Eco Anxiety and what to do about it

Today's Costing the Earth on Radio 4 looked at a growing phenomenon: 

Eco Anxiety

Costing the Earth

Is the future of the planet making you depressed? Do you feel paralysed, unable to imagine the happiness of future generations? 

As global governments fail to respond to the existential crisis of climate change it’s understandable that some people seem unable to conjure up a sense of hope, understandable that dozens of young British women have joined the Birthstrike movement, refusing to bring more children into the world. 

Verity Sharp meets the eco-anxious and asks if they are ill or simply more perceptive than the rest of us.

BBC Radio 4 - Costing the Earth, Eco Anxiety

As a mental health condition, it is gaining ground:
Radio 1 & 1Xtra Stories - Me & My Eco Anxiety - BBC Sounds
Eco-anxiety: Do you have climate change anxiety? What is the mental health condition and how to deal with it | London Evening Standard

With this recent piece from BBC Three:

'Eco-anxiety': how to spot it and what to do about it

Feeling overwhelmed by the existential challenge of climate change? You’re not alone

Dave Fawbert

27 March 2019

The headlines detailing extreme weather events seem to come at you day after day. Your social feed - and just stepping outside - alerts you to record temperatures being set. And yet, still, some people in positions of power deny its full impact.

Meanwhile, an academic paper on climate change - that is so grim it apparently resulted in people going to therapy - has gone viral, with some reports suggesting it has been downloaded more than 110,000 times.

In the words of the 16-year-old Swedish climate change activist Greta Thunberg, who founded the school strike for climate movement in 2018: “Adults keep saying, we owe it to the young people to give them hope. But I don’t want your hope, I don’t want you to be hopeful, I want you to panic.”

Climate change: Are you suffering from ‘eco-anxiety’? - BBC Three

Do we learn to live with it - and act on it - or do we try to 'cure' this condition? 

Here are some thoughts:
Eco-Anxiety Isn’t New, and It’s Time to Deal with It
How to cure the eco-anxious | Wellcome Collection
Amazing Tips To Deal With Eco-Anxiety
Climate change: are you suffering from eco-anxiety, what is it, and how can we feel less stressed about environmental damage. 

And here are a few more:

Have Anxiety About The Future Of Our Planet? Here's How To Cope

By Meg Lazaros

2 May 2019

There's a term for what I (and many others) feel: "Eco-anxiety" is described as worry, depression, or anxiety that is triggered by an awareness of the environmental woes we face. According to a recent poll, nearly three-quarters of millennials experience it to some degree after reading or listening to the news. And hot damn, for those who feel it, we can tell you it is real. Like real, real. Like sit-on-the-couch-and-wallow-about-the-impending-doom real. The International Psychoanalytical Association has officially recognized climate change as "the biggest global health threat of the 21st century."

The good news? There are ways to combat these feelings other than having a good cry or screaming at the top of your lungs (which, for the record, can be satisfying sometimes too). Here are a few that I've found helpful...

Eco-Anxiety: How To Turn Fear Into Action

Meanwhile, in dystopia-land:

Futures Forum: Utopia/Dystopia: looking forward to the end of the world

Futures Forum: 'Utopia for Realists' >>> Don't Despair: Big Ideas Can Still Change The World

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Climate change: "We're trying to be greener - so don't patronise us"

A couple of weeks ago, Tom Heap, of Radio 4's Costing the Earth and BBC One's Countryfile, got a lot of flack for saying we can't lecture people on their lifestyles:
Futures Forum: Climate change: "only large-scale technological, financial and political change will make any difference"

In a very similar vein, the i-newspaper republished this piece from Janet Street Porter writing in the Independent, entitled "We're trying to be greener - so don't patronise us": 

Share power tools to fight climate change? This is a laughable government attempt to ignore our capitalist reality

If Ineos can sponsor a cycling team, and L’Oreal can teach kids about packaging waste, is it any wonder our compass is awry?

Janet Street-Porter
Friday 3 May 2019 18:02
13 comments

As I sat on a train to Yorkshire yesterday, water was being handed out in small plastic bottles and hot drinks were sold in plastic cups. I want to do the best I can for the environment and the next generation, but it means devoting a lot more time to making the right decisions. Train journeys –good. On-board catering, maybe not so good.

First class passengers get real mugs to drink out of, but other passengers would need to bring their own. Leaving the train, I got in my car (diesel, bought when that was the recommended option, but now demonised) and drove through gorgeous green lanes around Bedale, to discover the area was lined with plastic traffic cones and festooned with ugly signage as people in plastic hi-vis jackets were closing off streets and marshalling pedestrians.

This weekend it’s the much-hyped Tour de Yorkshire during which hundreds of miles of recently repaired roads will be closed to traffic for a popular cycling race in which the leading team has accepted cash from a company determined to extract shale gas – in Yorkshire!

