COVID-19 Pandemic: An Opportunity to Press the Reset Button on Capitalism?

Summary

If ever there were a golden opportunity for humankind to press the proverbial reset button regarding the unsustainable way in which we live, it is now, in the midst of the global coronavirus crisis. The pandemic has brought economies worldwide to a virtual standstill and, in the process, given us clear skies and a glimpse of what the planet would be like without our species. And, regrettably, it appears — from numerous videos and news reports — that the world and its (other) creatures would be better off without us. Just this morning someone sent me a picture of a group of cats, in which one stood on its hind legs and told the rest: “They were called ‘people’ and they walked like this!”

That just about says it all. What a sorry state of affairs to have to admit that the human species’ short-sightedness, greed, and intent on amassing heaps of money, even if it means it is at the cost of the very condition of our continued existence — nature — have brought us to the brink of societal collapse. Many scientists — like this one — have stressed that it is humans’ “intrusion in nature” that has generated the transfer of the novel coronavirus to our species, and that — unless humans backed off — it would happen again.