'They Didn't Riot, They Danced'

Often, it feels as though the world is coming to an end. The world's not ending; it’s just the world as we know it.

We, humans, are obsessed with the idea of the end of the world, like some of our more iconic panics have been the Y2K panic and the 2012 panic. More tragic was the 1997 Hale-Bopp.

No matter where or when in history, there’s probably a 90% chance you’d be able to find someone with their knickers in a knot about an armageddon on the horizon. It never came, and maybe they were relieved, disappointed, or a bit of both.

I think it’s natural for humans to want to feel significant or be part of a grand moment in history. And since we all missed out on the beginning, our next best bet is the end.

But why does the end always have to be scary?

We are more than ever entering the end of the world as we know it. It has been over for a while. And will continue for a while longer. Slow and steady until one day you look around and go Truly, what the fuck is actually going on. We are closer to that WTF moment than we have ever been.

But with every end comes a new beginning, some new hope.

We can choose to be scared or to be hopeful. We can isolate, bunker down, disconnect, and become passive observers of the collapse. I’m not going to lie, watching the world fall apart while wrapped in a doona burrito sounds pretty appealing.

But I would rather seize this moment to help create a new beginning that feels even more appealing than a burrito doona.

I hope that current systems and structures will fall and will be consumed by the very monster they created and uphold. And no doubt they will kick and scream as they go.

Right now, they feel like Goliath, but lucky for us, we have a lot more rocks than David.

We can choose the world we want to create, a world that is better for all of us and the natural world, a world of collaboration, connection, and creation, instead of a world of exploitation, atomization, and destruction. Because no matter how we like it, the earth has about 5 billion years left on her clock, and she will keep circling the sun whether we’re here or not.

It’s exciting! I don’t know what the future holds, but I know it’s already starting to happen, and the systems of power are groaning under the pressure. Kicking and screaming all the way to their demise, stubborn but thankfully not immovable. Because, as you know, they said the Titanic was unsinkable…

A society that continues to be governed by the structures and systems that persistently fail and exploit us is much scarier to me than a world where those systems are no more.

We have a choice between destruction and creation, between fear and hope, between rioting and dancing. And you know what I’ll be dancing, and I hope you join the boogie.