Team Sky is now Team Ineos, funded by a business holding 21 licences to frack in some of the most beautiful parts of the country. Isn’t this somewhat at odds with a sport like cycling, which fans say is eco-friendly and good for health? Sponsorship remains a very good way for business to "greenwash" their credentials.

Local businesses and councillors are 100 per cent behind the Tour – they argue it attracts thousands of visitors, promotes tourists and brings much-needed revenue to rural areas. But at what cost? Is it OK to welcome Ineos and their star rider Chris Froome?

Hundreds of vociferous demonstrators disagree. There are tough decisions to be made if we want to be eco-friendly, and I see few signs that the people in Westminster and local government have the balls to make them. Tobacco companies are banned from sports sponsorship, but are there double standards at work when it comes to tourism?

And what about the same councils regularly choosing to build poor quality new homes on greenfield sites? According to former environment secretary Lord Deben, Britain needs to stop building “crap houses”.

We certainly don’t need a bunch of government advisors from the Committee for Climate Change telling us that Britain is facing a “climate change emergency” –as Mark Steel pointed out yesterday. The Extinction Rebellion demonstrations drew attention to something ordinary people have been concerned about for ages, before ministers queued up to be photographed with Greta Thunberg.

The public already pick up litter in their free time, recycle to the best of their ability, put solar panels on their roofs, and have turned down their heating –mainly because they can’t afford the cost of any kind of energy, green or dirty. According to a Sky News poll, more than half the country rejects the climate change committee’s main recommendations.

Watch more
Climate activists describe Gove meeting as 'less s*** than expected'
Extinction Rebellion did all it could and more – but is it enough?
Extinction Rebellion has proven climate bores entirely wrong
Veganism won’t make a dent in the fight against climate change
Parliament has declared a ‘climate emergency’. Now what?

Being told to switch to a “low-carbon diet” is unbelievably patronising. More of us are eating less meat, but when we visit supermarkets we discover tons of unnecessary packaging, stores that are over-lit and over-heated and confusing recycling labelling on 90 per cent of the products on sale.

We can’t trust businesses to tell us how to save the environment – a cosmetics company like L’Oreal (which puts face creams, shampoo and cosmetics in plastic containers) has the bare-faced cheek to sponsor a new educational initiative to teach school children about recycling – a blatant example of greenwashing.

A series of government-approved targets for electric cars, and renewable energy sources for heating our homes are all very well, but telling us to fly less, share power tools with our neighbours and not buy cheap “fast fashion” is laughable.

There’s a basic contradiction at the heart of these official directives to move to a “greener” life-style. To be truly “green”, you need to be thrifty, to recycle, upcycle and purchase the bare minimum. Self-sufficiency is the holy grail. Unfortunately we live in a capitalist society, which is based on a healthy economy with continued growth. Businesses employing people and selling stuff to us continually. That stuff might be “green” but at the end of the day, it’s still a lot more stuff than we actually need.

Built-in obsolescence means that we can’t repair most household gadgets, from toasters to mixers to the power hose or that electric drill the government wants us to share with the people next door. We can only grow vegetables using compost in plastic bags – and the small plants we’ll buy from garden centres this weekend are in plastic pots. All our fruit and salad greens are grown in polytunnels and heated greenhouses covering vast swathes of rural Britain that were once fields. The government would like us to cover more of these fields with solar panels, where sheep and cows (now demonised like my diesel car) once grazed and emitted evil methane gas.

If we all became truly green, didn’t buy any clothes for a year, dug up our gardens and grew all our vegetables, shared our washing machines and didn’t replace our cars, what would happen? John Lewis would go bust. The local high street would be derelict. And Britain would probably go into recession with high unemployment.

If, on the other hand, local councils and the London Mayor took a few tough decisions to radically deal with pollution – banning lorries from daytime deliveries perhaps, or funding free public transport for all in central areas – air quality in our major cities would improve, and young people wouldn’t be dying from fatal asthma attacks.

Ordinary people understand all too well how to live a greener life. It’s the people we vote into power who lack the guts to bring about real – as opposed to cosmetic – change.

Share power tools to fight climate change? This is a laughable government attempt to ignore our capitalist reality | The Independent
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A solution to our housing problems: self-build, modular and community

Tonight saw the last episode of Grand Designs: The Street:
Grand Designs: The Street - All 4
Q&A with Kevin McCloud on Grand Designs: The Street - Grand Designs Magazine

There's been a lot of interest:
Grand Designs The Street: Do couple end up homeless in finale of 2019 show? | Express.co.uk
Definite heartbreak and financial ruin: is the dream of a Grand Designs self build really worth it?  | Daily Mail Online
Grand Designs: The Street six-part series ends with a challenging £280k Modular House — built in a factory in nine weeks and assembled on site | Homes and Property

Here's The Sun's take at the beginning of the series: 

COUNTRY STYLES 

Life on Grand Designs street where 10 families have built their own homes in £100k plot on ex-MoD land in UK first

The pioneering community spent between £60,000-£500,000 on their charismatic builds in a UK first

By Hana Carter
4th April 2019

NESTLED among trees and Oxfordshire greenery is a cluster of very unique homes, all built from scratch by a tiny community of creative self-builders. After a plot of ex-MoD land was put up for sale, ten families bought their own slice of the 188-acres for £100,000 to design their very own stunning build. Every single home is completely different on the brand new street with each one made from different materials and seemingly inspired by various eras and tastes.

