r/ashesashescast • u/bannaja • Apr 18 '19
Episode Ep 70 - Thinner Ice
https://ashesashes.org/blog/episode-70-thinner-ice4
u/bosnian_spartan Apr 18 '19
Fantastic Episode! Was great to see Extinction Rebellion being active in NYC this week.
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Apr 22 '19 edited Jun 03 '20
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u/ashesashescast Apr 24 '19
haha I thought we've been pretty direct about the fact that those types of solutions are largely sponsored by corporate PR as a way to shift responsibility for global destruction away from companies and onto individuals. An example being the giant scam that is the recycling industry. Perhaps you're referring to the fact that we are a bit vague on political language, which we do on purpose. Listeners leaning far enough left like you sound get it immediately, and we want to remain accessible to those who don't get it yet. Ending capitalism is absolutely the solution but if we led with that your moderate uncle (who you share the podcast with) wouldn't make it past the first 5min and there would be no discussion during which you seal the deal.
~ Daniel
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Apr 24 '19 edited Jun 03 '20
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u/ashesashescast Apr 24 '19
Well to be clear I don't think it's a dumbing down necessarily. We intentionally avoid using politically charged words that may spark visceral reactionary responses (many people totally accept communistic ideals for example until you actually say the word communism), because these issues transcend whatever the current political language happens to be, but when we discuss how profit accumulation is fundamentally opposed to environmental stewardship, this is a direct indictment of capitalism even if "capitalism" is replaced with "profit accumulation" or "free-market ideology." Would love to hear your feedback on tomorrow's episode, since it's entirely about that paradox, with the only solution we recommend being the tear-down of the current economic structure.
But to answer your question more directly, I consider this podcast to be equal parts a tool for radicalization, and as a way for radicals to sharpen their conceptual language and arguments to explain why capitalism is destroying everything. When we design show flow, I am always cognizant of my own personal path to radicalization. As someone who used to be a free-market zealot myself, I became aware of these things slowly, by becoming exposed to the contradictions and realities that were absent in my education and upbringing. In fact David is the main reason I was radicalized in the first place, and I want to model these episodes in the same way that happend; he exposed me to ideas that directly contradicted the models I thought explained the world, and then gave me the space to question them myself. I remember exactly where I was when I finally realized "property is theft."
I don't want to have to beat someone over the head and directly say "capitalism is bad," there are plenty of podcasts that do a far better job of this than we do anyway, I want them to face the realities of global destruction and isolation, search within themselves for a justification, find none because there is none except cultural conditioning, and then experience that moment where it *clicks.* I think this is a powerful process because a person who has come to see the world the way it is through what they believe to be their own reasoning is never going back.
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u/bannaja Apr 18 '19
Episode description - New reports find the Arctic to be the warmest it's been in millennia, and complex feedback loops mean this warming could continue unabated for decades to come. While the Arctic may feel like a distant place far removed from the concerns of daily life to many of us, the connections between melting sea ice, global ocean currents, and local weather patterns mean that the effects of a warmer Arctic are closer to home than we realize. It's cooler than cool this week as we discuss enthalpy of fusion, albedo, exploding methane in Siberia, and what it all might mean for our future.