To create a deliciously sustainable future we should champion more rooted solarpunk / Alex Holland

Transcript

if we go to the next slide okay so which of these Futures would you rather live in this question gets to the heart of why solar Punk matters is it the best means we have to inspire people to build a desirable future or just Escapist fantasy sci-fi I'm Alex Holland the founder of solar Punk stories and we are trying to inspire the radical change we need by telling thrilling Tales From better futures in our deep dive article what is solar Punk one thing or many

we argue that there isn't just one type of sonar poem there are many shades for today the most important distinction is between two different characteristics of solar clone as it exists right now Fantastical and rooted the more Fantastical shade we can see on the right these are far Futures that tend to have lots of shiny skyscrapers flying cars or even be on other planets they tend to have little or no connection with the world we live in today more rooted shades of soda punk are visions that are based more on augmenting and adaptive world we have

now making a Greener fairer and more delicious to live in and are set not so far in the future as the Fantastic phase we argue that those who want to build the deliciously sustainable future that's possible and desirable within our lifetimes should Champion more rooted shades of solar power there's a number of reasons for this oh slide great so Raymond Louis was one of the 20th Century's greatest designers and salesmen inventing streamlined trains and the coke bottle among a number of other things

he said what makes things cool is Maya which is most advanced yet acceptable it draws on psychological research that if you want to sell the new make it more familiar and if you want to sell the familiar make it new the majority of people that unlikely to buy things that are too alien as the writer and philosopher hadn't he crying out has pointed out images like those on the left are too outlandish and he argues too childish to motivate people to act to make them

happen try not to argue the picture of this building in Singapore on the right is much more likely to win people's political support because because it is desirable and attainable he argues that when people don't root their Visions more closely to today we are letting the power of solar pump be monopolized by those who are authoritarian regimes like Singapore and Saudi another reason to support more rooted shades of solar pond is that they are closer to what makes this genre and movement special as Adam Flynn wrote in the first solapon

Manifesto solar Punk is a future with a human face and dirt behind its ears liking these artworks depicting solar Punk versions of New York and Germany they have more humans in them and they are more humanly messy as hansi Fine Arts has also argued this type of solar pump is less idealistic than utopian and more progressively protopian what I mean by this is is not an attempt at a perfect utopian world which as the 20th century has taught us can lead to nightmarish societies it's a protopian one better than today but not without

problems these protopian Visions allow for a Freer more plural idea of progress and prosperity which is more open to change and debate the other big point in its favor is that it's closer to people who are solar punking the world right now people like Joseph scaritzy the solar Punk VC who is seed investing in projects like the coconut Network which is using blockchain technology to help bring coconut farmers in the Dominican Republic together or improved Collective well-being or the solar punks Club who hosts solar-powered parties that connect solar Punk style Enterprises

Brands and artists for fun times or Grassroots Community food grain schemes like May project Gardens which brings together refugees and local residents in South London where I am based all of these are pre-figuring a solar Punk FIFA now and along with bigger Collective actions are helping us to build a deliciously sustainable future today we cover projects and groups like these in the Solar Punk stories sub stack and Instagram as well as Champion the more rooted shade of solar pumpkin art and fiction

such as our story series solar pump Detectives we're working on launching a dedicated setup on YouTube channel to inspire more people to build a deliciously sustainable world we are looking for aligned Partners investors and collaborators to make that happen if you think that you might be one of them get in touch for our Instagram or the email on our website so which of these Futures will you champion your choice could be the difference between Thriller Punk remaining a fantasy or all of us making it so any questions

[Laughter] is there anybody there [Laughter] I could just I just keep riffing about solar Punk [Laughter] oh I can hear you yeah shouts are really loud

hello basically summarize your main points and and and giving your uh guide or or your vision how to uh Implement what you're envisioned how could you help others to implement your envisioned um let's say dial structure on the yeah like on the world or communities uh so I've got to confess I'm not an expert on um

on a lot of web 3 stuff I'm pretty I'm pretty new to this and I am actually going to write a solar Punk's guide to web3 drawing on Experts from across the across the Spectrum so to get in touch if you want to be consulted to that article but if I can understand your question is like how do we make this vision of these deliciously sustainable green future Worlds how do we get from here to there right is that is that what you're saying how do we Implement on the field yeah okay yeah reality so I think well it's having the vision

and believing it can happen and it's real is so important because they can motivate you you have the desire but then making it happen I think there's lots of different levels that we can make the change so one that's really important the people don't talk about a lot is engaging politically so I think you know when you need to like Lobby uh like local political parties elective Representatives government and say you know this is the type of future that we want to see this is a movement that's yeah but then in terms of the Practical levels there's if you go on our sub stack

we cover lots of things that are practical like for example a shorter working week so there's a campaign right now in Britain to go to a 28 hour work a week but then we want to move beyond that to eventually like a 21-hour working week but they've been piloting that so that that's something that's happening right now today lots of companies already trialling a four-day working week with no loss of pay and lobbying the government and the labor party in Britain has said actually that now they're considering implementing that if they get into government next time and that is something that even five years ago people would have gone that's crazy that can't happen and then I guess also just on an

individual level if you can participate in a small way like in a local community group you know like a Grassroots food growing for something like that you know something that's that's you know in a very tangible way is building sustainability and solar Punk for you that's uh that's another way but I think you've got to go at the level that's right for you but but the main thing is The More We join together the more effective will be okay thank you more questions anyone um I have a question

um how do you see the synthesis with the kind of lunar Punk movement what's your read on that at the moment I mean I'm curious so as far as I understand Luna Punk because it's even newer than solar Punk um and it depends especially I mean some people are like it's just solo Punk at night time but there are other people who I think and there's a person who's written uh articles and done a really amazing YouTube video who's very active in web 3D and from her perspective

the solar Punk is well for lunar Plum for her is like it has more mystical and more Magical elements to it as Supernatural elements so from my perspective that's not as effective at motivating people to actually build it to happen because if you've got like witches and spells and things like that um in fact so that's so that's one thing that distinguishes lunar punch from Philippine but the other thing I think that the lady who actually is in the web free community who made the video her point is more about she Associates people in web 3 who identifies solar Palm as being like

really pro-transparency and transparency is always good no matter what the conditions and for her like the lunar Plum thing is that you need some secrecy and you don't want to be transparent all the time so for example you're dealing with authoritarian regimes or something like that so I think but but to be honest Luna bunk is so new I I haven't even read any unified stories or fiction so I can't even really it's hard to say it's such a it's such a new genre even competitive Punk yeah yeah it's a real shimmy you couldn't have been here this week because I feel like

it's been a real synthesis moment of the so we had a privacy meeting on Monday which was a very lunapunk themed thing and there's been quite a lot of synthesis here Rachel Rose O'Leary I think you're referring to the and the there's a video called dystopian dreams um made by wrecked news and it's I highly advise everyone to watch it it's brilliant um anyone else want to ask a question I think we've got one minute 30 seconds left um well thank you very much for dialing in give us your time uh today um really great to have the the kind of like the law of all this stuff expanded on

um I think it's really important cultural stuff that we need to which is very much the substrate of what we're trying to do here so thanks so much for your time at Round of Applause everyone cheers mate thank you thank you foreign [Music]