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Richard Heinberg: Old Age and Societal Decline

Richard Heinberg: Old Age and Societal Decline thumbnail

People grow old and die. Civilizations eventually fail. For centuries amateur philosophers have used the former as a metaphor for the latter, leading to a few useful insights and just as many misleading generalizations. The comparison becomes more immediately interesting as our own civilization stumbles blindly toward collapse. While not the cheeriest of subjects, it’s worth exploring.

A metaphor is not an explanation.

First, it’s important to point out that serious contemporary researchers studying the phenomenon of societal collapse generally find little or no explanatory value in the metaphorical link with individual human mortality.

The reasons for individual decline and death have to do with genetics, disease, nutrition, and personal history (including accidents and habits such as smoking). We are all genetically programmed to age and die, though lifespans differ greatly.

Reasons for societal decline appear to have little or nothing to do with genetics. Some complex societies have failed due to invasion by foreign marauders (and sometimes the diseases they brought); others have succumbed to resource depletion, unforeseeable natural catastrophe, or class conflict. Anthropologist Joseph Tainter proposed what is perhaps the best general theory of collapse in his 1988 book The Collapse of Complex Societies, which argued that the development of societal complexity is a problem-solving strategy that’s subject to diminishing marginal returns. Once a civilization’s return on investment in complexity goes negative, that civilization becomes vulnerable to stresses of all sorts that it previously could have withstood.

There is a superficial similarity between individual aging, on one hand, and societal vulnerability once returns on investments in complexity have gone negative, on the other. In both cases, what would otherwise be survivable becomes deadly—whether it’s a fall on an uneven sidewalk or a barbarian invasion. But this similarity doesn’t provide explanatory value in either case. No physician or historian will be able to do her job better by use of the metaphor.

Nevertheless, as long as we don’t fall into the trap of seeing it as an explanation, the comparison may still be useful. Explanation isn’t everything. We naturally want to know how to deal mentally and emotionally with both personal and societal mortality, and it’s in this pursuit that we may find usefulness in the metaphor.

Is the world getting old, or is it just me?

In order to locate that usefulness it’s probably best to start by acknowledging our context. Our own civilization is circling the drain. I won’t bore readers already well versed in the literature by rehearsing evidence that modern industrial society is past its sell-by date. For those new to the discussion, perhaps the most concise text I can recommend is William Ophuls’s tiny book, Immoderate Greatness: Why Civilizations Fail. Ophuls surveys the best previous writings on the subject and offers a summary of the stages through which every civilization seems to pass on its inexorable journey toward collapse. It’s up to the reader to decide at which stage our own civilization has arrived.

Those of us who have spent years or decades drinking from the well of ecological literature on climate change, resource depletion, species extinctions, and limits to growth need no reminder of the existential threats to our society. The global industrial civilization that currently supplies us with everything that is necessary for life is coming apart—politically, socially, economically, and ecologically. Our leaders are incapable of acknowledging, much less reversing, industrial society’s progress toward oblivion.

This realization can be as at least as devastating as that of our personal mortality, though only for those who actually pay attention to the warning signs and have a historical perspective regarding past instances of collapse. (We haven’t talked about a third level of death—the extinction of the human species. This is eventually inevitable, but it obviously hasn’t ensued from previous civilizational crises, and probably won’t do so this time around either. Very few people give this ultimate mortality any thought whatsoever.)

Personal mortality is harder to deny that societal or species mortality. It’s true that, when we’re young, we know theoretically that our lifespan will be limited, yet somehow that knowledge tends not to sink in. But then, as decades pass and as we see ourselves age, our parents die, and our friends disappear one by one, death gradually becomes a constant if unwelcome companion. If we’re practical, we make plans for old age and write a will. If not, we may persist in denial, living as though nothing will ever change. But even then, moments when denial is impossible become more frequent. And in those moments the awareness of mortality is an inescapable psychological burden. However happy, unhappy, fulfilled, unfulfilled, privileged, underprivileged, eventful, or boring our life is and has been, it is in any case fleeting. In a few years our personal window into the world will no longer exist.

If it is mostly older people who viscerally understand and grapple with mortality, it may also be the deeply mature who are more likely to contemplate societal decline. At environmental lectures it’s hard not to notice that the average age of audience members tends to be 50 and above. That’s not to say there are no young people who understand that our civilization is fragile and self-destructive. In fact, some of the most knowledgeable and dedicated environmental activists I know are in their twenties and thirties. Perhaps most in their age cohort are simply too busy just getting by to bother attending lectures.

