Why solarpunk in particular?

Our Current, Gloomy Situation

We live in challenging times. Almost daily, we are swept with bad news from all kinds of media channels:

All these things really happen and can indeed affect our mood over time. Even if we have a great urge to act within us: What can an individual do against it?

The whole madness has gone so far that people start researching and publishing "actually good news" nowadays.

But even that only serves temporary relief. Ultimately, it offers the individual only a short, refreshing break from swimming against the negative current and leaves them helpless in the end.

So, how can we offer lasting and honest hope to the individual again? In my opinion, we must radically turn away from the media flood and convert the newly gained time and energy into actions in our immediate surroundings. In the following, I will explain why turning away from the current negative information channels is important and how it helps us to gain back control over our society.

Communication, the Forgotten Tool

Everything mentioned in the last part worries me when we believe in the words of the philosopher Wittgenstein. According to him, our language, or further extended, our communication forms the basis of our real world.

The limits of my language are the limits of my world

-- Ludwig Wittgenstein

Or perhaps more bluntly formulated: What I cannot express with words is impossible, not realistic. One of his main concepts is the so-called Sprachspiel. He said that recognizing and controlling the current Sprachspiel is an incredibly powerful tool. And with this insight, Wittgenstein was not alone. Even Hitler recognized this and, as we all know, he and his followers unfortunately used it only too effectively. I would even assert that this played a significant role in Hitler's success. It makes us realize what impact this Sprachspiel has on our real world.

Now let's wind forward to our present time. In my opinion, the things mentioned in the first part of this analysis are subtly part of today's Sprachspiel. We are constantly confronted with negative language, which indirectly and unconsciously affects our mind and our reality. Not least, we numb ourselves through thousands of war reports or fall into depressive emotional states due to the underlying negativity. Whether this is actively driven by any shadowy force or simply a result of the "natural" development of our society, I dare not judge here. But one thing is certain: It spreads fear, horror, and a learned helplessness in society.

Breaking this current Sprachspiel, freeing ourselves from its chains, and opposing it would certainly do society no harm. But what options are there for that? In the next section, we analyze why I consider solarpunk as a suitable means to burst these chains that hold humanity back.

Solarpunk. Imagine, Act, Thrive

Solarpunk is a genre that has recently emerged in creative communities similarly to Cyberpunk. It combines social, scientific, and artistic ideas. The main focus of the movement is on a near, tangible future that is technologically advanced and has found a way to sustainably solve our current societal and ecological problems. No doubt: It is a utopia. But how does that help us in the here and now?

Firstly, solarpunk, similar to the "actually good news," provides a space for recovery from our everyday, apocalypse-approaching reality. It offers a completely unoccupied space for fantasy and ideas. There, one can freely think about how a tangible, positive future could look like. It is an invitation to enable new things and ultimately shift the conceptual boundaries of our world step by step. How else should the boundaries of reality change if our imagination itself cannot spread in a more positive direction yet? This task, formulating the unimaginable, lies in the hands of those who enjoy engaging in artistic activities. This includes, for example, painting, writing, animating, playing music, etc. So grab your brush, pen, or instrument if you feel like it!

Solarpunk is not only a utopia that imagines idealistic new worlds. It also has practical aspects and offers direct action space for every individual. Things like guerrilla gardening, tinkering, crafting, and researching in the local hackspace, or even relearning and expanding traditional craftsmanship and handicraft skills (woodworking, knitting, sewing, pottery, etc .), market gardening, and beekeeping can, among other things, be considered solarpunk. So grab your tools, plants, lab coat, if you feel like it!

The social aspect of solarpunk should not be neglected either. Solarpunk is, when you bundle forces with your fellows to create a new world wonder instead of fighting each other to create personal monuments, leaving a footprint on earth. Each person should also be aware that they always serve both as teacher and student to preserve the health of society and its knowledge. So give each other a hand and create things that would never be possible alone, if you feel like it!

Of course, solarpunk is and will remain not the final solution to our problems. For example, the problem of war remains unaddressed here, and we can best hope that the societal changes associated with solarpunk contribute to peace. I am quite sure that the one solution isn't even existing at all. Nevertheless, the framework of solarpunk is a good current vehicle for change in a positive direction. We can only try to spin the cocoon of a better future slowly around us, hoping to burst it someday and find ourselves in a never-before-seen beautiful new reality.

In conclusion, all of this is just my current advice for a better future from my subjective point of view. Therefore, I would like to conclude the text with the following words:

We only have the right to advise what we should add: "Follow it if you consider it to be good"

-- Pjotr Kropotkin
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