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Ever get the feeling we've lost the argument?
We may or may not be right (about a near-term peak and decline), but the argument -- the public argument, meant to help mitigate a crisis -- that is lost.
For example, look at the article here and the comments that follow:
clueless.
This guy's article points up a couple of things:
The public is deeply distrustful of Big Oil -- so much so, that many completely ignore the fact that Big Oil has been pooh-poohing Hubbert's message. This is going to come back to haunt the oil companies. If the public is angry over $3 gas, how will they react when it hits $5 or $10 a gallon?
We live in what I refer to as The Disinformation Age. There is so much "information" that comes at us from so many sources, that it really requires a sixth sense to be able to weed out the BS. Much of the public lack effective filters and so -- not knowing what to believe -- they retreat into superstition and prejudice.
Like you told the guy: Either you prepare or you don't.
My biggest fear is that the news of peak will be swept away by something more dangerous like...(fill in the blank)
Or, with this distrust, people go beyond attempting boycotts and eventually start attacking the infrastructure - as seen in Pakistan, India, Nigeria, etc already. It's another "if I can't have it, then..." situation.
Yet another above ground concern that will likely, eventually, become reality.
Which is why we need to look at the nodes in our fragmented, network industrial society where authority is recognized and defended - religious movements particularly, since media and government are widely dismissed as noted above. Religious movements could lead us, or groups of people, in any of a variety of directions - from authoritarian to egalitarian to communal - as people seek to make meaningful declining energy per capita, unprecedented in the vast majority of people's experience (even with the 1930s depression or WWII). I'm finding myself looking at these relationships among people in areas, societies and classes already dealing with powerdown.
Yes - if there ever was a reason to be connected in some way to an organized religion its Peak Oil Powerdown
Paradoxically this may not be the best for organized religion