Is there a natural tendency for old people to yearn for the good old days and to complain that the world is going to hell? Certainly it is possible to think of examples of the stereotype—from biblical prophets like Jeremiah to elderly contemporary environmental writers such as Paul Ehrlich. But the key authors of The Limits to Growth were in their twenties when the book was released, as was Bill McKibben when he penned his bombshell New Yorker articles about climate change, which became the bestselling book The End of Nature. And Paul Ehrlich was only 35 when The Population Bomb was published.

Further, in traditional societies the role of elders was not so much to foresee calamity as to offer guidance and encouragement to younger people, in return for which they earned respect. Perhaps it’s only in societies that are at risk of decline and collapse, and in which the traditional role of elders is largely unacknowledged and unfilled, that old codgers tend to turn prophetic.

It’s the end of the world but I feel . . . how?

Nevertheless, our relative personal age may tend to make us feel somewhat differently about the end of civilization.

Young people are naturally concerned with career, partnering, reproduction, and parenting. They are likely to regard information about dire environmental trends as a distraction from these genetically and socially driven interests. Their incentive for denial is strong. Optimism sells: it helps one get ahead in the job market and it’s attractive to potential mates. However, if denial is overcome for whatever reason, a young person is likely to feel that societal decline is something she or he will personally have to deal with. One response might be to engage in activism to counter trends leading toward collapse; another would be to spend time and effort developing skills that are likely to be useful in a society that is downsizing and simplifying.

Older people are naturally more concerned with personal maintenance (failing vision and hearing, failing joints, failing memory). They want to ensure that they have made some lasting contribution to community and extended family. Though there are plenty of elderly activists, on the whole the attitude of the aged toward societal decline tends to be more that of an observer: there is the belief that although the world is going to hell, I personally will be gone by the time that destination is reached. Nevertheless it’s my duty to tell everyone who will listen what I think is happening and why.

Often, when denial of societal decline is no longer tenable, young and old alike jump straight to cynicism. Here I am not referring the teachings of the ancient Cynic philosophers such as Diogenes, which had many good points, but to the modern meaning of the term—which refers to concern only with one’s own interests, and the belief that society is inherently corrupt and irredeemable. Cynicism offers some minimal psychological self-immunization to utter despair, but this comes at the expense of connection with others—which is an essential ongoing source of emotional vitality.

Those who get beyond denial and cynicism often arrive at an attitude of compassionate engagement. We may not be able to prevent collapse, but we can still make life better for ourselves and other potential survivors as events unfold. We can make our community more resilient, protect vulnerable people and other creatures, and devote ourselves to creating places and moments of beauty.

May we have a good death; civilization too.

We each wish to die painlessly and well, with dignity, with our faculties intact, and with loved ones close by. It often doesn’t work out that way. But there are things we can do to improve our odds, such as to eat carefully, exercise, and treat others with respect and generosity.

What would a good civilizational death look like? It would be relatively slow rather than sudden; the distance of the fall would be manageable (people would be able to adjust to the reduction in societal complexity); and the casualties would be few. In the best instance, the death of a civilization is merely the “release” phase of the adaptive cycle, clearing the way for new growth of more diverse, simpler human cultures.

Achieving a “good” civilizational death would entail minimizing damage to ecosystems and exhaustion of natural resources, so that human survivors would have the biophysical basis for recovery. It would also require minimizing human births prior to collapse so as both to conserve resources and reduce the sum total of human suffering during the decline and fall, since collapse always entails a reduction in carrying capacity.

Sadly, a good individual death is easier to achieve than a good civilizational death: personally, we have a wide range of behavioral choices, whereas great civilizations are denial machines that, at least in their latter stages of development, always reward excess and penalize modest sufficiency. Civilizations grow as big as they possibly can, given their energy sources, their technologies, and the available ecological bounty. And ours has grown the biggest of all as a result of having fossil fuels as energy supplies.

Nevertheless, our personal choices make a difference for ourselves and for those in widening circles around us, potentially expanding our survival and recovery options within a civilization whose overall trajectory toward dissolution is already set. By pursuing sufficiency in the face of excess, conservation of the natural world, and connection with others, we can have as good and meaningful a life as possible within a civilization that is both itself dying, and dealing death to creatures great and small.

These are not entirely new thoughts. Joanna Macy has for years sounded many of the themes explored above in her “Work that Reconnects.”

Carolyn Baker does the same in her book Collapsing Consciously: Transformative Truths for Turbulent Times. And The Dark Mountain Project pursues “uncivilization” as a collective creative project, having acknowledged that “It is . . . our civilisation’s turn to experience the inrush of the savage and the unseen; our turn to be brought up short by contact with untamed reality.” The effort to seek and provide hospice care for the inhabitants of a dying civilization is never likely to go viral on social media or spark a movement. But it makes as much sense as any other activity I can think of.

