Consume, consume, consume. Forget the fact that the world is so full of stuff that it is coming close to being stuffed and consume some more. Here have $900, be patriotic and buy Australian made. Or if you can’t do that go down to your local DFO and by direct from Asia’s sweatshops.

If you are as stressed as me about all these messages coming at you from all directions and need to know there are people thinking differently about this stuff check out this website – mannafromkevin.wordpress.com. It contains quotes like: –   

His gut tells him that what we need are not policies to reinforce our destructive habits, but communities animated by hope, able to imagine an alternative future. Communities who remind each other not to put blind faith in any human-made economic system. Communities who remember that the only ‘real’ economy is the earth, to which we must pay the greatest respect.

However the purpose of the $900 cash hand out is simply this: shop ‘til you drop. It is yet another development of the disturbing idea that a citizen’s duty is to consume. It says that even though the current crisis is a manifestation of our collective greed, and even though this greed is killing the planet and creating poverty, we are determined to do more of the same.

His addiction to the pokies had seen him blow his entire pension cheque at the casino — again. He would speak of how he had told himself just the night before that this time he wouldn’t do it. But the human capacity for self-delusion is immense. His denial of the odds led him to believe that this time it would all be different. Such is our problem with climate change. We are addicted to the very things that accelerate global warming. We know the problems but remain in denial about what it is going to require of us to fix them. Like an addict who thinks they can control their addiction or stop any time they like, we cling to the train as it hurtles towards the abyss.