My New Cope: Hospicing Modernity
Posted by fauxciologist@reddit | collapse | View on Reddit | 35 comments
Hospicing Modernity by Olivia Andreotti is one of the most important collapse-related books I’ve read, for the purposes of grounding myself in the face of fear and the rapid cycling outrage and despair. I know plenty of people have been able to compartmentalize or numb themselves, but I have not succeeded. I can’t turn it off. My relationship is falling apart. Im doing the meds, therapy, eating healthy, exercise, and meditation but my heart still hurts so much all the time. I am fixated on what it would mean to be a good ancestor to a better future, so I keep searching for a way that I believe in.
Anyway this is a short essay I wrote about part 1 of Hospicing Modernity. I did an audio recording for anyone that prefers to listen and I’ve included several links where you can read chapters for free, as well as some of Dr. Andreotti’s other work. I don’t think everyone or even most people will be into the book, but if you are still searching for a direction to put your energy this might be helpful.
ergoI@reddit
This book is my passion. There is a sort of community around it and courses that are available through UVic continuing ed and on line. Start with Facing Human Wrongs to get connected.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
Thank you so much for your comment and suggestion! It makes me feel really good to encounter other people who were so moved by the book. I’m on the mailing list with Facing Human Wrongs and I plan to get more connected once this semester is over.
ergoI@reddit
Great! Maybe I’ll see you at a class some day!
PandaBoyWonder@reddit
Heres what helped me: I started doing all the things ive been afraid of doing, or unsure about! and that has given me renewed energy and hope for my future.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
That’s a great tactic and one that I share. What kind of things have you been doing? I started a PhD in sustainability this year in my mid-40s because I spent my 20s and 30s doing all the things I was afraid of thanks to undiagnosed adhd. Actually staying in one place and committing to a longterm project was the scariest for me. But digging into the literature results in a whole new level of despair so I’ve been trying to work with that.
hiddendrugs@reddit
the wild edge of sorrow is also a good read
Gloomy_Change8922@reddit
The best book I’ve ever read on grief and loss.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
Thank you! I will definitely check that out.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
Short essay I wrote reflecting on the book Hospicing Modernity by Vanessa Andreotti (I see I mixed up her name in the OP). This book is collapse-related in that it is critiquing modernity and inviting the reader to observe it as dying - modernity could be understood as the metacrisis or polycrisis - so as to shift our focus from preventing the inevitable collapses that we will witness in our lifetime, towards thinking about how we can become aware of our unconscious colonial baggage and be good ancestors to a better future.
Gloomy_Change8922@reddit
This course is amazing https://facinghumanwrongs.net
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
Thank you so much!! I have not seen this and I love that this work is inspiring so many cool projects.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
Thank you so much!! I have not seen this and I love that this work is inspiring so many cool projects.
BTRCguy@reddit
The problem is that if we were capable of being good ancestors to a better future we would not be the shits we currently are. Sure, colonialism is awful, but if we went back to how things were before colonialism it would be outright conquest, subjugation and slavery. Going back to before when the upper class took 2/3 of the profits would be going back to hereditary feudalism where they took 9/10 instead.
The way modernity and human nature are portrayed in the essay and the "direction we should go" seems less of an action plan for humanity and more of a "then a miracle occurs" bit of wishful thinking.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
When you write, “sure, colonialism is awful, but,” I can infer that this is not the right book for you and that’s ok. Nobody thinks “going back to before” is possible and nobody is advocating for that. This book is not “an action plan for humanity,” as there is no such plan for the 9 billion people on earth or the tiny 4.2% of them who are Americans focused on their “rights” to indefinitely extract and consume and instigate wars to “protect” their interests.
BTRCguy@reddit
If there is no action plan for humanity, then there is no path to becoming better ancestors for generations to come, is there?
Not sure whether this is hopium, copium, or both.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
Who is this universal “humanity” that you are talking about and who among them should speak for “humanity” and make those choices? Which values should these action planners center? Or do you just assume that your values are universal? The empire managers have already decided how to address the metacrisis and we are living it. That plan is basically “ride it until the wheels fall off, expand the military, and let the population of surplus labor die off”. You are welcome to accept or reject that action plan.
