[CitizensTruth] zooplankton

[Jay Becker]

What kind of society continues head long to destroy the environmental foundation on which it depends, with all the scientific knowledge and means to measure that very destruction? I think that's more the question to pose for ourselves. Every problem doesn't stem from capitalism but it's the defining barrier to our ability to solve them at this stage in history, and revolution will be the first step to enabling us to deal with this gigantic one!


>From a piece by Ray Lotta in Revolution newspaper a few years ago:


Capitalism cannot deal with the environment in a sustainable and economically rational way for three basic reasons:

      First,
its logic is “expand-or-die”: to cheapen cost and to expand in order to
wage the competitive battle and gain market share. And unplanned,
large-scale, globally-interconnected production poses grave threats to
the environment.

      Second, the horizons of capitalism tend
to be short term. They seek to maximize returns quickly. They don’t
think about the consequences in 10, 20, 30 years. We see that in the
U.S.—they build a nuclear power station because it looks profitable and
then, ten years later, they realize, uh-oh, their investment isn’t
paying off. And so then they spend more money to try to undo it, and
then go in for another big short-term gain somewhere else. 


      Third,
capitalist production is by its nature private. The economy is broken
up into competing units of capitalist control and ownership over the
means of production. And each unit is fundamentally concerned with
itself and its expansion and its profit. The economy, the constructed
and natural environment, and society cannot be dealt with as a social
whole under capitalism. It’s all fragmented into private parts. And
each part looks at what lies outside itself as a “free ride.” An
individual capitalist can open a steel mill and be concerned with the
cost of that steel mill. But what they do to the air is not “their
cost,” because it’s not part of their sphere of ownership. In
mainstream economic theory, this is called “externality.” 


      So
capitalism is incapable of addressing environmental issues outside its
framework of private ownership and production for profit, and its blind
logic of expansion. And on a world scale, we see the effects. But
socialism can address environmental issues in a sustainable, rational,
and socially just way: because ownership of the means of production is
socialized as expressed through the proletarian state and this makes it
possible to consciously plan development; and because economic
calculation is radically different.
Continues at http://revcom.us/a/052/lottaonevironment.html

Jay

    Stop thinking like an American, 
Start thinking about humanity!


--- On Thu, 6/4/09, Hal Snyder <hal at drxyzzy.org> wrote:

From: Hal Snyder <hal at drxyzzy.org>
Subject: [CitizensTruth] zooplankton
To: citizenstruth at six.pairlist.net
Date: Thursday, June 4, 2009, 9:36 AM

Ok, how do we feel about this? How does this rate on a scale of importance next to, say, AIG bonuses, torture, abortion, the Federal Reserve, Ron Paul, health care reform, or Barack Obama's birth certificate?
Fall in tiny animals a ‘disaster’
July 11th, 2008http://www.earthportal.org/news/?p=1385

BBC News: Experts on invertebrates have expressed “profound shock” over a government report showing a decline in zooplankton of more than 70% since the 1960s. “The disappearance of butterflies, moth, bees, riverflies and other small animals is an environmental tragedy.“But, despite this experience, we were profoundly shocked to read that zooplanktonabundance has declined by about 73% since 1960 and about 50% since 1990.

Top of the Food Chainhttp://www.postcarbon.org/top_food_chain
We need to understand that these are food for crustaceans and fish, which are food for sea birds and mammals. We need to appreciate the importance of the oceanic food web in the planetary biosphere.
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