I don't have the power to compel people to follow my orders. But I've been thinking about it. What would I do if I could? Of course before doing anything I'd try to get the best advice I could, but here's my initial sense of the direction I'd take.
Unfortunately I see only one rational path. Society must be organized to take on this threat in much the same way the US organized to defeat the Nazi's during WWII. Consumption must be constrained. Resources must be devoted producing items that are essential to human survival and also to reversing the damage, just like resources were diverted to armaments during WWII.
So if I were king and you haven't yet taken that trip to Hawaii..well..too late. That kind of crap is done. I have a friend that recently invited me to join him on a cruise. I definitely like the idea, not so much because I want to be on a boat, but because I like being around people that I know. He shared a video that was basically a tour of the boat. Watching these people bouncing in bungee playhouses, sliding through water slides, being entertained with singing and dancing, it really struck me as odd. Depraved in a sense. This mountain of a structure was constructed, gets pushed around in water and must burn crazy amounts of fossil fuel, all to provide a weird distraction to people. If it's King Jon I can tell you that these type of things are at an end.
We must focus our energy on meeting critical needs and reversing the damage we have done. Humans need clean water, food, shelter, medical care, and clothing. We have to maintain the infrastructure that permits these functions and also permits humans to turn the sick planet around.
If it's King Jon the food is going to be food that contributes the least to global warming. That means an end to factory farming. As the human diet shifts away from meat, eggs, and dairy and towards legumes, potatoes, fruits, and vegetables I believe the science shows that this generates an amazing side benefit. The energy needed to treat chronic disease falls dramatically. Heart disease, stroke, diabetes, cancer. Rates of all would plummet. This means less energy needed for health services. The truth is there are foods that actually work better than drugs for things like cholesterol and diabetes and they have no side effects. But they are not the focus of our profit driven health economy. This insanity would end immediately.
The US already has tons of shelter space. Multiple empty homes for every homeless person. The entire building where I work would be emptied. My job is unnecessary. I'm in the auto industry. I've spent the last 2.5 years of my life developing a radio for a luxury vehicle. In King Jon's world everyone working in my building goes home and separately focuses on taking steps that reverse the pending damage. That could mean planting a garden if the weather is suitable. Maybe it means planting trees, teaching others to do it. This is where I'd get the opinion of experts to figure out what individuals can do. There will be some work activities that need to be done. We will need electricity, some infrastructure to transport items as needed (maybe food that can't be grown in some regions efficiently). We need doctors, dentists, surgeons. But I do believe largely we need people to stop working. Stay home, be with your family, meet your neighbors, work together on joint projects. A lot of energy is expended at the workplace and traveling to and from the workplace so as to create crap people don't need. The burning of that energy needs to stop and mental energy needs to be focused on needful activities.
We already have tons of clothing. Mountains of discarded clothes go to donation. So much that the donation houses can't cope with all of it. It gets shipped around the world to make room for new, more fashionable clothing. King Jon stops this cycle. You already have enough, make it work, learn to sew/patch as you go forward.
How am I going to motivate people to support these efforts? What am I going to do with people that refuse to go along? Wouldn't everyone want to be a non-worker as opposed to say a researcher working to reverse the damage or develop renewable energy? There is much more I could say about these matters, but in summary my belief is that humans could resolve these problems and make the planet habitable for future generations. In fact I do believe people would be happier. We would have to extract ourselves from right wing mind control that has us thinking profit for non-working investors should be the point of a healthy economy and meeting everyone's basic needs is impossible without sending the largest share of our earnings to sleeping billionaires. We aren't going to get there right away, but if we don't get there soon I believe massive suffering is coming. As Margaret Thatcher famously said, there is no alternative. We either organize and fix it or we die. I don't see another option.
