Marvel Madness Abounds

SUBHEAD: In "Avengers: Endgame" we see the price of our failure to deal with our self destructive behavior.

By Juan Wilson on 15 May 2019 for Island Breath -
(http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2019/05/marvel-madness-abounds.html)


Image above: Poster artwork for movie The Avengers:Endgame. From (https://bgr.com/2019/02/03/avengers-endgame-spoilers-avengers-5-release-date/).

Read the excerpt from the review below as an introduction to how far out of touch we are with the problems we must deal with.

“Avengers: Endgame” Is a Liberal War Cry
(https://truthout.org/articles/avengers-endgame-is-a-liberal-war-cry/)

... "Avengers, assemble,” Captain America said to his army as it poured into the battlefield. At the center stood Thanos, the villain who, with a snap of his fingers, killed half the life in the universe. He did it to stop overpopulation. Now the dead have been resurrected and join the fight against him. If they and the Avengers fail, Thanos will erase all life in the universe and start “fresh.”

Audiences cheer and cry as they watch the film. Many of them have seen the 21 films that preceded it, which makes Avengers: Endgame a cultural event. Driving global ticket sales to almost $2.5 billion is a Hollywood liberalism that gives relief from today’s rising fascism.

Endgame is the climax of a decade of movies that tapped into American anxiety over the war on terror, Black Lives Matter, #MeToo and now climate change to give the audience a liberal catharsis...

... Liberalism is refreshed as one by one, the white male leads are honored and replaced by a new diverse cast of heroes. Iron Man has a moving funeral. Thor cedes his kingship to Valkyrie. Captain America goes back in time to replace the Infinity Stones so the timeline doesn’t split but stays in the past with his lost love.

When he reappears, he’s old and wrinkled on a bench and gives his shield to his partner Falcon (played by Anthony Mackie). “I’ll do the best I can with it,” Falcon says heavily, knowing he represents the nation. Captain American responds, “I know, that’s why you have it.” ...

And no, driving to the cineplex and buying a huge bucket of GMO popcorn to be washed down with a half-gallon of GMO sweetened Coca-Cola to see "Avengers Endgame" is not part of the solution - it's part of the problem.

Escapism, unreal expectations, and self-denial are just the beginning of our lunacy as we shit the bed.

Crazy Abounds
As Americans we have a long and close relation to England. To a lesser degree we have close relations to France, Germany and Spain.  At one time or another and together these world navel powers dominated the world for the last few centuries. With the possible exception of Spain they are all going bat-shit crazy - especially France, England and the United States.

France has President Emmanuel Macron and the Yellow Jackets, England has Prime Minister Theresa May and Brexit and America is stuck with POTUS Donald Trump and MAGA!

All you need to do to see how far gone we are is to watch the Trump Administration's plans for taking advantage of the soon to be ice-free Arctic. That planetary disaster is seen as an opportunity to move more fossil fuels and services around the world. 


Image above: Secretary of State Mike "Pompous Ass" Pompeo arrives in Iraq to further bully the Middle East into a war with Iran. From article below.

Washington Heats Up Its Cold War In The Arctic
(https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2019/05/14/washington-heats-up-cold-war-arctic/)

...  So far as the US Military-Industrial complex is concerned, there is no climate crisis in the Arctic or anywhere else. Trump, Pompeo and the rest ignore their own government department, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, which states that “Arctic sea ice reaches its minimum each September.

September Arctic sea ice is now declining at a rate of 12.8 percent per decade, relative to the 1981 to 2010 average.”

In spite of this, Pompeo refused to sign an Arctic Council Agreement that acknowledged climate change as a severe threat to the region. His other achievement was that this was the first time a declaration has been cancelled since the Council was formed in 1996. Americans must be proud.

Finland’s foreign minister stated later that “A majority of us regard climate change as a fundamental challenge facing the Arctic and acknowledge the urgent need to take mitigation and adaptation actions and to strengthen resilience.” He told reporters “I don’t want to name and blame anyone,” which is polite — but regrettable because it’s about time Pompeo, Trump and Bolton were named and blamed for their campaigns of spiteful aggression.

Pompeo tried to justify Washington’s moves to militarise the region by declaring “We’re concerned about Russia’s claim over the international waters of the Northern Sea Route, including its newly announced plans to connect it with China’s Maritime Silk Road.”

He ignores the fact that Russia has not made any claim involving international waters. In accordance with the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea which Russia ratified in 1997 (and is accepted by 157 signatories, but not the US which refuses ratification) it has submitted a request to extend its continental shelf...

 If we could only get it together
The "solutions", or more like the "feeble compromises" we may be able to make at this late juncture won't be provided by our fossil fuel based corporate overlords. Forget Costco, Amazon, Google, Apple, Microsoft, etc. etc.

All the solutions available to you will soon only be available within an hour or so walking distance to where you sleep. Food, water, shelter, tools, medical service, and yes entertainment, will be off the grid and much more local. The alternative is extinction.

About fifty years ago, when the first report from the Club of Rome was published we saw the writing on the wall...  and ignored it. Had we acted then we might be living in a sustainable alternate universe than we find ourselves in now.

The last time the world went this crazy was in the late 1930's as the world was headed into fascism and World War II. That altercation ended with a bang - an atomic bomb. The current altercation could begin with one.

Get cracking and keep your head down!