THE AUTOMOBILE MORATORIUM

P.O. Box 9409 / Berkeley, Ca., 94709

1-510-967-4722

www.marctwang.org/auto

I am always amazed to read or hear discussions of the environmental crisis these days. It is as if we ordinary people believe we don’t have the power to make simple choices, and that industry, the government, the media, and perhaps, God himself, has predetermined our complicity in ransacking the earth of its remaining natural integrity. Recently, I listened to just such a discussion on a local community radio show with Kate Simmons, a member of the Sierra Club’s Global Warming and Energy Team, reflecting the general dismay at George Bush’s abandonment of the Kyoto Protocols, which would demand a serious reduction in greenhouse gases by its greatest contributors…i.e., us, the American people.

Nowhere in this discussion, or in the phone calls that followed, however, was there a suggestion or implication that our participation, as consumers, is as much a part of the problem as Bush’s self-serving offerings to his cronies in the oil business. The repeated intimations that we are simply victims of this industrial conspiracy is beginning to grow old, particularly when one observes the daily caravans of vehicular monstrosities parading down our major thoroughfares, right past the offices of the newspapers and alternative broadcasting facilities that express such ongoing concern for our ecological stability.

One would think that if ecological concerns are not enough to put an end to this narcissistic indulgence in flaunting one’s self-destructive importance then the imminent oil crash and its consequences just might convince the owners of these degenerate private transports that they are taking us all down the road to mayhem, sooner, rather than later. According to Bruce Thompson, writing for the “Auto-Free Times,” we can expect “massive disruptions to transportation and the economy” in less than ten years due to the peaking of petroleum production around 2009. In other words, if you think the current spike in energy costs is something to write home about then just wait until the market digests and responds to the fact that there will be less and less of it to go around! It’s like the old cartoons of the rabbit running over the edge of the cliff. It keeps going in defiance of gravity until it realizes that there is, in fact, nothing holding it up, at which point the dumb bunny takes a bee-line…down… as it splatters to the ground.

Of course we don’t have the option of picking ourselves up like the rabbit invariably does and going on with business as usual. The only thing we can do is start preparing for this certainty. We’re not talking about some questionable apocalyptic breakdown in communications like the Y2k fiasco. We’re talking about a finite resource and the causal impacts of its inevitable depletion.

But who would even suggest such a crisis exists in the midst of these empires on wheels. And even when we dare do, where is the outrage?, the anemic nature of which ( if it exists at all) is particularly curious in places like Berkeley, California or anywhere where the environmental movement has strong organizational roots and traditional enclaves for dissent. Yet on any given morning you can spot one colossus after another, charging (often with just a single occupant) down to the local coffee shop for the morning fix.

Herein, perhaps, lies the problem. The genesis of the new environmental awareness was, to a large extent, concomitant with the “free speech movement,” and the general eruption of  consciousness that defined the counterculture of the 1960’s. Within the psycho-political dynamic of that culture was the supposition that most, if not all, of our social-political and environmental problems were caused by a congregate of nefarious, macrocosmic forces that we, as innocent victims of those forces, had nothing to do with…. in other words  “The Establishment,” as it was unaffectionately referred to back in those days.

This may have been appropriate in 1967, when an embryonic understanding of these realities was just developing. But a generation or two later, the insistence that all our problems are caused and must be solved solely by the industrial-corporate megapoly has a resounding semblance to a child wringing the same old rag, and refusing to grow up. It is almost as if many of us have taken a callous, alarmingly cynical mandate from the failure of  the ‘establishment’ to meet our demands, and have decided to ride high on the hog (in our SUV’s, perhaps?), until some crisis forces us to be good little citizens and start to obey our own best interests.

Frankly, it is bewildering, if not outright discouraging, that modern activists cannot take the bull by the horns, and develop a program wherein people are enjoined to become significantly more pro-active in solving some of the problems that we have clearly (and all too often, proudly) contributed to. Organizing city-wide Automobile Moratoriums on a regular basis is an example of what we can do to back-up our supposed concern for Mother Nature. It would seem the least demanding of actions, as it would require nothing of anyone except that we abstain from driving on that designated day. Considering the sacrifice many have made in the name of democracy, one would think this a relatively painless way of paying homage to the good earth that sustains us and recognizing our participation in its ruin. It would seem simple, yet apathy runs deep in contemporary American political culture. Over fifty-percent of voters couldn’t even get off their complacent keisters in the November 2000 to vote in a critical election with a gamut of choices.

Righteously, hysterically and efficiently, activists have been able to rid many of our environs of the evils of tobacco and second-hand smoke. Yet there seems to be little energy spent contesting the far more invasive and destructive poisons that spew relentlessly from the tailpipes of our beloved automobiles, particularly the alarmingly popular “Sports Utility Vehicle.” With overwhelming evidence showing up daily, indicating an imminent global catastrophe, the rush to lay down $30,000-60,000 for a vehicle averaging just over 10 miles per gallon should be a source of great concern (if not abject condemnation) for all who value a natural, self-sustaining world. If the truth be told, it is not George Bush or the CEO’s of  Chevron who are behind most of these wheels of fortune…or misfortune, as the case may ultimately be, but our own paralysis as “concerned citizens” to do anything about it.

As things stand, the stampede to own and brandish the ever more polluting and rapacious means of private transportation, SUV’s in particular, should be understood as completely unacceptable and a primary target of any movement to bring back environmental sanity to our streets. A tangible social resistance to their arrogant, pernicious presence must be the first item on our progressive, collective hit-list. General  Automobile Moratoriums, regular community-city-wide days when driving is prohibited, certainly could be next on the agenda.

During World War II there were virtual moratoriums on almost every consumer activity (by way of rationing). Today there is a different kind of war going on with a more complex enemy. Certainly the corporate-industrial superstructure has been extremely sluggish in responding to anything beyond their quarterly perspectives and profits. But equally lethargic is our response to our own reckless indulgence and ostensible compliance with the ongoing corporate challenge to ecological sobriety.

There are many violations and criminal acts being committed against our environment and our own best interests that must be addressed and met with vigorous social and political energy. No one expects to bring down the “old guard” overnight. But for now, except in very special circumstances, there is absolutely no justification, on any basis whatsoever, for continuing to tolerate these behemoth, four-wheeled, overbloated testaments to our status-driven pathology, that barrel down the already constricted arteries of our lives in blatant defiance of the most modest of ecological sensibilities. As long as we non-chalantly endorse a ‘business as usual’ mentality while these beasts of burden roll merrily along, we can only lament our own contribution to pummeling this aching earth.

MARC TWANG 

LET'S WAKE TO REAL ACTION!!