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A review by toasternoodle
Learning to Die in the Anthropocene: Reflections on the End of a Civilization by Roy Scranton
4.0
Brief, yet far from parochial. A more critical meditation than many of the fact-folders and excitatory anthems out there: capital-B Beautiful, even. Roy Scranton had approximately five shits left to give after his Army discharge and he rehomed each one of them into a chapter of this book.
My favourite shit is contained in Ch. 4 (The Compulsion of Strife), which closes by observing the philosopher's place in interrupting social feedback loops of fear-driven anxiety and despair. Spoiler that isn't a spoiler: Let that fear die in you — sit with it, transform it, let it go — and you interrupt your role as yet another conductor of atmospheric stress. The interrupter practices dying.
Other gems by Scranton featured in above chapter:
- Names the (racist, classist, capitalist) shackles of rebuking ~aggressive spectacles~ like organizing, violent protest etc
- Bluntly refuses to elevate contemporary passivity; skewers it, actually: "The more we pass on or react to [every protest, chant, retweet, and Facebook post], the more we strengthen our habits of channeling, and the less we practice autonomous reflection or independent critical thought.... [These habits] remain locked in machinery which offers no political leverage." Louder for the people up front who can't hear over themselves namedropping climate action in their Earth Day grams.
Then again I'm clearly partial toward anyone who loves death and critiquing death (see: Ch. 5, A New Enlightenment) as much as I do, definitely @ me.
My favourite shit is contained in Ch. 4 (The Compulsion of Strife), which closes by observing the philosopher's place in interrupting social feedback loops of fear-driven anxiety and despair. Spoiler that isn't a spoiler: Let that fear die in you — sit with it, transform it, let it go — and you interrupt your role as yet another conductor of atmospheric stress. The interrupter practices dying.
Other gems by Scranton featured in above chapter:
- Names the (racist, classist, capitalist) shackles of rebuking ~aggressive spectacles~ like organizing, violent protest etc
- Bluntly refuses to elevate contemporary passivity; skewers it, actually: "The more we pass on or react to [every protest, chant, retweet, and Facebook post], the more we strengthen our habits of channeling, and the less we practice autonomous reflection or independent critical thought.... [These habits] remain locked in machinery which offers no political leverage." Louder for the people up front who can't hear over themselves namedropping climate action in their Earth Day grams.
Then again I'm clearly partial toward anyone who loves death and critiquing death (see: Ch. 5, A New Enlightenment) as much as I do, definitely @ me.