According to tradition, the Buddha’s awakening began with his realization that sickness, old age, and death are inevitable. Perhaps our own realization that civilization’s demise is just as certain can lead to still another level of awakening.

Here the metaphor may show its highest usefulness. Old age teaches us the preciousness of everything—friends, nature, and ordinary moments in ordinary days. Truly ancient people, aged 85 and above, often attain a level of happiness that belies their physical frailty.

Maybe a society that’s on the verge of collapse provides the perfect incubator for an experience of reassessment, reconnection, and renewal. Whatever time we have left is valuable beyond measure. Let’s make the most of it.

As Climate Changes, We Need the Arts More than Ever

Article originally posted at Ensia.

In tumultuous times, art can and must express the turmoil and help us process what’s going on.

What role might the arts play in response to climate change and related economic and ecological crises?

In the 1997 film “Titanic,” Wallace Hartley, the violinist and leader of the band on the ill-fated ship, turns to his band mates as the water rises around him and says: “Gentlemen, it has been a privilege playing with you tonight.” Is the only contribution musicians and other artists can make at this moment in history to bravely go down with the ship, lifting the spirits of fellow passengers? On its own terms that’s an honorable contribution, but surely we can do more.

It’s often said that a novel, a painting, a song or a motion picture changed the world. What that really means is, it changed how a lot of people thought or felt about the world.

Anthropologists and historians rightly argue that society’s major transformations have emerged not from the arts, but from our relationship to our environment — for example, our shift from hunting and gathering to agriculture, or from using firewood as our main energy source to using fossil fuels.

Nevertheless, artists’ efforts help shape the terms by which society adapts to such transformations and their consequences. And this can be a big deal. Think of how Beethoven marked the beginnings of modern democracy, the Romantic Movement in poetry and philosophy, and the nascent Industrial Revolution with music that shattered the aristocratic formalism of previous generations. Or how Hollywood writers and directors galvanized massive support for the U.S. war effort during the early 1940s.

Now think ahead.

We have embarked on a century in which the societal systems built since the start of the Industrial Revolution — our food system, our transport systems, our energy system, our built environment, our financial system, and possibly our political and governance systems as well — will prove unsustainable. All were designed during an era in which fossil fuels met the great bulk of our fast-growing energy demand. Cheap, abundant, and easy to store and transport, these fuels facilitated long-distance transportation, and hence centralized, globalized systems of production and distribution. Economic growth would probably never have become the organizing principle of politics and society if we had never started burning coal, oil and natural gas.

But fossil fuels are exhaustible resources, and their depletion will drive evermore desperate methods of extraction, create evermore environmental risk and require ever more capital — even as alternative energy sources also demand far more investment. The economic and political implications are barely fathomable.

Everything will be up for negotiation, redesign and change.Further, burning fossil fuels changes our planet’s climate. So, at the same time our economy will need to be redesigned to run on entirely different energy sources, the natural world will be shifting around us in unprecedented ways, with more frequent catastrophic storms, floods and droughts. Sea level will rise. Cities will be forced to move to higher ground. Whole populations will migrate toward the poles and inland.

And artists will have the opportunity and duty to translate the resulting tumultuous human experience into words, images, and music that help people not just to understand these events mentally, but also to come to grips with them viscerally.

The economic and environmental shifts described above are currently being detailed in ever-greater specificity in hundreds of reports released yearly by climate and energy experts — though in terms the average person struggles with. What’s missing in their carefully worded journal articles are the human dimensions of imagination, joy or sorrow, inspiration, and passion. No wonder so many of us simply deny their message or tune it out.

Art can help us cope with the implications of our collective challenges. It can help prepare society for a possibly traumatic future. It can give voice to suffering and loss, helping people deal with life’s inevitable stress. And it can also offer beauty, which can be especially important in hard times.

Of course, to be good, art has to succeed in terms of structure, skill, insight and originality. Bad art with a valid social message is still bad art, and it will take far more than just an increase in the number of climate change-themed TV series, movies, operas, dystopian novels, county-western songs, art installations, hip-hop verses, and performance pieces to show us the way. Artists will need to dig deeper, observe more closely and help their audiences connect abstract explanations and forecasts with concrete experiences.

As we move closer to what surely will be unprecedented ecological, economic and social disruption, meaningful art can and must express the turmoil we encounter and help us process it intellectually and emotionally.

In this sense, our need for truly great artists has never been keener.

Teaser photo credit: Photo by Khara Woods on Unsplash

EIA: U.S. Energy Abundance for Now— But Don’t Peek Behind That Curtain!

The Energy Information Administration (EIA) of the U.S. Department of Energy is about to release its Annual Energy Outlook (AEO) 2018, with forecasts for American oil, gas, and other forms of energy production through mid-century. As usual, energy journalists and policy makers will probably take the document as gospel.

