“Planet of the Humans”

I watched this movie, (it’s available free on YouTube) by Jeff Gibbs and produced by Michael Moore, as there have been appeals from the Green movement to take it down and, who knows, maybe they’ll succeed. While the film is, as critics say, no doubt hurtful to efforts to lobby for greener solutions, I think the central thesis of the film is correct, that without addressing the root causes of our environmental problems – overpopulation and unrestrained economic growth – any technological fixes we try to find will not work. (Update: See George Monbiot’s critique of the film.)

The main problem is capitalism, and our dependence on its fruits. Without addressing it, greener energy production, even if it turns out to be better than the dismal examples shown in the movie, is only going to increase demand. Just as improving the roads to avoid traffic congestion encourages more people to drive to work rather than take the bus, so the traffic congestion remains.

As a species we expand until it is no longer possible to meet our demands. When we reach that point, it seems than we will not gently restrain ourselves but, like the boom and bust economy, reach a point of total breakdown. That will be a tragedy, a holocaust, for our ourselves or our forebears, as well as for most of the larger life-forms on the planet, because it will coincide with the collapse of the entire biosphere.

It’s capitalism that is driving us to the apocalypse, of course, but turning capitalism into a scapegoat is not the solution. Our economic system is a product of the way we are. It’s something more fundamental that we need to change. And yet, if we can learn anything from ecology, it is that systems are intertwined and that no one of us exists in isolation, independently from the whole. So it is not as if I, as “an individual” can change anything. We effect change as a group, as a race, as a species, and in conjunction with every other species.

The film says that change can only begin with awareness. Awareness, if it is integral, and not just intellectual, can bring change. We’ve got to start somewhere. Let’s start by admitting that we exist in symbiosis with other species in a biosphere that has enough for all of us, if we only limit our share to that which we actually need, and leave enough for everyone else. If we don’t do that, we will soon reach a stage where we will have less than we need (and then we will die). But what constitutes a “need”? If we are asking that question, it probably means we are so remote from our actual needs that we have forgotten. We can begin by reducing our consumption and finding out for ourselves.

Human

human-themovie.org by Yann Arthus Bertrand

Watched this movie today for a second time; the running time is 3 hours and 10 minutes, and it’s available for free in a number of languages. I’ve also managed to watched several supplementary short documentaries about the making of the film and listened separately to the sound track. Actually I think this may be my all-time favourite film. It’s hard to see with dry eyes. The storytelling, music and cinematography are consistently incredible – if anything, the movie steadily improves as it goes along. The signature theme, for example, only becomes evident in the second half or last hour. The way the film is constructed and edited contributes to its power and ensures that there is never a boring moment. There are subtleties that I only picked up on the second watching. The image of a man speaking on a phone at the corner of a Manhattan skyscraper is followed by a man standing high among desert cliffs. The film plays a little with our expectations. Derisive comments about “rich people” by a poor man are followed by an obviously “rich” American, who, in turn, quickly wins our sympathy. The impoverished window of an Indian farmer who committed suicide due to the water crisis is followed by an educated upper class Indian, who, despite first impressions, places her simple story in its sharp political context. The director says that this is essentially a political film, and one has to agree, but it is not directly so. It commands our attention by its intense humanity. No film could be more true to its title. It captures the essence of what it means to be a human being in our era, beset by vast inequalities, violence, political turbulence and climate change, as well as the options we face as human beings when confronted by these horrendous difficulties. It gives a voice to the voiceless and permits us to hear stories that would otherwise be unlikely to reach our ears. Eventually it is the beauty of these portraits of ordinary human beings, even more than the magnificent landscapes, that lingers in our memory. It is not just that these humans are unforgettable, but that they also hold us accountable. We are so far removed from some of them that even the work that they are doing is unintelligible to us. People hang out long lengths of fabric over a wooden construction for what purpose? A human chain of men move earth with shovels to achieve what? Men rummage through a garbage dump to find what? If we thought we understood our world, we find that we are out of touch.

Eventually it’s an optimistic film. Nobody forced these people to be interviewed. They agreed because despite everything, they believed in the value of their experience and hadn’t given up on either us, the viewers, or, in most cases, themselves.

My great grandfather

Before she passed on a few years ago, I was able to collect a number of stories from my mother from her childhood. This is one that she told.

When he was old, Grandfather Newbould would move between the houses of his various kids. He would just show up, and bring along some of his furniture with him. He would move out unexpectedly too. On one occasion the family came home and found that the whole house was empty. Grandad had moved out again, taking all their furniture with him. Nanna Beatty (my mom’s mom) said that she would call the police if he didn’t bring their stuff back, so he told her to take whatever she wanted. (He was probably a little senile and had told the furniture movers to pick up everything.)