Talking with relatives about societal collapse

I’d just spent the last few minutes demolishing the fanaticism of the belief that technology will fix all the problems in the world. As we were coming to the end of our conversation, Daniel Pinchbeck asked me what I could say that’s positive about my conclusion that we have entered an era of societal collapse. I was sitting in my father’s living room, having returned due to him passing away just a few days earlier. I suddenly realised how grateful I am for how my father and I became closer to each other in the last few years. Probably one reason is how I changed since I felt the grief of what is happening in the world, as well as the potential proximity of death for both myself and everyone I know. I hadn’t talked a lot with Dad about my findings on the environmental predicament or the implications for society. But it had come up, and he had been more attentive to the news on climate change as a result. Perhaps that helped him to be more open and appreciative himself. I didn’t ask. But something changed for us over the last few years. That feels like a very personal and unexpected benefit from anticipating societal collapse. It’s an example of what I call ‘breaking together’ not apart. We won’t all react that way, but it’s a real possibility for many of us. Talking about that seems far more true to me than the elaborate ideas some people have about the emergence of an ecological civilisation or a collective higher consciousness after a collapse. I’d happily swap such stories of brighter tomorrows for some extra kindness between more of us today. Especially as we see such appalling and unnecessary violence around the world right now. 

My conversation with Daniel reminded me of what I wrote in the introduction of my book about my stumbling efforts at chatting about societal collapse risk, readiness and response with my parents. In case that is a challenge you are also grappling with, I felt like sharing some of that experience. Therefore, below is an excerpt from my book where I write about it, and then some simple advice on how to approach talking with relatives, and others, about this topic. My chat with Daniel is available here, and a slightly odd transcript (as it didn’t pick up on sarcasm) is here. 

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Excerpt from the Introduction of Breaking Together: 

“Working on this topic over the last few years has sometimes numbed me to the pain of it. Looking back at my notes from when I was first becoming aware of the situation, I was reminded of the shock and confusion I felt. One issue I struggled with was who to tell about my new awareness. For instance, should I tell my parents in their mid-70s all of what I thought I knew? As my work started becoming more well-known on this topic, and Extinction Rebellion brought similar concerns onto our TV screens in April 2019, we began to have conversations about how bad the situation might become. I drafted them a letter, which included the following.[i]

“I’ve been telling people not to take my word for it. I wouldn’t. But I don’t expect you to read all the ins and outs of the science on climate and the scholarship on collapse risk. To help you understand how this is not just a marginal view, I could tell you about the heads of global consulting firms, former heads of UN agencies, senior folks in the EU, amongst hundreds of others who have been getting in touch, privately, agreeing with my conclusions. But rather than that, we can simply recall the strangeness of ice creams and sunbathing in the UK during the February just gone. The weather has already changed and will continue to do so in ways that destabilise both wild nature and agriculture.

There is crying to come. There is dismay. There is despair. There is anger. But then, after that, it’s worth remembering that we aren’t in imminent danger. There is no need for a panicked response. We have some years ahead of us. But that doesn’t mean we can get out of this. I think we won’t. By that I mean we are likely to experience exorbitant prices, shortages of necessities, reactionary and authoritarian politics, bouts of civil unrest and international wars that will result from such stresses.

Although anger and blame are natural, they can be means of avoiding reconciliation with one’s own life, regrets, hurts, limitations and death. That is something we can all prioritise doing now, rather than leaving it to our death beds. We can also begin to prepare and to try to make things less bad.

The first thing I think you could consider is to plan for living in a situation where food is so expensive you end up needing government rations or selling things to buy food. In that context, growing more of your own food is helpful. But that’s not easy at any meaningful scale, especially when getting older. I think communal living is therefore helpful, so you can share the costs of heat, light and food and work together on growing more. But I know the idea of the major change in lifestyle, that such a move would involve, seems an unattractive choice if it’s only to protect oneself against a future crisis with an unknown arrival date.