That’s despite the fact that past AEO reports have regularly delivered forecasts that were seriously flawed, as the EIA itself has acknowledged. Further, there are analysts inside and outside the oil and gas industry who crunch the same data the EIA does, but arrive at very different conclusions.

The last few EIA reports have displayed stunning optimism regarding future U.S. shale gas and tight oil production, helping stoke the notion of U.S. “energy dominance.” No one doubts that fracking has unleashed a gusher of North American oil and gas on world markets in the past decade. But where we go from here is both crucial and controversial.

The most comprehensive critiques of past AEO forecasts have come from earth scientist David Hughes, a Fellow of Post Carbon Institute (note: I, too, am a Post Carbon Institute Fellow). Since 2013, Hughes and PCI have produced annual studies questioning EIA forecasts, based on an analysis of comprehensive play-level well production data. Their latest report, a critical look at AEO2017, is just out.

“Shale Reality Check: Drilling Into the U.S. Government’s Rosy Projections for Shale Gas & Tight Oil Production Through 2050” explores four big questions crucial to the realization of the EIA’s forecasts:

  1. How much of the industry’s recent per-well drilling productivity improvement is a result of better technology, and how much is due to high-grading the best-quality parts of individual plays? Over the past few years, industry has shown the ability to extract increased amounts of oil and/or gas from each well. This has been achieved in part by drilling longer horizontal laterals, tripling the amount of water and proppant (usually sand) used per unit of well length, and increasing the number of fracking stages. It is also in part a result of “high-grading,” or focusing drilling on the best-quality parts of each play (termed “sweet spots” or “core areas”). The decline in average well productivity observed in parts of some plays, despite the application of enhanced technology, suggests that sweet spots there are becoming saturated with wells. When this happens, drillers must either move to lower-quality rock outside of sweet spots, or drill wells too close together, which results in well interference or “frac hits” and reduced well production.
  2. Can technological advancement in the industry continue to raise productivity indefinitely? If, as the EIA suggests, improved technology will continue to increase well production, then perhaps per-well productivity can continue to grow for some time. However, based on the analysis of recent data, Hughes questions this (as does a team of MIT researchers). Well productivity is already declining in some plays, despite the application of enhanced technology, indicating that technology and high-grading have reached limits. Given uniform reservoir quality, improved technology allows the resource to be extracted more quickly with fewer wells, but it does not necessarily increase the overall amount of resource that can be recovered.
  3. What will be the ultimate cumulative production from all U.S. tight oil and shale gas wells? Taking the above points into account, Hughes concludes from a detailed analysis of production data that the EIA is making extremely optimistic assumptions about ultimate production and long-term production rates in most shale plays. Production over the long term is likely to be a fraction of what the EIA is forecasting.

 

  1. What about profitability? So far, overall, the industry has lost money on tight oil production, and shale gas has done little better. That’s even with most recent drilling being focused in core areas. The industry and its investors assume that if productivity continues to increase, and oil prices rise, profitability will eventually materialize. But what levels of oil and gas prices would be required to profitably extract fuels in the large non-core areas that the EIA assumes will eventually be tapped after “sweet spots” are drilled and exhausted? The AEO offers little in the way of realistic analysis on this point.

Let’s approach this subject another way. If you were an EIA analyst and you wanted to produce the most optimistic estimate possible of future U.S. oil and gas production, how might you go about it? You might do the following:

  • Mischaracterize the source of recent productivity improvements (assume it’s mostly technology, not high-grading);
  • Extrapolate recent well productivity improvements far into the future, even though evidence suggests this is unwise;
  • Assume that large areas that are not currently being drilled will be highly productive; and
  • Ignore price and profitability.

Check, check, check, and check.

Hughes figures, using EIA assumptions, that meeting the agency’s projections for shale gas and tight oil through 2050 for the 88 percent of production that would come from major plays would require drilling and fracking over 1 million wells at a cost of $5.7 trillion (the remaining 12 percent would require .68 million wells at a cost of $4.1 trillion). The EIA’s own estimate for all oil and gas (conventional, shale and offshore) is 1.3 million wells at a cost of $7.7 trillion. It would also consume countless billions of gallons of water and millions of tons of sand and chemicals. One might question the plausibility of this scale of expenditure of capital and physical resources. But even if the project were practically feasible, would it represent the best use of money in securing our energy future? And would the inevitable near- and long-term health and environmental impacts be somehow justified?

