How endless economic growth is incompatible with supporting life on earth (interview with shaun chamberlin of dark optimism)
Shaun Chamberlin is the founder of Dark Optimism (@Dark_Optimism), a nonprofit, public interest research and activist organization that is positive about the kind of world humanity can create while being realistic about how far we have to go to create that future.
Shaun is also one of the first Extinction Rebellion arrestees, the co-author of the book, Surviving the Future: Culture, Carnival and Capital in the Aftermath of the Market Economy, and the Executive Producer of the film, The Sequel: What Will Follow Our Troubled Civilisation?
In this podcast episode, Shaun sheds light on why the pursuit of endless economic growth is fundamentally incompatible with supporting continued life on earth; what it means to recognize the different layers of reality that people exist in today (i.e., the reality of economics and politics vs. the reality of physics and the environment); and more.
To start, get a glimpse below into the conversation between Shaun and Green Dreamer Podcast's host, Kamea Chayne.
Musical feature: Trust The Sun by Mountain Twin by Joel Porter (@JoelPorterMusic)
“There’s no question that if we don’t reconcile the economic vs. physical and ecological realities, it’s physics that’s going to pull rank. Physics doesn’t negotiate.”
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This is a conversation on Green Dreamer with Kamea Chayne, a podcast and multimedia journal illuminating our paths towards ecological balance, intersectional sustainability, and true abundance and wellness for all. This preview has been edited for clarity. Subscribe to Green Dreamer Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or any podcast app to stay informed and updated on our latest episodes.
On the human-constructed myth of the pursuit of ‘financial independence’:
“The things that we're supposed to really value are things like financial independence, which is held up as this desirable or even obligatory thing that we should achieve in our life. If we don't achieve that, then it's as if we're just a sponge or a parasite or something. But this is a complete myth!
The more you get into it, and the more you follow the path that's laid out for us in mainstream culture in the richer minority world where I was born, the more unsatisfying it becomes.
You realize that financial independence doesn't even really exist, because even if you've got enough money to pay your rent or your mortgage and buy your food and all the things that you need, you're not actually independent in any meaningful way.
Someone else still built your house; someone else still grew your food and delivered it to the shop where you bought it.
All that money really allows you to do is become dependent on people you don't know instead of being dependent on people you do know."
On the conflicting layers of reality people exist in:
“The stories our culture tells us about what's important are fundamentally flawed.
My late mentor, David Fleming, put it beautifully. He said, ‘Civilizations self-destruct anyway, but it is reasonable to ask whether they have done so before with such enthusiasm and in obedience to such an acutely absurd superstition…’
We're in this strange situation where everyone wants to claim that they're a realist, but we've got realists who have loyalty to two different realities. On the one hand, you've got the economic and political reality, and people say, ‘I'm realistic and I don't think [our world] can really change very quickly.'
On the other hand, you've got people studying the physical and ecological reality and saying, ‘Well, if we're realistic with regard to this reality, then politics and society has to change incredibly dramatically.’
They're standing on either side of this huge divide in realism, shouting at each other, saying, ‘We are the realists!’
At some point, we have to decide which reality we owe our allegiance to. There's no question that if we don't reconcile these two realities, it's physics that's going to pull rank because physics doesn't negotiate."
On the dangers of blaming humanity for our environmental destruction:
"It's completely understandable to look at what humanity is doing to the natural world and be disgusted by it, but I think it's inappropriate to point that disgust at humanity.
That disgust needs to be pointed at this culture and this economic system, because there are humans on this planet who know perfectly well how to live in ways that sustain the ecologies of which they are a part and are joyous and wonderful.
I hear comedians talk about humanity being like a virus, and Agent Smith in The Matrix talks about humanity being misclassified as a mammal when it's actually a virus—this idea is spreading in our culture.
The danger of that is that if we believe it's human nature that's the problem, then the disgust that we feel turns into self-loathing, because we are humans and we think, 'Well, if humanity is just a virus, then I hate myself.'
It's not true that humanity is the problem. The truth is that this culture and this economic growth based system is the problem.
It really suits the powers for us to turn that disgust into self-loathing rather than what it should be, which is a huge desire to change that culture, to change that system, and to create something much more beautiful instead—something much more imaginative and creative.
That's certainly what I want to do and what I have devoted my life to doing."
Final words of wisdom:
"Be more selfish—not selfish in the sense of acting at the expense of others, but in the sense of widening our senses of self to include more of the world, because we're so interdependent.
Do what really makes you alive, not what they tell you should make you come alive.”
