GeofCox

I'm an activist working in social enterprise, with particular interest in how it can contribute to social and environmental transformation.

I'm English, but work internationally, and have lived in France for the last 11 years.

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[email protected]

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nprofile1qqs8ewwrfruhzcarta5kmeqj7ju5ukz8vxsk6kglh44jnt54jtpnw3spz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumt0wd68ytnsw43qelpjge

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relay.mostr.pub

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Last Notes

2024-05-14 21:43:58

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@npub1y5h…7m3c
This is the full article:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/09/what-are-the-most-powerful-climate-actions-you-can-take

2024-05-14 11:15:18

"Fossil fuel companies are forcing governments to compensate them for lost earnings in the transition to a low-carbon global economy."
Bit like the UK compensating slave-owners, rather than the slaves, when it abolished slavery, eh?
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/14/fossil-fuel-investment-treaties-lobbying-climate-mary-robinson-ban-ki-moon-ect

2023-09-24 11:22:57

‘Capitalism is dead. Now we have something much worse’ - Yanis Varoufakis
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/24/yanis-varoufakis-technofeudalism-capitalism-ukraine-interview

2023-09-17 22:17:13

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@npub15tf…6uqv
Interesting article on Huawei - though I believe it wrongly implies that its 100% employee ownership is unique in China - it certainly isn't - I was involved in a research project on social enterprise in China, and found that employee ownership is in fact common.

2023-09-17 14:23:42

"Fascinating/depressing German research tracked 51 populist presidents/prime ministers from 1900-2020 in 60 countries. They are defined as those whose central argument is one of the “true people” v “dishonest” elites, and the bad news is their number has been on the rise for three decades. Worse, once they get into office they tend to stay for twice as long as non-populists. They are annoyingly good at politics, but very bad at economics. The researchers find that having a populist leader hits a country’s GDP per capita and living standards by about 10% over 15 years as the economy turns inward, institutions are undermined and risks are taken with macroeconomic policy. And there’s a specific warning for the likes of the US: once you’ve had one in power, populist leaders repeat on you... So populists are like cigarettes. It’s not the first one that does you in, but getting addicted to them that kills you."
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/sep/17/populist-leaders-bad-for-economy-but-hard-habit-to-break

2023-09-17 09:50:38

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@npub19jz…dp8p
I think the idea of an immediate return of the UK to the EU is a bit naive, to be honest. It won't go like that. What will happen (because the economic logic is inescapable - whatever party is in power) is a series of sector-by-sector deals, until rejoining the single market and customs union will not seem like a big deal to anybody.
But rejoining the EU - the political union - is a different matter, and depends not only on the UK, but on how the EU has evolved without the UK in the meantime.

2023-09-17 09:13:08

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@npub1ezu…jux5 @npub1vdk…msh2
The only label I'm sort-of comfortable with is 'socialist', because it alludes to the fundamentally social nature of humanity, and to the fact that everything that makes life good is socially produced - even self-awareness.
But I tend not to label people (while not denying that 'isms', etc, can be useful in grouping related ideas, etc); nor (I hope) do I have 'an ideology' - the whole point of left-wing thinking, surely, is just that: trying to see through ideology, to look reality square in the face.

2023-09-16 21:45:28

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@npub1ezu…jux5 @npub1vdk…msh2
Of course there are a range of views - otherwise we wouldn't be able to 'take what insights we can from all the great traditions of left thought'. I don't see anything negative - or ambiguous - in this.
But don't mistake the various different blueprints for better societies that appear from time to time for substantive differences. Such blueprints come and go, and will never be realised everywhere forever anyway - history doesn't end - and as Camus argues in 'The Rebel' such teleological illusions carry inside them the terrible danger of believing 'the end justifies the means'.
The underlying unity of left thinking lies elsewhere: in working for the oppressed, opposing exploitation and injustice, and, deepest of all, in the belief that humanity is capable of organising itself on the basis of evidence and reason - it is this that really defines the left, and distinguishes it from the political right and centre.

2023-09-16 10:37:24

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@npub1vdk…msh2
You might be interested in my own immediate reaction to #TheDawnOfEverything: https://climatejustice.social/@GeofCox/109916064374143676
Incidentally, I'm neither a 'marxist' nor an 'anarchist' - just a working-class left-leaning man that takes what insights I can from all the great traditions of left thought - and I think you'll find most left-leaning people find this ongoing squabble in the left family a bit silly - leading, in this instance to a 'review' that spends more time trying to charicature a 'marxist' straw man than on the book it's supposed to be reviewing. Not to mention, in the process, getting dangerously close to an anti-intellectualism we'd normally associate with the extreme right.

2023-09-15 12:15:49

"Benjamin Netanyahu expected to meet Elon Musk to discuss antisemitism on X"
Laugh or cry?