The EIA seems to assume that its audience consists of potential investors in struggling tight oil and shale gas companies, and that it speaks on behalf of those companies. That’s not the proper role of a government agency. Taxpayers who fund AEO reports deserve realistic estimates of future production, costs of production, and prices needed for profitable production. Otherwise, the agency’s pronouncements will continue to resemble those of the Wizard of Oz: Be amazed! Be awed! But pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

Heinberg



94 Comments on "Richard Heinberg: Old Age and Societal Decline"

  1. Duncan Idaho on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 2:33 pm 

    “The global industrial civilization that currently supplies us with everything that is necessary for life is coming apart—politically, socially, economically, and ecologically. Our leaders are incapable of acknowledging, much less reversing, industrial society’s progress toward oblivion.”

    Bingo! We have a winner—–

  2. makati1 on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 5:14 pm 

    “The reasons for individual decline and death have to do with genetics, disease, nutrition, and personal history (including accidents and habits such as smoking). We are all genetically programmed to age and die, though lifespans differ greatly.” (Reread that MM and think about it the next timer you assume I am falling apart. LOL)

    ALL oily stats are lies. How are they twisted??

    ” Mischaracterize the source of recent productivity improvements (assume it’s mostly technology, not high-grading);
    Extrapolate recent well productivity improvements far into the future, even though evidence suggests this is unwise;
    Assume that large areas that are not currently being drilled will be highly productive; and
    Ignore price and profitability.”

    BINGO on both counts! Excellent article!

  3. Sissyfuss on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 5:55 pm 

    Heiberg bemoans the fact that government agencies are shilling for shale companies and the like. It’s a corporatocracy, Richie. Go tell Potsie. You can’t tell anymore where the government ends and the corporation begins. The lobbyists do the majority of the work on bills that they are ruled by. Or use to rule with. The swamp is alive and well and spreading it’s fetid stench around the globe.

  4. Harquebus on Wed, 21st Feb 2018 7:12 pm 

    Continually increasing consumption in the face of diminishing resources can only have one outcome however, a collapse of modern industrial civilization does not have to mean a collapse of civil society if, we plan ahead. Unlikely so, desperate hungry mobs it is then.

  5. Kat C on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 3:47 am 

    Heinberg is one of the sanest voices about the future.
    Harquebus, you are right, collapse of industrial civ could go easier if we plan ahead. To do so would require first admitting that we have something to plan for. Since denial reigns, we of course won’t have to.
    But climate change may eclipse energy decline collapse. There are temperatures at which humans can’t survive and plants can’t grow. As the ice melts and the coastal methane clathrates with it, and as the melting permafrost gives up its CO2 and methane we enter into Permian extinction territory. Fracking accelerates our move towards that end by giving us more hydrocarbons to burn and leaking methane. The collapse of the fracking industry might buy us some more time to wait and see what nature has in store for us.

  6. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 7:22 am 

    “Heinberg is one of the sanest voices about the future.”

    I was impressed with Heinberg early on in my dooming and prepping but less so today. The reason is he is not completely honest about the potential for collapse. He is spreading an agenda of 100% renewable world that is likely a stretch. In any case this pushing of a renewable world will allow more integration of alternative energy into the energy mix giving the status quo more time. “More time?” I know some of you want the status quo to end to save the earth. It probably is too late to save the planet as we know it but are you ready to pull the plugs on billions? Should we have hope that humans will change and reduce their numbers with a lower ecological footprint? Surely we could do better but I doubt enough “better” to matter. So my idea is lifeboats and hospices of a strategy of mitigation and adaptation to decline and decay of our civilization. This is a collapse process and a paradigm shift from growth process of the last 10,000 years. This is essentially saying we are terminally ill but we have some time to live a normal life let’s make the best of it. Heinberg doesn’t want to go there. It alienates too many followers. I think it is more honest and he is less honest but that is the nature of being a celebrity and selling books and ideas in this modern world. Our prophets were once monk-like and lived on the edge of town in the wilderness now they are those who are wealthy and celebrities. If you tell the masses what they want to hear you can be a celebrity. Affluence has destroyed honesty.

  7. fmr-paultard on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:06 am 

    Professor Heisenberg is a supertard. I was the first to line up for his book party’s over. However he veered into doomerism and became illogical. Societies are made of people and people are made of DNA so its DNA.

    It’s a bit of DNA and nurture and religion
    there’re 1.6 billion Muslims so it’s religion

    the people who talk about dominant human forces are self ignorant. The only reasons tards are ahead of the rest because of unfair reward system for mental exercises. This is evident if we take away physical work and energy then nobody is better than others. It then become clubbing the next guy you see

  8. fmr-paultard on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:36 am 

    Oh joy the corruption level in Russia and China are off the roof.
    Remember this when tards try to recruit our supertards to spend life in Moscow and drink to death like Cambridge five

  9. Sissyfuss on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:42 am 

    Davy, I applaud you for your attempts at trying to find a rational path out of the predicament but how is that possible? A die-off is both necessary and inevitable and goes against everything we are taught from birth to present day. We are living Catch 22+1984×Soylent Green. As our fate becomes more transparent and less deniable we are at each other’s throats in mad attempts to give our rescue plans and to blame those who don’t get it. I have step-grandkids that I love dearly, that give me joy when I am with them and make me sad when I think about the future they are facing. Hope is more precious than gold in this era and like most precious metals grows ever more scarce. Keep fending off the haters as you provide for your children in these ominous times.

