Although Tim Winton is a wonderful writer and environmental activist, the horrific dystopian future of climate-charred cities and landscapes full of dirty inhabitants as described in his latest book Juice, reviewed by Tori Bail (Echo, November 27) is ridiculous. Unlike the perceived future in beloved Mad Max-type films of heroes surviving on cans of spam and baked beans in a hellish landscape, our rapidly-approaching reality will be of a beautifully clean world of magnificent vegetation, clean air and water – and the inhabitants will be living the healthiest of lives. North-eastern NSW and south-eastern Queensland will be particularly salubrious due to the efforts of all of our high-rise developers and our region will have reached its ultimate potential with vibrant communities enjoying their exciting lives.
The problem with the idea of a dystopian future is that reality does not operate like that, a slow decline into ever-poorer health and depression. Whether it is an individual, a business or a community, adverse conditions always cause a sudden collapse once vital tipping points are encountered. Individuals and businesses collapse more rapidly, communities are more resilient – though utterly dependent on stable and sustainable resources.
With a rapidly-heating world particularly affecting food security, ruled by corporations and politicians fighting for greater power, there can only be one possible future. Utterly dependent on foreign resources in an ever-more chaotic and conflicted world as populations increase, millions starve or attempt to flee climate realities – any of the numerous tipping points, be they political or natural, can cause a domino effect resulting in sudden collapse. Incomprehensible for most people that live in a delusional world, we are so overspecialised and dependent on cheap, easily-accessible resources only available because of their non-sustainability, that the sudden collapse is inevitable, no matter how optimistic we are. Tim Winton’s world without utes will also be a world without food or energy and his dystopian future will rapidly pass.
Some people may survive – those adapted to tropical ecosystems, though they will no longer have an impact on the world’s ecology. Plants and animals, particularly those that we regard as weeds and pests, will quickly replace us, recycling our pollutants, cleaning the air, sea and land. The towers of north-eastern NSW and south-eastern Queensland will support vast numbers of flying foxes, fruit pigeons and other birds feasting on the fruits of the strangling fig forests encrusting them while saltwater crocodiles will enjoy the tropical mangrove forests at their base. Humanity’s only possible legacy will be a thin greasy line in the sedimentary rocks, indicating a species that was exterminated by its hatred of nature and of its neighbours. People who can accept genocide in Palestine for the white persons’ narcissistic and delusional supremacy of their ideals of a ‘greater good’, are people who can only experience a short and ugly future.
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. 
