A Perfect Storm is Brewing

Yes, the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic is deeply worrying.

However, I’m more alarmist about the bigger picture, of which COVID-19 is just one component; the possibility of a “perfect storm” with other factors in there.

For example:

• the climate crisis and biodiversity loss (and their inevitable economic repercussions);
• mass migration to escape war, famine, degradation; etc.
• the end of the bull market, deregulation since the last market crash, the reduced capacity to stimulate economies, obscene federal and national debt (for which unsustainable growth and consumption are required, in some ways a Ponzi scheme) – aka “late-stage capitalism”;
• protectionist, polarized, nationalist populism and oligarchy (though globalization has its cons, such as complex, vulnerable and eco-unfriendly international supply chains, trade wars); or, for that matter, liberal elitism;
• what philosopher, linguist and poet Jean Gebser calls the late-stage (left-brain), deficient mode of the mental-rational structure of consciousness – with no guarantee that we’ll survive to evolve into a more integral mode of thought and action / being;
• an erosion of the social safety nets (and a reduction in social mobility) that would help many people through these crises, aka neo-peasantry;
• the fragmentation and growing powerless of communities;
• more generally: misinformation, disinformation and its weaponization, coupled with a loss of honour and truthfulness (the era of post-modernism and post-truth);

I’ve probably missed many vital elements out here, but you get the gist.

Be prepared

If this were a time of heightened military tensions, then (as was the case with the Cuban missile crisis and the Persian gulf war), we would by now be at DEFCON 2 (DEFCON 1 being the highest level of alert).

What we are experiencing now is rapidly approaching the civilian equivalent, and we need a calm and measured but thoroughly prepared response, imo. Our customary, piecemeal, left-brain problem solving will not suffice: what is required are multidisciplinary, integrated and transcendent, whole-brain solutions.

Perhaps we are in need of a reboot – even the installation of a whole new (or old) operating system.

~~~oOo~~~

Image: Peasants breaking bread.
Source: Wikimedia Commons.
Licence: Public domain.