The second thing to consider is how that kind of ‘prepping’ is unlikely to work, especially if the situation is bad enough to be affecting everyone. Hungry neighbours aren’t people we want to ignore, nor would we have the choice to ignore them. So, the urgent need is to find ways of living calmly with this awareness of unfolding disruption, breakdown and ultimate collapse. One of the biggest fears is of a painful or fearful death. I wonder whether this means we might all look for obtaining some drugs that relieve pain, like morphine. However, I don’t know about how long they last and what the laws are. I also hope that is not something to have to act on that soon. 

The third thing is probably the most important. It is to find other people who are talking about it. I am setting up a network to connect people who have this awareness and want to explore together what it means for their lives. Some of them are getting involved in activism to try and get a shift in government policies on both slowing and preparing for these disruptions. Without talking to people, I believe we will be bulldozed back into denial by a media that tells us to be positive, hopeful and to carry on shopping and complying.

Dad, when we last discussed this topic, you said I should give people some hope. I have thought about this and believe that hope is acting as an escape from reality. For most people it involves wishing that something is not so. I am discovering I don’t need hope. Instead of hope, I have a sense of what is important to life, whatever may come. Which, for me, is mainly about truth, love and courage. I think hope can sometimes be a lie to postpone letting reality change us. Instead, I know many of us will do good stuff amidst all the bad.” 

I did not send the letter. Looking back at it now, my recollection is that I didn’t want to suggest ideas for how to respond which are not easily accessible to them. That could mean they just felt bad and then pushed it all away from conscious awareness. It was for the same reasons I declined appearing on TV during the ‘international rebellion’ in 2019. I didn’t want to lie about my view of the situation but didn’t want people who were living alone watching TV suddenly to learn they are vulnerable, without having ways to talk about it, find support and explore their options for how to respond.

Rather than sending that letter to my parents, I recall deciding to be more connected to all my family by setting up our first WhatsApp group, ironically embracing technology due to a sense of the coming loss of such capabilities. Fast forward to 2023, times certainly changed. As people have already experienced massive disruption, the vulnerability of societies is on everyone’s mind. In addition, as I witnessed the way people have been lied to by governments, commentators and conspiracists to manipulate their emotions, views and behaviours, I felt a call to share my analysis more fully with those who would listen.”

That text is taken from the introduction of Breaking Together, which you can listen to for free here. Since writing that unsent letter, I have learned far more about talking with people, including relatives, about this difficult subject. 

• First, don’t try to convince anyone quickly, but explain what you have concluded, how you are changing your life, and recommend that they find significant time in their own life to explore this topic well enough for themselves to become confident in their own understanding. In many cases that means busy people will need to engineer time into their lives for reading into this topic, and to find open-minded people to discuss it with. 
• Second, explain that if they begin to conclude something similar to you, then it would be normal for a lot of difficult emotions to arise, including grief, fear and confusion, and that it can help to know that many people have found a new way of feeling and living on the other side of any despair. 
• Third, if they are concerned about, or experiencing, any intense moments of panic, or periods of depression, reassure them that for most of us, any societal collapse is not likely to be an immediate and total event, so we are not in any imminent danger. Instead, we have some time to assess, decide and change. 
• Fourth, recommend that they don’t rush into actions, which might be to quell difficult emotions, and instead try to remain curious about what is most important to them, and be open to talking to people who have reached similar conclusions, to explore options for living differently in future. 
• Fifth, during that exploration, know that there are many ways of acting on this knowledge, which might involve changing job, becoming an activist, becoming a community organiser, moving location, prioritising one’s spiritual path, or making amends with some people, and suchlike. There is no one right path, but there are a lot of people to learn from who have been living with collapse acceptance. 

A recording of me reading some of my book to Dad in hospice is here. After his terminal diagnosis, I wrote a song for Dad, called “A Stoic Love”. On this eve of ‘All Souls Day’, when we remember and celebrate the lives of our deceased relatives, it is as good a moment as any to share the song more widely (below). Big thanks to Papillon for the piano accompaniment!

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[i] I have removed some of the personal content. Looking back, I realise this was a rather formal letter, indicating I was considering trying to communicate in an unusually serious way. 

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