Slow Motion Apocalypse More Real Than a Movie
Last year I watched the movie, “Leave the World Behind.” The plot is an apocalyptic scenario in which external threats and internal strife break down societal order. Starting with a tanker ship running aground on the beach, then building the story that everything we know, everything we depend on is hacked and out of kilter. The movie portrays the fear and confusion of a small group of people. It also frames the contemporary disaster within a broader context of the enduring moral reckoning around racism and poverty in the United States. In the end, no one saves the world and we are left knowing that, bit-by-bit, what we rely on and take for granted in our technologically advanced world will be gone. This simply leaves everyone fending for themselves while society as we know it collapses.
I had forgotten about the movie, until now. The movie is from a book. When a book becomes a movie, time frames must be shortened, characters reduced in number and plot lines simplified and condensed. The movie takes place over several days. The events of the last few weeks feel like “Leave the World Behind,” but instead of playing out in a few days, they are playing out over many years. These recent events are part of continuum that started long ago.
Everything I read, experience and research shows climate change is real. With the November election we are poised to ignore this reality. Read an overview of Project 2025 – the Republican policy paper Trump’s key advisors have endorsed – to understand that the United States of America may not face this reality and will, in fact, assure that it comes quicker, by giving even more power to fossil fuel companies and dismantling all progress on renewable energy.
The last few weeks have been categorized as the Early July Heat Event. A presentation at the July 17 Sonoma City Council meeting demonstrated how these heat events can kill people and how government must pivot and plan to protect us during these times. These events are becoming more frequent and longer each year because of climate change. This is our new normal.
On July 19, transportation, banking and hospitals shut down due to a software update that was badly designed and/or not thoroughly tested. A huge swath of life was shut down by one piece of software. We rely on and we worship technology, yet it imploded in a minute. A little-known computer program triggered an IT meltdown that took down digital infrastructure on a global scale.
I watched snippets of the Republican National convention, where Donald Trump’s running mate J.D. Vance extolled his grandmother having 19 handguns tucked away all over her home. I watched the strange performance of a retired wrestler ripping his shirt off while screaming about Trump mania.
Each of these performances should give us pause, make us think. As events like these become more and more frequent, I feel more and more like we are in an apocalyptic movie in slow motion.
Our culture has evolved into one that takes no responsibility for people and our planet, is swayed by bizarre spectacles like the RNC, and is addicted to and totally dependent on technology.
