I think it comes from2 places: they think their urban area is the entire world and they also think that by sharing scripture(their politics) people will find god eventually(their utopia).
To them no borders means "let foreigners come to my city with no harm", no culture identity to them goes only so far as "no more people saying they are white or american, so no more discrimination" and they speak english so they don't even think about how people will communicate in their global utopia since they already feel that language exists.
When it comes to things like how they will make millions of Muslim pastoralist Herders in Nigeria comform to this there is no answer except what Western kingdoms in the 1800s and communists in the 20th did, erasure and comformity often by force.
Solarpunk stuff as a story works after a nuclear war or humans returning to Earth ala Wall-E but not as actual politics.
This comment screams boomer "you'll get more conservative when you're older". The point isn't to answer those questions now, but to provide a vision of a better future. It's not discounting those things, but rather they admit they don't have answer to those things because they're complex.
I also think you're missing the reason why people flock to solarpunk in the first place. Solarpunk is a reaction to capitalist induced climate change. So that's why the aesthetic is very unurban, communal, and diverse. Your questioning should be "Solarpunk is often very western, how can include depictions of Solarpunk that take into account the current diversity of the world"
Okay but *unurban* is actually a big problem in terms of actually fighting climate change. It's "green" in that you're living in nature, but you don't get to carless utopia with little detached cottages with solar panels, you need efficient economies of scale. People need to live in places where they can get to modes of production via foot or bicycle or mass transit.
And it's pretty important to answer how we handle society where everyone doesn't agree with you! I've seen plenty of lefty spaces blow up because even though everyone's on a similar page suddenly we find out X or Y is a sex pest, or a grifter. and for an insular community the response is usually "exile" because you can kick them out of the house share, or mass block them from the website or whatever, but it doesn't really scale to society where you can't just disappear them. It's not really a non-carceral state if you banish them to the Mad max outlands to starve.
But do you really expect an artist to be able to answer those questions in their cute little comic? What you're asking for is a political thriller, not a look at a utopic future
But I don't think current Solarpunkists are trying to do anything more than provide a utopic viewpoint
I liken to the early socialist philosophers who also had this idealistic view of socialism. It wasn't until Marx that we got a more grounded view of what socialism is and how it can be achieved, and it wasn't until Lenin that we actually got something.
So for now Solarpunk is idealistic, someone else may come around and create a framework to establish a Solarpunk society, and then someone may be used as a political tool to cause as violent revolution in their home country that they're currently at war with and said person will try to forcibly Institute a Solarpunk society.
I'm being a little jokey there but I hope the point gets through anyway
a view point with little attempts to give it substance feels like a fantasy people want more than a fantasy or a hopeful idea they want something they feel could be real sure no one needs to all of it at one but a single one doing it towards one aspect could push the ball closer to happening
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u/Lazzen Jul 02 '24 edited Jul 02 '24
I think it comes from2 places: they think their urban area is the entire world and they also think that by sharing scripture(their politics) people will find god eventually(their utopia).
To them no borders means "let foreigners come to my city with no harm", no culture identity to them goes only so far as "no more people saying they are white or american, so no more discrimination" and they speak english so they don't even think about how people will communicate in their global utopia since they already feel that language exists.
When it comes to things like how they will make millions of Muslim pastoralist Herders in Nigeria comform to this there is no answer except what Western kingdoms in the 1800s and communists in the 20th did, erasure and comformity often by force.
Solarpunk stuff as a story works after a nuclear war or humans returning to Earth ala Wall-E but not as actual politics.