  10. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 10:22 am 

    Siss, temporal scale is the only difference between our outlooks. Since a year ago I am now optimistic for some more time. Yet, there is no guarantee just that the possibility is there where 2-3 years ago I saw immediate danger. It’s like an eye of a hurricane if it makes you feel more comfortable becuase hurricane eyes are not very optimistic. Neither of us like the BS in regards to the status quo but I am finding doomers are so invested in doom they many times avoid optimism. It’s hard to admit we are wrong. In our case the wrong is only temporary. The cornucopian view of the world is very flawed by habituation but we doomers have our own issues of ideology investment. I am trying to be balanced in this regards.

  11. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 10:36 am 

    “Keep fending off the haters as you provide for your children in these ominous times.”

    He calls those children his offspring, they don’t even live with him, and when they do come for a visit, he makes them sleep in a barn.

    That’s hardly what normal people would call providing for one’s children.

  12. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 10:44 am 

    “Our leaders are incapable of acknowledging, much less reversing, industrial society’s progress toward oblivion.”

    And that will continue to be the case, as long as we keep choosing psychopaths as leaders.

  13. fmr-paultard on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 11:18 am 

    I’m disappointed that supertard attacked me even though I was sock puppets by non hyphenated . I’m hyphenated fmr-paultard
    the eurotard was sloppy
    And now I lost faith in p*ssy grabber because he attacked Luke 22:36
    I’m a libtard. I like music and want women in combat as a form of empowerment. I took command from deceased Hitchens
    I only criticized permacutism because I observed practitioners of same craft disguised themselves using paper bags when shopping for industrial ag. Produce

  14. fmr-paultard on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 11:23 am 

    I’m taking temporary retirement because I could easily attack liberal democracy. It’s also easily to think wrong because it’s so easy to think. I’m also a lazy thinker
    Everything is stacked against me. This on top of no scoring.

    I’ll be back at some point

  15. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 11:38 am 

    “Since a year ago I am now optimistic for some more time.”

    That isn’t optimism Davy. That would be selfish denial. The longer this continues on, the worse the consequences will be for the future of your “offspring”.

  16. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 1:14 pm 

    Oh greggie, my kids are doing wonderful. They love their personal RV in a barn right next to my cabin. Your kids could only wish to be taken care of like mine. Their first two years I had the opportunity to spend lots of time with them. Who knows what a fruit cake like you did with his kids. You are just jealous you are such a lousy husband and dad.

  17. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 1:17 pm 

    Greggie, you don’t know what optimism is because you are consumed with hate. People like you can never know compassion for others. I feel sorry for your family and the warping you gave them. I guess that is why you are in therapy.

  18. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 1:25 pm 

    What are you talking about greggie? What does it matter about picking psychopaths when you are a psychopath? So many in the world today are just like you greggie dirty and disgusting people obsessed with hate and resentment. So many are stuck on themselves like you. What do you know about the subject slimy?

  19. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 1:28 pm 

    This is how you treat a Nationalist
    https://i.imgur.com/PVa60tN.gifv

  20. Duncan Idaho on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 2:18 pm 

    “This is how you treat a Nationalist”

    Great punch!

  21. Cloggie on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 2:30 pm 

    Great punch indeed.

    Pretty symbolic for what is in store for European-America, this cornered, demoralized demographic.

    https://youtu.be/RC-Cqkq6zWc

    Ah well, at least these whitey’s won’t be mobilized against Europe for a change.

    [insert vile Natzi-grin here]

    This btw is how you systematically beat-up armpit-stinking antifas:

    https://youtu.be/c8GVtXfATtI
    [0:30 ouch]

  22. Cloggie on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 2:59 pm 

    “And that will continue to be the case, as long as we keep choosing psychopaths as leaders.”

    They decide what you get to choose from.

  23. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 3:01 pm 

    “my kids are doing wonderful. They love their personal RV in a barn right next to my cabin.”

    You’re so messed up Davy, that you don’t even understand how completely dysfunctional that is.

  24. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 3:12 pm 

    “People like you can never know compassion for others.”

    Says the guy who supports and enables empire. Blood and oil. The blood of millions of innocent people, for the oil, which ultimately will lead to the blood of his own ‘offspring’.

    You’re one very sick individual Davy.

