a billion seconds to complete.
Here's #5, finally:
If I could do this, why am I not doing it right now? If not now, when? What's my excuse for waiting?
By "this", question #5 refers to question #4, regarding limiting my own personal consumption to my own personal sustainable share of global production.
In answering question #4, I consulted an actuarial table to find my expected lifespan, and decided I would reduce my own personal consumption over the course of my natural life by 3-4% per year until I reached Green Communism by the end of my life.
So what's my excuse for dragging this out over the course of 29.0 years?
It's really about the other commitments I've made in my life. I can cut my own spending by 3% next year, and another 3% the next, without cutting into the commitments I've made to my career, to the two most important people in my life, and to the three pets I've adopted. Over the next seven years, as I approach retirement, these commitments will begin to fall away. Instead of sharing two homes (house with T, condo with K), I expect to reduce to one home at some point between age 55 and 60. These three pets are all entering the second decade of their lives, and will eventually pass away. And then I will retire from my career, at which point my consumption will drop anyway to fit into my post-retirement income.
It clearly would not be possible for me to continue any of these commitments if I were to immediately cut my consumption by over 90%. I could not afford to live in the DC area, so I'd have to quit my job, sell the house, stop sharing the condo. T would probably keep the pets if I dove below the poverty line. I'd have to move to a cheaper part of the world and find a new job.
I can aim to move toward Green Communism, but I'd have to break my life to do it immediately. And, Green Communism isn't something I can accomplish by myself anyway. I'd be setting an example for the rest of you, at best, but global warming and mass extinctions would continue. Living sustainably is something we all have to do together. And it would take time for all of us to do this, even if we wanted to. It would probably take as long as a human lifetime to reorganize all of our systems of government, production, and distribution to live within a rational ecological footprint. My own back-of-the-envelope plan for getting rid of fossil fuels would take 30 years to fully implement.
So, I'm not expecting any more of myself than I'd expect of humanity. Over the next 10 years I'll stop getting any of my energy from coal, and I'll cut my overall consumption of stuff by >30%. Over the following 10 years I'll stop getting any of my energy from oil, and I'll continue to cut my overall consumption by >60%. Over the final 10 years I'll stop getting any of my energy from natural gas, and I'll finish cutting my overall consumption by >90%. There will be time to adjust these goals if it turns out my share of sustainable global consumption is more or less than it would be today.
I'm embarking upon my own personal journey toward living Green Communism. It would be great if the rest of the human race joined me, but I'm not waiting for y'all. Yet, I'm also treating myself and those I care about with compassion, instead of unilaterally breaking my life and disappearing into a different world all at once.
After we all decide to begin this journey together, if we ever do, it will take the rest of our lives to get there. We can't just click on "OK" to load the next page. This loading screen is gonna take a billion seconds to complete.
I was telling B in the group chat, that I've exclusively worked for government or nonprofit agencies since 1996. I've been living Socialism for 24 years!