The little community near Bicester Village, Oxfordshire will be Britain's largest self-build project, all starting and finishing at the same time. With each patch being sold by Cherwell District Council and they invited buyers to be as ambitious as they pleased when it came to deciding on how they were going to build their dream home. And they did just that, in fact, the residents of Graven Hill were so innovative that Channel 4's Grand Designs will be featuring them on tonight's episode.

Kevin McCloud, who visited a self-built town in Amsterdam in 2010 had been looking for a British counterpart ever since, so was elated when he discovered the commuter town adjacent to the A41. He said that constructing your own house means "you get a highly bespoke home that's suited to your needs and reflects who you are."

The homeowners on the street vary from age 24 to 72 and each spent between £60,000-£500,000 to build their stunning properties.

Lynn, 65, who originally lived in an 18th-century cottage in Northamptonshire, said she decided to apply for the scheme with her neighbours, Terry and Olwen. All three of them got their homes accepted and retired school teacher Lynn got to work on her clay tiled house. Her property is made from Siberian larch with an oast house-inspired roundel. Light spills into the rooms which are spacious and bright.

She told The Daily Telegraph: "Every day, I come down and can't stop smiling that this is where I live. I've wanted to build a forever home before someone puts me in one."

With rolling fields, nature all around and a safe community, what better place to bring up a child and for Blanka and Paul that couldn't be more true. They live in their eco home with their two kids, which worked out to be the cheapest on the street.

Prior to the build, they were renting a cottage nearby. If they were to buy something similar it would have cost them £700,000 - something the couple didn't want to part with. So they whimsically decided to build one themselves with a budget of just £60,000.

Paul, a human rights lawyer, said: "I just thought, 'how hard can it be to build a house?'"

Their home is built using Hempcrete, a biocomposite made from hemp hurds and lime - an environmentally friendly and cheap material. The couple ended up spending £300,000 on their home after admitting that they had massively under-budgeted. But their home was completed after Paul took a few courses and watched a load of YouTube tutorials.

In the next decade the spot of land is expected to house up to 1,900 homes which will all be variations on a short list of home blueprints.

Graven Hill managing director Karen Curtin said: "The opportunity to showcase the first 10 self-builders at Graven Hill on the national stage is a milestone not only for the development and its community but also for the future of UK house building. The series will give viewers an insight into a bold and unique type of housing project, which has the potential to revolutionise the way that people approach both choosing – or building – a new home, and the environmental challenges the UK currently faces."

It will also have a new primary school, village centre, supermarket, village green, pub and maybe even a gym. All the residents at Graven Hill are friends and have a tight-knit community and for Paul, his advice to those wanting to turn their hand to building is - "just go for it."

Grand Designs: The Street will air tonight at 9pm. 

Life on Grand Designs street where 10 families have built their own homes in £100k plot on ex-MoD land in UK first
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Living a low carbon life

Today's Observer considers the practicalities of living on less carbon - and interviews three people trying to do just that:

Could you live a low carbon life? Meet the people who already are

There are things we can all do to lower our impact on the environment. We speak to three people who have taken the first steps

Donna Ferguson

Sat 4 May 2019 21.10 BST

Some want a clear conscience. Others want to see if they are up to the challenge. But none of them want to wait until 2050 to cut their carbon emissions down to near-zero.

Across the country, environmentalists of all ages – from seven to 75 – are taking action now to lead low-carbon lives.

Last week, the government’s official advisory body, the Committee on Climate Change, recommended that the UK set a legally binding target to cut greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050.

The committee’s report acknowledged that cutting emissions to zero would be challenging and spell the end of petrol and diesel cars, as well as gas boilers. To achieve this target, people will have to fly less, waste less and eat less meat.

But many people are already living like this, and some are even doing so in eco “superhomes” – houses which have been adapted to achieve a 60% or more reduction in carbon usage. The Observer spoke to three residents to find out how they have adapted their homes and their lives to reduce carbon emissions.

Harriet Martin, 75, Bournville, Birmingham

“My husband Chris and I are Quakers. Eleven years ago, we downsized to a semi-detached house in Bournville. To make our new home energy efficient, we insulated as much as we could – even under the floorboards. We installed double glazing and put solar panels on a pergola in the garden. In total, we’ve reduced our home’s carbon emissions by 85%. We open the house to show people what we’ve done.

Our diet is now 60% to 70% vegan, and the remainder vegetarian. We grow a lot of our fruit and vegetables on our allotment. We eat seasonally and I bake my own bread.

