Disaster Cannibalism: The Final Stage of Civilisational Collapse

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

When prey is scarce, Atlantic cod use younger members of their species as their protein source. When ponds dry up, frogs become carnivorous and devour their siblings. And when human nations compete for land and resources on an overpopulated planet, they begin exterminations. As the climate crisis and population overshoot increase competition between nations, between natives and … Continue reading Disaster Cannibalism: The Final Stage of Civilisational Collapse

How Humans Became Aliens on Their Own Planet — in 600 Words

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

This is a short piece. The longer essays go much deeper. Ecological consciousness is never a mental asset, but a spiritual muscle that humans lost long ago. It is a language that dies unspoken, a houseplant long forgotten, a desperate bird song coughing itself into a cacophonic abyss of incoming traffic. Nature is here, where … Continue reading How Humans Became Aliens on Their Own Planet — in 600 Words

It Is Never a War. It Is Always a Business

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

The minute a human becomes a soldier, they become a fast-moving consumer good in the war sausage factory: entering the factory as a life form with an identity and soul, and processed into an anonymous object that is hurled against other anonymous objects. War is the ultimate dehumanization. I learned this first hand when I … Continue reading It Is Never a War. It Is Always a Business

Genomic Autocracies: How Hyacinths Resisted Human Domestication

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

As the human world succumbs to the grip of autocracy, we are never short of examples from the natural world where nature itself successfully revolted against power. Today I bring you another story of a failed coup: the failed domestication of the hyacinth. The dominant logic of plant breeding has always been to maximize the most monetizable quality … Continue reading Genomic Autocracies: How Hyacinths Resisted Human Domestication

Biology Lessons In Degrowth: The Three Stages of Civilisation

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

My first job out of graduate school was also my first and only job offer. I jumped at the opportunity of becoming a manager at a fungal microbiology laboratory, specializing on indoor mold: people would bring me samples from their blackened shower wall, their carpet, or their basement, and I would analyze them. I would … Continue reading Biology Lessons In Degrowth: The Three Stages of Civilisation

The Myth of System Change. And The Heroes That Actually Make It Happen

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

Systems never change. First, they fail the people, and then they are demolished by the people. America is becoming witness to its own painful, but beautiful demolition. People are refusing to buy. They are seeing through exploitative employers. They are waking up to a rotten system than never “had their back”. And they are resisting … Continue reading The Myth of System Change. And The Heroes That Actually Make It Happen

End-Stage Necrocapitalism: Fumbling Towards The Exit

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

Societies were formed not to evolve, but to obey, and what we tend to affectionately call “social evolution” was merely the aftermath of succumbing, and then adapting to, ever changing forms of oppression. Much like farm animals on growth hormones, humans can easily live the entirety of their existence sustained by the distractions of a … Continue reading End-Stage Necrocapitalism: Fumbling Towards The Exit

They Came. They Danced. They Went Extinct

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

I normally don’t expect a nature hike in the clean suburban air of my beach town to turn into a back-to-the future, post-apocalyptic excursion into the remnants of an extinct society. But hey ho, after we had climbed up the hill, enjoyed spectacular views and traversed a forest that was literally dying for a drink of October … Continue reading They Came. They Danced. They Went Extinct

A 400-Word History of Capitalism

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

Humans were not corrupted by capitalism. They created it because they were corrupt in the first place. Capitalism has been accused of creating today’s selfishness, individualism and narcissism, but these vices pre-existed. Capitalism merely came along to monetize them. Greed was there from the start. Capitalism was the app that codified, amplified, digitized and weaponized it. It … Continue reading A 400-Word History of Capitalism

Oh Say, Can You See, We Have Never Been Free

Posted on by George Tsakraklides

How The Freest Slaves In The World Got Duped The best moment to rob someone of their freedom is when they have taken it all for granted; or better yet, when they have forgotten what freedom was in the first place. This is precisely what has happened to Americans over the past century: consumerism replaced … Continue reading Oh Say, Can You See, We Have Never Been Free