Critical Response
The Anthropocene is a new geological time frame that humans have caused due to their use of carbon and disregard for resources that are readily available. The issue is more significant than just recycling and driving less; our overconsumption and waste directly impacts earth. Although many people and scientist believe that the introduction of fire to humans has brought us to this geological time frame, we are going to explore Malm’s idea that capitalism started the trek down the dangerous path we are on today.
In Andreas Malms “The Anthropocene Myth,” the idea that Capitalism has made the Anthropocene is deciphered. Many people believe the myth that this new geological time frame became possible because of our early ancestor’s control of fire. Although this may be a simple reason why our world has become the way it is today, Malm rejects this opinion and believes that it is due to capitalism. He states that “Indians had the basic knowledge of how to dig, burn, and generate heat from coal. And yet they cared nothing for the fuel”. When thinking logically, this statement holds as most of the carbon-emitting technology has been created by mainly white males. Malm makes many bold statements that leave you to rethink your ideas about the Anthropocene. Some statements he makes include: the 1% is almost more responsible for the Anthropocene than those of the 99 %, only people who are intelligent believe that the capitalists have the people’s interests in mind, and that saying everyone is to blame; then no one is to blame. As all of this is stated, there are many well-paced opinions throughout the pages. Some focus more on capitalism, and others focus more on the 1% that is never accounted for during climate change. As Malm is concluding his essay, he evokes the idea that “without antagonism, there can never be any change in human societies.” This brings the reader to think about his hostility towards the capitalist governments that run our current era.
In my opinion, Malm did an excellent job of explaining and giving examples of why his idea of capitalism causing the Anthropocene was correct. However, I feel as though his use of sarcasm was not needed. This is not the smartest literary device to use because readers can easily confuse what he’s saying as his real opinion when he is just making fun of the other author’s statements. For example, readers can easily confuse him saying that “the ability to manipulate fire was surely a necessary condition for the commencement of large scale fossil fuel combustion in Britain in the early nineteenth century” is his real opinion. However, this isn’t his opinion, although it seems like that’s the point he’s trying to get across. If you read carefully, you can follow, but if you’re not paying attention, then it is easy to get mixed up.
Another thing that I feel he could improve on was how fast he changes his thoughts. If you read the text, you will notice that most of his paragraphs are super short and consist of about two to four sentences. In my opinion, I feel like Malm could have focused more on some of his bigger ideas instead of jumping around so much. This style of writing made it challenging to keep adjusting to the switches in his thoughts and also made it hard to figure out if what he was saying was his statement, or someone else’s. One thing that I really liked about his writing was that it was original. Most of the authors who are writing about climate change blame the Anthropocene on our use of carbon and nothing else, however, he has done a fantastic job of going deeper into the idea and proving that his notion that capitalism was the reason carbon consumption started. Malm states “six simple facts that demonstrate the opposite” of what others are saying. He goes one to provoke the idea that steam engines were “perdupposed, for a start, the institution of wage labour” and that the “British desperately wanted coal out of the ground.” These statements were the two that really stuck out to me throughout the whole essay. I feel that two ideas help give the readers a great perspective on where he’s coming from. If you think about it, the steam engine was one of the fist forms of carbon using transportation and was invented by the British. Without coal, the invention would be pointless, therefore giving the british a consentive to mine for coal. As for Malms conclusion of his essay, I feel like he left giving you something to think about.
Over all, I think that Malm did a really good job at putting a new idea out into the world. He gave me a different perspective on climate change, which is nice because I feel like I am always hearing the same thing from teachers, writers, and scientists. I agree with malms statements on capitalism, but am curious what the grater public think about his perspective. There seems to be so many reasons about why climate change is real, but what opinion is truly the right opinion?
Work cited
Malm, Andreas, “The Anthropocene Myth.” Jacobin, 30 Mar, 2015,https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/03/anthropocene-capitalism-climate-change/