2023-09-07 21:29:17

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@npub1m58…mdjg
Looks interesting:
"Margaret Thatcher and Augusto Pinochet are vampires in the new film from the Chilean director Pablo Larraín. Literally so: El Conde (The Count) drapes them in black capes and has them fly over the city, biting the necks of their victims and tearing hearts out of chests."
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/sep/07/director-pablo-larrain-venice-film-el-conde-pinochet-chile

2023-09-05 08:53:03

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@npub1ck7…lrc6 @npub1zdp…vqv8
One of my kids decided not to learn to drive because they though it would be 'a redundant skill'.
Mind you, he might have been right for the wrong reason - since we need to have far fewer cars, I guess we're going to need far fewer drivers too...

2023-09-04 18:14:57

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@npub1m58…mdjg
Pinochet was also supported by Margaret Thatcher, and her mentor Friedrich Hayek, a key figure in the propagation of neoliberalism, key influence on the 'Chicago Boys' and hence Reagan - and notable for his explicit belief that if democracy comes into conflict with capitalism, it is democracy that has to be discontinued. Which in my book makes him a fascist (as of course was Pinochet).

2023-09-01 22:44:26

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@npub1rrq…dmud
And a further Guardian article noting that "Stian Jenssen, director of the private office of the Nato secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, suggested that western diplomats were beginning to consider... the possibility of a deal over Crimea and Donbas."
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/sep/01/ukraine-end-war-allies-plan-military-us-election-west

2023-09-01 10:06:27

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@npub152z…uzx8
I'm trying to buy all my clothes second-hand now - which would be much easier if I could sew!
But really, buying from charity shops is fantastic, isn't it? - You reuse old clothes - and the money you pay goes to some good cause too. Everybody wins!

2023-09-01 09:48:44

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@npub1m2g…mhte @npub1g0t…tvm4
I was visiting a wealthy area in the UK recently (I live in France) and was very struck by the sight of a huge modern mansion - no doubt some millionaire's home - and immediately outside its gates a huge pot-hole in the public road. I should have taken a photo. It seemed to symbolise the huge transfer of wealth from the public to the private, that has ruined the UK over recent decades. But did the mansion's residents share this awareness, even as they risked their luxury car's suspension every time they left home? Who knows?

2023-08-31 11:30:26

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@npub1m2g…mhte @npub1g0t…tvm4
Maybe the rich just want to be supr-rich, and the super-rich think - with some justification - that their wealth buys them immunity from social collapse - that they'll never have to use public transport, or any other public services, or walk public streets...

2023-08-31 08:42:22

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@npub1rrq…dmud
Good article (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/aug/30/ukraine-war-vladimir-putin-prigozhin-russia) - it's rare indeed to read something in 'western' media that actually shows some understanding of Russian history and culture.
You can never be sure about the real agendas, but my guess is that the NATO hawks' encouragement of Ukraine's rejection of the Minsk agreements was a gamble they now realise failed - and that the talk now of Ukraine defeating Russia is a public posture, aimed at Ukraine's morale, but that behind the scenes, or at least in their hearts, they know that something along the lines of Minsk is - always has been - the only realistic settlement.

2023-08-19 17:55:14

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@npub1rz4…xe3g
You have nothing to fear on either of these grounds Rémy - Mastodon is fast with news - it's generally here before it's on mainstream media - and the level of political discussion really is far higher here than on any other social media I've encountered.

2023-08-05 10:45:37

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@npub1hpc…hjn3 @npub106t…55ul @npub1d7j…u8xc
I often wonder if people that think everybody is selfish and greedy have really never experienced love and friendship.
Did they never have a loving mother? a family, friends, good neighbours? Have they really never experienced the kindness of strangers?

2023-08-04 18:08:48

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@npub1hy4…fw8v @npub1zh4…7v99 @npub1qzc…yetl
I take every opportunity to recommend Rutger Bregman's book 'Humankind'. It's an extensive, closely argued and well-evidenced argument that most people are good - and why many people wrongly think they're not (because persuading us that we are brutish and unpredictable implies the need for a powerful ruling class to control us).
But actually it's easy to expose the weakness of the argument that humans are inherently greedy, etc... Just ask those making it if they are, in fact, themselves bad people - or their mothers, or their children. Generally, they then fall back to 'Well, I mean most people' - but then, of course, everybody that thinks humans are bad seems to think everybody they love is the exception...

2023-07-07 14:57:20

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@npub189n…satx
It's also really annoying that in some countries state-owned media - including the BBC in the UK, which is not allowed to advertise or recommend commercial products or services - still frequently publicise commercial social media - "Follow us on Twitter", etc - instead of non-commercial services like Mastodon.