Even though we own a car, we rarely drive and try to walk as much as we can or take the bus. We avoid flying, preferring to travel by train.

We mend our clothes and furniture. When I feel I need to buy something, I try to get it from a charity shop, borrow it from a neighbour or ask for it on Freecycle or Freegle, where people advertise things they want to get rid of.

We bank with Triodos Bank. It costs us a few pounds each month, but it means we know our money will be used for ethical and sustainable purposes, not fossil fuel exploration or companies.

I feel guilty about what people of my generation have done. I don’t want to leave behind a damaged world for my four grandchildren. But I think what really drove me to make changes was wanting to see just how sustainable we could make our lives now. It has been an enjoyable challenge, educating myself and adapting my lifestyle. It’s fun.”

Zoë Williams, 42, Faringdon, Oxfordshire

“I’m disabled and live with my parents Pat, 66, and John, 71, in a 1958 bungalow. We’ve done the obvious things like changing our boiler, adding insulation and installing solar panels but we’ve also taken some more unusual steps to lower our carbon emissions. For example, we’ve converted a chest freezer into a fridge, using a gadget that cuts the power once it reaches a certain temperature. The cold air doesn’t fall out like it did with our previous front-opening fridge, so it uses half the electricity.

We charge our electric car with our solar panels and, on sunny days, we use a ‘sun oven’ to cook outside – it uses mirrors to concentrate the heat and it’s a real joy, eating a meal or cake baked with just sunshine. We also use a method called haybox cooking to cook inside: bringing a soup to boil and then putting it in an insulated box for an hour or two. It carries on cooking in its own heat, saving fuel.

The waste water from our sink drains into our toilet cistern, so we reuse the water the next time we flush the toilet.

All our vegetables are seasonal, grown either in our garden or on a local organic farm. My meals are 80% vegan, and 20% vegetarian. Vegan food is delicious – it’s a cuisine.

I try to reuse and repair my belongings. I use the money I save to spend more on products I do buy. My clothes are either secondhand or organic. I have aFairphone – it’s designed so that the individual parts can be easily replaced when they break. I don’t buy wrapping paper, I reuse an old duvet cover I cut up into squares.

In total, we’ve reduced our home’s carbon emissions by 93%. I’ve enjoyed making all these changes – they’ve been fun – and I feel part of a big movement. I want to be able to say to the next generation: I tried to prevent runaway climate change. If I didn’t, I would feel I was committing a wrong.”

Jürgen Huber, 49, Shepherd’s Bush, London

“My wife and I have two kids: Anouk, 12 and Laurie, seven. We used to live on a boat. Ten years ago, we moved into a freezing cold 1920s terraced house in Shepherd’s Bush. Straightaway, we started converting it – I did a lot of the work myself. I insulated it and added energy efficient windows, electric underfloor heating and an air-source heat pump.

I also installed solar panels and a battery bank. This provides most of the energy our family needs all year round. We increased our energy efficiency by nearly 70%. I reckon we must be saving £1,000 a year on our energy bills.

We buy organic food from Lidl, grow our own fruit using harvested rainwater and have cut down the amount of meat and dairy we eat, saving us about £60 a month. Our kids love vegetables and vegetarian meals, because they’ve always had them. Our favourite family meal is pea soup.

We all enjoy shopping in second-hand clothes shops and getting bargains for £2, but the children do shop at Primark too, and will sometimes eat at McDonald’s and buy plastic toys or electric gadgets. We don’t try to restrict them. We just try to recycle and repair, and promote a green lifestyle. They do get a bit fed up of me preaching about renewable energy, but at the same time, I know they feel very strongly about climate catastrophe.

I’m not just doing this for my kids and my community. I’m also doing it for myself. I want to be able to say, in the future: I have not taken part in the destruction of this planet. I can’t make a massive difference alone. But I can help a little and that’s what I’m doing. So when there are water shortages one day and floods the next, storms, heatwaves and bug infestations, when we are living in a horror movie in 10 or 20 years time, I will have a clear conscience.”

Could you live a low carbon life? Meet the people who already are | UK news | The Guardian
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Sidmouth Sea Fest > Saturday 18th May

The Sea Fest will be with us very soon:

Sidmouth Sea Fest - Home | Facebook




Sidmouth Sea Fest – Sidmouth Coastal Community Hub CIC
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Social prescribing > gardening rather than drugs

"Social prescribing is a way of linking patients in primary care with sources of support within the community to help improve their health and well-being."
Social prescribing: less rhetoric and more reality. A systematic review of the evidence | BMJ Open
NHS England » Social prescribing
Home | The Social Prescribing Network

Health, in other words, is a social issue.

It can involve getting us to move a bit more:
Futures Forum: Active by Design Summit: Sustrans "discuss the massive gains that can come from increasing physical activity levels in cities."

