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If you find the collapse of human civilisation interesting, you might enjoy: It Could Happen Here - podcast by Robert Evans exploring a US decaying in to warri

If you find the collapse of human civilisation interesting, you might enjoy: It Could Happen Here - podcast by Robert Evans exploring a US decaying in to warring states and dissolving https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-it-could-happen-here-30717896/ https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-it-could-happen-here-307... Dark Mountain, a twice-yearly collection of short stories and poetry on themes of collapse and ecocide. https://dark-mountain.net/ https://dark-mountain.net/

edrxty 5y ago
It Could Happen Here was pretty haunting. Some of it was hand wavy but a lot felt borderline prophetic. I should caution people here though. Going down this rabbit hole is not at all good for your mental health and in parallel, much like a particular Big Short scene, glorifying any of the potential scenarios here is glorifying death and suffering on a level never seen before. We have a lot of problems to solve over the coming years but resisting this train of thought becoming mainstream in the algorithmic feeds that define our future is one of them. This can only have strictly negative consequences of the "self fulfilling prophecy" variety.
- deleted 5y ago
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- CalRobert 5y ago
  It's horrifying, but then, the more time goes on the more IPCC forecasts trend towards what was previously labeled as histrionics and doomerism. Anyway, action is the antidote to despair and it's what has worked for me. We're far past the point where losing a few coastal cities is our biggest worry.
  - edrxty 5y ago
    This is a good point. My focus above was more the artificial disasters (ie. political unrest for the sake of political unrest) which to me feel like the most imminent given all the people sitting on their ai feeds and seething in message boards. It does bear mentioning that the real issues, most importantly climate change followed by economic inequality, are very real and absolutely will destroy just about everyone's way of life.
evil-olive 5y ago
It Could Happen Here recently restarted as a daily podcast, after its limited run a few years ago. it's been fascinating listening. Evans has been careful to avoid Doomerism and focus on some of the potential for hope and resiliency, such as in local mutual aid networks. he's also been using "the crumbles" rather than "collapse", which is a terminology shift I like a lot. "collapse" seems to suggest a singular event, whereas what we are more likely to see (and are currently already experiencing, I think) is a more gradual crumbling of societal institutions. to paraphrase William Gibson - the collapse is already here, it's just unevenly distributed
- CalRobert 5y ago
  "crumbles" works well, and seems a lot closer to what we're feeling. Personally, I prefer the phrase "collapse is a process, not an event".
cbHXBY1D 5y ago
I've listened to a few of them and don't recommend the new daily episodes. They're unscripted and not as polished as the old series. And don't forget Evan's State Department/intelligence ties: Bellingcat plus being embedded in US military units in Iraq. We don't know to what extent COINTELPRO-like programs ever ended. Evans fearmongers and overinflates groups like the Proud Boys which are really just marginal organizations without any popular support. Note: I've been involved in the activist scene in the PNW for years and have known people who know him. Most activists here are highly skeptical of Evans for the reasons above, viewing his work as a mix of LARPing and political voyeurism.
- myWindoonn 5y ago
  As a PNW native antifascist, this reads like FUD. Evans isn't perfect, but you'd have to be completely out to lunch to miss what the Proud Boys are doing in the Portland/Vancouver area.

edrxty 5y ago

It Could Happen Here was pretty haunting. Some of it was hand wavy but a lot felt borderline prophetic. I should caution people here though. Going down this rabbit hole is not at all good for your mental health and in parallel, much like a particular Big Short scene, glorifying any of the potential scenarios here is glorifying death and suffering on a level never seen before. We have a lot of problems to solve over the coming years but resisting this train of thought becoming mainstream in the algorithmic feeds that define our future is one of them. This can only have strictly negative consequences of the "self fulfilling prophecy" variety.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
CalRobert 5y ago
It's horrifying, but then, the more time goes on the more IPCC forecasts trend towards what was previously labeled as histrionics and doomerism. Anyway, action is the antidote to despair and it's what has worked for me. We're far past the point where losing a few coastal cities is our biggest worry.
- edrxty 5y ago
  This is a good point. My focus above was more the artificial disasters (ie. political unrest for the sake of political unrest) which to me feel like the most imminent given all the people sitting on their ai feeds and seething in message boards. It does bear mentioning that the real issues, most importantly climate change followed by economic inequality, are very real and absolutely will destroy just about everyone's way of life.

evil-olive 5y ago

It Could Happen Here recently restarted as a daily podcast, after its limited run a few years ago. it's been fascinating listening. Evans has been careful to avoid Doomerism and focus on some of the potential for hope and resiliency, such as in local mutual aid networks. he's also been using "the crumbles" rather than "collapse", which is a terminology shift I like a lot. "collapse" seems to suggest a singular event, whereas what we are more likely to see (and are currently already experiencing, I think) is a more gradual crumbling of societal institutions. to paraphrase William Gibson - the collapse is already here, it's just unevenly distributed

CalRobert 5y ago
"crumbles" works well, and seems a lot closer to what we're feeling. Personally, I prefer the phrase "collapse is a process, not an event".

cbHXBY1D 5y ago

I've listened to a few of them and don't recommend the new daily episodes. They're unscripted and not as polished as the old series. And don't forget Evan's State Department/intelligence ties: Bellingcat plus being embedded in US military units in Iraq. We don't know to what extent COINTELPRO-like programs ever ended. Evans fearmongers and overinflates groups like the Proud Boys which are really just marginal organizations without any popular support. Note: I've been involved in the activist scene in the PNW for years and have known people who know him. Most activists here are highly skeptical of Evans for the reasons above, viewing his work as a mix of LARPing and political voyeurism.

myWindoonn 5y ago
As a PNW native antifascist, this reads like FUD. Evans isn't perfect, but you'd have to be completely out to lunch to miss what the Proud Boys are doing in the Portland/Vancouver area.