the holiday season is upon us and with it a deluge of new tech trinkets and advertisements convincing
us to indulge but of course this torrent of consumption is nothing new especially in the free
market capitalist consumerist nation of the united states every year the holiday shopping season
spanning across november and december sees massive monthly profits for corporations
while employees are crushed by inhuman workloads and environmental destruction runs rampant
and every year the connections from consumerism to capitalism to the climate crisis are once again
laid bare today we dive into the holidays and the manufactured desire for more to understand
how capitalism is driving the climate crisis but it's not enough just to critique we will
also try to understand what will dismantle our current system and what could develop an
ecologically sound and ethical world in its stead this video was made possible by the people who
support me on patreon get early access to all my videos by becoming an occ patreon supporter
underneath the bright glitz of christmas lights and shrouded under the cover of wrapped presents
lies the stark reality of the holidays in the imperial core starting with the celebration of
colonial genocide in thanksgiving followed immediately by the capitalist schemes of
black friday and cyber monday that bleed into a month of christmas celebrations foregrounding
extensive gift-giving ceremonies holidays have been co-opted by corporations and a relentless
drive for profit and growth gift giving has been present in the ethos of winter holidays
for hundreds of years a tradition which some scholars point towards the 19th century new york
city aristocrats for starting as a way of shifting december holidays from a season
where poor people could demand food and drink from the wealthy and celebrate in the streets
to one of cozy celebration in the home encouraging gift giving to children but the amount of gifts
were generally small in the 1800s and it wasn't until the rise of advertising around the turn
of the 20th century that retailers especially toy retailers saw the potential of holidays for profit
and capital accumulation by the 2000s u.s retail sales during the holiday season reached 416.4
billion dollars and have only gotten bigger of the many factors driving the us shopper to spend
an average of one thousand dollars on the holidays every year advertising is definitely making a mark
advertisements make us feel good about something we know deep down is either unethical useless
harmful or all three they're the rose tinted glasses that make the things in our homes
seem necessary when they actually are not so for a moment let's pull off those rose-tinted glasses
and understand the impact of the capitalist model on ourselves our planet and our holidays
the world today is highly unequal as those in the imperial periphery toil
under life-threatening conditions to extract materials from the earth they fuel the lifestyle
of those in the imperial core which is comparably gluttonous especially for the white ruling class
in core countries like the united states we buy because we're told to we buy for social change
and we buy to find happiness and while we buy our money fuels an untenable system consumerism is a
cog in the capitalist machine corporations need us to buy more to fulfill quarterly growth goals but
the consequences of these pursuits are devastating the world emitted 49.36 billion tons of greenhouse
gas emissions in 2016 and continues to emit more each year and at the head of historical emissions
output is capitalists stronghold the united states here 40 of food goes to waste despite
the prevalence of food insecurity the average american throws out 95 pounds of clothes adding
to the glut of textile waste that represents 4 percent of global trash each year yet all this
waste and pollution is good for the bottom line of the capitalist class because it means we're buying
more stuff and industries don't have to worry about the consequences clothing waste for example
is accelerated by the relentless turnaround of the fast fashion industry while we buy more their
profits go up and waste continues to drive on and even when those in the us are reluctant to throw
things out we hoard our stuff in storage units an industry which now makes 38 billion dollars every
year housing all of our useless gadgets drummed up by capitalism and let's not forget the global
exploitation of workers that occurs on the daily especially during the pandemic so acting against
any of these destructive paradigms then means taking a stand against capitalist exploitation
of workers and the planet because in short capitalism can't support us it's leading us down
a path of planetary destruction that nothing short of global systemic change can fix to end climate
change to end this toxic cycle of unsatisfying consumerist lifestyle we must end capitalism
the history of change is the history of revolution from the russian revolution to
the french revolution to the haitian revolution as marx writes in clash struggles in france
revolutions are the locomotives of history they represent societal ruptures with the status quo
that catapult us towards the future as we sit on the precipice of global climate collapse
revolution represents an avenue away from planetary ecocide marx proposed a revolution built
on the ire and action of the proletariat grasping for socialism that would morph into communism but
the proposed paths towards that revolution and what might get built in the ashes of capitalism
are varied ecosocialism is one such path it seeks the ownership of the means of production
also known as the factories and tools that make the things we need by the very laborers
that use them in doing so eco-socialism seeks to rid itself of the parasitic relationship of
the capitalist class that siphons profit from laborers through underpayment and externalities
as michael lowey and joe koval write in their 2001 eco-socialist manifesto eco-socialism insists on
a transformation of needs and a profound shift towards the qualitative dimension and away from
the quantitative a valorization of use values over exchange values essentially eco-socialism seeks to
build an economic structure where production is not based around how much profit we can
extract from an item but instead how useful and necessary it is in this quest some eco-socialists
point towards the successes and failures of previous socialist regimes like the soviet union
as guideposts for a greener more liberatory future one that initially wields state power to form
and organize this new economy ecoanarchism presents another vision rejecting state
governmental and hierarchical power eco-anarchism envisions a society of decentralized structures
formed horizontally emphasizing the importance of both human and natural liberation in collections
of communities a world based on cooperation rather than competition but of course these are
very basic explanations of political tendencies that have rich debate and histories regardless
of ideology or the path change needs to happen revolution must begin now because no true change
can come through buying a field raven backpack or an eco-conscious water bottle these are just
minuscule gnats picking at the elephant in the room to make change to avoid climate chaos
and planetary collapse capitalism must fall and in its stead eco-socialism eco-anarchism
or another political tendency informed by the teachings of solar punk permaculture degrowth
indigenous culture and ideologies must rise from its ashes unfortunately videos like these
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liking the video and commenting i hope you all enjoyed the video and i will see you in two weeks