It can be about better design of our environment:
Futures Forum: Landscaping for Health

It can mean getting some fresh air in nature:
Futures Forum: Hug a tree > it's good for you
Futures Forum: "Green care"  >>> nature-based interventions for mental health care
Futures Forum: Take a walk: it's good for you!

It can be about learning to cope:
Futures Forum: Resilience and Salutogenesis: "Environment, health and resilient cities: what constitutes salutogenic environments?"

It should be all about community:
Futures Forum: 'Down to Earth': using sustainability to improve people’s mental health

It could be about a spot of gardening: 

‘My doctor prescribed me gardening rather than drugs. It has made a big difference to my mental health’

Karen Litton had been suffering with depression for eight years when she was introduced to garden allotments next to Vale Community Hospital

Paul Gallagher

Friday March 29th 2019

Karen Litton had been suffering with depression for the last eight years when a friend introduced her to the garden allotments next to Vale Community Hospital in Dursley, Gloucestershire.

The area was a wasteland until Down to Earth, a local not-for-profit organisation that supports people in growing and harvesting their own fruit and vegetables, teamed up with local doctors to introduce a social prescribing scheme that allows patients to tend their own allotment – instead of receiving medication.

“My friend was prescribed an allotment herself and told me how good it was for her,” says Karen. “I then saw my GP and asked for a referral. It’s very good for me because I suffer with depression, which can be quite isolative, whereas here I feel part of a group, I meet lots of new people.”

The allotment is also somewhere Karen, 53, can bring Hope, her seven-year old Yorkshire Terrier poking her head out from Karen’s jacket where she enjoys sheltering to stave off the rather cold and windy weather on the day i visits the gardens.

“I’ve put in broad beans, leeks and garlic – and also have rhubarb that came with the allotment. Being here also helps build my knowledge of weeds and plants and flowers, not that I remember them all the time! There’s so much to learn. I’ve been doing it for a couple of months so I’m beginning to get to know people’s names and building a group of friendship really.”

Non-medical treatments

Social prescribing – non-medical treatments which have health benefits – forms a key part of the NHS long term plan, launched in January by Theresa May and NHS England chief executive Simon Stevens. Within five years over 2.5 million more people will benefit from social prescribing according to the plan, which promises over 1,000 trained social prescribing link workers will be in place by the end of 2020/21. Health Secretary Matt Hancock has said he wants the “balance shifted” from drugs to social activities to improve the nation’s health.

Down to Earth founder Amanda Godber spent three years leading the £25,000 Dursley project – from the design to the funding, which is almost entirely charitable rather than from NHS budgets – through to its recent launch. Of the 51 raised beds, each measuring 16 feet by 4 feet, five are currently used by patients with plans to increase that figure to 15. The only thing that is banned are potatoes – and trees. Amanda has already spotted on this morning. “That’ll have to come out,” she says.

“One of the reasons shy it works so well is that it’s become an extension of someone’s garden, which is really good. When people think about it as a garden – that’s a lovely place to be.”Dr Simon Opher, of the Walnut Tree Practice in

Dr Simon Opher, from The May Lane Surgery, in Dursley, has worked on the project in conjunction with Down to Earth since the outset and is delighted with the results. As well as growing cabbages, cauliflowers, leaks, or almost anything they fancy, patients can make a cup of tea, chat and bond with other people. Most patients using them are over 50 with some around the age of 30. They tend to visit up to three times a week.

“It’s not actually a therapy, it’s getting people to do different things,” Dr Opher says. “It’s trying to demedicalise what we’re doing. I think it’s generally true that we’ve all got a bit too medicalised, so if you’re a bit isolated you tend to go to your doctor rather than talk to your neighbour – then the doctor medicalises you by potentially giving you tablets. This was a different response to that. It’s not saying that medicine doesn’t have a place, it’s saying that sometimes you can look to do different things to make people better as well.”

There are several factors behind the increasing number of people who say they are socially isolated, he says, including a reliance on cars, the “slight breakdown” of local communities, and the way organised religion has stopped attracting quite so many people to weekly gatherings.

“This is a way of getting people back together and doing something positive. One thing about the allotments is that they don’t do any harm – you can’t get any side effects! Well, apart from getting a bit chilly,” Dr Opher laughs.

Changes to diet

An evaluation of the Dursley project found that not only did patients enjoy being prescribed an allotment to care for, but that it also made them think more about their diet. “That was an interesting outcome, because if you start growing your own food you start saying ‘this is really fresh and it tastes better’, it promotes a more healthy eating,” Dr Opher says.

The only downside seems to be the finite number of people who can prescribed an allotment. “If it gets really popular we might be in trouble,” he adds.

Social prescribing is for anyone with a physical or mental health diagnosis. A patient is prescribed an allotment for up to a year. If they want to keep it on longer there’s a nominal charge of £11 per year to keep going – or hand it back for someone else to enjoy.

