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30 Dec 21, 4 tweets, 2 min read
Last night I watched #DontLookUp. It was like seeing my adult life flash past me.
Even down to the morning TV show where I totally lost it while trying, for the 1000th time, to explain what climate breakdown would do.
All the anger, the frustration, the desperation: I feel it.
I'm not proud of what happened on that show, but I'm not going to run away from it either. After 36 years of the most important of all issues being marginalised in favour of fatuous news about celebrities, it was bound to catch up with me.
The film got it dead right. The Great Wall of Denial erected by the media. Money and political games taking precedence over the survival of life on Earth, the endless trivial nonsense on our screens that sucks our brains out through our eyes.
theguardian.com/environment/20…
I'm so sick of being treated like a pariah by most of the media because I care about the survival of life on Earth. I'm so sick of being treated as if I'm mentally ill by other people. I'm so sick of beating my head against the wall of indifference and distraction and denial.

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More from @GeorgeMonbiot

George Monbiot Profile picture
31 Dec 21
Now it's winter wildfires in the US. How far do things have to go before governments recognise that crucial Earth systems might be reaching their tipping points? If so, we need to respond not with slow and steady carbon reduction plans, but with sudden and drastic action.
Otherwise, it's like announcing a plan, after Lehman Brothers collapsed in 2008, to bail out the banks by 2050.
I'm going to keep saying this until it lodges:
If Earth systems are approaching their tipping points, current plans are far too little, far too late.
It's really hard to imagine what crossing a major Earth system threshold (a tipping point) would look like. But:
1. It will be orders of magnitude worse than anything we have ever experienced.
2. If one system tips, it could trigger a chain reaction, tipping other systems.
Read 4 tweets
George Monbiot Profile picture
29 Dec 21
I won't apologise for supporting Jeremy Corbyn. While he got some things wrong (as we all do), his policies offered us the best chance we've had in decades of escaping from the cage of neoliberalism.
I find it phenomenally depressing that, in almost-2022, so many people are asking "what's neoliberalism?" and see me as some pointy-headed loon for mentioning the word. It's the dominant ideology of the past 40 years, that now affects almost every aspect of your life.
It should be as familiar to us as communism was to the people of the Soviet Union. But the greatest success of this tremendously powerful ideology is its anonymity. And by heck, has it succeeded. theguardian.com/books/2016/apr…
Read 5 tweets
George Monbiot Profile picture
27 Dec 21
I had a really interesting discussion with @matthewremski about the hazards of activism, navigating despair and keeping hope alive, while resisting the temptations offered by conspiracy theories, grandiosity and “aesthetic accelarationism”. Do listen. conspirituality.buzzsprout.com/1875696/975789…
We also explore the dark spiral of gleeful apocalypticism that led to this:
What I see in this and some previous statements by the same author is a liberating disregard for human life. If you believe the collapse of civilisation is inevitable, and our role is merely to observe it from a godlike height, you are not afflicted by certain troubling dilemmas.
Read 8 tweets
George Monbiot Profile picture
21 Dec 21
How many more more accounts of dying patients saying "I wish I'd had the vaccine" will we have to read?
Those who make misleading claims about covid vaccines being dangerous or unnecessary, and persuade others that this is true, are killing people.
We recognise that there are limits to free speech: almost everyone agrees that we should not be free to shout “fire!” in a crowded theatre, because it is likely to kill people. Surely spreading false claims that discourage people from getting vaccinated is the equivalent?
I believe that, where there is an obvious conflict between them, it is right to strike a balance between free speech and the preservation of human life. I explore the question here: theguardian.com/commentisfree/…
Read 8 tweets
George Monbiot Profile picture
14 Dec 21
I’ve seen some disturbing things in my time, but the howling silence in most of the UK media about the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, whose measures include stifling protest and legislative cleansing of Gypsies, Roma and Travellers, is close to the top of the list.
We’ve all had the fantasy, right? About what we'd do if politicians here attacked democracy, seized dictatorial powers and introduced special laws against minorities? How brave and noble we are in these dreams! Now it happens, and we clear our throats and look the other way.
If you ever wondered how dictators come to power, this is how: through resistance melting away like summer snow, as journalists and other public figures suddenly discover they're late for an urgent appointment about something-or-other. Sorry, must dash! Toodle-pip.
Read 7 tweets
George Monbiot Profile picture
13 Dec 21
The sheer hypocrisy of these people, who are simultaneously pushing through a "papers please" clause (compulsory voter ID) that could disenfranchise 2 million people.
Not to prevent a virus from spreading, but to prevent the Conservatives from losing office.
The same "papers please" Conservatives have just voted for a measure (in the Nationality and Borders Bill) that could arbitrarily deprive 5 million people of their passports.
The Conservatives are now driving a measure through Parliament, without debate in the Commons, that will ban named people from attending protests, or even mentioning protests on social media, and force them to surrender themselves to police stations at the state's pleasure.
Read 6 tweets

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