Where I’m At Right Now: Reality Matters

"The center must hold. The extremes—left and right—are tearing the fabric of society apart. We need pragmatic idealism, not purity tests. We need leaders who know how to solve problems, not just perform outrage." -- Dr. Glen Barry

After four years of silence—of soul-searching, survival, and stepping back from the brink—I return to deep ecology writing with a sense of urgency and burden. My essays once poured out like wildfire across a dry forest floor. But the last several years have been too strange, too raw, too dangerous. Now, as planetary boundaries rupture and social delusion festers, I find it necessary again to speak on a variety of topics. 

Signs of ecosystem and societal collapse are all around. The climate unravels, forests burn, species vanish, and water and food grow scarce. The biosphere—the thin layer of life that sustains us—is dying by a billion cuts. We are gutting Earth for comfort and profit, and pretending it's normal.

Ecological collapse is intertwined with the rise of fascism, perma-war, and grotesque inequity. Reality matters. The types of truths found in old oak trees and large intact forest ecosystems. Let me share where I am right now.

I believe in biological sexes as a scientific fact. I have no issue with others expressing their sexual identity however they wish—live as you see fit, as long as you are not hurting others. Just don’t demand I change my language and abandon scientific truth to avoid hurting your feelings.

I have no issue with legal guns either. They’re not going away. But let’s be clear: reducing gun violence starts with treating mental illness and restoring dignity to hollowed-out lives. A society that leaves people isolated, angry, and desperate will always be violent. Give people meaningful work, shelter, belonging—and the guns become less necessary and dangerous.

Unchecked immigration threatens to overrun stable, well-run societies. It also carries deep ecological consequences—more people, more consumption, more concrete, more emissions, and less nature. Legal immigration, foreign aid, and refugee support are essential. But so are walls and lawful deportations. When tech companies use global talent to drive down wages and shut out local communities from the benefits of AI, it’s not progress—it’s exploitation.

AI is here. It is too late to avoid. What matters now is whether it exacerbates collapse—through surveillance, disinformation, and hyper-consumption—or becomes a tool for healing and renewal. I’ve used AI to help write this essay, not to replace my voice, but to sharpen and clarify it. Augmenting my thoughts, not automating them.

MAGA is largely comprised of those who didn’t work hard in school, aren’t particularly clever, and were bullies. The high school tormentors are now in charge, and it’s called fascism. It’s a movement rooted in resentment, fear, and an open contempt for knowledge and caring for others.

Trumpf has no decency. He is a cancer upon American values and global well-being. That he routinely mocks others’ appearance is beyond hypocrisy—it’s absurd. The man is physically grotesque and morally hollow. He is the emperor with no clothes—waddling, bloated, enraged, violent, and obscene. That millions follow him is a symptom of civilizational decay.

Anti-fascist resistance to Trumpf tyranny is the responsibility of all decent, free-thinking, and liberty-loving people.

Yet progressive liberals are becoming just as extreme as those they oppose. They’ve lost touch with working people, pushing rigid beliefs instead of focusing on real-world struggles. Too often, they trade common sense for slogans and empathy for self-righteousness. When winning arguments matters more than improving lives, liberal politics turns into another form of control.

I long for political moderation. At this point, I would describe myself as a Bob Dole Republican. You want a 10% tax rate, I want 6%—let’s compromise at 8% and go have a beer together. I long for that simpler time (excepting the start of bloated military budgets and endless social wars), when policy was hashed out over handshakes, not hashtags. 

The center must hold. The extremes—left and right—are tearing the fabric of society apart. We need pragmatic idealism, not purity tests. We need leaders who know how to solve problems, not just perform outrage. Some life-threatening issues may warrant strong responses. Reasoned extremism on behalf of Earth, humanity, kindred species, peace, equity, liberty, and justice for all is no vice.

Every one of these social diseases—fascism, economic injustice, identity tribalism, immoderation, and political demagoguery—are worsened by ecological breakdown. When the climate collapses, food systems fail. When forests vanish, cultures unravel. When we become alienated from the land, we lose each other—and eventually, we lose everything. Our home, our lives, our very ability to exist.

The human family is not separate from nature. We are one and the same. 

