Rabbit in the Headlights

Leadership & Collectivism in Times of Change

Morning Comrades and welcome back to the first of two patreon-only dispatches this week. You know the drill at this point, if you are interested and can, sign up below for a 2 week free trial.

Admittedly, I am excited about a meeting this week that will, hopefully and most likely, have an impact on what we are going to be chatting about here towards the end of the week. I am fortunate enough to spend some time with one of my favourite philosophers this week, Eva von Redecker, and if all goes to plan, we will be chatting some about revolution. More about that on Friday though. For the time being, a precursor so to say, to Friday’s topic and something that has been on mind recently. Considering all the science that is available to us, especially in regards to Climate Change and to a larger extent, the threat that Capitalism poses to on a broader scaled I have been asking myself the question whether our civilizations inability to adapt to the realities at hand is a failure of leadership or an unwillingness in humanity itself.

There is heaps of writing on this, from the dawn of time to today but I will not bore in you great detail about the historical evolution thereof, but rather muse a little after this 12hr day.

A few words then. Important ones, in the sense that we don’t have all that much more time left to figure out what to do when the shit hits the fan. And it is. As the ever important Luxemberg said in the beginning of World War 1:

“Friedrich Engels once said: ‘Bourgeois society stands at the crossroads, either transition to socialism or regression into barbarism.’ … Until now, we have all probably read and repeated these words thoughtlessly, without suspecting their fearsome seriousness. … Today, we face the choice exactly as Friedrich Engels foresaw it a generation ago: either the triumph of imperialism and the collapse of all civilization as in ancient Rome, depopulation, desolation, degeneration – a great cemetery. Or the victory of socialism, that means the conscious active struggle of the international proletariat against imperialism and its method of war.”

Socialism or Barbarism then, comrades. What is it to be?