Love and The Apocalypse

Why Radical Is The New Normal

By Robert Jensen
Yes Magazine
May 24, 2013

Feeling anxious about life in a broken-down society on a stressed-
out planet?

That’s hardly surprising: Life as we know it is almost over.

While the dominant culture encourages dysfunctional denial, pop a
pill, go shopping, find your bliss, there’s a more sensible approach:

Accept the anxiety, embrace the deeper anguish, and then get
apocalyptic.

We are staring down multiple cascading ecological crises, struggling
with political and economic institutions that are unable even to
acknowledge, let alone cope with, the threats to the human family
and the larger living world.

We are intensifying an assault on the ecosystems in which we live,
undermining the ability of that living world to sustain a large-scale
human presence into the future.

When all the world darkens, looking on the bright side is not a virtue
but a sign of irrationality.

In these circumstances, anxiety is rational and anguish is healthy,
signs not of weakness but of courage.

A deep grief over what we are losing, and have already lost, perhaps
never to be recovered, is appropriate.

Instead of repressing these emotions we can confront them, not
as isolated individuals but collectively, not only for our own mental
health but to increase the effectiveness of our organizing for the
social justice and ecological sustainability still within our grasp.

Once we’ve sorted through those reactions, we can get apocalyptic
and get down to our real work.

Perhaps that sounds odd, since we are routinely advised to overcome
our fears and not give in to despair.

Endorsing apocalypticism seems even stranger, given associations
with “end-timer” religious reactionaries and “doomer” secular
survivalists.

People with critical sensibilities, those concerned about justice and
sustainability, think of ourselves as realistic and less likely to fall for
either theological or science-fiction fantasies.

Many associate “apocalypse” with the rapture-ranting that grows out
of some interpretations of the Christian Book of Revelation (aka, the
Apocalypse of John), but it’s helpful to remember that the word’s
original meaning is not “end of the world.”

“Revelation” from Latin and “apocalypse” from Greek both mean
a lifting of the veil, a disclosure of something hidden, a coming to
clarity.

Speaking apocalyptically, in this sense, can deepen our understanding
of the crises and help us see through the many illusions that powerful
people and institutions create.

But there is an ending we have to confront.

Once we’ve honestly faced the crises, then we can deal with what is
ending, not all the world, but the systems that currently structure our
lives.

Life as we know it is, indeed, coming to an end. Let’s start with the
illusions:

Some stories we have told ourselves, claims by white people, men,
or U.S. citizens that domination is natural and appropriate, are
relatively easy to debunk (though many cling to them).

Other delusional assertions, such as the claim that capitalism is
compatible with basic moral principles, meaningful democracy,
and ecological sustainability, require more effort to take apart
(perhaps because there seems to be no alternative).

But toughest to dislodge may be the central illusion of the industrial
world’s extractive economy: that we can maintain indefinitely a
large-scale human presence on the earth at something like current
First-World levels of consumption.

The task for those with critical sensibilities is not just to resist
oppressive social norms and illegitimate authority, but to speak
a simple truth that almost no one wants to acknowledge:

The high-energy/high-technology life of affluent societies is a dead
end. We can’t predict with precision how resource competition and
ecological degradation will play out in the coming decades, but it is
ecocidal to treat the planet as nothing more than a mine from which
we extract and a landfill into which we dump.

We cannot know for sure what time the party will end, but the
party’s over. Does that seem histrionic? Excessively alarmist?

Look at any crucial measure of the health of the ecosphere in which
we live, groundwater depletion, topsoil loss, chemical contamination,
increased toxicity in our own bodies, the number and size of “dead
zones” in the oceans, accelerating extinction of species, and
reduction of biodiversity, and ask a simple question:

Where are we heading?

Remember also that we live in an oil-based world that is rapidly
depleting the cheap and easily accessible oil, which means we
face a major reconfiguration of the infrastructure that under
girds daily life.

Meanwhile, the desperation to avoid that reconfiguration has
brought us to the era of “extreme energy,” using ever more
dangerous and destructive technologies (hydrofracturing,
deep-water drilling, mountaintop coal removal, tar sands
extraction).

Oh, did I forget to mention the undeniable trajectory of global
warming/climate change/climate disruption?

Scientists these days are talking about tipping points and planetary
boundaries, about how human activity is pushing Earth beyond its
limits.

Recently 22 top scientists warned that humans likely are forcing a
planetary-scale critical transition “with the potential to transform
Earth rapidly and irreversibly into a state unknown in human
experience,” which means that “the biological resources we take
for granted at present may be subject to rapid and unpredictable
transformations within a few human generations.”

That conclusion is the product of science and common sense, not
supernatural beliefs or conspiracy theories.

The political/social implications are clear:

There are no solutions to our problems if we insist on maintaining
the high-energy/high-technology existence lived in much of the
industrialized world (and desired by many currently excluded from
it).

Many tough-minded folk who are willing to challenge other
oppressive systems hold on tightly to this lifestyle.