Be purpose-driven and forward-facing. Move with clarity beyond the traumas you have endured, for me the pain of abandonment and loss by those who said they loved me. Forgive—but do not forget—the treachery of the jealous and less gifted. Let your scars speak for you and move on. Restore yourself as you restore natural ecosystems.

The new pope is onto something. His calls for peace, humility, and care for the Earth and the poor reflect spiritual clarity we desperately need. An end to war and global demilitarization isn’t optional—it’s a prerequisite to funding the health, environment, employment, and education investments needed for a livable future for all.

War must end. Perma-war saps the soul of nations and destroys the natural world. Weapons manufacturers profit while children die. Entire ecosystems are reduced to rubble in the name of power. War is the ultimate ecocide. If we cannot disarm, we cannot survive.

I am a strong supporter of Israel and insist that Jewish pogroms be relegated to the past. At the same time, I strongly support the Palestinian need for a place to live in peace. I condemn Hamas terrorism unequivocally. And I condemn the collective punishment and terror unleashed by Israel upon Gaza. I demand human rights for all—supporting and condemning both sides where needed. Moral clarity requires holding both truths at once.

With the Russian invasion of Ukraine, there is no such moral ambiguity. The Russian government is a dangerous force for imperialistic evil, launching a genocidal war of expansion upon innocent civilians. To stand by idly while Russian troops flatten cities is to erase the lessons of the last century. How long until Russian tanks rumble through Paris and London? The future of the free world depends upon resisting Russian, Chinese, and yes, American imperialism in all its forms.

As a failed pacifist, it pains me to realize that in this historical moment, we must fight for peace. To then demilitarize globally once and for all.

Overpopulation and consumption disparities threaten to pull down the entire biosphere and end being. Infinite growth on a finite planet is a mathematical impossibility. Educate girls and boys equally. Provide birth control freely. Tax large families. 

We either find balance, or we collapse into nothingness.

The human family must urgently adopt an ecological policy agenda: end fossil fuel subsidies and accelerate the transition to renewables; protect over half the Earth through rewilding and conservation; implement permaculture-based agriculture; tax overconsumption and pollution; and reorient economies toward ecological limits, local self-reliance, and regeneration.

Human exceptionalism is more than money and status. It is appreciating art, sport, philosophy, science, family, spirituality, lovemaking, pets, and constant self-betterment. Our greatness lies in what we create and protect, not what we consume. 

Reengage with lofty goals: the rights of all humans, ending tyranny, lasting peace, equal opportunity, sharing and caring. End war. Stop ecocide. Reach for the stars.

Protect kids. When you know someone is harming children, report them. Even when frightened. Fully expect blowback and character assassination. Do it anyway, it is worth it. Authorities and media must take every report seriously—investigate thoroughly and refuse the reflex to attack the whistleblower. The vulnerable must come first.

Life can be so beautiful. The sky, the woods, the waters, the kinship of friends including other species—it is all profoundly miraculous. Is it possible we are already in heaven, yet are destroying it out of alienation and greed?

Seek grace and faith, but don’t push them upon others. There may be multiple paths to the divine. What matters is awe, reverence, and service to something greater than ourselves—be it Earth, future generations, or loving gods.

I trust you are somewhat surprised at the opinions expressed here. They fall across the political spectrum, a long-time quest for truthful reality, not ideological purity. And a recommitment to moderation.

We are the Earth protecting itself. Or we are its destroyers. Through my modest work building a global ecological AI, I hope to be on the side of truth, Earth, and life. 

Because reality matters. That’s where I’m at right now.

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 This is a personal essay and not the viewpoint of my employer.

Join me on Bluesky at: Climate, Ecology, War and More by Dr. Glen Barry

Freedom Isn’t Free, Terrorism Is Pervasive

Enduring occasional acts of random terror is the cost of living in a free society. Giving up civil liberties does not provide security, but rather enslaves you in a state of pervasive terror. The human family is threatened by systematized eco-terrorism and other assaults by the elite upon the poor far more than by infrequent criminal acts which the courts can and should handle.

By Dr. Glen Barry, EcoInternet
Earth Meanders

Eco-terrorism

PERVASIVE TERROR

Terrorism is the act of inspiring terror in others by harming presumed innocents. For many, unjust postmodern life on a dying planet is full of PERVASIVE TERROR. The term terrorism has been usurped by the nanny military state to mean only politically motivated violence that targets the public. While such murder is never justified, in fact it occurs rarely and is not a high-profile threat to most. It is one of the manageable costs of being free.

