Hope. Why does everyone use that word so much? It feels like it's on an endless loop somewhere, being repeated ad infinitum like a chant; an invocation. As if the gods are listening.
It's the thing that troubles me most about mainstream activism. While most are busy praising youthfor their decades-late climate charge, what's lost is that no one is listening.
Why? Because the kids' climate strike is essentially a Government-sanctioned protest that fits neatly within the confines of business as usual. And, look, they're not hurting anyone and that is, of course, the point.
If anyone really believes that the powers that be are going to sit up and do something because the world's young are suddenly marching, then they're taking something psychedelic. Or should be.
Basically, what we've got is a sop to the kids, and a bone thrown to the masses, in the name of hope. Except it's not a tweak here, or a touch up there, that's going to solve the looming crisis.
Will climate change rallies rally save the planet? Rachel Stewart doesn't think so. Photo /NZME
My own well-documented view is that our planetary fate is already locked and loaded. But, even if I'm wrong and there's still time to turn this sinking ship around, it'd take a level of human cooperation, intelligence, and goodwill between all nations hitherto unseen since the dawn of civilisation. What are the chances of that?
Back to hope. What is it, and why do we think we'll instantly drop down dead if we stop having it? Could an absence of hope actually create the opposite effect? Would ditching hope create the space to see the world differently? Because that's what happened to me.
It became clear that hope only served to emotionally enslave me to a system that is designed to destroy. By clinging to hope, it was like trying to control my ultimate powerlessness.
Let me explain. Just because I hope that I don't die a horrible, painful death doesn't mean I won't. Just because I hope that my friends and loved ones don't either, doesn't mean they won't. Just because I hope the planet doesn't become uninhabitable to all life doesn't mean it won't.
People always say you must have hope to go on. I say hope chains you to the same way of thinking, and to the status quo. Counterintuitively, I'm far more effective without it than with it.
People often tell me that without hope they'd prefer to end it all. They claim they'd rather die than have no hope. I say that despite knowing how bad things are, I also know one fact. That being alive in the absence of hope can still be fulfilling, fascinating and fun. I mean, we've always known our own lives are finite so, what's the difference?
Swedish activist and student Greta Thunberg, centre, takes part in the Climate Strike in Montreal. Photo / AP
I'm more in the present, and I'm easier to live with (I'm told) than when I possessed hope. I'm also more effective at doing what needs to be done – environmentally and otherwise.
Just because I know in my bones that protecting the longfin eel or ruru is likely fruitless in the long term, in the short term and the here and now, I help them. Why? Because that's what's in front of me. It's the right, and human, thing to do.
By giving up hope I've also turned away from the culture of politics, the thin veneer of democracy, and any power which that spectacularly broken system has over me – other than playing the game of paying for things I must pay for, and staying out of jail because of it.
In other words, I've turned away from giving any credence to those in power who continue to push for unending economic growth. In doing so, I've found another way forward. Hope made me fearful. Now I'm not. And that makes me dangerous.
What all the good folks marching in the streets may yet come to understand is that true change, and revolutionary thinking, first requires the removal of hope. Hope is a fantasy world where sustaining it means always looking to others to fix your problems, and the world's. It reminds me of organised religion. It signals more inaction than action.
If you keep looking to politicians to solve the climate crisis, or Forest & Bird, or Greenpeace, or Elon Musk, or technology, or a pandemic wiping out billions, or God, or Greta, then you'll be ultimately disappointed. There is no failsafe panacea.
Hope removes personal agency. It makes for weakness and lethargy. It looks to everyone else to solve dilemmas. It lets us off the hook. Having no hope does not automatically equate to despair.
One can still care and act on climate change – or anything – without hope. Who knows? It could be the thing that's holding everyone back.
And just because there's no hope for me, doesn't mean there's none for you.