BTRCguy@reddit
Hmmm...maybe the "humanity" referenced in the title of the goddamn book?
Hospicing Modernity: Facing Humanity’s Wrongs and the Implications for Social Activism
Unlike you, I have a clear understanding that my individual rejection of that action plan will not change the probability of it happening any more than if I was pushed off a cliff and decided to reject gravity. And if it can be changed with collective action, that sort of implies that the values involved in that collective action are, if not universal, at least universal enough to bring about change.
So, are you going to go for a three-fer on bloviating, or will you actually come up with a useful reply?
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
It is interesting how my asking you questions about your assumptions made you curse at me in response. It’s even more interesting that you think you can be so aggressive to a stranger on the internet and still demand they respond to you. That’s certainly one way to cope with the uncomfortable feelings.
Mission-Notice7820@reddit
It’s not complicated. We are going extinct and observing it in realtime. We are in collective hospice right now and most of us don’t even really comprehend that. Our bodies know but our minds reject it. Things become easier when we accept how temporary we are and even if we are not going extinct or collapsing we all die anyway and have to make this peace one way or another. Whether it’s along the way or in the final seconds of our conscious existence.
But yeah, here we are.
cool_side_of_pillow@reddit
My body knows it too. I feel it the moment I step outside: the lack of a breeze, the whiff of a distant forest fire, the browning, dying tree canopy, the whirr of our air conditioning units, the overhead drone of a commercial jet, the near total lack of bees, birdsong, and other insects.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
“Collective hospice” implies that there is a collective acknowledgment of the inevitability of the death, as well as collective intention and action towards care and composting. So while maybe our “bodies know” (not sure how much the body knows complex language the same as the mind to be able to draw those conclusions from reading stories on the internet), there is definitely not any kind of collective process happening beyond denial.
Mission-Notice7820@reddit
Denial is part of the process, a really fundamental part. If not, the core part of the human experience. It is in our nature to deny. We are biologically wired to expand until stopped.
RemiChloe@reddit
This is quite fascinating, thank you for putting in this effort. I can't say that I'll have the fortitude to read it, but who knows?
nommabelle@reddit
I'm in the same boat. I'd love to read it, but the last book I bought has sat unread for 2 years. :(
cool_side_of_pillow@reddit
I too have purchased a few climate and grief related books but they are hard to sit through.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
There is an audio version available and some of the exercises the author uses in the book can be found at decolonialfutures.net
hoserman16@reddit
Life changing, I'm on my third read and I started a book club for it.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
That’s so great! I know I’m going to be reading it several more times and sharing it with people. For those who it resonates, it’s really powerful.
Knatp@reddit
Kobo has the audio book for $70aud, it's a bit much
Knatp@reddit
I have it now, it's free on Spotify 😀
RadiantRole266@reddit
Check out the Libby app if you’re in the US. Libraries use it to offer audiobook downloads for free. You have to wait to borrow sometimes because they have a limited number of copies but I just downloaded this book from my library no problem.
fauxciologist@reddit (OP)
That is a lot, which is why I only gave the Audible link (fuck Amazon but they always have free month deals). I should have mentioned that some libraries have the audiobook. My friend just got it that way in Philly. Worth checking. Also there are a ton of YouTube video interviews with her where she lays out a lot of her ideas.
hiddendrugs@reddit
been recommending this one to my ppl lately
ComprehensiveBid6290@reddit
https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/125-vanessa-andreotti
Author on this podcast
StatementBot@reddit
The following submission statement was provided by /u/fauxciologist:
Short essay I wrote reflecting on the book Hospicing Modernity by Vanessa Andreotti (I see I mixed up her name in the OP). This book is collapse-related in that it is critiquing modernity and inviting the reader to observe it as dying - modernity could be understood as the metacrisis or polycrisis - so as to shift our focus from preventing the inevitable collapses that we will witness in our lifetime, towards thinking about how we can become aware of our unconscious colonial baggage and be good ancestors to a better future.
Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/1eur7cq/my_new_cope_hospicing_modernity/lim8r6u/