The critic Fredric Jameson has written, “It is easier to imagine the
end of the world than to imagine the end of capitalism,” but that’s
only part of the problem, for some, it may be easier to imagine the
end of the world than to imagine the end of air conditioning.

We do live in end-times, of a sort.

Not the end of the world, the planet will carry on with or without us,
but the end of the human systems that structure our politics,
economics, and social life.

“Apocalypse” need not involve heavenly rescue fantasies or
tough-guy survival talk; to get apocalyptic means seeing
clearly and recommitting to core values.

First, we must affirm the value of our work for justice and
sustainability, even though there is no guarantee we can
change the disastrous course of contemporary society.

We take on projects that we know may fail because it’s the right
thing to do, and by doing so we create new possibilities for ourselves
and the world.

Just as we all know that someday we will die and yet still get out
of bed every day, an honest account of planetary reality need not
paralyze us.

Then let’s abandon worn-out clichés such as, “The American people
will do the right thing if they know the truth,” or “Past social
movements prove the impossible can happen.”

There is no evidence that awareness of injustice will automatically
lead U.S. citizens, or anyone else, to correct it.

When people believe injustice is necessary to maintain their material
comfort, some accept those conditions without complaint.

Social movements around race, gender, and sexuality have been
successful in changing oppressive laws and practices, and to a
lesser degree in shifting deeply held beliefs.

But the movements we most often celebrate, such as the post-
World War II civil rights struggle, operated in a culture that
assumed continuing economic expansion.

We now live in a time of permanent contraction, there will be less,
not more, of everything.

Pressuring a dominant group to surrender some privileges when there
is an expectation of endless bounty is a very different project than
when there is intensified competition for resources.

That doesn’t mean nothing can be done to advance justice and
sustainability, only that we should not be glib about the inevitability
of it.

Here’s another cliché to jettison: Necessity is the mother of
invention.

During the industrial era, humans exploiting new supplies of
concentrated energy have generated unprecedented technological
innovation in a brief time.

But there is no guarantee that there are technological fixes to all
our problems; we live in a system that has physical limits, and the
evidence suggests we are close to those limits.

Technological fundamentalism, the quasi-religious belief that the
use of advanced technology is always appropriate, and that any
problems caused by the unintended consequences can be remedied
by more technology, is as empty a promise as other fundamentalisms.

If all this seems like more than one can bear, it’s because it is.

We are facing new, more expansive challenges.

Never in human history have potential catastrophes been so global;
never have social and ecological crises of this scale threatened at
the same time; never have we had so much information about the
threats we must come to terms with.

It’s easy to cover up our inability to face this by projecting it onto
others.

When someone tells me “I agree with your assessment, but people
can’t handle it,” I assume what that person really means is, “I can’t
handle it.” But handling it is, in the end, the only sensible choice.

Mainstream politicians will continue to protect existing systems of
power, corporate executives will continue to maximize profit without
concern, and the majority of people will continue to avoid these
questions.

It’s the job of people with critical sensibilities, those who
consistently speak out for justice and sustainability, even
when it’s difficult, not to back away just because the world
has grown more ominous.

Adopting this apocalyptic framework doesn’t mean separating from
mainstream society or giving up ongoing projects that seek a more
just world within existing systems.

I am a professor at a university that does not share my values or
analysis, yet I continue to teach.

In my community, I am part of a group that helps people create
worker-cooperatives that will operate within a capitalist system
that I believe to be a dead end.

I belong to a congregation that struggles to radicalize Christianity
while remaining part of a cautious, often cowardly, denomination.

I am apocalyptic, but I’m not interested in empty rhetoric drawn
from past revolutionary moments.

Yes, we need a revolution, many revolutions, but a strategy is not
yet clear.

So, as we work patiently on reformist projects, we can continue to
offer a radical analysis and experiment with new ways of working
together.

While engaged in education and community organizing with modest
immediate goals, we can contribute to the strengthening of networks
and institutions that can be the base for the more radical change we
need.

In these spaces today we can articulate, and live, the values of
solidarity and equity that are always essential.

To adopt an apocalyptic worldview is not to abandon hope but to
affirm life.

As James Baldwin put it decades ago, we must remember “that life
is the only touchstone and that life is dangerous, and that without
the joyful acceptance of this danger, there can never be any safety
for anyone, ever, anywhere.”

By avoiding the stark reality of our moment in history we don’t
make ourselves safe, we undermine the potential of struggles for
justice and sustainability.

As Baldwin put it so poignantly in that same 1962 essay, “Not
everything that is faced can be changed; but nothing can be
changed until it is faced.”

It’s time to get apocalyptic, or get out of the way.



Robert Jensen, is a professor in the School of Journalism at the University of Texas, Austin, is the author of Arguing for Our Lives:
A User’s Guide to Constructive Dialogue and We Are All Apocalyptic
Now: On the Responsibilities of Teaching, Preaching, Reporting,
Writing, and Speaking Out.

http://www.yesmagazine.org/issues/love-and-the-apocalypse
/radical-is-the-new-normal