MATTHEWGOODONLINE

In the documentary 11th Hour, former CIA Director James Woolsey, of all people, makes a very important point with regards to the correlation between consumerism and industrial opportunism and the ability to affect change in a very short period of time given what are traditionally viewed as ‘exceptional circumstances’.

Woolsey’s point of reference was the transformation of the US auto industry into an industrial mechanism with which to produce aircraft, tanks, and a variety of other military necessities during the early stages of America’s involvement in the Second World War. That transformation took, believe it or not, merely six months. Put into context, if the disastrous environmental reality that we are currently facing was seriously addressed by government, the implementation of alternative energy use, that being non-carbon based energy (fossil fuels), could be introduced in a very timely fashion. It would also create jobs, which would replace those lost in the transformation. The only loser in that transformation would be the corporate oil sector, which possesses such enormous influence that, in truth, they are largely responsible for the inability, or unwillingness, of government to act. Ultimately, greed has become the foremost factor in the inability to seriously implement alternative energy sources that would significantly impact the amount of damage that fossil fuels do on a daily basis.

Of course, many economists will argue tooth and nail that such a transformation would be disadvantageous. But that supposes that the economy is of greater significance than the environment. The only problem with such logic is that economies can grow; as can populations and the waste they produce. The environment, on the other hand, cannot expand to match it. It is a limited and immovable thing, and therefore unalterable with regards to meeting the demands of economic growth.

In the last half of the twentieth century the world’s population has grown faster than at any other point in human history. In fact, during that period it has increased so much that that increase alone constitutes a figure greater than the population of the planet at any time prior to the industrial revolution. During that increase, the primary source of energy used by the population of the planet has been carbon based – which includes everything from food production to transportation to the production of electricity.

For the majority of human history our species relied on available sunlight for energy. But since the discovery of fossil fuels, we have become wholly dependent on an energy source that is not only unsustainable, but also catastrophically damaging with regards to its impact on the environment. Thus, we now find ourselves in an era in which we are forced to make a very important choice – to either disregard the realities of that dependency and its ramifications or to address our dependence on fossil fuels and work to eliminate it.

In the end, and despite our intelligence, our species may very well constitute nothing more than a global parasite, one that, having been given the chance to grow and consume the benefits of its host may very well find itself the author of its own destruction because of it. Given that, it should also not be overlooked that despite the damage caused, our host will outlast us, no matter how superior we believe ourselves to be. It has, in the billions of years of its existence, seen life forms come and go, and to think that we are somehow immune to that natural eventuality is, perhaps, the primary reason that we refuse to alter our perspective.

Of course, there are those that faithfully believe that a higher power created the world and that what we do to it doesn’t matter because is it, in the end, part of a greater divine plan. There is little that can be said to such individuals regarding this subject, only that if a divine plan does exists, our eventual demise is a part of it, and that the endurance and eventual reconstitution of the natural world is as well. Unless, that is, God’s plan is to also destroy the natural world in the process.

I’m sure many of you remember Morgan Spurlock’s Academy Award nominated movie “Super Size Me.” It was a documentary that took the viewer on a one month journey with Morgan as he consumed three square meals a day of pure, wholesome McDonald’s food.

After the movie came out, McDonalds quickly pointed out the weight gain and rapid deterioriation of Morgan’s health would have come about regardless based on the number of calories per day he was eating. Shortly afterwards McDonald’s removed all super size options from the menu:

Subsequent to the showing of the film at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival, the Supersize fries and beverage were retired from the menu and McDonald’s replaced them with healthier foods, though McDonald’s denied that this was in reaction to the movie. In Summer 2006, Super Size beverage was brought back under the name ‘Summer Size.’ It is unknown if it will remain permanently, though. The corporation did, however, issue a press release on their website, denouncing Spurlock’s film and blaming the filmmaker for being a part of the problem, and not the solution. [wikipedia]

Today the trailer was released for Morgan’s next film, “Where In the World Is Osama Bin Laden?” In it, Spurlock attempts to locate the most wanted man on the planet, Osama Bin Laden. The marketing campaign for the movie has been deliberately quiet about how close Morgan came to actually locating Osama, which is obviously being used to hype up the movie a fair bit.

I’ve been reading some comments on various forums about the film. While most fans of “Super Size Me” are looking forward to watching it and seeing what Morgan actually uncovered, there are a few complaints already that it perpetuates a few of the typical stereotypes about people from the Middle East.

Watch the trailer and judge for yourself.

Click here to watch the documentary “Kill The Messenger” about the Sibel Edmonds affair. I highly recommend that you find some time today, or over the next few days, to watch this crucial film. The information provided in it is extremely important, so if you have a blog, or an email list that you use to send group emails to friends, please help spread the link.

More on the documentary here.

So I finally got my hands on a copy of Ken Burn’s The War, thus I’ll spend the next 10 hours watching it. So far it’s very good. I especially like how Burns chose to focus on four US towns and various individuals from them with regards to their experiences rather than trying to cover the nation as a whole. It provides an insight that is little seen.

One of the more interesting aspects of the first disc is how Burns goes about portraying US isolationism. While Europe and Asia were already in the throes of conflict, many Americans went about their daily lives contented that it was a world away, and thus did not affect them. I was also glad to see that Burns delved briefly into the fact that prior to World War Two the US military was relatively small, and that following it, because of the economic prosperity the country ultimately enjoyed in its wake, the United States became the most powerful country in the world.

Over 400,000 Americans lost their lives during the Second World War, but the United States itself remained the only major power involved in the conflict untouched at its conclusion. Europe and Asia were decimated; Russia had lost some twenty million people, and yet the United States remained as it was before – intact. While not directly relatable to the content of the documentary itself; that is a fact that shouldn’t be lost on anyone with regards to the birth of the American neo-imperial mindset.

The sacrifices made by Americans (and Canadians and Newfoundlanders for that matter) in a conflict that had no outright impact on this continent are certainly admirable. But as Burns attempts to reveal in the documentary – war is not a proposition that is ultimately about right and wrong, nor the superiority of political ideologies. It is one that is an exercise in those vulnerabilities from which we all suffer, and thus the revelation that despite the reasons for conflict, the base common that must ultimately pay the price for them are, in truth, more alike than not when the uniforms come off and arms are laid down.

Though it might be hard to believe, this generation of North Americans finds itself the product of the result of that war. Our political ideology, like those of many societies that have come before us, has been overwhelmingly employed of late to justify aggression. Democracy itself has become a weapon in and of itself, one that is rarely questioned when used to justify the need for war. In such times we turn ceremoniously to its principles as if a blank cheque, and that is an unfortunate reality that was created by the outcome of a war fought more than sixty years ago. But it is not the reason why that war was fought, and that is something that should not, in the name of those that fought it, ever be forgotten.