A lesson from clouds

(or finding hope at the end of things....)

Photo by Robert Koorenny on Unsplash

I used to love watching clouds.

When things just got too complicated down here on earth what a joy somehow to look up at that peaceful world and just…

…drift off I suppose….

…taking comfort in the orderly procession of the planet and her seasons…

…and the good earth beneath our feet…

and the annual cycles of death and rebirth.

Not any more.

We know things have gone wrong now.

Not through the capricious actions of a god in the sky who can maybe be placated by repentance and offering and sacrifice

But because of what we have done. Because of our own geed and our stupidity.

And now even here in our once temperate climate, the sun can and will become hot enough to kill us…

And here and elsewhere in our world entire populations are beginning to find their cities and their countries become increasingly uninhabitable.

And find themselves being compelled to abandon their homes…

Forced out by flood or fleeing for their lives from fire.

It was frightening early in the week to feel this, not just as an abstract concern belonging somewhere in the future, but to see it as a reality now.

But we know, deep down we all know, that this crisis is necessary because there is no other way for change to happen.

And I felt a stirring of hope: at last people will listen, I thought, at last people will take note.

And then Rishi Sunak pledged to block the construction of inland wind farms, because Tory members don’t like them.

And Liz Truss promised to reduce income tax…

And there was a general sense of deep concern over trans women using women’s toilets.

And one of these will be the next prime minister…

And meanwhile a member of the present cabinet, a “politician and businessman” called Kit Malthouse, made it clear that the government was committed to doing nothing and that people in the UK had just better get used to living with excessive heat.

And I think: how is it we have ended up with such catastrophically bad government?

It was in the sixties Bob Dylan said “A Hard Rain’s A Gonna Fall”, and he was right, and “The Times They Are A Changing”, right there too, and for a while hopeful winds of change did seem to be blowing.

And we grew vegetables in our commune, and we shared our money, and we drew up elaborate housework and cooking rotas and then had bad tempered meetings when they didn’t work so well…

But we were trying, trying to outgrow traditional identities of man and woman, trying to replace the nuclear family, trying to live in a different, non-selfish and mutually supportive way because we knew capitalism was over, revolution was coming, and it had better begin in our lives.

And the revolution did come: but not from the left, where we were all expecting it.

It came from the right.

And the whole vile injustice of the capitalist system re-entrenched itself and now seems immovable.

And the world is burning.

And no, we can’t learn to live with it, Mr. Malthouse, because it is killing us and will surely kill you too.

Yes, kill you too, Mr. Malthouse, and your Duchy of Lancaster, and the whole archaic, inadequate, rotten and unjust system of government you represent.

And we all have to recognise this, Mr Malthouse, and learn to co-operate with the new systems of society and government that are beginning to emerge.

And that takes courage.

And, sadly, it is far easier to fret about trans women using women’s toilets.

And what is to be done?

It all seemed very clear to Lenin in 1901, apparently, when he asked the question, found the answer and went ahead and did it…

But as for us… we feel mired in confusion and impotence, fragmented and despairing as we are in a society that tells us it is every man for himself, and it is about men, and always has been. And it can be every woman for himself too, as long as a woman behaves like a man…

But what our society is determined to stop is women having autonomy over their own identities and lives, and that is why the right to abortion must be removed.

And that is also why men who identify as women must be somehow be made to disappear because, as the gender critical feminists and their friends the traditional churchmen assert, we threaten the existence of everything.

And what is to be done?

Maybe we can begin by remembering that Lenin, too, and his co-revolutionaries, started from a place of fragmentation and powerlessness.

And this can change.

And it doesn’t have to be this way. It hasn’t been like this in the past, and it doesn’t have to be like this in the future.

We human beings have not always seen ourselves as selfish individuals in competition with each other.

We did once see ourselves as being part of a harmonious universe.

We did once understand ourselves as being part of a collective and we did have the skills to work with nature instead of against her.

And we do now understand that we are all connected to each other, and we can begin to act as if it were true.

And we can do all we can to keep hope alive, and solidarity alive, and joy alive.

And we can celebrate kindness.

Because the times really are changing….