“I think it’s about people missing that link with nature as well,” says Amanda. “About being outside in the fresh air with a group of people who have similar interests. It’s a really good move from the government by encouraging it, otherwise we go and get medication which doesn’t need medicalising. It’s good to have a reason to get up and go out the door.”

Karen says she has noticed the benefits to her mental health already. “When I’m down here, I forget about my worries. I can be part of a group, talking to people. People who just accept you for what you are rather than what diagnosis you have. That’s really important.

“If I didn’t do this I might not be doing anything on a Thursday, maybe not even leave the house.”

'My doctor prescribed me gardening rather than drugs. It has made a big difference to my mental health' - inews.co.uk
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Out of Office > the future of work @ Radio 4

Do you get the feeling that you're in the wrong job? 

This is a piece from this blog from last August:  

The Wrong Job: the postwork civilization is a giant fraud 

This blog occasionally looks at the issues around 'work':

What's the point of work?
Why Work? | James Livingston
Futures Forum: Why work?

Why not be idle?
BBC Radio 4 - Archive on 4, Embracing Idleness, Idleness: relaxation or subversion?
Futures Forum: In Praise of Idleness: working less could actually be better for everyone.

It's better for us:
The Abolition of Work--Bob Black
'How to Be Idle': Being and Do-Nothingness - The New York Times
Futures Forum: Saint Monday: in defence of skiving

And the Hadza of the Kalihari should know:

Play Makes Us Human V: Why Hunter-Gatherers' Work is Play | Psychology Today
Futures Forum: In Praise of Idleness: "If Hadza nomads get by on 14 hours’ work a week, why can’t we?"
Futures Forum: On the Transition: "Future Primitive"



How about a 'post-capitalist utopia'?
Capitalism Will Abolish Laundry Day - Foundation for Economic Education
Fully Automated Luxury Communism! - YouTube
Futures Forum: The future of work: "Capitalism will abolish laundry day" >>> or: "Fully Automated Luxury Communism"

Or 'money for nothing'?
BBC Radio 4 - In Business, Kenya's Basic Income Experiment
Futures Forum: Universal Basic Income @ Radio 4's In Business

Because the current situation is hell:
Open plan offices 'killing' communication. Should we bring back cubicles? - inews
Futures Forum: Open-plan offices are killing face-to-face communication.

And people are revolting:
Video: the welcome, belated backlash to the open-plan office | FT Alphaville
Futures Forum: Knowle relocation project: Open-plan offices have been found to reduce productivity and impair memory. They’re associated with high staff turnover. They make people sick, hostile, unmotivated, and insecure.

Futures Forum: The Wrong Job: the postwork civilization is a giant fraud

"Out of Office", Radio 4's new series on the future of work, starts with an interview with David Graeber, author of "Bullshit Jobs" - a look at how disengaged we are from the world of work:

Episode 1

Out of Office

What do we want from work? Millions of people are now reinventing their working lives. Ruth Barnes presents the first in a new series exploring the changing world of work.

There are now five million self-employed people in the UK, it’s the fastest-growing group of workers. Sometimes it's a case of "needs must" as conventional industries collapse - but the evidence suggests that most are doing it because they want to, they see themselves as breaking free.

The internet is full of inspirational talks from the late Steve Jobs and others, exhorting us to take risks, set out on our own, make our fortune. But with the average freelancer earning only £240 a week - about half the earnings of the average employee - what is the price of freedom?

In this first programme, Breaking Free, Ruth hears from people who have reinvented their working lives, becoming taxi drivers, brewers or cleaners. She talks to David Graeber, an anthropology professor who tapped into something really big when he published his book Bullshit Jobs.

Ruth Barnes spent ten years as a producer and presenter at the BBC, covering music and culture across the national radio. She’s written and presented music documentaries for Radio 4, reported live from the Glastonbury Festival for BBC Radio 5 Live and the red carpet at the Cannes Film Festival for BBC Radio 2. In 2006, Ruth started her own online radio show The Other Woman, to showcase new music from female artists. She is three years into running her own podcast production company Chalk & Blade, an independent start-up based in East London.

Producers: Susan Marling and Elizabeth Burke
A Just Radio production for BBC Radio 4

BBC Radio 4 - Out of Office, Episode 1







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"A city is not a park" @ Radio 3 > "What would change, psychologically, socially, emotionally, if we covered the concrete and brickwork of our towns and cities with vines, plants and vertical gardens?"

Putting a bit of green up some ugly concrete is known as covering something up:
Futures Forum: Knowle relocation project: greening the grey >>> "Is the trend for foliage on buildings a fig leaf for poor design?"

However, 'greening the grey' might be quite effective - on many levels:
Futures Forum: Vertical forests... vertical gardens...

As explored on this evening's 'the Essay' on Radio 3: 

A City Is not a Park

The Essay

Des Fitzgerald tracks the relationship between the modern city and its green environs. Drawing together psychological research with urban history and literature it asks: what would change, psychologically, socially, emotionally, if we covered the concrete and brickwork of our towns and cities with vines, plants and vertical gardens? A city is not a park but should it be?