Infrequent criminal acts, of the sort that recently occurred in Boston and occur much more frequently around the world, are tragic but best handled by the criminal justice system. America has become such a drama-queen nation that it continues to incautiously react to such dastardly acts with endless pundit pontificating, needlessly giving up hard-earned revolutionary civil liberties, and lashing out militarily in a counterproductive manner. Doing so breeds the next generation of criminal terrorists and ensures further blowback.

America is not special. In fact, many acts of terror occur around the ecologically and socially collapsing Earth for which America is responsible. The far greater threat issues from systematic targeting of the poor and of nature by America’s and other nations’ privileged elite. The rich and their corporations, police, and military routinely practice systematic terrorism that is much grander in scale, with devastating impact.

To name but a few: two billion people live on less than $2 a day, at least 3,000 kids die daily from bad water, and millions of innocents fear random drone attacks. Where are the outrage and the manhunts to bring those responsible for these preventable tragedies to justice? Their terror is no less heartfelt than that of the pampered elite.

Imagine the terror of an indigenous tribe suddenly finding a logging, mining, or oil company entering their ancestral land, where they have lived from time immemorial, telling them it does not belong to them. Instead, their forests will be cut, they must go to the cities, and their women are whores to service their needs. Or please consider the heartfelt terror of innocent communities hearing the incessant buzz of drones over their heads, not knowing when or whether they will be targeted as “collateral” damage – meaning murder victims. Or feel the everyday terror of the working poor, serving as slaves to the elite and then going home to unfed families and uneducated children, devoid of hope. What of the terror felt by kindred wildlife species as their habitat is razed and their young slaughtered in the name of “progress”?

Such systematic terror arising from pervasive inequity, lack of human rights, militarism, and other injustices have been endured for far too long. Many acts of criminal terror result from these social ills, and we will not achieve a lasting reduction of violence until they are addressed. Working to resolve the terror pervasive in our social and economic structures may well be the only way that an unlikely, albeit possible, large scale act of biological or nuclear criminal terrorism can be avoided. Further stripping our civil liberties, establishing a police surveillance state, and waging perma-war certainly won’t do so.

TIME OF GREAT DYING

Earth’s ecosystems are collapsing and dying as all life and the biosphere are murdered for industrial economic growth. Just like a cancer cell, exhibiting profound personal and societal sickness, humanity is systematically destroying billions of years of naturally evolved ecosystems for a few generations of excessive consumption for some, to be followed by biosphere collapse and unimaginable terror for all.

A time of great suffering and dying is upon us as global ecosystems – water, land, oceans, air, and food – are routinely destroyed by the industrial growth machine. Everywhere on Earth species, ecosystems, economies, communities, climate, and our one shared biosphere are being liquidated.

Drone perma-war, tar sands and coal, old-growth logging, inequity, ecocide, lack of justice, poverty, and human rights abuses are all terrorism and need to end.

These acts of ecocidal and genocidal terror are waged upon Earth and her ecosystems every day by the industrial growth machine and by our unfair consumption. Ecosystems and their life – that together power Earth’s biosphere – are being methodically plundered by this growth-at-all-costs mentality, which can only end in ecological collapse and the end of being for most or all life. As ecological thresholds are surpassed and climate and ecosystems are in the process of collapsing, this means continued economic growth without destroying the biosphere is not possible, and the continuation of an economic system that tries is itself an act of unspeakable terrorism upon all being.

It is time to passionately love all life and end the burning, cutting, and pillaging. Out-of-control human growth in industry, economies, and population is steadily stripping Earth of its ecosystems – meaning the end is near unless we stop.

ECO-TERRORISM

The real, worst sorts of terrorists are eco-terrorists, the corporate elite and their minions ravaging ecosystems and climate. Every day, eco-terrorism by the industrial growth machine and nanny government is waged against Earth’s ecosystems and all species, killing billions (including humans) and destroying the biosphere as habitats essential to life are weakened and killed.

Because the ruling oligarchy holds the wealth, power, and guns, such terror is nonsensically called progress and rarely questioned. Yet the terror of ecocide is unmatched in human history.

