Of Great White Whales And Sacred Cows: Who Dares Criticize Bill McKibben?

A certainty of my waning years is that any likely social movement is almost immediately co-opted by $$$$$$$, sometimes masquerading as the Democratic Party. I say masquerading because, even though the DNC was too racist for my parents to want to belong, it subsequently rebranded itself as progressive, socially aware, and concerned with the plight of poor people. This is a convenient mask to wear while wining and dining with General Dynamics.

The Squad in Congress who object to military funding pointing out, as Rep. Rashida Tlaib did, "These are huge checks being written to Boeing and Lockheed," are inconvenient to the ruling class. D's and R's have criticized them, while history suggests they will be wooed by many a suitor to abandon their principles. Only time will tell.

So goes life under late capitalism, with its designed-to-be-endless wars hastening climate catastrophe barreling down on us.

Climate activists have their share of Democratic Party-style apologists. Bill McKibben's recent piece in the New York Review of Books shows him doing backflips to minimize the Pentagon's role in hastening climate change, and frame the U.S. military as, not a cause, but a solution.

My good friend and climate activist Janet Weil had this to say about that:

The thing that really stood-out for me in McKibben's article was the "of course" about 800 U.S. military bases all over the world.

Of course they are! Just like seawater in the seas, or any other "natural" phenomenon. 

But we can hope for a world where U.S. military bases, of whatever number, all over the world and into space and maybe Mars someday, are fueled by renewable energy! Which is magic and comes from renewable fairies, not resources dug out of the ground and fought for/defended by...the military!

Journalist Cory Morningstar addressed some of McKibben's other points in a Facebook post on July 4:



If you don't do Facebook the See More link will not work, so here are screenshots of the rest of Morningstar's commentary:

What would real action on Pentagon climate crimes look like? Extinction Rebellion marched on Washington DC recently. They are on the list for big donations from a "philanthropist" being advised by McKibben and others of his ilk. Probably because of sentiments like this one from an extinction rebel in DC interviewed by Popular Resistance:

“I’m here because I have seen that what traditional environmental NGOs do to address climate change isn’t working,” [Dominic Serino] said.

Which brings me to the best article I've read in a long time on climate, governance, human behavior and, yes, literature: "Ye cannot swerve me: Moby-Dick and climate change" by Manuel Garcia, Jr. in Counterpunch.

Some choice morsels from Mr. Garcia's analysis:

...fossil fuels are the opiates in the addiction to war that would be the death of humanity by Planet Earth’s rejection of it.

Do we work dutifully to the death, or till cast adrift as expendable, and do we willingly follow the leader to perdition if he is hellbound and determined for it; or do we rebel, overturn the structure of command, and lead ourselves even if such freedom entails a hard life? Is humanity as a whole worth our individual pains in this effort? Or, is the idea of restructuring human civilization — and soon — to jettison capitalism, authoritarianism, and their enabling fossil-fueled militarism and marbling corruption, just a chimera that would use up our individual life forces to no avail;

We're the crew of the doomed ship. Young people are demanding we swerve, the whale is climate catastrophe, and I think we can guess who Captain Ahab is.

Ha, you thought it was going to be the demagogue with bad hair, didn't you? Sadly, it's McKibben.

If you find other authors who dared to criticize Bill McKibben's article, drop me a line will you?

Meanwhile, you owe it to yourself to read Garcia's whole piece, for the hope and optimism contained within its bitter truth.