The human family (2019)

From the January 2019 issue of the Socialist Standard

The human family can produce abundance for itself without harming nature — as soon as the world’s workers take possession of the human family’s home, this planet, in the interests of our species. When the population is in conscious control of its affairs, it will not jeopardise its future or commit mass suicide by destroying its source of sustenance,

It will develop and make use of sources of energy such as tidal, geothermal, solar, satellite solar, and wind power, and nuclear fusion. Experts in these fields insist that the knowledge, technology, energy, and materials are available to produce abundance for today’s population and more, with a sustainable environment.

It will use the brains of the 50 percent of scientists in industrial countries that now is tied up in military, mass killing research. It will free the productive talents of the 50 percent of every labour force that is now tied down to occupations only required by the existing insane society, such as money counters, police, armed forces, lawyers, judges, etc.

It will allow the present tiny minority who are the ruling class in today’s crazy system to join in to support themselves. It will free the repressed energies, intellectual, physical, and creative, of a population that is now restricted to the requirements of obedient profit producers.

We cannot rely on leaders, who represent the world’s minority owners, who cannot even cooperate to save themselves. They can only see themselves as dominant beings, investors, top dogs in a class-divided world.

Their businesses and governments cannot police each other in controlling environmental destruction.  Capitalism can no more prevent climate change than it can prevent wars or poverty, because capitalism is the system that’s causing them in the first place.

How we act depends on how we think. We must think for ourselves, not let ‘great’ women or men do our thinking for us.