Stop The World – I Want To Get Off

I haven’t written for a couple of days. I’m not one of those people who write for money, so I am not bound to produce output. I write when something gives me cause to write. I write from the heart. I need to feel there is some point to it all. And that just hasn’t been there for a few days.

I realise there are a lot of ‘I’s in there, but it needs to be expressed. So I have been burying my head in the sanity preserving world of online gaming. Where I can search an endless universe, fighting tyranny with good background music and a light philosophy, or travel on horseback through a medieval world of magic and sorcery, fighting the ever present threat of monsters, again with excellent background music and lightweight philosophy. I do that all the time of course but perhaps more so in those last two days. It’s my way of stopping the world and getting off for a break.

That idea came to me, as most of my best ideas do, in the early hours of the day while sleeping. And today, it stuck.

Do you remember 1961? That was the year of my finishing High School and the beginning of my work life. It was also the year of the Cuban missile crisis, when the world first feared nuclear annihilation. The rhyming of history may be coming full circle.

Do you remember also the 1961 musical – ‘Stop The World – I Want To Get Off’, presumably manifested as a serious or not so serious reaction to the dilemmas of the times? Co-written by Anthony Newley, who also played the lead part in the first West End stage version. The Wikipedia entry may refresh your memory.

Have you thought of for how many people since that time, the world has stopped to let them get off? With an annual global death count of around 60 million, that would be a staggering 3.6 billion people who once walked the Earth as we do, have now left for whatever, if anything, comes after. Is that a perplexing fact? Then think of this… that is more people than were alive in 1961 (a little over 3 billion). And a further, more truly stupefying fact, is that around 8.6 billion folks have arrived since that year. I was going to say ‘arrived as replacements’ but a replacement rate of almost 3:1 is not really a simple replacement figure, is it? Don’t believe me? Do this sum: 3 billion (pop.) + 8.6 billion (births) – 3.6 billion (deaths) = 8 billion. That result being the current (in another 6 months or so) figure for the world population – which now stands at a little under 7.95 billion.

That is not what I want to talk about, but it sets the background quite well.

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Our world is on a track to nowhere we should be wanting to go. There is no Shangri-la waiting at the end of this road, and no peace along the way. Continual warfare, disease and deconstruction, are all that can be envisaged – even through the rosy coloured glasses. Has the thought ever occurred to you that something must break, something must be done to stop our crazily careering engine before it derails? That the world needs to stop (figuratively) while we take a good look at ourselves? Discover what the problem is and, if possible, change direction?

Well, some parts of the world are attempting to do that. They have figured out what the problem is and have settled on a solution. Russia and China combined (hopefully for a long, long time), and they have a lot of friends (roughly 80% of the world), have developed a plan. The problem is being caused, they have come to believe (and I agree) by a smallish minority (let’s say 1 billion) of unruly people wanting more for themselves that they have a right to gain (more for some always comes at a cost of less for others and, directly or indirectly, inflames conflict). The capitalist myth of ‘rising tides lift all boats’ is just that – a myth, as even many westerners are discovering. Nothing get created, just the shares in the pie get adjusted (unfavourably for most). And the ‘Most’ are getting fed up with the plan.

The west must be prevented from taking the whole pie. Russia is taking the lead in that (China has its back). The Russian plan must succeed, as indeed I know it will. The plan, as I see it at least, is to weaken the West’s grip on the world by cutting it off from any hope of spreading its waning influence beyond the borders of what Russia considers its own territory. And that plan is going well for Russia (and the world). The west now has no answer in reply to Russia’s push and so must revert to underhand tactics for as long as it can – awaiting its own self-imposed collapse – its own anti-Russian sanctions working against itself, and its own social and political debauchery wreaking its own havoc internally.

It is a sad thing but western influence has, by surreptitious influence, infested much of the world, including both Russia and China. Parts of the youth of those countries becoming attracted to the glitzy Western Wurlitzer facade of flashing lights and music – and the promise of riches. Being unaware that this is only a bright facade of western democracy, hidden behind which (and propping it up) are the truths of poverty, violence, decay and death. Russia is saving its own future by openly exposing the future of the west. I hope, I earnestly hope, the youth of Russia not so far bedazzled by the light and music show, will see the truth in that before it is too late and they come to live a life of regret in some foreign land. The same goes for China. In the end it is not about east and west (which are simply indeterminate directions depending on where you are standing), but about the whole world removing or pacifying a cancer which has grown within its body over the last two generations. And that operation must succeed if the world is to have any hope of a bright future.

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So, what is my idea? Is it a solution at all? Will it work, if attempted?

If we are to stop the world of mankind from the slow death of rotting, or a particularly nasty sudden death, how could we change our tack? And of course this assumes that the demon of westernism is caged or eliminated. It would be preferable if the whole world is involved.