Des Fitzgerald is a sociologist at Cardiff University who is researching health, illness and city living. The Essay was recorded at the Free Thinking Festival with an audience at Sage Gateshead.

New Generation Thinkers is a scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to select 10 academics each year who can turn their research into radio.

Producer: Torquil MacLeod.

BBC Radio 3 - The Essay, A City Is not a Park

For a little more, see also:
Futures Forum: Greening Grey Britain
Futures Forum: Greening grey Britain @ Radio 4's Costing the Earth
Futures Forum: Greening grey Britain > tackling pollution and flooding

And:
Futures Forum: A sensory garden for Sidmouth
Futures Forum: "Greening grey Britain for health and happiness" >>> a sensory garden for Sidmouth

And finally:
Futures Forum: Vertical farming
Futures Forum: Vertical farming > "the most technically advanced indoor farm in the world" unveiled
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Cutting CO2 vs "Make Cars Great Again"

Can we have our cake and eat it - continue to drive freely whilst cutting down on our CO2 emissions?
Futures Forum: Cutting Exeter's car emissions by getting motorists to drive differently, by using technology >>> launch of "Breathe Exeter" Thursday 25th April

However, it is very difficult to square this particular circle, as demonstrated in a recent piece from Wired: 

GERMANY HAS PROVEN THE MODERN AUTOMOBILE MUST DIE

This story originally appeared on The New Republic and is part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
AUTHOR: EMILY ATKIN

08.21.18

Germany was supposed to be a model for solving global warming. In 2007, the country’s government announced that it would reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent by the year 2020. This was the kind of bold, aggressive climate goal scientists said was needed in all developed countries. If Germany could do it, it would prove the target possible.

So far, Germany has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 27.7 percent—an astonishing achievement for a developed country with a highly developed manufacturing sector. But with a little more than a year left to go, despite dedicating $580 billion toward a low-carbon energy system, the country “is likely to fall short of its goals for reducing harmful carbon-dioxide emissions,” Bloomberg News reported on Wednesday. And the reason for that may come down not to any elaborate solar industry plans, but something much simpler: cars.

“At the time they set their goals, they were very ambitious,” Patricia Espinosa, the United Nations’ top climate change official, told Bloomberg. “What happened was that the industry—particularly the car industry—didn’t come along.”

Changing the way we power our homes and businesses is certainly important. But as Germany’s shortfall shows, the only way to achieve these necessary, aggressive emissions reductions to combat global warming is to overhaul the gas-powered automobile and the culture that surrounds it. The only question left is how to do it.

In 2010, a NASA study declared that automobiles were officially the largest net contributor of climate change pollution in the world. “Cars, buses, and trucks release pollutants and greenhouse gases that promote warming, while emitting few aerosols that counteract it,” the study read. “In contrast, the industrial and power sectors release many of the same gases—with a larger contribution to [warming]—but they also emit sulfates and other aerosols that cause cooling by reflecting light and altering clouds.”

In other words, the power generation sector may have emitted the most greenhouse gases in total. But it also released so many sulfates and cooling aerosols that the net impact was less than the automobile industry, according to NASA.

Since then, developed countries have cut back on those cooling aerosols for the purpose of countering regular air pollution, which has likely increased the net climate pollution of the power generation industry. But according to the Union of Concerned Scientists, “collectively, cars and trucks account for nearly one-fifth of all U.S. emissions,” while “in total, the US transportation sector—which includes cars, trucks, planes, trains, ships, and freight—produces nearly thirty percent of all US global warming emissions ... .”

In fact, transportation is now the largest source of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States—and it has been for two years, according to an analysis from the Rhodium Group.

There’s a similar pattern happening in Germany. Last year, the country’s greenhouse gas emissions decreased as a whole, “largely thanks to the closure of coal-fired power plants,” according to Reuters. Meanwhile, the transportation industry’s emissions increased by 2.3 percent, “as car ownership expanded and the booming economy meant more heavy vehicles were on the road.” Germany’s transportation sector remains the nation’s second largest source of greenhouse gas emissions, but if these trends continue, it will soon become the first.

Clearly, the power generation industry is changing its ways. So why aren’t carmakers following suit?

TO AMERICAN EYES, Germany may look like a public transit paradise. But the country also has a flourishing car culture that began over a hundred years ago and has only grown since then.

Behind Japan and the United States, Germany is the third-largest automobile manufacturer in the world—home to BMW, Audi, Mercedes Benz, and Volkswagen. These brands, and the economic prosperity they’ve brought to the country, shape Germany’s cultural and political identities. “There is no other industry as important,” Arndt Ellinghorst, the chief of Global Automotive Research at Evercore, told CNN.

