Eugene’s Silver Linings Thoughts, First Edition:

“The Best to be Imagined”

Eugene Jarecki • Sunday, March 14, 2020

This is the first in what I hope will be a series of rather optimistic thoughts I have on the present circumstance. Like anyone, I understand the gravity of the global situation, which, as ever, promises to unleash its worst on people far less privileged than me. So while I wish to share some idealistic reflections on what positivity may be drawn from all this, it is not out of insensitivity, but rather from a sense that, alongside the immense cost that has already been inflicted and is likely to get far worse before it gets better, I believe this is a moment for the power of positive thinking, not just as some “fake it till you make it” panacea, but as a real force for making things better.

I think my positive outlook came from the last several weeks in which, for the first time in my life, I have been physically incapacitated and unable to walk without assistance. I gained a new level of empathy from this and am hopefully on the road to recovery. Today, I even managed to walk the streets of Berlin in the sunshine, which, after lots of immobile time in hospital rooms, moved me greatly. To see it all — the children playing, the mothers and fathers with their strollers, juggling their crepes and hand-sanitizer, the mix of camaraderie and anxiety the pandemic has already begun to produce on the street — I was overwhelmed by the poetry of the moment.

So, moving as quickly as my legs could carry me, I went home to write these thoughts:

First, for me, most worrisome as an American of course, is that I see the dangerous convergence of this pandemic with an already fragile political situation at home. I and my team, who had geared ourselves up to work this entire year on GOTV activities for the election, now realize that we have to turn our attention to a mix of community support for those afflicted with Covid-19 and the protection of democracy during a pandemic that can easily be exploited by political operatives (of all stripes) to undermine democracy.

Second, as a lifelong anti-capitalist, I seem to be on everyone’s mailing list for “told ya so” type messages about how this is the system’s long-overdue comeuppance. The logic here is that Mother Nature has simply had enough of us and, with Covid-19, has sent us anything from a warning shot to an atom bomb that says “Stop abusing me, and get over your petty infighting. I can drop you all to your collective knees with a virus tinier than a speck.” While recognizing how much pain may be felt by so many as capitalism gets a black eye, I recognize that a system with so much bureaucratic thrust does not relinquish power easily. Today alone, the U.S. government continues its sanctions on Iran, despite the grip that country feels from Covid-19, and we have started renewed bombing of targets in Iraq. So apparently, industrial capitalism, despite the manifest evidence of its total global failure (as reflected in the climate crisis and elsewhere), plans to continue rapacious business as usual until something truly shuts it the fuck down. Which as the markets crash, and city after city, business after business continue to close, may just be happening. If you are an enemy of predatory global capitalism, this horror, no matter how grave, may prove a lesser evil than the continued operation of the machine. Just think (hopefully) of the break that mother nature will get as certain industries (like cruise ships) slow down and stop polluting her air and water.

Each of these thoughts carries with it the capacity to think positively or negatively. Each underscores the abusive nature that humankind has within itself, of “man’s inhumanity to man,” and also of humankind’s abusive relationship to the rest of nature. But equally, too, each has within it the tools for vast leaps of defiant optimism, and while the darker stuff may be seductive, the way conspiracy theories and the consideration of evil are, what we most need now, and what is far more challenging and exciting, is to see a road ahead of deep humanism here and now, and the capacity, from this bleak place, to carve a better path going forward than that which got us here.

For the sake of conversation, here are my first few positive thoughts, with more to come, and more to be shared in the group chat I hope you will join!:

1) Don’t just cancel! Adapt! Instead of canceling certain public events outright, find creative ways to adapt them. So if South by Southwest can’t happen as planned, don’t just cancel it. Make it happen in a new and unexpected way. How about South-by-Election2020, how about South-by-feed-the-hungry, etc. Instead of just canceling the Tribeca Film Festival, why not shift it to the Tribeca-feed-the-kids-who-will-not-get-lunch-because-they-get-their-lunch-at-school-and-schools-will-be-closed-Festival. There is all this energy already gathered, all these resources, all this personnel. And shit happens. And what a real statement of community it would be for an arts-organization to recognize that beneath art, the wheels of society need to turn. And by the way, if you are a customer who paid for their tickets, don’t ask for your money back, ask the organization to use part of your money to do these public works and use the rest to survive till next time the festival can happen! Don’t punish them because of an act of nature.

2) Many people will have disrupted work. Those of us who can afford to need to fight for welfare subsidies for those who need them. And those of us who can sustain a period of lost work should use that time to help those in need and to fight for the protection of election security in the coming months, when the pandemic may easily be weaponized to undermine the election.

3) Despite its pain, this can be a moment that so many of us have longed for, to get closer to ourselves, to each other. To be more involved and helpful to those we love and those we do not know. It is a time to live outside of the endless consumption grip of capitalism and its materialism. Engage in small and random acts of beauty, poetry, and community, like these guys.

4) It’s a time for us to think more closely about all we use — not just hand-sanitizer — but ways to take this time to adjust behaviors and question and rethink things we do by reflex, without thought.

5) If you have some time, read Mark Fisher’s Capitalist Realism and Gar Alperovitz’s America Beyond Capitalism. Both have beautiful clues in them for what the world can be made to look like past this crisis. It’s community-thinking against disaster capitalism Naomi Klein brilliantly explained in The Shock Doctrine. Let’s think about increased urban farming, non-capitalistic-community-barter-exchange, the re-purposing of spaces, changing, where possible, our usual businesses and structures to fit a world that could look very different indeed. Beyond its tragic effects, this may actually give us all a long overdue chance to push reset on many areas of life. To live lives that better reflect the priorities we increasingly have come to value.

Please do DM me if you would like to join the group chat I am looking to start to build on these thoughts and pool them with yours. It will also allow us to plan the most constructive actions going forward toward the better world we all wish to see.

Stay safe, mindful, and kind ❤️,

Eugene