Capitalist Realism

We all know where this is headed, clear and evident, yet among us, there are those willing to do something about it. But what? "Let’s plant trees," says a young girl. Very well then, let’s plant them, and in a few years, the city’s average temperature will start to drop again. But then what? The trees won’t stand a chance against the mass of pollutants hurled into the atmosphere, not after another fifty or sixty years without radical, revolutionary change, not a chance, come on, deal with it, deal with it! "Why pour gasoline on dry straw," says the digital influencer, raising one hand, "let’s cut back on water consumption and start riding bicycles!" Oh, how wonderful, taking shorter showers and pedaling around town will be nice, but the planet, you see, will feel about as much of a difference as a terminally ill patient whose wounds are dressed with band-aids, do you get it? Then they turn on me, furious: "So what do we do then, mister provocateur? What? Nothing? Just die?" Oh, adjust your lenses: let’s kill what’s truly making the world sick! "And what is that?" asks the policeman, fists clenched, eyes ablaze, "tell me, and I’ll do it myself!" The industries that exist purely for profit, not your 1999 Chevette, a keepsake from your father; extensive livestock farming, the greatest water consumer in history, not the shower you take at the end of the day; the boundless production driven solely by profit; Capitalism, after all, my friends—and not-so-friends alike! It turns the planet into a frail body to be used up and, when old, discarded for… for… for what? "Elon Musk!" a fifty-something teenager exclaims as if shouting Eureka, "he’s taking us to Mars, didn’t you hear?"