Tompkins County Relocalization Project

[Tompkins County Relocalization Project <tcrp-news AT lists.ibiblio.org>]

I posted the Kunstler piece last night because I thought it was a
pretty decent agenda for action.  By now I guess I'm so used to
Kunstler's bilious views of American culture that I just don't
notice them any more.  This response (forwarded with permission)
points out the counterproductive aspects of such bias.

Jon

---------------------- Original Message ----------------------
Subject: Re: Kunstler
From:    "David Quinn-Jacobs" <dqj AT graphwise.com>
Date:    Tue, February 6, 2007 12:17 am
To:      bosak AT ibiblio.org
--------------------------------------------------------------

He's created a straw man and refuted that.  People aren't responding
negatively to him for failing to offer solutions, but for his aggressive
intolerance and tunnel vision.  He deserves to be "twanged on" for the
fact that he cannot separate his own aesthetic from peak oil problems
and solutions.

He has a well-documented distaste for suburbia, mass production and mass
culture.  We may sympathize with some or all of those tastes, but they
blur the issues.  Although suburban living may present problems for
sustainability and may not be the choice for existentially authentic
people, it is not intrinsically /evil/ in other respects.  That is an
important distinction to make because it takes the religion out of the
discussion and denies the creation of a simplistic us/them dichotomy.
As another example, Kunstler expresses support for the invasion of Iraq
in the/ Long Emergency/.  He ridicules peace activists who drive SUVs,
making the illogical jump from there to citing it as tacit approval of
the war on their part.  Of course a small correlation exists, but it is
not nearly as strong as he paints it.

When you recognize that lifestyles and histories as different as those
in the US and China have painted us all into the same corner -- or left
us on the same raft, to use Heinberg's analogy -- everyday Suburbanites
and SUV Drivers no longer appear as Satan incarnate.

His "agenda" is motherhood and apple pie to peakniks.  No real arguments
there.  Only with his vilifications, which are not constructive, and
which he did not address.

Cheers,
-dqj