Solarpunk

A fixation on system change alone opens the door to a kind of cynical self-absolution that divorces personal commitment from political belief. This is its own kind of false consciousness, one that threatens to create a cheapened climate politics incommensurate with this urgent moment.

[...]

Because here’s the thing: When you choose to eat less meat or take the bus instead of driving or have fewer children, you are making a statement that your actions matter, that it’s not too late to avert climate catastrophe, that you have power. To take a measure of personal responsibility for climate change doesn’t have to distract from your political activism—if anything, it amplifies it.

Wondering if anyone’s been to solar punk summit. If you have, what was your experience ? Do you think it’s worth the money to attend?

Liebe Solarpunks aus DACH (Deutschland, Österreich, Schweiz),

ich überlege gerade, ob es sinnvoll sein könnte, hier auf Lemmy eine deutschsprachige Solarpunk Community einzurichten.

Mögliche Themen und Ziele:

• deutschsprachige Ressourcen austauschen
• auf Veranstaltungen aufmerksam machen
• evtl. lokale Communities finden/gründen
• Menschen erreichen, die nicht supersicher im Englischen sind
• die Bewegung in DACH größer und bekannter machen.

Hättet ihr Lust auf sowas?

With every solution, and even in the title of this newsletter itself, I emphasize the number one thing individuals can do that most of us are still not doing: talk about it! Use your voice to explain why climate change matters and to advocate for climate action.

A new Tailor joins a community which has lacked one for years. In a world of distributed manufacturing tailors are no longer just artisans, but educators, material and sustainability experts, fashion designers and translators of cultures, making sure no garment offends others when traveling. Seeing that they’re much less traditional than their predecessor, will they be accepted by the community? Which bold statement surprised everybody?

Recorded by Tomasino, with the CC-BY-SA 4.0 art from The Lemonaut!

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/27579423

Communities are clustered by common users. I am also part of jlai.lu, a french-speaking instance, that is pretty isolated, while slrpnk.net is very spread out. I find it an interesting view.

This is my first try at creating a map of lemmy. I based it on the overlap of commentors that visited certain communities.

I only used communities that were on the top 35 active instances for the past month and limited the comments to go back to a maximum of August 1 2024 (sometimes shorter if I got an invalid response.)

I scaled it so it was based on percentage of comments made by a commentor in that community.

Here is the code for the crawler and data that was used to make the map:

https://codeberg.org/danterious/Lemmy_map

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/13156086

Parable of the Sower is such a good book.

First, it's interesting that it starts right about now. The book starts in mid-2024, and even mentions that its an election year. That was a fascinating experience to read a scifi book in the moment in time in which it is set. It still feels like it takes place about 20 years in the future. It was written 31 years ago, so politically things have seemed to move as many steps forward as backward. It seems like a lot of things have not gotten better and worse than when Butler wrote it, so in some sense I feel like I'm looking at it as a near future in the same way as when it was written a generation ago. I guess I'm glad things didn't go as badly as in the story, but it's rough that the looming threat from 30 years ago feels the same distance away now as then.

Second, it's painful to read. Although the events described in the book haven't happened in the book's setting -- California -- the social collapse and migrations described have happened in Honduras, Gaza, Yemen, and certainly others I'm not aware of. It was really hard to read that and know that it was already real somewhere.

Third, as a solarpunk novel -- and really as general fiction -- it feels like it should be part of a high school curriculum. It's really well written and an engrossing read. Since publishing Fully Automated, I often relate solarpunk stories to that game. What might I have added to the game if I'd read this before? How well does it naturally fit? One thing that struck me is that her emerging in-world faith -- Earthseed -- reminds me quite a bit of elements of Seekerism, a new faith tradition in Fully Automated. I wish I'd known and included direct references to Earthseed, but it's nice when the game has alignment with great works that I wasn't directly familiar with.

Has anyone else read this? What do you folks think?

Für die deutschsprachigen Solarpunks unter euch: Ich hab letzten Monat meinen Blog gelauncht, auf dem ich in Zukunft regelmäßig Romane besprechen sowie allgemeinere Gedanken zu Solarpunk als Bewegung teilen werde.

Vielleicht habt ihr ja Lust, reinzugucken!

Liebe Grüße, Lex

☀️👉🏼Morgen Abend, 19:30 Uhr in der #VHS #Berlin #Mitte - nach diesem Vortrag bist du im Bilde, wie du deinen eigenen Strom schnell, einfach und ohne Bürokratie produzierst und damit Stromkosten senken und ihn direkt in das eigene Haus oder die Mietwohnung einspeisen kannst! ✅ Dit Janze für 0️⃣ Euro ... quasi für umme und noch vom Profi! 🤗 https://www.vhsit.berlin.de/VHSKURSE/BusinessPages/CourseDetail.aspx?id=723833 #balkonsolar #Energiewende #balkonkraftwerk @energiezukunft @solarpunk @DeutscherBildungsserver

Hey folks, appologies if this has been asked before (although surprisingly I couldn't find a similar post) - what solarpunk book, film, game, tv, etc recommendations does every have?

I'm only just discovering the genre, looking for some good starting points!

I’m designing a solarpunk city for my next novel and am exploring my options for streetlights. On the one hand, light pollution harms wildlife and humans. It also uses energy. On the other, well-lit streets increase the perception of safety. This is not to say good lighting prevents crime. If anything, it facilitates it. Further, you would expect crime to be less in a solarpunk city that prioritizes mutual aid, minimizes wealth disparity, and fights toxic masculinity. However, we should not discount the feeling of danger from darkness.

Personally, I’m male presenting, actively seek out dangerous situations, and have a high tolerance for horror movies. My first inclination is that streetlights should go. That said, once I got caught out at night in the woods. I was immediately terrified. And I had my phone light with me. In short, if a city is not lit, I suspect few people would venture out at night.

1- Mostly Dark-

A city could remove all street lights. People would instead rely on personal lighting: head lamps and flashlights. This would be more efficient and less harmful. Curbs and other critical areas could be marked (not illuminated) by glow-in-the-dark paint or bioluminescent algae or plants. There would be some light from open windows.

2- Lightly Lit-

Streetlights with caps that aim light downward, wavelengths skew into the redder side of the spectrum, and the minimum illumination required to see. Amber light is less harmful. Brighter lights create more shadows. An example of a city using this minimal approach is Canberra, as light pollution would jeopardize local observatories.

3- Cinderella Lighting -

Bright streetlights switch off at a specific time, such as midnight. This would allow people to enjoy some nighttime hours, while leaving others to more natural darkness. This is the scenario I used in my previous solarpunk novels.

Do let me know your preference and awesome ideas.