A similar phenomenon exists in the United States, where gas-guzzlers symbolize nearly every cliche point of American pride: affluence, capability for individual expression, and personal freedoms. Freedom, in particular, “is not a selling point to be easily dismissed,” Edward Humes wrote in The Atlantic in 2016. “This trusty conveyance, always there, always ready, on no schedule but its owner’s. Buses can’t do that. Trains can’t do that. Even Uber makes riders wait.”

It’s this cultural love of cars—and the political influence of the automotive industry—that has so far prevented the public pressure necessary to provoke widespread change in many developed nations. But say those barriers didn’t exist. How could developed countries tweak their automobile policies to solve climate change?

For Germany to meet emissions targets, “half of the people who now use their cars alone would have to switch to bicycles, public transport, or ride-sharing,” Heinrich Strößenreuther, a Berlin-based consultant for mobility strategies told YaleEnvironment360's Christian Schwägerl last fall. That would require drastic policies, like having local governments ban high-emitting cars in populated places like cities. (In fact, Germany’s car capital, Stuttgart, is considering it.) It would also require large-scale government investments in public transportation infrastructure: “A new transport system that connects bicycles, buses, trains, and shared cars, all controlled by digital platforms that allow users to move from A to B in the fastest and cheapest way—but without their own car,” Schwägerl said.

One could get away with more modest infrastructure investments if governments required carmakers to make their vehicle fleets more fuel-efficient, thereby burning less petroleum. The problem is that most automakers seek to meet those requirements by developing electric cars. If those cars are charged with electricity from a coal-fired power plant, they create “more emissions than a car that burns petrol,” energy storage expert Dénes Csala pointed out last year. “For such a switch to actually reduce net emissions, the electricity that powers those cars must be renewable.”

The most effective solution would be to combine these policies. Governments would require drastic improvements in fuel efficiency for gas-powered vehicles, while investing in renewable-powered electric car infrastructure. At the same time, cities would overhaul their public transportation systems, adding more bikes, trains, buses and ride-shares. Fewer people would own cars.

At one point, the U.S. was well on its way toward some of these changes. In 2012, President Barack Obama’s administration implemented regulations requiring automakers to nearly double the fuel economy of passenger vehicles by the year 2025. But the Trump administration announced a rollback of those regulations earlier this month. Their intention, they said, is to “Make Cars Great Again.”

The modern cars they’re seeking to preserve, and the way we use them, are far from great. Of course, there’s the climate impact—the trillions in expected economic damage from extreme weather and sea-level rise caused in part by our tailpipes. But 53,000 Americans also die prematurely from vehicle pollution each year, and accidents are among the leading causes of death in the United States. “If US roads were a war zone, they would be the most dangerous battlefield the American military has ever encountered,” Humes wrote. It’s getting more dangerous by the day.

To Confront Climate Change, the Modern Automobile Must Die | WIRED
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The Puppet Master and managed democracy @ Radio 4

We are living in a world where 'managed democracy' might well become the norm:
Futures Forum: Managed democracy: "The deliberate undermining of people's perception of the world, by creating confusion and contradiction ... undermining any opposition to existing power structures ... which leaves us feeling helpless and depressed and to which the only response is: 'Oh dear'."

This blog has looked at some of the ideas behind this norm - and how we might counter them:
Futures Forum: Moving beyond the ideological boundaries and "empowering people to find the solutions to their problems themselves"

Starting today, Radio 4 goes in search of one of the masterminds behind this set of politics:

The Puppet Master

The Puppet Master

This is the story of the most powerful man you’ve never heard of. He can spot an ex-spy with presidential potential and help turn him into a world leader. He creates opposition movements out of thin air. He’s got a nation’s news directors on speed dial. Billionaires seek his advice. He’s even got his own little war. He’s at the heart of the standoff between East and West. Some even credit him with pioneering the concept of post-truth politics. Yet few even know his name.

He is Vladislav Surkov. His background is in theatre and PR. He has a taste for Beat poetry, American rap and postmodern theory. But his politics are 100% Russian, and they’re spreading. Surkov invented Russia’s ‘managed democracy’ – where authorities arrange not only elections, but the results as well. He guided Vladimir Putin to his current unassailable position atop Russian politics. Now, Surkov is focussed on Ukraine, where the separatist movement he helped create continues its bitter war on Europe’s eastern flank.

BBC Radio 4 - The Puppet Master, Episode 1

1. Snipers

The Puppet Master

The Puppet Master is a series that gets to the bewildering heart of contemporary Russia by exploring the fortunes of a secretive, complicated and controversial man called Vladislav Surkov. 

Reporter Gabriel Gatehouse speaks fluent Russian and has access to a vast cache of leaked emails from Surkov’s Kremlin office. Using these, plus archive and sources gained over a decade of covering Russia and its wars, Gatehouse goes in search of the man pulling the strings. The journey is by turns dramatic, surprising and surreal, ranging from the battlefield to the theatre and the Kremlin itself. The destination? The post-truth world we inhabit today.

BBC Radio 4 - The Puppet Master, 1. Snipers
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