First we need to stop the world. I mean the world of human activity, not the globe.

That will call for a considerable workforce. Let’s do a little calculation. I’m using ballpark figures for this, since I don’t know, and probably don’t need to know the actual counts. And, to make the numbers work for our simple minds, I’m going to use a world population of 9 billion – which it will be in 10-12 years anyway unless we resort to some practice of self-culling. The actual figures don’t matter much.

Whether you agree with my thinking or not, I’m sure you will be able to follow the simple logic.

Our global population – and let’s assume for this purpose that we are totally responsible for the pickle in which we find ourselves and we are the only ones who can find a way out of it, if such exists – can be split into three groups of roughly equal thirds…

The Non-Productive – by reason of their status – including infants, juveniles, students, the infirm, the elderly and the incapable (for whatever reason).

The Carers – those who look after the Non-Productive – home-makers, personal service providers, health workers, administrators, guards, and others who may not do anything productive but are necessarily involved with a service task of some sort. I haven’t thought through whether to include military in this group.

The Producers – those who are physically involved in finding, growing, extracting, harvesting, moving or materially making or applying stuff.

Each of those groups of people – and we must never forget that they all are people – consists of approximately 3 billion people.

While the first two groups – two thirds of mankind – don’t actually do anything productive (in a commercially driven society sense), they are consumers of society’s products and in fact are the backbone and the reason that society came into being in the first place, and why it continues to exist. The third group – the Producers – are simply there to provide the means of existence both for themselves and the other two groups which depend on them. On the face of it, it is a sound way to run a human society. Except… and I don’t think I need to go into those exceptions here. They are self evident.

So, let’s take a look at the three billion producers and what they do.

I’m growing tired of this already, as so often happens with my writing, but I know that if I put this aside until later, it will never get finished (and I have put a considerable amount of effort into it already). So, let’s cut to the chase…

All of our basic problems arise from what we do (actually what the Producers do on our behalf – and get paid for doing), how we do it, and the unwanted and mostly uncosted external effects of doing that. It is this that needs to change or be materially reduced if mankind is to continue as a high-end species here. Bearing in mind that this will also materially effect the other two groups – the non-productive and the carers – who must also adjust their expectations from life. And bearing in mind that all producers have and will at various stages of life be numbered among either the carers and/or the non-productive. Which is a roundabout way of saying that this is not simply a fault of productive people. It is a whole of humanity issue.

So, what must be done? Well, if we are to reduce productive activity, we would need to examine what it is that we are doing unnecessarily for a start and, in order to not upset the balance of society, pay those workers to do nothing (or join the carers in doing the non-productive, mostly paid work they do). And then, by stages, reduce or eliminate other areas of production similarly – starting with the most costly in terms of external effects. At every stage examining whether we have reached a stage of ecological balance that will sustain life. At every stage there would also be an adjustment of expectations for quality of life by all groups – not a compromise, but a real adjustment.

Of course in order to accomplish such a task, the ownership of production (unless by the compliance of current ownership) would need to be taken into the hands of the authorities tasked with its achievement. And those ‘authorities’ may not be those we have currently. They are tarnished by corruption far too heavily to retain the respect of most of us for this most important task.

And what of the ‘considerable workforce’ I spoke of earlier? Well, this is the sub-group of productives who are displaced by the new practices. I mentioned that they could be subsumed into the carers group but there is considerable scope for new or ‘alternative’ production also, allowing for them to continue as productives. These would include the expansion of existing, low-intensity, activities essential to life – low-intensity, more human-powered farming for example. Some current production could possibly be retained, perhaps using a different, less problematic, power source. Others would necessarily be discarded as not conducive to continued life. And the carers, the in-between group, some of whom are involved in essential though often unrecognised work, with the reduced expectations of the population generally, may be freed to assist with the newly recognised human productive survival activities.

So, while for all groups of humanity, life will change, for those 3 billion currently involved in productive activities the greater change in what they do will come about. And, of course, in this managed process of change, if indeed it is a ‘managed’ program, there will be fewer of us to consume whatever products are on offer.

And all of that a change for the better. But if we by default or neglect of the warnings, continue in an unmanaged descent into chaos and apathy, then the numbers will be far fewer. Tending to zero.

This is an opportunity we must not miss. A break in the status quo, engineered by the noble peoples of Russia. So, align yourself behind both Russia and China for a new free world.

Because if we don’t do that, there is no discernible future.

It is a big ask, but not an impossible one. Although, sadly, the stage we are currently at, the immensity of the natural forces now actively arraigned against us, and our collective indecisiveness and indolence, will tend to work together to overtake or prevent any such effective plan. All is already lost, so with that in mind, we have nothing to lose by trying. Russia is boldly leading the way.

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