posted by Brit
Ruth Tierney reports on the disturbing phenomenon of 'carborexia' or 'Dark Greenie-ism'. Contagious and possibly incurable, the symptoms are disproportionate guilt about the effects of your carbon emissions, a firm belief that you are one of only a handful of guardians of the planet's future, and an uncontrollable desire to keep making other people feel bad until they too catch the disease.
Frighteningly, Dark Greenies appear just like ordinary geography teachers. Until you try to speak to them.
A blog about, among other things, imaginary ideas - What ifs? and Imagine thats. What if photographs looked nothing like what we see with our eyes? Imagine that the Berlin Wall had never come down. What if we were the punchline of an interminable joke? All contributions welcome.
It's an apocalyptic belief, and these are the classic signs of apocalyptic believers from Jews in the 2nd century BC onwards.... a belief in yourself as a specially selected human, granted special knowledge of the end of the world leads to certain predictable psychological results.
ReplyDeleteBy which I do not mean to say that all Jews in the 2nd century BC and since then were apocalyptic believers of course, nor even that there is necessarily anything wrong with holding apocalyptic beliefs- they can be very enjoyable and motivating.
ReplyDeleteThe great Bryan Appleyard himself is a good example of man who derives both pleasure and motivation from apocalyptic scenarios, after all.
ReplyDeleteYou're going along so nicely Vernon that I feel I ought not to interrupt.
ReplyDeleteBryan got hypnotised by James Lovelock once and has never fully recovered.
They are pillars of rationality compared with the Jehovah's Witnesses. Talking of apocalyptic, I'm told it is true that Sutherland and Christie really did shag in that movie
ReplyDeleteYes, sorry about that, it's one of my favourite themes. Been reading a lot about the 17th century Jewish Messiah Sabbatai Zvi lately...
ReplyDeleteGood choice of pic by the way. The Donald Sutherland 'Invasion'flick is the best in my view. Didn't know he'd shagged Julie Christie however. Wonder if Leonard Nimoy felt rejected?
Here's how much I know, but is there a word which describes the pathology of those taken over by apocalyptic beliefs, leading them to feel certain they have been specially selected in some way? It's clearly a syndrome that crops up all over the place so one guesses that it is wired into us.
ReplyDeleteAs for the "dark greenies", if they weren't worrying about this they'd be worrying about something else. It's selfish no doubt, but I'm so glad they are doing all my worrying and guilt-carrying for me. There could be a business here: Team Carborex will do all your worrying for you, from a tenner a hour for minor ones to a hundred an hour for the real guilt-ridden baddies.
I am uber dark green
ReplyDeleteI'm depressed. We had to euthanize our cat today (both hub and I crying like babies as we gazed into kitty's glazing eyes). But we buried him deep in our garden and planted a sapling (nandia) on top of him.Tomorrow I'll put white tulip bulbs all over the area. That's green, ain't it?
ReplyDeleteLord, I forgot how cute Donald Sutherland was in his youth. His son has a much rougher, tougher look, as if his name should be "Butch" not "Kiefer."
That pic reminds you of Sutherland's cuteness, Susan? He's supposed to be frightening and horrible.
ReplyDeleteSorry about your cat.