Page 1 - Nebraska Report Nov Dec 2020
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Nebraska Report




                                                            There is no Peace without Justice
              Nebraskans for Peace                   NOVEMBER / DECEMBER 2020    VOLUME 48, NO. 6







                 In This Season of Frenzied Overconsumption


          Resolve To Live More Simply





                                         ( so others can simply live )


         If you’re fortunate enough to be   what’s ‘old’ or out of fashion. This   economy has had a further dampening
         ‘middle class’, you’ve been able to hop   consumer drive is so ingrained in our   effect on our consumer spending, with
         in the car whenever you want, eat what-  psyches, it’s now reflex. We don’t give   supply shortages and price increases on
         ever you’re hungry for, go shopping,   it—or its impact on the ecosystem—a   everything from toiletries to groceries
         spend money on recreation, and maybe   second thought.               (particularly meat).
         even fly somewhere for a holiday.     But with the coronavirus and the   Like our “Greatest Generation”
             Consumption has become such an   climate crisis, we have no choice but to   great-grandparents during the Depres-
         enthroned part of our American way of   start rethinking the way we live.   sion and World War II, middle-class
         life we’ve equated it with ‘freedom’. So   By limiting our mobility, sheltering  Americans now find themselves having
         long as we’ve got the money to pay for   at home and social distancing have not   to make do with a lower level of con-
         it, we’re free to move around at will,   only reduced transmission of the CO-  sumption—concentrating on the bare
         eat out, shop till we drop, trade up for   VID-19 pandemic—they’ve simultane-  necessities needed to live, and not a
         a nicer car, a nicer home (in a ‘nicer’   ously reduced our ability to go out and   lot more. Instead of being a temporary
         neighborhood), and then ‘throw away’   consume. The lockdown on the global   state of affairs, however, this retrench-
                                                                              ment is the wave of the future. The pre-
                                                                              vailing threat of pandemic and climate
                                                                              disruption ensures that ‘doing with less’
             inside:                                                          will be the ‘new normal’ from now
                                                                              on… And ‘Living Simply’ our only vi-
                                                                              able lifestyle option.
                                                                                 And, it turns out, cutting our
             A Holiday Appeal to Our       What’s HOT in Global Warming?   p. 8  consumption won’t kill us. Half of the
               Supporters          p. 4
                                           Racism Is a Problem                world already lives on less than half of
             What Is “Responsible            Only Whites Can Solve   p. 10    what we do, so we know it can be done.
               Investing”?         p. 6                                       But making these necessary cuts—both
                                           Keeping Up with COVID-19   p. 12   for own health and the planet’s—will
             FRATELLI TUTTI:                                                  require a permanent cultural shift in our
               TO ALL MY BROTHERS          HARD TRUTH by Sally Herrin   p. 16  perspectives and attitudes.
               AND SISTERS         p. 7
                                                                                              continued on page 2

         Nebraskans for Peace’s state office in Lincoln is located on land that formerly belonged to the Otoe Tribe.
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