Putting Human Rights First to Solve the Polycrisis, or Metacrisis
August 21, 2024
A civilization built on the mindless drive for power, wealth and luxury will inevitably impose an equivalence of misery and suffering. Resources and energy are finite, and their extraction and usage come at a cost.
Our current economic system demands infinite growth to avoid collapse because the wealthiest have commandeered nearly all the planet's resources. Most of earth's citizens are forced to work longer hours to procure the necessities of life compared to previous generations, and many are going without.
We are threatening to surpass every critical planetary boundary. Energy sources and raw materials that required tens or even hundreds of millions of years to form are being rapidly exhausted. Our economic system is speeding toward the cliff's edge, and the powerful of the world refuse to course-correct. As is always the case, the poorest citizens of the world will be the first to pay the price. But eventually, we all will.
The wealthy and powerful have always found ways to expropriate resources and labor from those under their thumb. They will only double down on these efforts as resources become scarcer and costlier. Then they will insist that continued economic growth is the answer to ensure fair opportunity.
But we cannot grow ourselves out of this mess. We must revamp our societal systems entirely, placing human rights and sustainability over imaginary profits. After all, profits are a human construct. We fool ourselves into believing the inputs are free, other than the direct monetary costs to extract, harvest and appropriate. But there is always a steep external cost. There is the cost of emissions, harmful waste by-products, environmental degradation, and social costs. These include conflict, scarcity and price inflation.
All of this contributes to the ruinous feedback loop, forcing everyone to compete in the "Great Game". But this is self-defeating in the long run. It's time to put human rights first and rebuild society accordingly.
