Recommended Reading: Disaster, Blame, and Solidarity
This Week's Recommended Reading on Substack: Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Jack Crosbie, Parker Molloy, Justin Glawe, Elad Nehorai, J. P. Hill, Taylor Lorenz, and John Pavlovitz
This Week's Recommended Reading on Substack:
Ruth Ben-Ghiat writes that “in the culture of competition for money and assets promoted by neoliberal thinking, and it is no wonder that ecoanxiety is pervasive as we witness one conflagration after another. As insecurity becomes normalized, survivalists pursue their dreams of off-the-grid self-sufficiency, which often entails amassing arsenals of weapons and viewing everyone as a potential enemy. But there is another path. Instead of radical individualism, there can be radical solidarity in the face of loss.”
writes that “you are not mad at the power company. You are not mad at the oil company. You are not mad at Karen Bass, or the Democrats, or even the Republicans, really (although I’m not going to stop you on that last point.) You are mad at capitalism. You are mad at the society that we have built over many, many, many years that has grown so large and built everything on such a scale that it can only fail catastrophically.”
writes that “the question isn't whether these conspiracy theories will continue—they will. The question is whether we'll let them distract us from the real issues: climate change, infrastructure funding, and emergency preparedness. While the right obsesses over imaginary water declarations and DEI initiatives, actual solutions get pushed aside. That's not an accident. It's the point.”
writes that “ignoring the most obvious factor of climate change in the wildfires that are ravaging the Los Angeles area, the American right has been very busy in the last 36 hours lying about who is to blame for the ongoing natural disaster… Now, the entirety of the right-wing information ecosystem — from pundits and influencers to members of Congress and Trump’s entire team — has mobilized to blame any Democratic official or progressive policy they can think of for a natural disaster that is most directly being caused by dry conditions and hurricane force winds.”
writes that “when I look at the images of people running for their lives, cars destroyed, homes gutted, I do not see anything natural about it. I see it as targeted violence done by people who know exactly the consequences of their actions, protecting themselves from the consequences of their actions while knowing full well they are not just destroying lives today, but far into the future.
writes that “no one is coming to save us from this malevolent politics that insists we accept a torrent of fires and floods. No benevolent billionaire or powerful body will fundamentally change society to avoid this apocalyptic new normal. Certainly Donald Trump and his cadre of climate deniers, billionaires, and various oligarchical elements have no interest in saving us.”
writes that “billionaires like Zuckerberg aren’t champions of free expression, they’re opportunists weaponizing the concept of free speech to shield themselves from accountability and cater to an increasingly radicalized, politically motivated base. Their performative policies ultimately undermine the very principles they claim to espouse.”
writes that “we all have a reason we get up in the morning. It is the thing that energizes, propels us into the day, and makes the painful and unspeakable stuff we encounter a lot more bearable. For you that that might be a group of people or a cause or a moral code or a theological conviction or a sense of meaning. Your why may have become obscured by the events of the day but you need to recover it and guard it with your life because it is a sacred thing. Don't lose your purpose as you enter into the fight.”