Public Meetings are disastrously bad at achieving their goals. They are not the only reason that social movement organisations struggle to recruit or retain people, but they are a significant barrier to a Better World (tm). I have been writing and video-making about this forever (well, it feels like that). See here and here. To... Continue Reading →
Gestural politics, security and movements. So much for the climate emergency
The short version: I went to a small-ish rally on the steps of parliament house, then navigated intimidatory security to watch… school boys and school girls ignoring the climate emergency. The longer version: Around sixty people, many aged sixty or more, gathered on the steps of the State Parliament of South Australia at 1.30 today.... Continue Reading →
“Welcome to the Smugosphere” – a two page bluffer’s guide/warning
What would you want to tell a new member of a social movement (organisation)? My two pager below - comments in the comments pls. A couple of years ago (god, it feels like a million years) I wrote a piece called "Dear New Climate Activist", which largely stands up, I think (genuinely interested in folks'... Continue Reading →
Hibernation review
I wanted to like this. I wanted to be able to say “new play”…”climate change”…”thought-provoking” … “go see.” But although “Hibernation” – set in a future where to buy us more time to sort out the climate crisis, almost all the humans on earth are put into a year-long coma - is well-staged and very... Continue Reading →
Stranded asses- speaking out of rear-ends as rear-guard action. Fossil incumbents protecting their assets as #climate change becomes inescapable
There’s a technique I am beginning to see more and more (1). The inevitably laughable COP26 looms, and yet another “we’re screwed” climate report [e.g. IPCC WG1 6AR] is out. In response, fossil fuel companies are either heading for the exits as best they can OR they are claiming that they are part of the... Continue Reading →
COVID, the media, New South Wales. pending international outrage and what else comes next.
Today New South Wales recorded 466 new cases of COVID. I heard the "press conference" (I will come back to those scare quotes) with the Premier, Gladys Berejiklian a while ago and a couple of things struck me, which are probably old hat to most folks, but I've seen them written anywhere else, so here... Continue Reading →
Sisyphus does his cardio. But no koalas in sight
Koalas are fantastically dim. Their brains used to fill their cranium, more or less, but in the absence of predators requiring them to be able to think, the expensive (in terms of protein and energy) wetware got selected against. Koalas are therefore even more fantastically dim than they once were (when your 'prey' is eucalyptus... Continue Reading →
“Big Fish, Little Fish, Box”: Social movement organisations and their lifecycles.
What goes up must come down. Sooner or later, the laws of political/social movement (1) gravity re-assert themselves. Your movement organisation goes from big fish to little fish and then, unless it can institutionalise itself (i.e. get charitable status, and carve out a niche in the existing ecosystem that it came to overthrow) it simply... Continue Reading →