But What If…?

I’ve been staying with beloved friends for the past week, and they have three absolutely adorable cats. For reasons of hygiene, the cats are not allowed on the kitchen bench. They are particularly not allowed on the chopping board that lives on the kitchen bench.

Here is Herb, not being allowed on the chopping board.

Not pictured is Herb being gently, but firmly, removed from the chopping board, followed by Herb jumping back onto the chopping board, then being removed… this can go on all day.

Herb, you see, is irrepressible. From his point of view, he is happily sitting on the chopping board, or he is being held – which he is a big fan of – or he is back on the floor and ready to jump back up onto the chopping board.

“Herb!” his parents lament. “We’ve talked about this. No cats on the chopping board!”
“But what if…” ponders Herb…”what if Herb was allowed on the chopping board?”
Rinse and repeat.
And repeat.
And repeat.

The thing is, I think there is something we could all learn from Herb’s “But what if…?”

Over the weekend I attended many of the Planet Talks at Womadelaide. They were incredible, and they contained a unifying thread that I really needed to hear – now, more than ever. It was beautifully summed up by Kumi Naidoo on the Monday. (All quotes are likely somewhat inexact, because it was between 35 and 40 degrees the whole time and my brain may have melted a little… but I believe the sense remains intact)

Kumi’s point, which hit me right where I needed it, was this:

“Pessimism is a luxury we simply cannot afford.
The pessimism that naturally arises from our circumstances must be met with the optimism of our thought, our courage, our love, and our humanity.”

While our governments are in thrall to corporations, it is up to us to reimagine our future.  As Tim Winton put it, talking about fossil fuel companies like Santos, Woodside, and BP: “These are the names that carry weight in parliament. And they’re not our names.”

We are frequently told that we can’t have Universal Basic Income (UBI), because people might stop working, even though every trial of UBI ever held shows that people do not stop working. Instead they become more entrepreneurial. More creative. Oh, and healthier.

We’re told we can’t ditch fossil fuels because we don’t have the technology to replace them yet, even though we absolutely do, because that would threaten the profits of businesses and billionaires, which we prioritise above all else.

We can’t listen to First Nations people because they might ask us to re-examine our systems.

We can’t this because it’s not profitable… We can’t that because it would weaken the economy… We can’t, we can’t, we can’t.

Andry Sculthorpe called it a colonial values system. We have to take what we can get.

So we maintain a system in slave to the great god Economy, where people have to work two and three jobs simply to keep their heads above water. And we don’t try to reimagine that economy. Tim Winton pointed out that “the true economy is the earth under your feet, the air you breathe…” which really spoke to me.

Why do we not measure our success by the things that we truly value, rather than the movements of small green pieces of paper? Rather than a made up financial system that is designed to funnel wealth and resources to a privileged few, and keep the rest of us working so hard that we don’t have the energy or the strength to reimagine the future, let alone to make it happen.

Elizabeth Mossop said “We suffer from a desperate lack of leadership in government, and in corporations. There are so many people who are afraid of the consequences of standing up for what is right. We so desperately need people who are going to be brave in this space.”

So what if Herb was allowed on the chopping board? What if we were brave enough to value the things that actually matter? What if we broke the unspoken rules, rebelled against the voices that hold weight but aren’t ours?

What if we could be irrepressible like Herb?  They stop us, they toss us off the chopping board, we get back up. What if we changed the rules? What if our voices did hold weight?

What if … Universal Basic Income? What if … housing for all? What if… no more fossil fuels?

What if … meaningful education focused on problem solving and critical thinking, training us all to ask “What if…?” instead of training us to sit down, shut up, and do what we’re told.

Tim Winton said “we need people to continue to write out of love and rage and fealty to the real world. Change is hard, and slow, but it happens, and it never happens if we don’t try to make it”

What if…?