  25. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 3:24 pm 

    Greggie, you are in therapy. We know how messed up you are. This is board documented not your imaginary make-believe. Where you abusive to your family or something? I know you wanted to come down here to Missouri and find me. I assume to do some kind of harm but then a few days latter you wanted to ass fuck me. That is messed up greggie. Does your wife know you are a cheater?

  26. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 3:27 pm 

    Spare me the drama greggie. You are a fool talking about things you don’t understand. I support the truth when I can find it and it is not nearby you that is for sure. You are one warped individual that gives Canada a bad name.

  27. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 3:45 pm 

    “You are a fool talking about things you don’t understand.”

    Unlike you, I understand that murdering other people is wrong, buddy.

  28. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 4:07 pm 

    Greg

    Who says its wrong? You ? The bible? Who decides the rule book? See that is what you don’t understand about nature..In a world of finite resources life is a zero sum game.

  29. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 4:09 pm 

    Greg

    Society is only 9 meal away from Anarchy!

  30. Cloggie on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 4:38 pm 

    Society is only 9 meal away from Anarchy!

    You haven’t seen a meal for a week now, right?

  31. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 5:04 pm 

    Clogg

    “…some men aren’t looking for anything logical, like money. They can’t be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.”

    ― Michael Caine

  32. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 5:07 pm 

    Clogg

    I have my eyes set on Emma Watson when society collapses! She can be the beauty I will be the BEAST!

  33. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 5:08 pm 

    Sure greggie and that is why you support and enable billy 3rd world and his message of hate. I guess a 3AM wake up call to nuclear death is ok for you and billy. He actually delights in the thought and I think you do too.

  34. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 5:21 pm 

    Davy

    You nailed it..Greg and Madkat would love to see millions of US people die horribly. They are both just two crusty old boomers who want everyone to feel like them do..Miserly loves company…

  35. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 5:57 pm 

    “I guess a 3AM wake up call to nuclear death is ok for you and billy.”

    If the U.S. is unable to gain control over the psychopaths and warmongers in Washington DC, WW3 is a very distinct probability, and that war will very likely be fought on US soil. It is the idiots such as yourself Davy, the enablers, who are most responsible.

  36. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 6:28 pm 

    Greg

    Get the fuck out of here with that mad kat nonsense 3 am flashes..LOL If any country ever did that the would be nuked back into the stone ages…As they say “Don’t make me George Bush this button over nothing” LOL

  37. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 6:52 pm 

    Greggie, again confusing the discussion. This is about you and billy 3rd world rejoicing in an American Armageddon. It’s about personal attitudes of two sick individuals not the abstracts of the geopolitical.

  38. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 7:37 pm 

    “This is about you and billy 3rd world rejoicing in an American Armageddon.”

    To: Leaders and citizens of the world

    Re: Two minutes to midnight
    Date: January 25, 2018

    “In 2017, world leaders failed to respond effectively to the looming threats of nuclear war and climate change, making the world security situation
    more dangerous than it was a year ago—and as dangerous as it has been since World War II.”

    “In 2017, the United States backed away from its long- standing leadership role in the world, reducing its commitment to seek common ground and undermining the overall effort toward solving pressing global governance challenges. Neither allies nor adversaries have been able to reliably predict US actions—or understand when US pronouncements are real, and when they are mere rhetoric. International diplomacy has been reduced to name-calling, giving it a surrealistic sense of unreality that makes the world security situation ever more threatening.”

    “Because of the extraordinary danger of the current moment, the Science and Security Board today moves the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock 30 seconds closer to catastrophe.
    It is now two minutes to midnight—the closest the Clock has ever been to Doomsday, and as close as it was in 1953, at the height of the Cold War.”

    “In the past year, US allies have needed reassurance about American intentions more than ever. Instead, they have been forced to negotiate a thicket of conflicting policy
    statements from a US administration weakened in its cadre of foreign policy professionals, suffering from turnover in senior leadership, led by an undisciplined and disruptive president, and unable to develop, coordinate, and clearly communicate a coherent nuclear policy. This inconsistency constitutes a major challenge for deterrence, alliance management, and global stability. It has made the existing nuclear risks greater than necessary and added to their complexity.”

    An insufficient response to climate change.

    “Last year, the US government pursued unwise and inffectual policies on climate change, following through on a promise to derail past US climate policies. The Trump administration, which includes avowed climate denialists in top positions at the Environmental Protection Agency, the Interior Department, and other key agencies, has announced its plan to withdraw from the Paris Agreement. In its rush to dismantle rational climate and energy policy, the administration has ignored scienti c fact and well-founded economic analyses.”