Postmodern humanity shows utter contempt for other species – terrorizing all other life forms before murdering them – as we cut down and burn our own and all life’s ecosystem habitats, filling them with waste and perversely calling it development. Earth’s ecosystems are being scoured of life to “develop” as if air, land, water, oceans, and other species are worthless. Animals certainly are terrified as their habitat is cleared and their young massacred.

Eco-terrorism is the oil oligarchy and corporate elite ravaging ecosystems and climate, destroying our one shared biosphere and all life’s well-being, for a bit more growth in stuff for a while; what will follow are apocalyptic collapse and the end of being. Where are the outrage and government resources to stop this preventable corporate terrorism? Oh wait, that’s right, they aren’t affluent Americans so they don’t matter.

If you train yourself to listen, you can hear Earth wailing in pain, speaking of and mourning her and all life’s death as ecosystems are lost.

TERRORISM IS TERRORISM WHEREVER IT OCCURS

It is time for President Barack Obama and America, after triumphing over the horrific Boston Marathon terrorism, to stop terrorizing and murdering other innocents with drone-based perma-war worldwide. Terrorism is terrorism, whenever innocents are killed, whoever pulls the trigger. After an estimated million revenge killings, how many more must be murdered to avenge 9/11?

Exaggerated fear of criminal acts of violence continues to be used as a straw man – in a misconstrued “war on terror” (though no longer referred to as such, remains nonsensical against a tactic) – in order to enslave us, and wage eco-terrorism upon the planet and the poor.

The amount spent on “defense” and “homeland security” by America is obscene. A one-time expenditure of twenty billion dollars could provide clean water for the world and save a million children a year from a preventable and terrible death. Yet America spends 30 times as much yearly to dominate the world and continue to extract an unfair share of everyone’s resources.

Again, giving up freedom does not make you secure. I sense from the Boston Marathon tragedy an America slowing becoming recommitted to justice and freedom, rather than cowering in fear and lashing out. Terrorism is a criminal act and not well addressed through military force. America must never give up its freedoms because of terrorists – and its very soul and well-being depend upon again committing to justice, freedom, sustainability, and the rule of law.

Billions of people overconsume every day, as billions of others are in excruciating pain and suffer with unmet basic needs. Each in their own way – through a combination of sheer numbers and inequity – are destroying the ecosystems necessary for life. There is no surviving such exponential industrial growth that feeds upon itself. The overdeveloped world must stop being so self-absorbed and face the daily terror borne by much of the world.

STOP THE LIES: WE ARE ONE

Going forth we must base our actions upon ecology truth. We are one human family utterly dependent upon ecosystems, climate, and kindred species for life. Nations, gods, and economic growth are passing fables; only billions of years of natural evolution reflected in life-giving ecosystems, their species, and the biosphere in sum are real and truly indispensable.

Wake up, you foolish and deluded (you know who you are). Without ecosystems there can be no economy. Global ecosystems are collapsing. The end of being draws nigh because we won’t stop burning fossil fuels and destroying natural ecosystems. When we kill the planet, all other issues will be null and void.

Love Earth, humanity, and all species like close family and friends; and together we will end the terror and sustain Earth and well-being for all life.

It is time for a radical political center to come together globally and in each of our communities with answers to threats including climate, poverty, abuse, war, denied human rights, and ecosystem collapse.

Global ecosystems and all life’s one shared biosphere are collapsing and dying under the strain of the insatiable and ecocidal human industrial growth machine. Human well-being is inseparable from the health of land, air, and water, yet we devastate ecosystems for throwaway junk. To survive, let alone thrive, humanity must immediately power down fossil fuels, protect and restore natural ecosystems, and embrace justice, equity, and peace.

Abrupt climate change and ecosystem collapse are a global ecological emergency. Resistance to ecocide is self-defense yet must NEVER target innocents. The answer lies in loving life and using all possible other just means to achieve and maintain green liberty.

It is clearly time for global Earth Revolution to sustain land, water, and air and to achieve universal human rights and economic fairness. Let’s make it so together, firmly denouncing all forms of terrorism while clearly understanding that all other forms of resistance are legitimate when used to avoid global ecosystem collapse and end systematic terrorism upon the poor and nature.