If the amount of money going into the war economy were invested in landscape restoration, we would be in a far more positive position. It may get a little dire before we pull together, but I think when the prosperous nations, and in particular the U.S., realize they're wrecking their own kids' lives, there will be a mass change in value.
Interpretation
Investing in environmental restoration is more beneficial than spending on war, and a realization of this can lead to significant societal change.
This quote emphasizes the potential for a positive transformation in society if resources currently allocated to warfare are redirected towards ecological recovery. It suggests that as nations, particularly the U.S., begin to understand the detrimental impact of their decisions on future generations, there could be a collective shift in values that prioritizes sustainability over conflict.
In practice
In a TED Talk about environmental awareness, one could use this quote to highlight the importance of prioritizing environmental restoration over military spending.
Economics was like psychology, a pseudoscience trying to hide that fact with intense theoretical hyperelaboration. And gross domestic product was one of those unfortunate measurement concepts, like inches or the British thermal unit, that ought to have been retired long before.
That's one of the ironies of our time: Right when we're on the edge of serious improvements in health care, we're also cooking the planet.
We have to overcome the practice of male domination - even though it's changing, and changing in Liberia quite drastically.
We all remain who we are. But on the way to healing or liberation we have to do what the Romans called agere contra: we have to act against the grain of our natural compulsions. This requires clear decisions. Because it does not happen by itself, it is in a way "unnatural" or "supernatural" . . . (we) simply have to cut loose now and then, and in the process . . . make mistakes.
If there has been any progress in the Chinese society and politics over the last 20 years, it is all because the citizens have been pushing for change.
The world is full of people whose notion of a satisfactory future is, in fact, a return to the idealized past.
That night I lie out under the stars again. The Pleiades are there winking at me. I am no longer on my way from one place to another. I have changed lives. My life now is as black and white as night and day; a life of fierce struggle under the sun, and peaceful reflection under the night sky. I feel as though I am floating on a raft far, far away from any world I ever knew.
We should not forget that in the '60s, George Wallace's motto was 'segregation forever,' and that he did nothing to deter bombings and other acts of violence and, by his actions, condoned them.
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