Oh, and that capitalism needs to be done away with and replace with Marxism
Local schmocal: Why small-scale solutions won’t save the world
I have a confession: I’m a cynic when it comes to living small. I like to garden and ride bikes; I buy local whenever I can. But I don’t think my personal lifestyle choices are going to save the world — and neither will yours.
I’m not alone. Just ask Greg Sharzer, a frustrated Marxist activist with a Ph.D. in Political Science from York University who also enjoys cycling and Fair Trade coffee. Sharzer’s book No Local: Why Small-Scale Alternatives Won’t Change the World is a bucket of ice water on fresh-faced progressive localism, and an affront to the concept of micro solutions altogether. Localism is a survival strategy, Sharzer writes, not a movement, and not a solution. (big snip)
Sharzer relies on Marxist class analysis to make his arguments that localism fails to bring about systemic change. I will spare you the Marxism (you’re welcome!) but not the class war. He basically argues that if localists “understood†capitalism (scare quotes necessary), they’d be in the streets with torches and pitchforks, not out scavenging used veggie oil to power their Jettas. He is lobbying for us to think and act collectively, globally, instead of just focusing on ourselves.
So, a 2 for 1 bonus: Warmists shouldn’t really bother making changes in their own lives (like any do other than token changes in the first place) and the need to do away with capitalism and replace it with Marxism (actually, what they are attempting to do is replace it with Progressivism, ie, nice fascism. Marxism is not that far off).
I should note that the Grist writer, Susie Cagle, does end the piece by recommending that people engage in these micro-solutions. Alas, they won’t. And that, as someone in the comments points out, if Sharzer isn’t giving his book away, he’s not really a Marxist. He’s not: it’s $19.95.
