A call to women who do not want to burn
We urgently need to stop the expansion of exploitation. How? By echoing the feminists of the 80s: “We have the right to say NO!” We need to build a plan towards de-growth and deceleration. And, of course, by practicing alternatives to the patriarchal capitalist machine.
The climate is heating up. If the atmosphere reaches 2°C or higher, the conditions for life on our planet will be disastrous.
Relations deteriorate. If we hesitate any longer, human relations between men and women, between groups, Peoples and the Earth will be completely compromised.
The responsibility for this crisis is common, but different. In the case of climate change the countries located in the Global North are more responsible because they have imposed a pattern of toxic production and consumption, and targeted pollution.
In the case of human relations, sexism has generated inequality and raised an empire of white, western, urban, male hierarchy to rule over women. This exploitation model is the same domination model that affects Nature and women. Oppression is capitalist and patriarchal. It is violence against life.
Capitalism expands and the last frontiers are now cycles and elements of Nature, women and traditional Peoples. From Nature, this system created a condition of servitude, obligation, and then accumulation. The photosynthesis of trees, care of women and conservation by traditional people, for example, serve the capital and are transformed into commodities, and financialized. This is exactly the “solution” being presented in the United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change!
In fact this is the largest international declaration that gives priority to capital over life. They make the essential causes of climate change secondary: Sexist machismo power and especially the continued burning of fossil fuels, such as oil and gas. Although the problem threatens all life on this planet, they seem to prefer this destruction rather than to jeopardize the capital machine created by man.
It is this energy that moves the global machine and that keeps the wheels of capitalism turning. But it is this fossil fuel based model that wanes human energy, wasting our potential and even undermining the essential energy sources from spiritual, cultural and food.
One can easily see the impacts from these large-scale development projects on women in Espírito Santo, Brazil, including: Territorial invasions from oil structures and eucalyptus plantations; the high incidence of violence due to the huge contingent of male workers at these projects; restriction and contamination of areas of crops and fishing compromising household food security; biodiversity loss; fragmentation of the family; community conflicts promoted by the companies; exposure to chemicals and pollutants that increase diseases; rare, precarious and low-paid work in the territories; decontextualized offset projects; housing difficulties in the cities; the industrial model of education and health; and all devaluation and invisibility of knowledge and creativity of women.
There is no coincidence that Espírito Santo is the second largest national oil producer and the world champion in paper pulp production (Aracruz / Fibria), and at the same time also ranks first in violence against women throughout all of Brazil.
We urgently need to stop the expansion of exploitation. How? By echoing the feminists of the 80s: “We have the right to say NO!” We need to build a plan towards degrowth and deceleration. And of course by practicing alternatives to the patriarchal capitalist machine.
Infinite growth is impossible on a finite planet. If the invented wheel is not turning in a good way, better to reinvent it. What we need is to be free to love, desire, choose, give opinions, attend, cultivate, worship, create, sow, produce, choose to give birth, experience, change, feed, care, plant, fish, exchange, share, market, express, communicate, educate, produce, and reproduce. We need to live well. All life on this planet depends on us.
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