    “These US government climate decisions transpired against a backdrop of worsening climate change and high-impact weather-relateddisasters. This year past, the Caribbean region and other parts of North America su ered a season of historic damage from exceedingly powerful hurricanes. Extreme heat waves occurred in Australia, South America, Asia, Europe, and California, with mounting evidence that heat- related illness and death are correspondingly increasing. The Arctic ice cap achieved its smallest-ever winter maximum in 2017, the third year in a row that this record has been broken. The United States has witnessed devastating wild res, likely exacerbated by extreme drought and subsequent heavy rains that spurred underbrush growth. When the data are assessed, 2017 is almost certain to continue the trend of exceptional global warmth: All the warmest years in the instrumental record, which extends back to the 1800s, have— excepting one year in the late 1990s—occurred in the 21st century. https://climate.nasa.gov/ news/2655/october-2017-was-the-second-warmest- october-on-record .

    https://thebulletin.org/sites/default/files/2018%20Doomsday%20Clock%20Statement.pdf

  39. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 7:43 pm 

    Davy

    You know what is weird is that I realize all the world is going to collapse. And there are many countries I don’t care too much for..But I dont wish death upon any other country..Madkat and Greg do though..Because it makes them feel like good people…

  40. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 7:46 pm 

    greggie, I guess you can’t get it through your head that we are talking personal attitudes. You and billy 3rd world delight in the thought of Americans like myself getting flash seared by an American Armageddon. Your anti-American hate is confusing your feeling. You two are sicko’s full of hate and contempt manifested by billy 3rd world statements like a “3am flash”. You constantly deflect this by references dealing with the issue on another level. That level you are not worthy of because this is about your personal agenda. You are incapable of dealing with these issues rationally and scientifically. You have no balance required of a logical discussion of these issues. This is about you and me dumbass. You want me to fry and that makes you sick.

  41. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 7:53 pm 

    No Davy,

    This is about all of humanity. A nuclear war isn’t in anybody’s best interests, and neither is a catastrophic runaway greenhouse event.

  42. Davy on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 7:59 pm 

    sorry greggie, you are confused. You act grandiose as if you are speaking for humanity. You are just a stupid worn out 50’s something guy who hates Americans. You have found an outlet here to manifest this hate. You use the concern for humanity as cover for your illness. This is about you and me and your daily hate mail towards me. You are a disgusting human being.

  43. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:06 pm 

    No need to apologize Davy, it’s obvious that you’re beyond help.

  44. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:12 pm 

    Greg

    You are scared of runaway greenhouse? LOL We are getting ready to run out of oil and collapse into total anarchy and you are worried about the weather from the world warming up by one freaking degree…LOL

  45. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:28 pm 

    “You are scared of runaway greenhouse?”

    The worst of catastrophic climate change is not likely to kick in until after I’m dead MM. My concerns are for my children, who are your age, all of humanity after that, as well as all life as we know it on the planet Earth.

  46. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:32 pm 

    Greg

    You are such a great humanitarian and noble citizen of earth! Koombaya my lord! koombaya! Barf!

  47. MASTERMIND on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:33 pm 

    Greg

    I know you want to stop the rising of the seas! LOL You fundamentalist preppers are so funny! The only thing you should be preparing for is diabetes!

  48. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:40 pm 

    “You are such a great humanitarian and noble citizen of earth!”

    Thanks MM!

  49. GregT on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:48 pm 

    “I know you want to stop the rising of the seas! LOL”

    It’s already too late for that MM.

    “You fundamentalist preppers are so funny!”

    I’m not a fundamentalist,and anybody who does not prepare for the future is an idiot.

    “The only thing you should be preparing for is diabetes”

    It doesn’t run in the family.

  50. Cloggie on Thu, 22nd Feb 2018 9:56 pm 

    There is no reason to assume that in the near future MAD will cease to exist, so forget about “3 a.m. flashes”.

    Run-away climate change is a theoretical possibility but by no means certain. Anecdotal “evidence”: I haven’t been scratching my window shield so many times like this winter for many years and the coldest days have yet to come.

    The American empire is over and Trump is acting on that insight. American exceptionalism will vanish and the American population will wake up in an ethnically very divided “nation”. Now that the US can’t have it all the country will need to “reinvent” itself. That “reinvention” will consist in the attempt of a considerable part of the white population to escape the fate of having to “drown demographically in the third world” and they will attempt to break away from Washington, the explicit goal of the so-called “alt-right”. The (((owners))) of the country of 100 years will try to prevent that. All the ingredients are there for a repetition of 1776, but this time on a massive scale:

    https://deepresource.wordpress.com/2014/11/25/the-second-american-revolution/

    And again continental Europe will make the difference and set (white) Americans free, this time not from the British, but from said owners. Because it is in European interest to get rid of the US overlord… by breaking it up.

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