Robin Harrison, Binna Burra
It’s been obvious for some time that the primary concern for our species is whether or not we will have a future. It’s equally obvious that our do or die transition to a sustainable future has been meeting with massive opposition from the wealthy and influential with their vested interest in the status quo and they have clearly been running the finest political and legal systems money can buy. However, their attempts at obstruction are becoming particularly desperate if the whole Trump/QAnon phenomenon is anything to go by, because, right now, the richest man in the world thinks the primary concern for our species is whether or not we will have a future. What’s more, he’s demonstrating a truth that the status quo fears above all else. The pursuit of sustainability is highly profitable because it makes far better economic sense. They will probably get even more desperate when this gambit fails, as it inevitably will.
The wealthy and influential have always run everything and probably always will, but maybe we’re beginning to see the transition of the one per cent. Will the economic superiority of sustainability become the wealth and influence that runs everything? If so, that would be a monumental tipping point in our transition to a sustainable future. The younger generations of some of the wealthiest families on the planet, eg Rothschilds, Rockefellers, and Windsors, are sharing that primary concern for our future. They are, after all, part of our species and with any luck they’re learning from Elon’s clear example; the more sustainable it is the better economic sense it makes. Of course it helps that he’s a genius but, historically, genius finds the way that can then be followed by the rest of us. I suspect the healthy environment and healthy society needed for a sustainable future are likely to be infinitely more prosperous than anything we’ve ever done so far.
If our transition to a sustainable future becomes driven by its inherent economic superiority, as we’re beginning to see in the energy transition, then maybe we have a chance of getting there.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
